Sidney McGill
JOAN GOT pregnant for her high school sweetheart shortly after graduation. Six years later and now with three children she is beginning to wonder if being in a committed relationship with Oniel is all that love was supposed to be.
"What would it be like to be in bed with another man?" she mused. She is now in her late 20s and is a beautiful and appealing woman. There were lots of men out there who looked sexier and had more money than her common-law husband. In fact, she had been having occasional sexual fantasies of a second cousin who had declared how much he loved her from the time she had gone to spend summer holidays in the country. He was now vice-president of a Canadian company, and they corresponded regularly via cell phones.
Oniel, the father of her three children, felt tired of the monotony too. He craved more from his relationship with Joan. He was more outgoing and had short-lived secret, sexual relationships. He quickly warmed up to any decent-looking woman who took a second look at him. Oniel had an active sweet tooth and gravitated to other women as if they were freshly-baked plantain tarts. One-night stands that lasted no more than two to three months were his cravings.
In general, most couples prefer a definition of infidelity that is limited to heterosexual, extramarital sexual intercourse while emotional attachments that may lead to sexual intercourse are often ignored. Even the scientific community, over the last three decades, cannot agree on a single definition of infidelity. I have adopted a broad definition to include more types of sexual involvement in the hope of levelling the playing field.
DEFINITION
"Infidelity is a sexual and/or emotional act engaged in by one person within a committed relationship, where such an act occurs outside of the primary relationship and constitutes a breach of trust and/or violation of agreed-upon norms (overt and covert) by one or both individuals in that relationship in relation to romantic/emotional or sexual exclusivity" according to Blow & Hartnett's (2005).
This broad definition leaves little room for denial of sexual unfaithfulness in Jamaica. A.P. Thompson in his 1983 review of extramarital sex, offered a three-part system of describing infidelity: (a) Is the 'committed' relationship sanctioned by both partners? (b) What type of 'committed' relationship was it when the behaviour occurred? (that is, was the behaviour extramarital, extra-cohabiting, and so on?) and (c) What is the type of behaviour? (sexual intercourse, friendship, number of partners, and so one).
CRUSHING THE STEREOTYPE
Now let's use the tart as the sexual object to improve our understanding of infidelity. Oniel could spend a good deal of his time just viewing the tarts and occupying his mind with them by thinking and talking about the texture, flavour and scent of the pink delight inside and not eat them. He could eat the tarts occasionally or become so addicted to them that he could not function without them.
Infidelity means much more than having heterosexual sex outside of marriage. It means having excessive work hours, excessive cell phone conversations with persons you are attracted to, excessive Internet use that may or may not include viewing pornography. It means having homosexual sex outside the committed relationship as well.
Dr. Sidney McGill is a marriage and family therapist and executive director, Family Counselling Centre of Jamaica, St. Ann; email: yourhealth@gleanerjm.com.
