When it comes to relationships, the best piece of advice that most people can offer is simply—leave before you cheat. If you’re going to cheat on your partner, it’s usually because you are unhappy and unsatisfied in the relationship you’re currently in.
Many believe that it’s better for an unhappy partner to leave before they decide to betray another person—one that they once truly did love. However, as we all know, there are many people who do cheat instead of leaving.
And, Reddit users are sharing just why they decided to cheat on their partner instead of walking away before hurting them.
1.
Due to low self esteem, I thrived off attention, so rather than saying “no thank you, I have a girlfriend”, I’d let things continue. But at the same time, I also craved stability, so never wanted to break things off with said girlfriend. There’s nothing I regret more than hurting my ex like I did and karma finally caught up with me a few years later when I was cheated on by a different girlfriend, repeatedly. I didn’t endthat relationship after I found out about her cheating the first time, as I felt I deserved it from my past shittiness. I vowed never to cheat again, especially after feeling the pain myself.
2.
Immaturity, and a lot of insecurity. I was a teenager the only time I ever cheated and it wasn’t even a thought process when I did it, it was really just “I want that right now” and the fact that I had a girlfriend didn’t even cross my mind because I had never had to think of others’ feelings in that way before. I was an insecure kid who thought that having a lot of sex meant I was masculine and it proved something, but now I know its just a scum move.
After the person I cheated with told my girlfriend, I learned reallyquickly what those actions meant and what kind of behavior is expected from a SO. Wish I didn’t have to hurt someone to figure it out though.
3.
I was in an abusive relationship and wanted to feel like I had power over something. I didn’t.
4.
I cheated with an ex long term SO. That relationship was was so fucking co-dependent and unhealthy. The break up made me want to die. I was trying so hard to move on and put myself back together. I didn’t want to end the new relationship. The ex was like my kryptonite, it took a long time to be able to not get sucked back in. It was because of my own baggage not the new SO. I screwed up.
5.
I have cheated once. I loved this guy more than I can say in words, but we did not have a healthy relationship. He cheated on me. I even caught him once in bed with another man and I stayed with him anyways because he was my world. He was my best friend. He was my family.
But we didn’t have sex. It killed me inside. I would show up at his house wearing nothing but lingerie and a fur coat (I wish this was a made up story by FML it isn’t) and he would ignore me.
I didn’t feel like I was attractive or sexy and it got to the point where I didn’t think he would even care if I had sex with someone else. So one night, I was out at a show with a bunch of people, including a guy I had an innocent crush on and we ended up kissing. One kiss. I felt terrible about it afterwards. Sick. I confessed to my boyfriend and he went insane. He punched the windshield of my car and shattered it while I was driving. It was bad. He felt betrayed.
Looking back at this 20 years later, it’s obvious what was going on, but I didn’t see it at the time. I was young, naive and he was everything to me.
I regretted hurting him then and I still regret it to this day. I have never cheated on anyone again. Cheating isn’t the answer. Talk it out, work it out or get out.
6.
I was with my ex for 7 years. He was incredibly emotionally abusive, he constantly called me fat, compared me to his female friends and made sure I knew he wanted to fuck them, told me no other guy would ever want me. He eventually got to the point of changing the wifi password and making me do tasks to get it, taking tv remotes, my phone etc. I was afraid to leave my house because of him. I had pretty severe bipolar disorder and issues with self harming (I was on medicine and 4 years cut free at this point). We were supposed to be going on a trip to Colorado, about a week before he told me he only loved me as a friend but wanted to stay with me because he didn’t know how to be alone, I was devastated, but didn’t think I was mentally or financially independent to leave, he had basically isolated me from all of my friends and I moved away from family to be with him. We decided to stay together and just “work on things” , essentially we both just hoped he would start loving me again I guess.
The daywe were leaving for CO, he informed me he never bought my ticket and never intended on me going. I stayed home and cheated while he was on that trip. As soon as he came home I told him. I felt awful, I knew there was no excuse for what I did regardless of how he treated me. I told him I wanted to leave, we broke up but continued living together for the next 6 months, him mostly trying to “fix” our relationship while I just wanted to bury my pain in other people. It was truly awful and I wish I would’ve just been strong enough to leave rather than cheat. I will regret it probably for the rest of my life although I am ultimately thankful our relationship ended.
7.
