According to the Office of National Statistics, of all the marriages annulled in 2005 in the UK, about 40% had cited adultery. In a staggering 75% of the cases, it was the man who strayed from the conjugal bed.



But then, extramarital affairs have been hiking among women too. On the other hand, the British Attitudes Survey reveals men have also learnt to be more forthcoming with 70% preferring to confess their affair to their wives. Remarriage rates have risen, and so have second divorces. Cohabitation has grown in popularity and has a higher divorce rate than marriage. Most couples surveyed agreed that extramarital affairs brought a traumatic phase for them, complicating it further when they had children.

Why Do They Happen?

Why do extramarital affairs happen? The reasons are too many to be averaged, but here are some common ones.

• Midlife Crisis: This is the most common cause of extramarital affairs ? the same old story of a middle-aged male falling for a younger female. These affairs are also dishearteningly transient, because the woman is only a gateway to another life that these men want to move to. But the second youth does not happen in most cases, leaving them broken and suddenly much older.



• Late Marriage: Does this sound an unlikely cause? But most people in the UK do not consider marriage at all till they are about 32. Yes, the maturity level is much higher by then, but so are personal rigidities. It is not easy to strike the correct balance of compatibility. In fact, many people are making better second marriages after this.



• Daily Schedule: There is the empty nest syndrome that is becoming common all over the world. Women who pride themselves as home-makers keep balancing the tough acts of a successful career and brining up children, but become very lonely after the children grow up and move away. Therefore, they enter into a new relation to start a fresh chapter of life, or just out of boredom with the daily schedule.



• Love: Well, it still happens. At the wrong time, with the wrong person and at the wrong place, you may find yourself going weak in the knees again, and not being able to stop the sheer biological demands of the strongest human emotion identified so far.



• Greater Mobility: The world is getting smaller and rounder. Jobs demand a degree of globe-trotting in all professions beyond a certain point of seniority. Affairs can happen anywhere or while travelling.



• The Internet: Chat rooms, blogs and social networks have been blamed by newspapers and cheated partners, but they do continue to flourish. And people continue to dig up old flames on them to start a fire.



• Laptops and Mobile Phones: Lovers can keep in touch more easily and with greater privacy now. So an affair gets a lot of time to flourish in peace before getting discovered.



• Changed Social Structure: Divorce and affairs are accepted everywhere and familial ties are more loose.

Why Do Only a Few Marriages Survive?

But a few marriages do survive. Most fall apart because their foundation was not strong enough, and the partners had drifted apart anyhow. Many couples file amicable divorces to hide an affair and also validate the fact that their union had disintegrated prior to that.

Why Infidelity Cannot be Forgiven

Why is it so hard to forgive infidelity? Not just marriages, but cohabitations, same-sex relations and relations in all EU nations show that extramarital affairs are not tolerated. Religions forbid it, cultures brand it. This is because an affair goes against the basic tenet of marriage ? which is a commitment between two people to exclusively stick together.

What to Do When it Happens

Here are a few tips to tackle an affair.

• Control your anger. Try talking instead of shouting; it's saner and more wanted.



• Was something wrong with your marriage and your approach to it? This may be a bad time, but you have to face the mirror too.



• Ask your partner to take his or her time and think it over before you go for a divorce.