Do you think men are more likely to cheat?

[nikki1978]

Feeling a bit sad as a couple of good friends have found out in the last month that their husbands have been cheating on them for over a year (one while his wife was pregnant with a baby they had tried to conceive for many years through IVF!).

Don't get me wrong I love my DH and am sure he would not do the dirty on me but I feel a bit disillusioned with other men at the moment.

MIL and I were having a chat on Boxing Day and she was telling me about how many of her friends husbands had affairs over the years. Of course there were a few women who did too but it was mainly the men.

I am pretty sure my Dad used to cheat on my Mum. My GM cheated on my GF. DHs Gf cheated on his GM. 3 of my uncles have cheated on their wives.

I feel like I am surrounded by it. Are humans just not able to be monogamous? I am sure that I will be for life and DH says the same. Why do people do it? And why does it seem to be mainly men?

Lots of people have affairs while married. It has always been very common, across all societies and social classes.

Actually Tadpoles I didn't reach that conclusion at all, from what Madonna was saying, because that would imply that my H is still selfish and immature. He would be the first to admit that he was though - and would agree with Madonna entirely.

I think that's the crux of it. Fizzfiend apparently still thinks infidelity is acceptable in some circumstances, as apparently do you. I don't - and neither does my H.

There is always another choice, but one that is frequently disregarded and re-packaged as "not wanting to disrupt a family", when in many cases this actually means "not wanting to disrupt my nice secure life and finances."

MargaretGraceBondfield:

It applies to every species and is more important in species with prolonged parental care such as ours. The amount of time and resources that we put into rearing our offspring is tremendous when you compare us to other species and the fact that a woman is physically capable of bearing very few children in her lifetime makes it even more important to increase the odds of them surviving to adulthood by finding the best possible man to father those children. Even the females of species that do not exhibit parental care (such as most species of insects) are more selective about their mate choice than males because the production of eggs uses a lot more resources than the production of sperm so the female has more of an investment in the production of offspring.

Give a hand job? FFS. How about masturbation?

Sometimes when I read things on here I have to remind myself that this is 2011. How on earth can one person's desire for something outweigh another's not to do something?

I agree that completely lost libido over a long time can be addressed via sex therapy or something to find desire again, but not to force yourself to do things.

Why is everyone caveating cheating by adducing the 'sexless marriage' argument? I don't see how that's relevant at all.

If your relationship is shitty - whether because of no sex, or emotional abuse, or whatever the reason - and if you've exhausted all avenues of rehabilitating the relationship, the next step is not to sleep with someone else, the next step should be to end the relationship. And then sleep with someone else.

Whoever said that it's totally unfair to cheat on a partner who is still under the apprehension that the relationship is monogamous was spot on.

I agree that, being 5'1", I have always been attracted to tall men...a subtle and not so subtle desire to have taller dcs. But I don't wish for my children to have children, certainly am not thinking about my son's genes being passed on. Perhaps that comes later. TBH I'm such a narcissist I hoped all dcs looked like me!

Isn't there a large proportion of men that cheat when wives are pg? Dreadful. I have two friends that this happened to, seems like their H's needed a little more attention and couldn't quite manage the lower incidences of shagging, which I actually think is more about attention than anything else.

OK, I got sidetracked. This thread is about cheating and, of course, an asexual partner who accepts that his partner may look elsewhere for sex isn't being cheated. An asexual partner who imposes sexlessness on his partner is a bully, and that's another topic.

Margaret, you may not be thinking about the promulgation of your genes but your body is!

Anyway, I've said what I always say my bit so will back off now

An asexual partner. Are you implying that some people get married have sex to procreate and then no more sex? Surely that's all people that are actual faith followers?

Some people just aren't interested in sex at all, they claim it's a sexual orientation like being gay.

www.asexuality.org/home/

If your relationship is shitty - whether because of no sex, or emotional abuse, or whatever the reason - and if you've exhausted all avenues of rehabilitating the relationship, the next step is not to sleep with someone else, the next step should be to end the relationship. And then sleep with someone else.

Totally agreed. I'm not sure about the alpha male being more likely to cheat though, I think it can be a lot more about the insecurity of the beta males as well.

My xh cheated on me, and has subsequently married the woman he cheated with. She was also married, so it was 50/50 in their case, and 2 families were damaged in the process. For xh it was about sexual attention and a knight in shining armour, a desire to be the alpha male. I was told that she was a victim of DV (hence the knight saving his damsel), but there were sex problems between us for a long time. He was very demanding and unwilling to understand my issues regarding being abused as a child and PND after having my two kids. He was an emotional blackmailer who wore me down to a depressed lump of nothing for a long time (again, attempts at alpha male dominance). It was also about him wanting to be like his alpha male cousins and brother, who he never felt as good as.

