No Limit Posted January 19, 2015 Posted January 19, 2015 No, it's rarely the BS fault (unless the BS has been abusive for years and years). And it really stirs my ire whenever I hear about a BS that was talked into feeling guilty and having to change. In a different forum a guy who eventually stayed because of his children kept talking about missing the "sweet hours, days, nights" with his OW, but "at least my wife is doing a bit progress now" - as in acting on his every whim. Incredible.
ComingInHot Posted January 19, 2015 Posted January 19, 2015 There are 2 people at fault and neither of them are the Betrayed spouse. The cheating spouse and the one driving the get away car. Twist it however you want to Try but the truth is what it is. Justifications just make the cheater and partner seem even more shallow and soul less... 4
Author Timshel Posted January 19, 2015 Author Posted January 19, 2015 autumnnight- "All I can say is you are brave to pose it." In an Infidelity discussion forum? Yes, you are probably right.
Author Timshel Posted January 19, 2015 Author Posted January 19, 2015 There are 2 people at fault and neither of them are the Betrayed spouse. The cheating spouse and the one driving the get away car. Twist it however you want to Try but the truth is what it is. Justifications just make the cheater and partner seem even more shallow and soul less... I'm not trying to twist anything. I'm not surprised by the emotion but understand, this is a question I wanted to explore. I am not trying to manipulate any response or justify any behavior.
ComingInHot Posted January 19, 2015 Posted January 19, 2015 I'm not trying to twist anything. I'm not surprised by the emotion but understand, this is a question I wanted to explore. I am not trying to manipulate any response or justify any behavior. I meant as in general. Any party within a cheating scenario. Didn't mean you personally
truncated Posted January 19, 2015 Posted January 19, 2015 As the saying goes, at some point, the buck has to stop here. If one spouse can "force" someone to cheat becuase they are/ are not doing x, y or z, the that would validate the assumption that one person can be respinsible for the actions of another. does that mean that a seductive om/ow is responsible for someone cheating because they "lured" them into it? if the bs never wanted sex, was cruel, was angry, ignored their husband or wife, does that make the ws responsible for the choices of the bs to act the way they did? perhaps the best way of looking at it, at least in the cases where there were major problems in a marraige is that the bs may certainly have contributed to the issues, and is responsible for their choices and decisions, while the ws is repsonsible for their choices and decisions, with one of them being to have an affair. This being said, blaming someone for your choices and saying " they were treating me badly, and I felt really horrible and made some poor choices because of it" the same thing, but it does allow room for both sides to grow and learn. It's different than saying " I had no choice, she made me do it', which is something a little kid would say to try and cover their behind. 2
gettingstronger Posted January 19, 2015 Posted January 19, 2015 No, never, ever the spouses fault-everyone has choices- everyone can choose to leave a bad marriage, or talk about it and come to some sort of agreement- As for the idea that when you marry someone with a past that points to cheating, thats silly. We have to believe that people can change. I know for me, all of the red flags were there- my husband was the classic bad boy with infidelity running through his family- the fact that I believed him when he said what he wanted more than anything was to break that cycle is not on me, its on him- its on him for having the opportunity to break the cycle and choosing not to- Its something he has a hard time coming to terms with- he had it all in terms of being the first in generations of his family to break the cycle of infidelity and he blew it- he knows that now his children will suffer like he did, watching, knowing, being exposed to this horrible thing- he knows its 100% on him and he was not strong enough to take what was handed to him and be better, to do better- 1
BetrayedH Posted January 19, 2015 Posted January 19, 2015 Your statement sounds very familiar to me, except I'm the BS, my H says things like that when we discuss the A. I have to say that IME we were both in major resentment mode and neglecting eachother before his A. I was doing most of the neglecting and he was in major resentment mode, but did not discuss the extent with me, although I knew I didn't realize how bad he had gotten. As unhappy as I was I didn't think we would lose eachother, even though at times I was planning to leave him without the knowledge of the A. None of the this makes sense to me now that I am out of it but at the time I justified my neglect and expected him to fix us with no help from me. So I didn't make him cheat, but when a woman in his office said things like your so wonderful and I can't believe you would be interested in me I can see that at that time I didn't give him a good reason to not cheat. This is a good example of where a BS is willing to admit that they weren't perfect in their marriage. And I'd say it's fairly typical of the BSs around here to admit to imperfections. Is there a perfect marriage out there? I do find it interesting that there are some spouses in horrible marriages but never cheat. And we find plenty of waywards that admit to having a perfectly good spouse and marriage at home, yet they found themselves cheating anyway. I bet I could find half a dozen threads like that in just 10 minutes. This leads me away from any cause and effect theories. Some people just want to have "more" from life than any one person can provide; they have an excessive need for external validation. Some people have an overdeveloped sense of entitlement; they "deserve to be happy." Others are so conflict-avoidant that they never adequately shared what they "needed." Many of these things develop during childhood, linked to their family of origin, and notably have nothing to do with the betrayed spouse. People tend to assume that a betrayed spouse must have done something to cause the wayward to stray. Sounds logical, I suppose. In many cases, it just turns out that the cheater was also the crappier spouse. That seems pretty logical to me, too. It happens to be true that in many marriages, the wayward is actually the "overbenefitted" partner in the relationship. Frank Pittman makes that case pretty well. What is consistent is that the wayward made the choice to cheat. They chose to deceptively keep their spouse committed to the marriage while they went out and played single. I don't believe that anyone made them select that particular choice. 1