I got cheated on by my first girlfriend. You know the one, you lose your virginity together and talk about marriage way too young. We were messed up kids inadvertently keeping each other emotionally hostage.
Once that relationship ended I went full on dirtbag mode. Started doing a ton of drugs and sleeping w a ton randoms. Usually had a gf, but never really cared. Only got caught once, but made a lot of very questionable decisions.
Nowadays I’m in a much better emotional and mental place. Have been in a wonderfully committed relationship for several years where I feel safe and comfortable. There’s nothing better than being able to provide that same reassurance for my partner.
It’s hard reconciling who I was with the person I try to be today. Some of it may have been the drugs or my chaotic upbringing, but mostly I was just a reckless person who was too selfish to really care about how my actions impacted others.
8.
It was a dead bedroom situation. And not just no sex, but no intimacy, no connection and fairly toxic. But I felt stuck in the overall relationship and didn’t know how to get out. The first time I had an affair, it was more of an impulsive mistake that I regretted deeply and said, I’ll never do that again.
I tried to make the marriage work, but a few years later it wasn’t, and I thought having a sexual/romantic affair would round out things that were missing in my life and make things surviveable. Instead, after barely even meeting up with the “other” man, it made me realize, I can’t do this, I need to decide between being married or not. I was separated and divorced two months later.
So, I guess I only half qualify to answer the question because it’s not like I continued merrily along with the relationship.
9.
I was young and stupid and I didn’t think about how my actions would impact other people. Or I felt like I got lost in it emotionally. I didn’t have the self restraint. I wasn’t used to someone liking me and I felt like if I didn’t take the opportunity to interact with someone who was interested in me, I would never get the opportunity again. There’s a lot of factors.
10.
I cheated on a boyfriend because I knew it was the only way he’d let me out of the emotionally and sexually abusive relationship.
11.
Because if I even mentioned cutting things off with him, he would hit and throw things at me until I bled and bruised. He was a very, very morbid man, which didn’t show until years into the relationship to begin with.
I cheated on him because the person I went to as a safe haven in between assaults made me feel safe and made me feel loved, and I didn’t have a feeling of “I need to get out of here!” constantly weighing on my mind.
Luckily, I got out of the relationship with help of friends, and I havea daughter with my safe haven, we’re married, and he’s not so much as raised a hand at me. I’m safe.
12.
What happened: I was crossfaded to the point where I didn’t really know what was happening. As a part of a spin the bottle game I found myself in, I ended up making out with about five people.
Why I did it: At first I told myself it was a drunken mistake, that I wouldn’t have done it if I was sober or even moderately drunk. Which I’m sure is actually true. But looking back at it, I wasn’t that happy, and it was only about a month into the relationship. I’d known by the third date that it wasn’t going to work out in the end, we got along well, but something just didn’t feel right. I think that might have played a part in what I did. Why didn’t I end the relationship before? He was a great person, and I didn’t think I could do any better.
13.
Selfishness.
Thought I could have my cake and eat it too.
14.
Long distance, didn’t want to break up over the phone. Also, I felt like I was guilted into a relationship after having what I thought would just be a fling when I worked abroad.
I was never truly in love, and therelationship could never have worked out since we were from different cultures and neither of us wished to make a permanent move.
Still wrong though, these are not excuses, just explanations.
15.
I started getting unhappy, noticing the little annoying things more and started to resent her and myself for the person I was becoming, made a mistake in not communicating this cause I was afraid of hurting her by telling her I loved her but wasn’t in love, after about 7 months of this I got drunk at a party and made the choice to have sex with a random chick, I made out with her but my best friend stopped me 3-4 separate times before I could go any farther, felt like a piece of shit once I was sober, never told her(gf at the time) this but knew I’d do it again(and I wouldn’t be stopped) if I stayed in that situation so broke up with her two weeks later in person(had been long distance for 2 months at the time), tbh I think it was the push I needed to finally be able to break up with her, just wish I hadn’t needed to betray my morals and the trust I had in myself to do it. Was my first long term relationship.
16.
It was my first relationship and I didn’t have the backbone to end it. She was far away and the girl I was really in love with confessed her feelings to me and it went from there. My girlfriend broke up with me shortly after because she wanted to travel the world, and I never told her I cheated on her. I feel bad for not telling her, but it ended l amicably and I don’t see a reason to hurt her just to ease my own guilt.