I felt there should be a counterpoint to this thread.
From high school through my mid 20’s, I was in 4 different longer-term, supposedly monogamous, relationships, and in every case I later found out I had been cheated on.
I’m 41 and have been married for 14 years. AKAIK, my spouse has never cheated (but I guess I’ll wait for that shoe to drop).
So, girls who cheat: why didja do it? Do you think girls cheat more often than people realize?
Because women are inherently evil?
Yes girls cheat a damn site more than people think (again AFAIK my spouse has been faithfull so I have no direct axe to grind)
As a boy growing up infidelity was ALWAYS shown as something men did. It wasn’t til I was in my mid twenties that it suddenly hit me that all of the cases of Infidelity I had personally come across had been women cheating on men. I now know of some men who have cheated but my experience has shown many more women cheating than men.
I put this down to good PR on womens part.
I wonder if it’s historically seen as a male “crime” because of pregnancies that can result from said cheating. It has to be far easier for a cheating woman to convince her husband that the baby is his, than for the cheating husband to convince his wife that his girlfriend’s baby is hers!
Yes this is the ultimate in double standards. MSN did a peice on this not too long ago.
There a probably a few reasons why women cheat; unhappy with current partner/not enough affection/etc. But men usually cheat for different reasons. They don’t necessarily have to be unhappy to cheat, they just want a different piece of ass.
I’m just taking a stab folks… throwing ideas out, please don’t take anything personal here.
I cheated on my boyfriends in high school and college. For me it was because I was insecure. I didn’t think I was attractive or special… and though I knew my boyfriend at the time thought I was, THAT WASN’T ENOUGH to soothe my insecurities.
I would cheat. I would WANT SO badly to feel special and attractive and I thought that the MORE men that ‘wanted’ me would help me feel special.
I was grasping for validation anywhere I could get it. I wanted it SO badly, I wanted it more than a monogamous relationship.
However, since then I have realized that there is no certain amount of men wanting me THAT could ever, will ever make me feel good about myself. Inner peace and self acceptance is an internal matter… and all my years of cheating, I had assumed it was something I could get externally through men.
Don’t assume it is YOUR fault that your partner strayed. I think it’s safe to say it’s an issue within them; an internal yearning which they are trying to appease through external measures.
What Mith said.
Well, according to the June 2003 issue of American Demographics, men and women do differ somewhat in their motivations:
And there’s another interesting double standard. When the woman cheats, it’s because he didn’t show her enough affection; in short, it’s the man’s fault. Whereas when the man cheats, he’s just a horny bastard.
Well, not according to my mother. In her view, yes, there is a double standard, but it goes a bit differently: When a man cheats, it’s because his woman failed to realize that men are hard-wired to cheat, and so she did something stupid like leave town without him for two weeks, or allow him to have lunch with his female coworker.
HUZZAH FOR PROPOGATING EQUALITY BETWEEN SEXES
The problem is women are way too trigger-happy when it comes to committment. This leads to the familiar shitfest about committment phobia in men. Then when they realise “hey duh I’m a spastic and forgot to check compatibility” they leave and then run crying to their friends over how men are pigs, trouble which could have been avoided had they applied that old maxim about looking and leaping. Actually I had a great analogy involving computers but I’m tired.
WHat’s the reason for doing anything “bad”? Fear.
THe opposite of love is fear, not evil.
Perhaps after being taught the school of thought that MEN CHEAT for … the female collective unconscious is turning the tables of sorts. Cheating before we can be cheated on.
I think a lot of women cheat under the guise that they are sexually liberated and open minded. That to be permiscouis IS being sexually mature.
It’s frustrating always hearing myths that women get more emotionally attached from sex. That isn’t ALWAYS true, and i think perhaps some women revolt against these beliefs by acting as though sex can be virtually meaningless to them.
I wish I knew. That way I’d know which ones to approach.
Francis, I wish I knew what to say to help you not make the mistakes I’ve made. According to other posts you’ve made, you do love your wife, and your problems are bedroom-related…can you not work this out? Sorry I put this in the wrong thread.
When I cheated on my ex (not irishfella) it was beacuse he made me feel like crap.
Although I did nothing to make him mistrust me, he refused to let me drink, go out without him, spend time with male friends etc etc.
So I got drunk, and took one of my mates home.
If he’s going to treat me like a lying, cheating hussy, I reckoned I may as well act like one!
It was worth it.
Thanks for the kind words. My feelings probably stem much more from my regret over my wasted youth than anything my wife has done or hasn’t done. “Wasted” in the sense that I missed out on a LOT of opportunities for nookie.
In recent years, I’ve found that my memories of a few wondrous sexual encounters with young women whom I regarded as “merely” friends hold a warmth and fondness that far outshine any “romantic” experiences I had, but I didn’t appreciate them at the time because I was searching for True Love ™. I’ll probably feel the need to express myself in MPSIMS about this soon.
I am the guy my wife cheated with, before she left her exhusband. (In my defense, I did not know she was married until it was way too late. I did meet an exboyfriend, though.) We’ve been married for almost 18 years. I’ve never directly asked her, so I don’t know for sure why she cheated.
As far as I can tell, my wife cheated on her ex, because she was very unhappy with him. She didn’t have the confidence, or guts, to end it, until she realized that things could be better. This guy left a lot to be desired in a husband. E.g., we met while she was living at school. When I wasn’t at her place, she was at mine. The guy never, ever called. (Of course, she didn’t call him either.)
I guess I’m saying that sometimes, some women cheat because their relationships are $hit.
Mith, I feel sorry for you, or rather, the woman you were. The truth is, some guys probably cheat for the same reasons, but don’t know it. (22% waiting for the perfect opportunity? C’mon, even the jerkiest guys need some reason.) Francis, your statement here seems to directly contradict your statement in the “have you cheated thread”.
This probably should go in that other thread, but to clarify – I regret that I didn’t have sex with very many women before I was married, the times I did were pretty great, and I’d love to now. Also somewhere in there is a disillusionment with “romance.” I don’t think there is a contradiction.
Wow reading about all of these double standards and cheating defintitely makes me want to stay sinlge FOREVER!!!
When I was married I cheated - sort of…
He was in the military and was gone on temporary duty all the time. I tried to make the best of it living overseas. I learned the language and made friends with other wives and got a job but he didn’t liek my independence. He wanted me to stay home and make babies so he volunteered to move us to another base in another country where I didn’t have a job, friends or know the language. I started all over again. He promised no more long temporary duties. But he worked all the time, 16 hours a day. Eventually I found out he wasn’t really working all that time and I left him. HE begged me to come back and promised it would be different. Well it was, it was worse. He vounteered for every temporary assignement he could get, missed every hoiliday, went on midnight shift, took seperate vacations, went on his own vacations with his polish girlfriend. In my mind, even though it wasn’t legal, our marraige was OVER! I started dating too and didn’t care if he knew it - guess what? He didn’t care either. We lived in the same house for three years, both dating others and never even commenting that we knew…what a dead marriage. I am not sure if that was cheating but it made our divorce much easier.