Do you consider the bottom blog post to be accurate?
Project Happily Ever After
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5 Ways We All Cheat on Our Spouses
Posted: 11 Jul 2012 11:35 AM PDT
When most people think of cheating, they think of extramarital affairs, usually of the sexual kind.
Yet take a moment to consider why we call it “cheating.” A couple agrees to a set of rules when they marry, and often these rules include sexual monogamy. When one partner has sex with someone outside of the marriage, he or she secretly breaks that rule. Essentially, the wayward partner continues to play the game of marriage, but by a different set of rules.
That’s why we call it “cheating.” By definition, cheating involves dishonesty, usually to gain an unfair advantage. It’s about deception, and it’s often also about avoiding an undesirable outcome.
Yet monogamy isn’t the only rule you agreed to follow when you married your partner. Chances are, you agreed to many rules—some of which were written down as vows and many of which were unspoken. Overtime, I’m guessing, you’ve broken some of those rules from time to time, and you did so in a secret effort to gain an unfair advantage.
For instance, maybe you:
Agreed to do something, all the while knowing you wouldn’t ever do it. You only agreed to get your spouse off your back. This is more damaging to a marriage than standing your ground.
Agreed to stop doing something, all the while knowing that you were not going to stop. For instance, maybe you told your spouse that you would never ride your bike without a helmet. Now you wear the helmet to a friend’s house, remove it, and then ride the rest of the way without it. (More about helmets in tomorrow’s post).
Did not keep your spouse’s confidence. Your spouse confided in you. You listened. You promised never to tell. Then you told.
Called a truce, and then grew your army. You resolved an argument in person, made up and claimed to move on. Then in secret, you told others about your argument and you swayed them to take your side and even encouraged them to needle your spouse about his or her stupidity.
You’ve told your kids, “Don’t tell Mommy.” Or perhaps you told them, “Don’t tell Daddy.” Rather than confront your spouse about a difference of parenting opinion, you defied your spouse behind his or her back.
If you don’t think the above cheats are “big deals,” consider how you would feel if the situation were reversed and your spouse was doing this to you. Would you feel loved, supported and admired? Would this behavior build trust? Or would it tear trust apart? Would it bring you closer or drive you farther apart?
Alisa Bowman is a journalist and author of Project: Happily Ever After, a memoir of how she saved her marriage. This was originally posted on ProjectHappilyEverAfter.com.
The author just needed a story for her blog and a soap box to preach on... Pretty lame way to twist the word of cheating. It's all semantics I guess.
All of that is well and good. It's all examples of things you need to work on to make sure you don't do.
However, it's not cheating. Sorry, but cheating is going outside your marriage for what you should be getting from within your marriage, whether it is sex, emotional connections, or something else. That's cheating.
I agree that the blog post illustrates examples of "cheating".....but not in the vernacular term we're all used to.
NONE of the examples are of healthy, honest relationship behaviours, but I don't think most people would consider then "deal-breakers", as so many do with adultery.
My personal opinion on the blog post? Sounds preachy.
I would not consider any of this cheating, just bad relationship behaviour.
My husband is guilty of this one: Agreed to do something, all the while knowing you wouldn’t ever do it. You only agreed to get your spouse off your back. Its certainly not "cheating" its just a great way to piss off your spouse and make a big fight out of something!
I do not claim to be the perfect wife and mother...but I WILL say that I have NEVER done any of the suggested "cheating". I have no issue with telling my husband I am not going to do something....he can stay on my back all he wants, I am not going to do it. I would never tell my kids not to tell dad something. I am very thankful that my marriage is NOT like that. Bleh. It sounds awful.
But guess what? None of that is cheating. I can work through a lot of those examples with my husband. But if he decided to lay down with another woman and have SEX with her then I am not willing to work on a damn thing.
L.
She's right! Cheating has it's basis in being dishonest and sneaky. All of the above fit in those two categories.
It's not cheating so much as it's not fighting fair.
All it's saying is:
If you want some honest communication and conflict resolution to happen,
don't be underhanded, two-faced and sneaky about it.
