Sad state of affairs? Best to turn the other cheek
An extramarital relationship can end in divorce, but forgiving may be less painful
Could there possibly be a simple explanation for the predicament in which French President François Hollande finds himself ? France’s first lady, Valérie Trierweiler, and Hollande’s alleged mistress, Julie Gayet, are uncannily alike. Same neat nose, same hair, same-shaped eyes, same porcelain complexion. In certain photos, they could be sisters or even the same woman.
During a reception at the Elysée Palace, the shortsighted president might have put his glasses down and wandered over to give Valérie an affectionate squeeze, only to discover that the First Lady was, oops, the Second Lady.
In Paris, this would not have been the grievous faux pas it would be in London or Washington, rather a perfect opportunity for l’amour. Just think how easily Hollande could have averted international humiliation.
Hollande and Trierweiler are themselves guilty of breaking the vital though unwritten Eleventh French Commandment: “Thou shalt not get found out and wreck a family.” He left his longtime common-law wife and mother of his four children, Ségolène Royal, for Trierweiler.
Controversially, French psychologist Maryse Vaillant says cheating on a spouse can sometimes be for the best, so long as the security of the family unit is not endangered. “A lot of men respect, love and admire their wife and she is indispensable, but they feel the need for little flings to fulfil their life as a man.
“They don’t much bother with feelings in affairs; they keep them for their wives. For a lot of men, it is easy to make this separation.”
Vaillant believes women’s radar tells them when their partner is having an affair, but “there’s this unspoken agreement: The husband does everything to respect his wife and make sure she doesn’t find out, and she does everything she cannot to know anything.”
Even that sounds an incredibly French point of view although, intriguingly, Vaillant claims that les femmes are following suit. There is less and less difference between how married men and women behave, she says, a fact borne out in the U.K. by the 2012 Adultery Sur- vey. When it comes to fooling around, it found that British women have an average of 2.3 secret lovers compared to a mere 1.8 for men.
Shocking? I don’t think so; not anymore. The self-righteous 20-something me would have abhorred the French distinction between marriage and sex. Thirty years later, I have seen too many goodenough relationships go to the wall over some infidelity, with all the bitterness and wild regret that comes in its wake.
The other day, a girl sobbed on my shoulder over her parents’ breakup. The divorce was seven years ago, and the girl is now 26. Infidelity hurts like hell, but divorce can cause lifelong devastation.
The Anglo-Saxon marriage model insists on monogamy or bust, and where has it got the U.K.? The highest divorce rate in the European Union.
I know married friends of both sexes who have had secret affairs but re-embraced their families with a feeling of immense gratitude and only a glittering shard of regret. Men, it seems, find it easy to forgive their indiscretions, but harder to forgive their wives. Quelle surprise!
Many moons ago, I was the Other Woman and I can honestly say I am so glad my lover didn’t destroy his family for me, even though I would have crawled over broken glass to be with him. Now I have children of my own, I understand what I couldn’t then.
The late, great John Mortimer, who was a veteran divorce lawyer as well as a writer, once observed: “People will go to endless trouble to divorce one person and then marry someone who is exactly the same, except probably a bit poorer and a bit nastier. I don’t think anybody learns anything.”
Would it be heresy, amid the mockery of Hollande and his identikit First and Second Ladies, to suggest that we could learn something from the French? To err is human; to forgive and forget, not a bad idea.