‘GREY’ ZONE: More women over 50 are having affairs

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A growing number of older women are having affairs – and they aren’t apologizing for it.

Gender expert and author Susan Shapiro Barash has studied female infidelity and found that grey divorces and affairs are on the rise.

“Women in their 50s and 60s are actively seeking lovers and engaging in extramarital affairs,” Barash told The Toronto Sun. “Some leave their marriages, some stay.”

Grey divorce is a term that’s become widely used when referring to couples 50 and older who are splitting up.

The instances of divorce after long marriages has increased significantly over the years, but for women, it’s becoming quite the phenomenon.

Barash found in her most recent research on women and infidelity — all of which can be found in her current book A Passion for More— that during the last few years, the women she spoke with were older.

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Since before COVID, and especially during COVID, I kept hearing a very diverse group of women – in terms of age, ethnicity, race, religion, level of education, from sophisticated suburbs and cities to rural areas – talking about these affairs,” she explained.

“It really speaks to female agency and the fight against ageism, in a way, in a culture that is very much about judging women for their age,” Barash said.

“But when we think of grey divorce and the fact that 69% of women of all ages instigate the dissolution of the marriage, then we think, ‘How many women will engage in an affair at some point in their marriage?’”

With so many people choosing not to grow old together, it makes one wonder – what happened?

“We’re raised on these myths: happily ever after, some prince sweeping us off our feet and being provided for,” Barash said.

But we all know fairy tales are only in books and movies.

“A lover is filling whatever void there is in the marriage, and what we’re really talking about is getting what you can’t have and having it be a very different experience,” said Barash, who added, “78% of the women in my studies said that the husband and the lover are complete opposites.”

Sometimes an affair is purely sex-driven, other times it’s about improving self-esteem, and for some, it really does become a love story.

“Those are the toughest of the stories because it’s unexpected, where everything seemed fine until this other person came along.”