Well, I find it odd that I would be much more receptive to you saying that instead of my H. He had me and the OW fooled so I have no way of neatly directing my anger at the OW. There's a cognitive dissonance I wrestle with. I saw signs of his guilty conscience during his A that I didn't recognize for what it was yet he continued. He did this, why? Of course he has his issues, family of origin issues, yadda yadda... but he knew full well what he was doing. I can't help but think he must've found all kinds of reasons to hate me.

I hear what you're saying, but I don't know if it applies to him. Thanks for your insight.

I don't think my wife did it to hurt me but I do know that she could not of not know what she is doing she is an adult and knew what she was doing was wrong and knew it would destroy me. She made her chose to do it anyway. So I know that she did not do it to hurt me but she knew it would hurt me.

" I don't think my wife did it to hurt me but I do know that she could not of not know what she is doing she is an adult and knew what she was doing was wrong and knew it would destroy me. She made her chose to do it anyway. So I know that she did not do it to hurt me but she knew it would hurt me. "

Agreed.

Let keep it simple. Everyone knows right from wrong and everyone knows when they are married and they get emotionally or physically involved with someone, other than their spouse, they are having an affair. Simple. They told us that when we said our vows and you learn this as soon as you knew the meaning of dating, your parents taught you that and the church beats it into your head before you even know what adultery is. EVERYONE who has dated understands cheating. The why you did it is where it varies, but no matter what you knew it was wrong.

I think this is when selfishness comes into play. Everyone tries to justifies why they cheat and though there are good reasons to work harder on your relationship or leave, they are just excuses, period. Because everyone has flaws, no one is perfect in their relationship it just some people can deal with those flaws better and accept their spouse flaws and all. If we all cheat because we don't like something our spouse is doing EVERYONE will be committing adultery and there would be no point to a marriage. Either work on the issues, accept them or leave adding another person is not the answer unless there is an agreement between both partner.

A easy way to know if you are doing wrong is to say, how would I feel if my spouse did this to me? If you feel they would not care, tell them what you are doing. If you can't tell them what you are doing, you know you are doing wrong.

People do a lot of things they shouldn't do from stealing time on the clock, to office supplies to much bigger things. When you do wrong you always think, if no one finds out no one gets hurt but you know when you do it you are hurting the company or that person, you just haven't faced the consequences of the action yet so it's easy to deny doing it and justify it until you are caught.

If you are single but dating a married man, you are just as wrong, it's just you are not hurting anyone, on your side but yourself but you are just as much responsible for the damage to the other party's partner as them. Why? Because you know what you are doing is wrong. The only way you are exempt is if you didn't know the person was married.

I know for a fact my husband did not do it to hurt me but like Jason, he knew it would if I found out and that is the key to any secret...if you find out what then? When the line are first crossed most people are terrified, they are scared of getting caught. That how you know it's wrong. The more you get away with it the easier it gets to compartmentalize your wrong doing from your home life.

All married people (or people in serious relationships would like to say that their spouse would never cheat. That is just a fantasy and an expectation we know can't be upheld to at least 50% of the population (I think it more like 75% a lot of affairs are not discovered). I also think if you married young and/or stay with someone for a long period of time your chances of getting cheated on increase. I got married young, early 20's it took almost 20 years but it happened. May have before now but I can't worry about that now.

" I thought that if another woman wanted me, you would want me
more"

"I am still half mad at you because caused me to have an A"

"You were a bitch for five years before I had an A ( not true by the way) what did you expect to happen?"

Just a few select quotes from the person who just happened to have an A by" Accident"

Here's one from the poor confused OW who never meant to hurt anyone either. " My H is a sniveling Pu**Y and he was never there for me". She wasn't a bit mad at him and her pursuing my H was an accident too.

