Cheating in relationships

I’ve never cheated but I was almost ‘the other man’ with a new female friend who was dating a long time male friend.

I’ll save the story but it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done to pull back and not cross the line. Two months later they were broken up and he ended a 16 year friendship with me because I stood up for her when he tried to bad mouth her to other people. (He’d bad mouthed every ex he ever had, but she was the first that I got to know as a friend and hear her side of the story and found out just how self centered he really was.) That was 4 years ago and she’s still one of my best friends and we never dated.

Never have, never will, no way in hell, not even a kiss.

I suspect that I’d feel so much guilt by even seriously considering it that I’d have trouble getting it up when it came time to actually perform the act. :smiley:

But supposing that I somehow did pull it off, and supposing even that it turned out to be the best sex I ever had, I still can’t see how it would be worth it. What is an hour of physical pleasure compared to days, weeks, months, or even years of sickening, torturous guilt?

Add to that the feelings of my (currently hypothetical) SO if she ever found out, and it would be a thousand times worse. To do that to the person you claim to love and trust more than anyone is simply unconscionable. To rip your partner’s heart to shreds with devil fangs and spit the bloody pieces onto a bedroom floor for no other reason that your own petty physical pleasure - well, it’s just sick. I can little more relate to that mindset than I can that of a murderous sociopath.

I have been cheated on – brutally painful.

I have never cheated on an SO.

I have been the other woman – we broke it off fairly quickly, but not before my heart got broken.

I’ve never cheated on anyone, but I can’t swear that I never would – shit happens. I know that I’d feel like shit if it happened, though, and I also know that I would tell my SO right away.

I’ve never had an affair, but I’ve kissed two married men and have slept with one who was engaged. I don’t regret any of the above, but at times I’ve regretted not sleeping with one of the married men.

I’ve been cheated on.

I’ve been cheated on.

Never cheated on someone.

I have been the other man, is that considered cheating on my part?

I guess I have mixed feelings about the whole cheating thing. I mean a lot of it depends on what kind of relationship you are in. When you are younger…who gives a shit? Two months you probably won’t be dating anyway so what’s the big deal if she breaks up with you for cheating or because your car sucks?

Even if you have been in a relationship for awhile, is it always bad? What if it’s just a one-time thing? Should you destroy the relationship over a moment of weakness?

Now if it’s an ongoing affair, you really need to pick one or the other (unless your objective is to just go as long as you can until it blows up in your face).

Or you could do the Vincent Chase from Entourage thing. Just never commit to anything and do whatever you want. That’s technically not cheating.

And yet, I’m still disgusted by men who openly and premeditatedly cheat on their wives or SO. Call me old fashioned but I thing that shit should be kept on the DL. I actually had to tell my coworker after he suggested bringing his girlfriend (oh and by the way hes been married for 3 months) to a company function “Hey idiot! Why don’t you not make us all uncomfortible by bringing your mistress to a happy hour!”

But hey…if you never cheated, how would you tell which girl you like better?

Because presumably, you could break up with your SO who obviously isn’t doing it for you and get with the person who is?

I suspect it’s because a lot of the folks here are “nice guys” who often end up on the shit end of the cheating stick. Or maybe they aren’t attractive enough to statistically meet more than one girl at a time? Or maybe they are the super possesive type.

To put things in perspective for you - had you actually cheated, you would still have endured a shit storm…but at least you would have gotten some pussy.

Badmouth how? Like “that stupid fucking whore tried to sleep with my friend of 16 years behind my back”?

Well, I guess the obvious thing that for whatever reason your ex-wife liked this guy more than you. Or that he offered her something you just weren’t providing. Maybe she should have divorced you first. Maybe this guy should have respected your relationship like your wife was a piece of personal property like a car that no one should drive. Not to belittle your situation at all, but I think what makes being cheated on so difficult is that a) people don’t like being lied to and b) the shattering of the fantasy that your relationship is a-ok.

Funny you should say that. Then-girlfriend and I broke up, of course, due in part to my “cheating”. After she moved out, it was a joke between my friends and I. I would often say “if I had known how things were gonna work out, I would have at least gotten a hand job.”

Only because hand-jobs are funnier than pussy.

Ummmm, neutron? While your sincerity is appreciated, I have been cheated on, along with several of my friends, and I’m sure that we’d all agree that while broken hearts hurt, they aren’t quite that bad. It’s not the end of the world, just the end of the relationship. Just trying to put it all in a healthy perspective.

As far as my opinion, well . . . I try to be philosophical about it. I honestly don’t think it was me. Some people will cheat on you at the first opportunity, and some people won’t cheat on you if you’re practically begging them to (although they very well might pack up and leave you). I’d say it’s 80% them, 20% you, so there’s no use torturing yourself as to why they slept around.