Author Timshel Posted January 20, 2015 Author Posted January 20, 2015 This is a good example of where a BS is willing to admit that they weren't perfect in their marriage. And I'd say it's fairly typical of the BSs around here to admit to imperfections. Is there a perfect marriage out there? I do find it interesting that there are some spouses in horrible marriages but never cheat. And we find plenty of waywards that admit to having a perfectly good spouse and marriage at home, yet they found themselves cheating anyway. I bet I could find half a dozen threads like that in just 10 minutes. This leads me away from any cause and effect theories. Some people just want to have "more" from life than any one person can provide; they have an excessive need for external validation. Some people have an overdeveloped sense of entitlement; they "deserve to be happy." Others are so conflict-avoidant that they never adequately shared what they "needed." Many of these things develop during childhood, linked to their family of origin, and notably have nothing to do with the betrayed spouse. People tend to assume that a betrayed spouse must have done something to cause the wayward to stray. Sounds logical, I suppose. In many cases, it just turns out that the cheater was also the crappier spouse. That seems pretty logical to me, too. It happens to be true that in many marriages, the wayward is actually the "overbenefitted" partner in the relationship. Frank Pittman makes that case pretty well. What is consistent is that the wayward made the choice to cheat. They chose to deceptively keep their spouse committed to the marriage while they went out and played single. I don't believe that anyone made them select that particular choice. So true, no one can make anyone do ANYTHING. My question was leaning more toward contributing to the behavior of WS reaching away from the marriage. It is interesting to me also that you are right, there does tend to be an assumption that the BS did something wrong for the WS to stray. Unless, of course the WS is just your garden variety douche that everyone knows won't be faithful. You know, the one's everyone rolls their eyes at when they hear about their latest conquest. I am aware of some situations with women, however, that felt stuck financially in a marriage and felt they had no choice to stay because of not being able to make it without their spouse. A viable reason to cheat, no. I think there are some people who will cheat because it is a dysfunctional part of their personality. Then there are some who are simply married to the wrong person, resigned because they don't see a way out and then meet someone who brings them some joy again. Not because they were looking or that it was their intention, it just happened. They were vulnerable to this happening.
elaine567 Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 Is it less about morals and ethics and more about personality traits perhaps? For example Is the person in a very bad marriage who would not cheat, just a person who, is risk averse as opposed to the cheater who grasps the opportunity if it is presented, no matter how risky it is? Is the person who wouldn't cheat in a bad marrage more centred, they don't really NEED the love and affection in the same way a cheater does, maybe they are just more self reliant? Does the person who wouldn't cheat, have less self esteem, no-one would ever want them, so they don't go looking perhaps, no matter how bad the marriage gets? The cheater is perhaps more aware of their own powers of attraction. Just a thought
serial muse Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 Yes, this is what intrigued me about this discussion. Often, the spouse cheated on leaves the relationship or stays in it with the "Trump" card. You committed the ultimate marital sin, therefore I have no responsibility and you are a complete ***hole. Case closed. I wonder if after the initial hurt and shock (wake up call) if the spouse instead of reveling in the "sin" of the cheater, took a long look at their role or the lack there of in the marriage. Everyone agreed that cheating is wrong. We also agreed how lovely in wonderland if every person who cheated had the foresight to announce that this would occur and leave the marriage untainted. By demonizing the cheater, unless serial, do we let the other 50% off the hook? My observation is that most BS do quite a lot of soul-searching in the aftermath. I know that I personally went through a phase where I almost entirely blamed myself -- in part because I was depressed, and in part, because I think that's part of the process: You're looking for some way, any way, that you could have prevented it. Had you only known. Had you been more xxx. Had you done yyy. Some small semblance of control over a situation that is entirely out of your hands. But I think that the healthy resolution is to realize that no, the choice to cheat is a particular (and particularly bad) conflict-resolution choice and it's separate from problems within the marriage. I also think that there is a tendency to create a false 50/50 share of blame: The BS is 100% responsible for the demise of the marriage, and the WS is 100% responsible for the cheating. See, we're all owning our own stuff, right? But no, that's also false. It varies from couple to couple, of course, but the BS is never 100% responsible for the marriage problems; that's just the storyline that a WS tells the AP. Both parties need to own their stuff when it comes to whatever has gone wrong in the marriage; but the WS needs to also own the cheating, separately and wholly. I think that in marriages where that can happen, reconciliation is possible. But otherwise, no. And I think that a lot of WS buckle under the weight of owning both the affair and their share of marriage problems. That's why you so often see this tit-for-tat, as though that's "fair". But it's supremely unfair, actually. 4
runredlights Posted January 20, 2015 Posted January 20, 2015 I think it could definitely be true in how a lot of you are saying that the WS had certain has tendencies like conflict avoidance, poor communication, or "broken". She did have some of those traits. I'v seen broken thrown around a lot too so perhaps one of you would be able to clarify that with a little more detail. It would be nice to believe that an ex has major character flaws and is a lost soul, but it could also be a rationalization to protect the ego. The latter could be that they simply don't care about you (apparently not since she cheated, did nothing to fix it, and then broke up with me) at all and knew it was going to end. By all means, either of the two are more than enough reason not be with someone. There's probably a nasty combination of the two.
.thumb.jpg.5b545778ea4e1274f0665b2aa00b2629.jpg)
Recommended Posts