"I don't care about you ( me and my child ) or your family"

This was e-mailed to me when I asked her to stay out of our lives. People have affairs all the time to get back at others. That is why they are called "revenge affairs" by professionals. Part of accepting responsibility for an A is to accept that an A is not an accident and can be prevented if a person is motivated to do so. If an A is an accident than so is car theft and bank robbery. If it is a" trap" it is one of the cheater's own making. My H and his AP both went out of their way to hurt their respective spouses. How can I believe otherwise when the proof of this was right in front of me? Why should I give them credit for having better motives than they actually had? I certainly wasn't given the benefit of the doubt on that.

Cheaters know the pain that knowledge of the affair would inflict

that is a fact

yet cheaters cheat

tells me all i need to about what type of creatures that cheaters are

you can coat, sugar coat, that turd anyway you want it still is a fact

i would agree that "the act is evil, not always the person."

however, i maintain that the act is evil, AND sometimes the person. so for every person who defends their CS, there is at least one out there who has been at the mercy of a cold, calculating, lying, and manipulative spouse. who has/had no problem doing whatever it takes to get what they want. anyone who tries to go outside their marriage vows, while trying to keep their spouse at the same time, is at least acting from a pretty evil place at that given time. if you want your marriage, don't cheat. if you want someone else, tell your spouse. to have to lie, even by omission, and to do it willingly, is evil. does that make the person "evil" as a whole, not necessarily. but to pretend that they were/are not coming from a dark place at that time is just denial, it's just a bandaid for the feelings of the BS, to avoid feeling some of the pain that comes along with the knowledge that someone willingly deceived them.

i'd even go so far as to say that some are so evil, that they will continue to play nice, go through the motions at home, convince the BS that they have changed, because they still want to have their cake and eat it too. "the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world that he didnt exist." so likewise, i think some even go through all the motions of "reconciliation" to get their spouse to stay, and just become better at hiding. why? because some simply want a spouse AND a mistress, they like having both. and the sad thing is, no one really knows until it all plays out to the end. obviously most BS's trusted their CS's to begin with, so it would be unwise to think that some, if not many, of them don't relapse once the trust is regained. we can each of us believe whatever we want, but at the end of the day there is NO way to have absolute certainty that the CS won't do it again or isn't already doing it again, and that's just life. personally, i'm glad not to have to wonder if my CS is working on new ways to betray my trust. i'll take my chances with someone who has a clean track record with me, rather than someone who already knows what does and doesnt work when trying to sneak around on me (and therefore has at the advantage in a second round of attempted deceit).

Here is a light hearted illustration that will help explain the

1) WHY'S

2) HOW'S

............of A's.

I hope knowing the why's and how's of A's will bring some members here a small level of comfort.

Here is the PERFECT recipe for an affair smoothie.

Ingredients ---

1 Fruit of OPPORTUNITY (peeled)
1 scoop of LUST
1 scoop of TEMPTATION
1 cup of IGNORANCE
1 cup of MISUNDERSTANDING
1 cup of MISCONCEPTION

Combine all the ingredients in a large blender.

Blend all the ingredients for **********FOUR MONTHS***********

The resulting smoothie will be an AFFAIR

Well, guess if a person considers selfishness, insensitiveness and lying not bad...then they're not bad. I'm not quite sure how anyone separates what a person actually does, from who that person is. How in the heck do we know who a person is, but by what they do?

There is certainly a link between being and doing. Actions tend to flow from the heart. But neither do I think it is a one-to-one relationship. Some points to consider.

1. Being is the sum of your life experiences and personality disposition. What one does at a particular point adds to that identity narrative, but by itself represents only one "data point" in a longer history that may have little impact on one's "being". Coupled with a longer history of the same activity will have a greater affect on one's identity/being, but also may not be the final word.

2. All of us have done "evil" things in our life. Cheating, while certainly up there, is far from being the only evil act a person can do. Based on a black and white "do something evil, then you are evil" means we are all evil, which makes the distinction irrelevant.

3. What do you do with people who only cheated once, then repented and stopped, never to do it again? Is their life, which contains many good acts as well, deemed evil for that one moment of making a bad decision? If not, where is the line they pass over from being good or okay to being evil? Who decides this?