I’ll add one item to enipla’s list of wise thoughts:

You can have a fast, wild relationship. You can have a lasting, stable relationship. You can’t have both, and what’s more, you probably won’t be able to turn one into the other. Such is love life.

I’ve never cheated. Trust in a relationship is important to me. I would prefer an open poly relationship, but no way would I ever go behind my partner’s back.

IMO, “the other guy” , unless he’s a close friend, isn’t to blame. He’s not the one who promised something to you.

To answer the OP, I never cheated though I’ve been once extremely close to do so (like in leaving the bed stating something basically like “I’ve just changed my mind, what about being just friends instead?”).

AFAIK I’ve never been cheated upon (but of course I could be mistaken).

I’ve been “the other man” once, for the time it took for my new girlfriend to announce the bad news to her former boyfriend (though actually we didn’t have had sex, but mostly because the conditions weren’t ideal. We met again one month later and she had broken up with him meanwhile).

By the way, the absolute deal-breaker fo me wouldn’t be cheating as in “havng sex with someone else” but cheating as in “lying to me about it”.

I’ve never cheated and I probably never will. I just don’t think it’s in my nature.

I’ve been faithful to my wife for 15 years. I would never be able to stand the anxiety and guilt of cheating. Plus it’s too much work to sneak around and make up lies and I’m a lazy sod.

Okay, here are what have been my rationales for past cheating (as defined by me, and I have a fairly prudish definition given my past lapses). I am posting this on the assumption that because we are not in GD you will not try to convince me that cheating is “wrong” (I acknowledge that arguendo) and because we are not in the Pit, you will not try to demonstrate that I am a lowlife (stipulate, as to past behavior, and don’t want to hear anyone’s dead-horse-beating). Again, this is just the rationale(s) I employed at the time.

  1. There’s enough of me to go around. This was like my non-Mormon take on Mormonism – if I can keep multiple girlfriends happy, really happy, what skin off their back is it if I am (in fact) doing the same for the girl across town (here I will give a hint as to my grounds for remorse – one problem is it becomes easy to get irritated at girl 1 and say (to yourself), Hell, girl 2 isn’t giving me this sort of static [right now], screw this noise, I’m headed over to girl 2!"). When you only have one woman, you have more incentive to compromise on problems.

  2. I’ve been forced to cobble together a gf from spare parts. So many women I found in the early days had serious personality flaws or drawbacks – but I’d been through enough dry spells that I’d take them for what they were worth. So, this one has an okay personality, but isn’t too smart. This one is smart, but mean. This one is good looking, the others aren’t, so I’ve got to go out with her too. I wasn’t trying to have multiple girlfriends. Just one composite gf who approximated the profile I’d been futilely searching for for years.

  3. Women use sexual monogamy as a bait and switch. And they do. Women (to generalize) promise you sex [with them only] in exchange for a relationship [with them only]; then you come to find out that they want you to have a [sex] relationship with them only, where the bolded parts are respectively emphasized and the bracketed parts de-emphasized. Don’t debate me here; I’m telling you what my younger self perceived.

The problem (so I reasoned) is that the male monogamy and exclusivity that are the female-demanded benefit of this bargain are presumed to run 24/7, whereas the female sexual availability part of it is much more situational, conditional, and patchy. Well, says I, if my access to sex with her is conditional and periodic, then how much worse is it if the quality of my “monogamy” is likewise, in practice, patchy and periodic?

  1. Women exploit their status as relationship gatekeepers, I may as well exploit any random opportunities I have.

'Nuff said. Women generally decide when a [sexual] relationship will start. When men see any opportunity to seize the initiative in the overall sexual balance, they will be tempted to do so, because it happens so rarely.

  1. Women crave emotional relationships (among others). Men crave physical relationships (among others). Society sanctions women finding deep emotional relationships with their SO, but also with Platonic male friends, female friends, homosexuals, etc. Men are not encouraged or allowed to develop their “most craved” types of relationships (sexual ones, or so it seems when one is younger) with anyone other than a SO. This is an unfairly asymmetric situation.

Res ipsa loquiter, whether you agree or not.

  1. Your gf is always a drop of the hat away from leaving you for one of her many would-be suitors. That she does not do so is an accident of fate or whim. You have no such multifarious opportunities. When any opportunity does come up, you should jump on it – you may not get another chance, she will.

Again, I expect outraged dissent, but this is how men are often left thinking after being dumped multiple times (as I was) in their teens, always for one of a crowd of guys who seem constantly to be hovering around even the “steady dating” girls.

And yes, I know my USMC screen name is/was a joke in view of the above, so you needn’t point this (nor any of my other alleged hypocrisies) out.

I said that as I was reading, thanks for vocalizing.

Uh, yeah. Been at both ends of the stick.