I get her point.
Sex outside the relationship is definitely breaking marriage vows, and these other things may not be out and out breaking of vows, but it doesn't make for strong relationships - which can also lead to breaking marriages.
Call it what you will, these things are marriages killers. I totally agree with her, in that.
Lack of good communication skills, yes, immaturity, yes, cheating - nope.
I can say I've NEVER broken a confidence with my husband or anyone else for that matter. If someone tells me something is "just between us" then it remains just between us. With the exception of my husband on most accounts. Meaning all of our friends know we don't keep secrets from each other. Of course I'm not offering up to my husband that Sue spent $250 on boots but told Bob they only cost her $50. But if he asked me how much did those boots cost Sue I'm certainly not going to lie to my husband. However, everyone knows where we stand with our views of fidelity and relationships. So if you're cheating on your SO, do NOT tell either one of us if you do not one the other one of us to know. Because we will tell each other that one. Not out of a need to gossip but out of concern for said couple and what we can do to help them get back on track.
I think all of us are guilty at some point of saying "Yes Dear, I'll take care of that ASAP." Which really means when I get "aroundtoit" ;D Again, I don't consider that breaking a vow or cheating...that's just life.
I do not bad mouth my spouse to others. If we've had a disagreement then we work it out. There is no need to involve other people to validate you in your own argument. That's just silly immature behavior not cheating.
Now we have playfully said to our oldest "Oh don't tell Daddy/Mommy this or that" however the other person is right there in the room with us and everyone, including our girls know we are teasing. The girls know we are a united front. Mommy and Daddy make all the decisions together and we will always back each other up. No need for secrets, we just all follow the rules. But again, I wouldn't consider that cheating just bad parenting.
I think this list would better categorized as immature behavior in a marriage but most certainly wouldn't consider it cheating.
Peace and Blessings,
T. B
I consider it to be true, but also think you have to account for the fact we're all humans and everyone makes mistakes. Whether you make one over and over and it becomes a way of life or one huge mistake in your partners eyes is what is important in my opinion.
I think you have to know eachothers limits and ideals. for one person telling a friend a marital issue they said they wouldn't could J. be annoying while to another with baggage in this area it may be huge.
I agree and always have. "Cheating" happens any time the couple makes an agreement and then the other changes that agreement with disregard to that agreement, whatever that agreement might be. This is why I think that we should not go into marriage with assumptions about how it ought to go. There are enough bumps along the way.
For example, my husband and I talked and agreed to what "keeping only to each other" would mean in our marriage. For some it might that sex without intimacy with another is okay. We actually talked about that and agreed to what those terms would mean for us.
If my husband is "cheating" on our marriage, then he is putting someone/something before our marriage, giving it more value. The act itself might not be a problem. The problem occurs when it is done in secret or in direct contradiction with something that we've already agreed to and that I am trusting him to honor.
Cheating happens any time you keep playing the game but aren't playing by the established rules. In our marriage, my husband and I both establish the rules, not one or the other.
I think the situations mentioned, are not "cheating" in the popular, legal sense of marriage dissolution, a.k.a. "adultery," but they ARE signs that there are definite marital problems, for sure.
The english language can be quite tricky. Words can have multiple meanings. In our society, when we say one spouse "cheated" on another - we are referring to adultery. Not any of the above situations.
However, by dictionary standards, then yes, it is technically "cheating". If you are doing the above items, then yes, you are "cheating" your spouse out of the loving trusting relationship that they deserve.
But, I'd be careful to use this term to say Bill "cheated" on Sally, because most people are going to think the worst of Bill...
I was reading through all of these thinking "wow, I can't believe anyone would DO that, I would never..." Then I got to the last one and thought "Doh! " I have said "Don't tell Daddy I let you have an ice cream cone" and even "Don't tell Daddy I got pulled over by the Policeman for speeding," but in the second case it was just because I wanted to be the one to tell him and not have the kids yell it at the top of their lungs as soon as we got home! And I agree with Lesley S., this is a littel preachy and these behaviors are not what I would label "cheating" at all.