"Fizzfiend apparently still thinks infidelity is acceptable in some circumstances, as apparently do you. I don't - and neither does my H."

WWIFN - but you have openly discussed on these boards your husband's infidelity and your decision to remain in the marriage despite his adultery so you really are somewhat contradicting yourself here.

I'm not contradicting myself at all Tadpoles. I have never said anything different. Good people have affairs and to err is human. However, my H would tell you till the cows came home that what he did was wrong and it is something he passionately regrets.

I have the utmost empathy for anyone who thinks that their former behaviour was a mistake, but absolutely none for people who are still justifying deceitful behaviour. No contradictions whatsoever, therefore. I passionately disagree with anyone who still thinks that deceit is ever justifiable, because it's not. It is the ultimate in cowardly, but controlling behaviour. There are always other choices.

So. I should have crossed my legs til the end of time? And you want to try getting my DH into counselling. He would never hear of such a thing.

A man kissed me. Unexpected. As in unplanned. So actually I should have got out my crystal ball, seen a new man, then told DH I wanted a divorce. Then gone off and shagged someone else. Not exactly sure how this benefits anyone. DH obviously does not give a shit about me whether I fuck someone else when we are married or when we are divorced. Please stop trying to make the rules. There are no rules.

Wouldn't it all be so neat and lovely. Monday: DH let's get divorced. Tuesday: get divorced. Wednesday: ooh lovely new man arrives. Am chanelling Bree from Desperate Housewives. .... MY FUCKING HUSBAND TREATS ME LIKE A PIECE OF THE FURNITURE. And refuses to talk to me about it. He deserves more than bloody deceitful behaviour if you ask me. I was never anything but a lovely supportive wife. He changed it. So please do get of your high horses.

And thank god there are some sensible women out there (the more intelligent ones I suspect) who know life is not something you can quantify and make rules for. Moses tried that and look where that got him...

I'm such a beligerant drunk...sorry if being an arse! But I feel no guilt. I gave everything, tried everything. DH never hit me, but he emotionally tormented me for years. Which is worse?

Not an arse. Practical, down to earth, frustrated (!) and funny.

Did you divorce in the end? Sorry if I should know this.

fizzfiend:

Emotional abuse can be worse than physical abuse - at least with physical abuse you know it's happening. A man hit me once and I never gave him the chance to do it again but I let my next boyfriend emotionally abuse me for years. Emotional abuse is insipid and it's very easy to not recognise it until afterwards. In the space of just a few months he turned me from a strong confident woman into a wallflower and to this day I still don't know if he meant to do it or if he was just a fuckwit.

That's the crazy thing isn't it QueenStromba, the moment I knew my xh was having the affair, I threw him out, but I put up with crap for years before that, defending him to my friends and, on one occasion, defended him against a man who had come to the door looking for him after xh had tried it on with his wife In hindsight it all fits, another woman told me that he tried it with her shortly after we'd got married, and I have my suspicions about someone who used to be a friend of mine, who suddenly turned cold on me. XH's justification to me was that I didn't satisfy his needs, it was obviously all my fault that he couldn't deal with things like a man. The truth was, I didn't satisfy his needs because I felt worthless, he had me in my place and he could do as he pleased while I took care of the kids and was 'allowed' to do things now and again.

I didn't recognise it because he wasn't verbally abusive or nasty to me, it was much more subtle than that, lots of emotional blackmail and leaving me out of things. I swear I'll never allow it to happen again, I hope that I'd recognise the signs anyway.

A secret affair is also emotionally abusive though Queen and just like you said, all the worse because the faithful partner didn't know it was happening.

This is all about choices, not claiming victimhood and pretending there weren't any. Refusing someone sex, not talking about it and not going to counselling are marriage-reducing behaviours, but are in the open domain. The other party in the relationship can then make a choice about what s/he does - leave, put up with it, agree an open relationship or have an affair. The latter is not an openly disclosed choice. It is expressing dissatisfaction (if any exists) in a passive-aggressive manner, while not taking responsibility for that choice.

I'm definitely not trying to condone cheating and I agree that the deceit makes it a lot worse. I'd hate to be cheated on but I think I'd be a lot more inclined to forgive if I was told straight away rather than lied to about it.