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Cheating vs. Being in love with someone other than your partner


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Okay. So I have been having something that has been bugging me recently. I will be completely honest so that answers are unbiased because I am not looking to be right, but to hear honest and unbiased answers. I recently admitted to my boyfriend of a year that I cheated on him about 6mos ago. I would NEVER do do it again and I consider it the worst mistake of my life because I love him more than anything in this world and will never again jeopardize our relationship. Through the massive fallout and us eventually deciding to try to work through it, we ironically have a couple we are friendly with going through a rough time as well. They have been together for two years and the man in the relationship recently discovered that his girlfriend, whom he introduced to one of his closest friends, had subsequently fallen in love with one of his longest and closest buddies after they ended up fostering a business relationship. His girlfriend and his friend have had this intense emotional relationship behind his back and at first, we all thought he was exaggerating until one night while we were all out drinking, she admitted it to not only me but my boyfriend. Fast forward a month and they are having a shotgun wedding all of a sudden. I couldn't help but feel like while I am in no way justifying my actions, that should I ever have to deal with something of the sort, that I would much rather have to deal with my boyfriend admitting to me a careless indiscretion that he would never repeat and had no emotional attachment to than for him to come to me after all we've built and been through together and tell me he is in love with another woman. When I tried to talk to him about this, he flipped out on me and said I was crazy, childish and selfish for feeling that way but I can't help but feel that I would just be so much more crushed for him to come to me and say he was in love with another woman? Am I crazy? I need opinions and advice because while I think both situations are horrendous and should never have to happen to anyone, and completely hate myself for what I did to him and our relationship, I also can't help but feel that the latter would be so much more awful because I can't imagine myself loving a man enough to give my life to him and all the while he is in love with one of my best friends. Any response is so greatly appreciated.

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Lernaean_Hydra

It depends on how you view sex and love. For some people, after being cheated on the sex is what bothers them more than anything. It can often be that that keeps them up at night.

 

Having a partner fall in love with someone else can be devastating, but for those who believe in "true love", soul mates and the like, they can be far more understanding. It won't hurt any less mind you, but many people believe falling in love is a thing that happens, it can't be helped in certain circumstances and that the heart developing feelings for someone else is not an inherently malicious act.

 

Meanwhile, for a lot of those betrayed, sexual infidelity is even worse when it is a "careless indiscretion". The idea that your SO could so callously disregard their primary relationship and everything that's been built for a casual sexual encounter is tremendously upsetting all the more because it was "only sex". You have to wonder what kind of person would risk everything for a few moments gratification? And the act certainly can be seen as decidedly selfish and malicious.

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Simple...

 

Cheating is cheating. Doesn't matter if you love someone else or not. There really is no way to justify it. If you love someone else, breakup with your current relationship, instead of sinking so low as to cheat.

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It does matter if you love someone, because you genuinely love them you don't cheat on them to begin with. It doesn't mean you are the perfect partner or anything, it just means you don't solve issues via sex with other people.

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evanescentworld
.... Overall, the men who cheated said they did so because they were dissatisfied sexually.

 

“They were looking for sexual variety and excitement,” says David Frederick, an assistant professor of health psychology at Chapman and the study’s lead researcher. The women overall said they cheated because they were emotionally dissatisfied. “They were more likely to fall in love with someone else or to look for reassurance that they were still desirable,” Dr. Frederick says.

 

The study also found that men were more upset at the idea of a partner having a sexual affair, and women were more upset at the idea of a partner having an emotional affair

 

From THIS thread, running currently....(see link provided in first post.)

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