How Long Should You Wait for an Affair Partner to Leave?
Nobody can tell you when, or whether, an affair partner will leave their marriage, and no study can either: research describes groups, not one person's timing. What you can see is how much of your own week goes into waiting. Written down over several weeks, that share shows a direction, and it is yours to read.
If you typed this question into a search bar, you probably typed it the way it runs through your head: how much longer? At some point this person said something like "I need a bit more time" or "after the summer", and since then your days have bent themselves around that sentence. You keep Saturday free in case something comes up. At dinner with friends, you check your phone under the table.
I cannot tell you from the outside whether to stay or go, and I will not pretend to. A quick word on terms: affair partner, often shortened to AP in online forums, is the person on the other side of an affair, and here it means the one who is married. This article sorts what can honestly be said about the question from what cannot, and it ends with something you can observe yourself while you wait.
Will my affair partner ever leave their marriage?
You have this person's words and their behaviour, and you are the only one who sees both up close. Advice sites still publish percentages for how many people leave and how many stay. I could not trace any of them to a study you could look up, so those numbers stay out of this article.
An announced decision has not happened yet. A sentence becomes a step when a date is attached to it, or when this person's everyday life visibly changes. Even the strongest study below, Labrecque and Whisman (2020), recorded who was separated two years later, not when anyone left. The waiting is the one fact you can verify, and I would rather give you that than a percentage that falls apart when you check it.
Do people actually leave a marriage for an affair partner?
Labrecque and Whisman (2020) followed 1,853 married adults from the General Social Survey, a probability sample of US households. People who reported extramarital sex were significantly more likely to be separated or divorced two years later, and the link held after the researchers accounted for how satisfied people were with their marriage.
Selterman and colleagues (2021) asked 495 US undergraduates and online participants about affairs they had had. When the motive lay in the main relationship, such as anger at a partner or a lack of love, the affair lasted longer and that relationship ended more often. Affairs that grew out of a situation, such as stress or drinking, were shorter and ended the main relationship less often. Both studies describe groups through self-report, while you are waiting on one person whose reasons you cannot see.
Why does waiting for them to decide wear you down?
The first finding comes from Rankin and colleagues (2019), who in three studies followed students awaiting an exam grade and law graduates awaiting bar results. The second is from Wilson and Sweeny (2024): among 248 law graduates, those whose expectations of passing changed more often reported more worry and more negative emotion throughout the wait.
Howell and Sweeny (2025) found that people seek the most information exactly when their worry peaks, and that information is not always helpful. Rereading old messages is one version of it. Those studies looked at waits that end, like exam results, an election or a job offer, and yours has no such end. That this makes it heavier is my reading, not a finding. If the thoughts circle almost all day, limerence may be the more precise word.
Should you give your affair partner a timeline?
I mean that practically. The waiting does not switch off at a certain hour; it runs through the whole day, in the hours you stay reachable and in the meeting where you grab your phone because it buzzed. Kept for several weeks, three notes give you an answer that does not depend on the other person:
- How many hours you kept free or stayed reachable in case something came up.
- Which plans you skipped or postponed because of it.
- What was announced this week, and what actually changed.
If fear or control is part of your situation, a support service or helpline in your country is a better first step than any journal.
What writing changes about the waiting
Guo (2023) pooled 31 randomised controlled studies with 4,012 participants, all testing expressive writing, the method that goes back to Pennebaker and Beall (1986). In people without a clinical diagnosis, writing reduced symptoms of depression, anxiety and stress slightly (Hedges' g = -0.12), and the effect appeared later, at follow-up. With one to three days between sessions, it was stronger than with longer gaps.
If you would rather start smaller, the free Check-in is the place to begin.
Frequently asked questions
How long does it take an affair partner to leave their marriage?
There is no documented average. None of the studies in this article measures the time to a decision, and the figures on advice sites usually have no source you can check. You can track your own side instead: how much of each week goes into waiting.
Do affair partners ever leave their spouse?
Some do; how many is not documented. Labrecque and Whisman (2020) found that marriages end more often after extramarital sex. Whether a relationship with the affair partner followed is something the study did not record.
How do I know if my affair partner is serious about leaving?
From the outside you cannot know for sure, and no checklist can make that judgement for you. You can, however, tell apart what gets announced from what actually changes in everyday life. Written down over several weeks, the difference becomes hard to overlook.
Does journaling help while you wait for someone to decide?
It will not make the decision for you or speed up theirs. The evidence shows a small, delayed effect on stress, anxiety and low mood (Guo 2023). You also see, week by week, how much room the waiting takes. If a blank page feels too open, an unsent letter is an easier way in.
Sources
- Labrecque, L.T. and Whisman, M.A. (2020). Extramarital Sex and Marital Dissolution: Does Identity of the Extramarital Partner Matter? Family Process, 59(3), 1308–1318. doi.org/10.1111/famp.12472 (retrieved 14 October 2026)
- Selterman, D., Garcia, J.R. and Tsapelas, I. (2021). What Do People Do, Say, and Feel When They Have Affairs? Associations between Extradyadic Infidelity Motives with Behavioral, Emotional, and Sexual Outcomes. Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, 47(3), 238–252. doi.org/10.1080/0092623X.2020.1856987 (retrieved 14 October 2026)
- Rankin, K., Sweeny, K. and Xu, S. (2019). Associations between subjective time perception and well-being during stressful waiting periods. Stress and Health, 35(4), 549–559. doi.org/10.1002/smi.2888 (retrieved 14 October 2026)
- Wilson, M. and Sweeny, K. (2024). Volatility in Expectations While Awaiting Important News. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 50(7), 1040–1050. doi.org/10.1177/01461672231158883 (retrieved 14 October 2026)
- Howell, J.L. and Sweeny, K. (2025). Information-management behavior during stressful waiting periods. Emotion, 25(7), 1774–1783. doi.org/10.1037/emo0001529 (retrieved 14 October 2026)
- Guo, L. (2023). The delayed, durable effect of expressive writing on depression, anxiety and stress: A meta-analytic review of studies with long-term follow-ups. British Journal of Clinical Psychology, 62(1), 272–297. doi.org/10.1111/bjc.12408 (retrieved 14 October 2026)
- Pennebaker, J.W. and Beall, S.K. (1986). Confronting a traumatic event: Toward an understanding of inhibition and disease. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 95(3), 274–281. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3745650 (retrieved 14 October 2026)
Simone Pleifer, MSc
Simone Pleifer, MSc, is the founder of Journals by Simone and the creator of the Emotional Clarity Journey system. She holds an MSc in Nutritional Science and has 14 years of experience in pharmaceutical clinical research. Her work bridges scientific rigour and emotional depth for people navigating secret love, situationships, and unspoken feelings. She is currently developing a supplement line to complement the ECJ system.
About Simone