Neither is fun, both suck, both hurt.

The only apologies I make are to the family, SO’s I’ve hurt.

I work at being better, but all I can do is improve.

And that’s about as introspective as I care to be at the moment. Now you’ll excuse me I’m going to shut the laptop and go curl up with the woman and thank her for sticking around.

'night y’all

Everyone cheats on Six Feet Under because the scriptwriters have run out of ideas, and cheating is a lazy way to create some dramatic tension. Eastenders is really bad that way–those people will hop in bed for no apparent reason, with no warning, and sometimes I sit there thinking “What just happened here?” and “Why am I still watching this show?”

I’ve never cheated. I don’t need that much drama in my life. I kind of understand some of the reasons why people cheat, but I wouldn’t want to hurt someone I cared about, even if the relationship was basically over.

Me too. Even though I should probably know better by now. The world needs more Hopeless Romantics. :slight_smile:

Never cheated and, to my knowledge, i’ve never been cheated on. I have been “the other guy” in one scenario, sleeping with a woman at work who was engaged to someone else. I’m not proud of it, and in my defence i was only 21 at the time. Also, i think the burden of fidelity in a relationship is primarily on the two people who are in the relationship, not on the third party.

I’ve always told myself that if i ever found out that a girlfriend/spouse was cheating on me, there would be no second chances. It would be over immediately. To tell you the truth, i’m not so sure about that any more. I’ve been with my married for just over a year, and we’ve been together for almost four years. I’m certainly not worried that she would cheat on me but, if she did, and it was a single indiscretion, i’m actually starting to think that i could probably get past it. Of course, i’ll never really know my reaction unless it actually happens.

One things i have always believed, though, is that if you do cheat, and if it is a single indiscretion that will not be repeated, then you’re probably better off never telling your partner/spouse about it.

Nope. No outraged dissent. Those are probably the sort of reactions i would expect from a teenager.

What i’m more interested in is how long ago this was, and whether you actually still believe any of those cheap rationalizations.

The bulk of what I regard as my cheating (and I really am fairly strict about this – smooching another chick drunkenly while I was dating a first one steadily, qualifies in my book) took place in the first . . . five or so years after I really started having any success with women. I suppose I felt much the same way (several years later on) that a thirteen year old girl feels when she first realizes that she has a lot of options based on her attractiveness. Having been through adolescence (wherein the attractive women for the most part held the social whip hand in the dating power game), I suppose I found it easier to justify a similar approach, viz., get while the getting is good. “Cheap rationalizations?” Maybe that shoe fits the foot (though I’d argue that many other cheap rationalizations go unremarked in the dating game).

Do I still believe any of them? I’ve tipped my hand on my lack of confidence in No. 1 – the “Enough of me to go around” theory is fine so far as it works (and, not to make a joke of it, trying to juggle multiple girlfriends is a lot of work and cures you of any desire for polygamy), but it makes it too easy for you to dodge any real problem-solving or decision-making as to whether you can make a go of it with one or the other.

The others . . . I can still certainly recognize the thought process behind them, and the frustrations in the dating game that drove them. I just don’t care enough about those frustrations to act on them once I’ve gone to what I’ve now realized is the substantial time and energy commitment (on both sides) of getting to know and date someone.

I never cheated, but I spent one horrifically miserable year in love with someone who was NOT my partner of 12 years. Think we needed to talk? Boy howdy.

Still, it was hellishly diffucult to drag her into couples therapy-- it took a suicide threat to do it a very INTENTIONAL suicide threat. I’m over that now, thanks to Mr. Effexor and Ms. Wellbutrin.

It was incredibly difficult NOT to cheat. I’m not at all good looking, and the “other person” was hotHOTHOTHOT, not to mention incredibly intelligent, and had a good heart. But we both managed kept the brakes on each other.

It took a lot of time and therapy, but now me and the SO are doing a helluva lot better. Other Person went on with her life (and ended up with my best friend, eeek. But at least they were both single.)

I’ve gotta say that I am now THE most sympathetic person on the planet when it comes to issues like polyandry and ethical sluttage. Yep, extremely sympathetic. And sometimes… occasionally… incredibly jealous. :smiley:

I’ve never cheated and hope I never will.

That being said, I was the other woman. It was the singularly worst experience of my life. He was a bastard that played me and played me well. I loved him. I didn’t know it then because as naive as this sounds, I had no idea what love was. My friends finally found out and told me this needed to stop. I was being used. His girlfriend was being used. I confronted him. He said he would make it right. Then I overheard him telling his girlfriend that I was crazy and he loved her more than anything in the world and would never hurt her. I will never become that souless. I will never look at the man I love and tell him that there is no other when there is. And I will NEVER do what was done to me or the jerk’s girlfriend (not that I ever liked her, but still).