Whether or not a person is apt to be unfaithful depends a lot on the circumstances, so somebody might face those circumstances once but then never be unfaithful again. Women with caring but unsexy partners are much more likely to cheat than are woman with sexy but uncaring partners. A woman might once have a relationship with a caring but unsexy man and be driven to cheat on him with men she finds much more attractive; she might never have that experience again. [Edit: I am not dichotomizing the concepts of sexiness or caring. I realize there is a wide spectrum here and that these traits both probably exist on a bell curve. I’m just using extremes to demonstrate a point.]
I think lots of people carry with them a folk-psychology theory of ingrained pure evil, where some people are just, y’know, cheaters, and some people aren’t. It’s really not like that. I personally think that anyone under 40 (and past puberty, of course) who claims they could never be driven to infidelity is either married to a movie star or has steely nerves possessed by very, very few people.
My two cents are that your relationship with another person is not just based on the two people involved - the circumstances of the relationship itself are also a major factor. Not just romantically. Two people that get along great at work may find they have nothing in common if they’re together in a social setting. Two close friends may find that they argue if they start working together.
And it is true about romantic relationships - not all of which are the same. Two people who have been dating for six months are not in the same kind of relationship as two people who have been married for twelve years. Which means that two people who may have been deeply in love while they were dating may find that they’re not that compatible as a married couple.
To get back on topic, a marriage is not the same as an affair. So a person can be deeply attracted to somebody they’re having an affair with - more attracted than they are to their spouse. And because of that, they may leave their spouse and form a long-term relationship with the person they’re having the affair with.
Then they may find that somebody they loved being in an affair with is not somebody they enjoy being in a marriage with. They may even realize that the original person was a better marriage partner than the new person is.
Which completely stands to reason when you factor in that an affair is all the fun, shiny, new and exciting stuff about a relationship, without any of the drudgery. Your undying affection for this person never gets tested by overwhelming bills or kids failing math or even uncapped toothpaste. It’s fundamentally a fantasy.
When you get into an actual, workaday relationship with that person, you may well find that there’s plenty you don’t like about them in real life.
See, that’s so funny. To me, an affair is all the insecure, awkward, unpredictable parts of a relationship. I put up with that bullshit to get to the good part of a relationship–where you are like two old shoes, used to each other and accepting of each others quirks and follies.
This, more than any superior moral strength, is why I think it unlikely that I or my husband would have an affair. It just sounds like a lot of bother.
I suspect at least some who have cheated would say that they don’t experience all of that in an affair because there’s no risk. If the affair doesn’t work out, you still get to go home to your secure, stable relationship. So you can put yourself out there without the awkwardness.
I wonder how much correlation there is between people who really like dating and people who have affairs. If you perceive the ‘getting to know you’ part as ‘insecure, awkward, and unpredictable’ and the ‘old shoes’ thing to be the ‘good part’, well… yeah, you’re going to be disinclined to stray.
On the other hand, if you enjoy the buzz of the ‘shiny, new, and exciting’ world of dating, that’s a hard thing to give up. I think the majority of affair-havers are in it for the buzz, frankly. Not necessarily the taboo aspect of it, so much as the heady feeling of ‘falling in love’.
True. I never cheated myself but my friends and family members sure have including my father. There are two different types. One feels a deep angst in life and searches for something deeper to help dampen the pain even though he wishes it were different and things would get better in the primary relationship. The others just like fucking other women and it is as simple as that. Think Bill Clinton. There isn’t a lot of thought or remorse that goes into it. They do it because they can and just want to.
I don’t know about “once a cheater, always a cheater,” but I will say that any married person who cheats has to deceive their spouse. If it’s an open marriage, or if it’s a de facto open marriage because the spouse does know but accepts it for whatever reason, then there’s no deception. But if you can’t be open about what you’re doing, you are cheating. And if you’re okay with lying to your spouse, then I could never be sure you were being honest with me.
I don’t think most people who cheat have big regrets about doing so, no. Sounds like something friends say to the victim to cheer them up.
How does one get driven to infidelity? Is a limousine provided? If you meant to say something akin to ‘tempted’ I could warm up to this theory.
I agree with your other points; most of my close friends, who are by and large very nice people, have cheated. They weren’t looking to deliberately betray and hurt their partners, they just lacked impulse control and/or wanted an easy out of the relationship. There are very many serial monogamists who start every new relationship by cheating on their previous partner, in this world.
I guess I put myself in the ‘steely nerves’ category. I’m only 25 and we’ve been together 6 years (but he is damn good-looking…) It’s not that I don’t find other people physically attractive, it’s that I have zero desire to act upon it. To me ending a committed relationship prior to starting anything with another person is the only honorable thing to do. People who can’t do this are moral weaklings (whether it’s just at that time or always).
I’ve known a few people who have been unfaithful when they were not done with their current marriage. i.e. they wanted to stay with their spouse, figured their spouse wouldn’t find out, had a fling. All those people regret it, whether their spouse found out or not.
People done with their current spouse who are cheating as a way to end a relationship (because they don’t have the guts to leave and then cheat) don’t tend to regret it - and why should they? They’ve found a great way to get what they want without the uncomfortable “its not you, its me” part.
I really doubt my ex husband either regrets cheating on me or has ever wanted me back. I wish he’d have had the backbone just to dump me without the drama of a third party - but the third party DID make it easier for me to get over it.
The one time i know for sure i was cheated on the girl left me for the other guy. They had a kid, got engaged and are building a house for themselves, i can’t vouch for their overall happiness but it sure seems to have worked out for the bitch.
This is my experience as well. The cheater felt very bad about the way the relationship ended, but did not at all regret the fact that the relationship did end. I have an ex who cheated on me in terrible circumstances, and once said “I can’t believe you’re still on speaking terms with me!” She was VERY remorseful about the awful circumstances of our break-up, but she never once thought that breaking up had been the wrong thing to do.
I would say there’s an enormous difference between a relationship ending because one party died or moved away and it ending with a flower pot smashing against the slamming door, yes.
Losing my father to death still makes Mom angry. But losing him to an affair? WWIII would have been smaller.