WATCH: This woman claims she had an affair with a chimpanzee
Adie Timmermans has formed an unbreakable bond with one of the captive animals.
While a dog might be a man or woman's best friend, we're not quite sure where on the friendship scale a chimpanzee might rank.
According to Adie Timmermans, a chimp might be one of the greatest friends you could ever have.
Although her bond with a local chimp might also be classified as more than just a friendship.
Chita is a 38-year-old chimpanzee that lives at Antwerp Zoo in Belgium and four years ago Adie started visiting him quite regularly.
Now, after many visits and hours spent bonding, she believes that the two of them have an inseparable bond and that they deeply, truly, and honestly love each other.
Although Adie has now had her heart broken since the zoo stepped in and decided to put an end to this relationship.
We're having an affair, I'll just say. I love that animal and he loves me. I haven't got anything else. Why do they want to take that away? Other dozens of visitors are allowed to make contact. Then why not me?
In an interview with ATV, an Antwerp Zoo representative said that Chita's well-being may suffer if this relationship and bond with a human continues, so they have banned Adie from seeing him. She has been informed by the zoo that she is no longer allowed to make any contact with him.
The zoo claims that they just want Chita to be happy and explained that they want Chita to be as much like a chimpanzee as possible, which won't happen if he is too focused on people. If this relationship continues he could become less respected by his peers and become excluded from the group.
Since he has to spend 15 hours of his day with them, and not Adie, it only makes sense that the zoo put their attention towards him strengthening bonds with his own species.
Chita was brought to the zoo 30 years ago because he was a pet at the time and became unmanageable. He learned chimpanzee behavior with us, but the interest in humans has remained. When Chita is constantly busy with visitors, the other monkeys ignore him and don't consider him part of the group, even though that is important. He then sits on his own outside of visiting hours. Of course we are happy when our visitors feel so involved with the animals, but animal welfare comes first here.
While Adie might be devastated by this news now, hopefully one day she'll realise that they have done what's best for Chita and she'll be happy for him, too.
Or maybe she'll just become a regular at the gorilla enclosure instead...
Main image courtesy of De Telegraaf YouTube