4. What does it tell the person deemed to be evil? "Don't try to change. You can't change who you are. You'll always be this way. So just give in to it."

5. In the end, what does it matter whether the person is evil or not (people can be, not by design, but by choice)? It is the actions which harm, hurt, and must be dealt with. Whether a person gives themselves over to evil or not, the net effect on the victim of the evil act is the same, and it is the behavior which we can deal with. None of us can neither see a person's heart or know their final destiny.

6. In light of 5, even if we could know whether a person is evil or not, focusing on that instead of dealing with what they have done is not productive. If we can know they are evil by what they did, you are still focusing on what they did to make that decision. It turns the focus away from their actions and toward placing labels on people. But doing that solves little. In the end, whether I think a person is evil or not holds little value, since I won't be the one making the final judgment on that issue anyway.

"Being" for humans is a dynamic thing anyway. I was just thinking today how different a person I am now than I was in my 20s. That life seems like a galaxy away. So much has happened, both good and bad, mistakes and shinning moments, bad decisions and examples of good character, that my ongoing identity narrative has grown a different "being" now than I had 30 years ago. If I live another 30, I'll probably be an even different person from now.

So whether a spouse's actions make them evil or not, and I'm not saying they can't, it is irrelevant. One, because that can change. Two, because all we can really see is the evil action, and that is what we must deal with. It doesn't matter whether they are evil or not in their heart at that moment.

Thanks Cole. That was a good perspective.

Most cs know that their cheating will destroy their spouse which is a big reason why they never tell. Atleast that seems to be the general thought process over at the CA board.

The subject of "to tell or not to tell" comes up often. The vast majority follow the concept of don't tell because it will devastate my spouse. So the vast majority is well aware of the enormity of their actions.

I always find that board a great source for insight. I do wish more of them would lurk here for insight without getting so offended. I also wish more people from here could find the strength to atleast read some posts there. While either side commenting or posting to the other side risks being torn a new asshole or asked to go away, reading and absorbing the other sides perspective can help heal.

There is gulit, justification, anger, addictive behavior, excuses, self loathing, and remorse. The cs can offer a birds eye view from the A standpoint.

However I don't recommend going unless you are prepared to see the many sides, good or bad.

And BTW I have never saw mys as evil. Cruel and selfish for many years but never evil.

Why oh why do we always complicated matters that are very simple?

Cheating is not an accident or a mistake. It's a series of very calculated moves designed to keep the betrayed in the dark so the cheater can enjoy cake. A mistake is forgetting to pick up milk at the grocery store. You don't slip on a banana peel and fall into someone else's genitals; you make a series of decisions to get you to that point.

Here's another ugly truth. If they are having sex with someone other than you, they aren't that into you anymore. They are not overwhelmed by the fog, accosted by a staggering facebook crush., etc. They feel entitled to their happiness and they had the opportunity so they did it..The End.

I don't believe they set out to hurt us because I don't believe that they're thinking about us at all. They are very skillfully putting you into a locked drawer so they continue to have unfettered access to cake. Does that make them evil? It's not for me to say. I just like to call them what they are-cheaters.

http://thevarmps.tumblr.com/

Before I say anything I'm gonna let you know I am a cheater. I had one affair. Slept with the man one time felt so bad about it I told my husband all about it and did everything in my power to regain his trust. All the way down to allowing him control of my phone... he deleted or blocked any number he didn't recognize (which complicated my job) we had one email and FB. So if you want to discount what I have to say because I'm one of them... so be it.

People are people. They make mistakes. Some bigger than others. Some make a series of mistakes that lead them down a dangerous path. Personally I confided in a man about how my marraige was. Instead of putting on my big girl panties and going against my fam my church and everything I'd been taught and getting a divorce I went against my own morals and let a friendship with a man slip into something it should not have.
Do I think this is the case with every cheater? No. I def don't. I don't ever think that every person should be judged by the generalities they fit into. Not every case and every person is the same. Treat people as they are not as u assume them to be.
Just my two cents.
Thanks