In other words, would you date somebody who had cheated on a former partner? If yes, under what circumstances?
For me, the answer depends on time, maturity, learning experience, and my expectations for the current relationship. I think twenty-five is a good cutoff for dumb youthful indiscretions, and I’d be very, very leery about getting serious with a woman who was older than that when the infidelity occurred. A serious relationship with someone who was unfaithful after the age of thirty is right out - I doubt I’d be able to trust somebody who was that selfish and immature.
Oddly enough, though, infidelity to a current relationship isn’t necessarily an absolute deal-breaker for me. I mean, it’s still going to be the end of it 99% of the time, but I can imagine circumstances where I’d make the decision to try to work things out.
I’m straight, male, 31, recently non-single, and have never cheated, myself.
About the time I was getting involved with my now ex-wife, a female friend who had spent 15 years with the cousin of my best friend came on to me and tried to get into a relationship with me.
The thing was, I had learned that the entire reason they had split up was because she had been caught cheating on him. With a married man.
Then she made it clear that she was still seeing him, and had no intention to stop seeing him while in a relationship with me.
Then she wondered why I was completely uninterested in having a relationship with her.
Long ago thing, I’d be suspicious and move very slowly and cautiously. Last relationship? Sorry, not my thing. Integrity is a big thing with me.
I prefer to believe people are capable of change no matter what their age.
I am also assuming that the only way you would know of your potential partners infidelity is if they told you. Which basically translates to honesty. Or I guess it could also translate to stupidity if said potential mate was only telling you because they thought it was funny or what not. But then again, someone like that wouldn’t even be in the running now would they?
Just a couple of weeks ago I was having a (friendly) debate over religion with a christian friend of mine. I told him “If I’m going to invest my faith into something, it’s going to be with people. Not some imaginary sky man.”
Cheating is a symptom, not an affliction. Did the person cheat because they weren’t in the right relationship? Because they lack commitment? They just got bored with their partner? A drunken indescretion? They like the drama? Or maybe they just lack self esteame?
I would be far more interested in the why and how of the cheating.
I’d say it would be a huge-ish red flag, approaching deal breaker.
Unless she was way hot.
I’m tempted too to say “unless there were extenuating circumstances that explain the cheating.” But IME that is tough because you often find the data out by self-reporting, which sometimes turns out to be fudged for self-justification purposes. If I had third party verification that the guy was an abusive/cheating/closet case or whatever it was she was saying to explain it away, that might be a significant exculpatory factor. If I had just her word that she was the victim – it has little weight.
Well, simulpost, but just to endorse everything you say BUT stress the importance of independently verifying those factors if possible. Cheaters are also (inherently) liars, often good liars.
What a person has or hasn’t done in the past is meaningless to me. What I think and feel now and what I think will happen in the future is important. But I’m a lonely, disappointed old man with a poor track record; YMMV and I certainly hope it does.
I’m a lonely, diasappointed old man with a poor track record too, but the upside of all those years of experience is the site-specific ability to tell if I’m being treated with kindness & respect. So your past is none of my godamn business, and mine is none of yours. If you’re that worried, demand test results & run a background check.
Also, the why and how I learn about it would also be important. Was this in th nature of a confession? Or a boast? Do I learn this from some 3rd party who she cheated on? Or someone who may have an interest in hurting me, or her, or breaking us up?
The mere knowledge that my partner once cheated would not be enough to break it off.
I don’t ASK about prior relationships but if i found out beforehand it would be a deal breaker. Unlike msmith537 i feel the reasons behind cheating are completely meaningless, if you are unhappy with a relationship you walk away or try to fix it.
What if she doesn’t make excuses? I’d be a lot more sympathetic to someone who was like “Five years ago I was in a bad relationship and I acted stupidly, but I’ve learned a lot since then–now I’d do it differently” than someone who had a long complicated story about how they were really the victim.
You make a good point – if her explanation is not dependent on my making extensive factual assumptions for which I have solely her word, I can take it basically at face value. May well reject it (oooohh . . . . I’m also still making some factual reliance on whether her last relationship was really truly “bad” or whether in reality her ex-BF was Sir Galahad or more pointedly, Sucker Huerta v.1.0 , and whether she’s in fact “learned a lot”) – but a straightforward “mea culpa” would get more hearing from me than “well after I got back from the Special Forces he cheated on me with Wonder Woman and then my mom got leukemia so I had to go on welfare and run trains with the Hell’s Angels to save our adopted Namibian orphan” sob stories I’ve heard.
My current boyfriend was in the tail end of a relationship when we met, but he was very upfront about the fact that he was still with someone and that he was going to break up with her before we started anything. And he did. We did go on a few dates before he actually broke up with her (she was living in a different country at the time) so I suppose technically he was unfaithful in a previous relationship. That doesn’t really bother me - he was honest about the whole thing and even said we should wait until he had completely finished things with his ex. I was the impatient one.
Having also been the “other woman” in a relationship that lasted two years, my feelings about infidelity are rather complicated. I don’t think infidelity should be justified, but I also think that it’s rarely as clear cut as a lot of people think it is.
I’ve been the “other man” in a couple of brief flings, and to my surprise didn’t feel very guilty about it – maybe because she was hot, or maybe because it was obvious that she and the boyfriend were almost finished anyway, I’m not sure which. The last time this happened the woman said to me “How can you ever trust me after I’ve cheated on [name of boyfriend]?” It was a good question I didn’t quite know how to answer other than “Let’s burn that bridge when we come to it.” Our relationship never really went anywhere so I never found out if I’d be insecure or mistrustful about her past.
When my wife and I got together, we were in the clear – she broke up with a boyfriend in order to be with me, and told him so. That was all right.
I told Marcie, before we married, that I had cheated on my ex-wife; I volunteered the information and offered to answer any questions she might have. Worst mistake I ever made.
It totally depends on whether I think they’ve changed. I don’t believe in the excuse that “The relationship was bad, so I cheated.” If it’s that bad, end it first. It’s not that hard. I’ve done it.
Now, note that cheating specifically requires lying of some sort: the other person doesn’t know that you are doing it. If it’s an open relationship, I can understand it (although that’s not my thing). But I find someone who would willingly mislead their partner disgusting.
Oh, and if you meant cheat in the married sense, hell no! Check out the vows: marriage is supposed to be a lifelong commitment.
