Cheleigh
Well-Known Member
I was thinking about Jesse James' sorry apology to Sandra and kids, and in that post, some folks pointed out that Jesse was basically trailer trash anyway, so what did you expect. And Tiger and Michael J are celebrities so what do you expect.
But I think that whether a man is at your level or not, a man might cheat. Lawyers cheat. Pastors cheat. Fine upstanding citizens, (previously) great husbands and great fathers cheat. There's a very good article in April's O magazine called "The After Wife," and it's a story about a wife dealing with her husband after he cheated--a man that she would never have suspected of cheating initially.
The more I live, the more I think that it's a man's nature to WANT to cheat, and he spends his (married) life fighting/managing that desire. The things that cheating gives men--excitement (versus the "boredom" of day to day married life); anonymity (only having to show one side of himself to a woman versus the transparency needed to have a successful married relationship); the focus on the "sex" (versus the focus on the intimacy); the ego stoking (a new woman doesn't deal with the issues the married wife deals with so she stokes his ego with the 10% she does know about him, versus what the wife sees daily. Men can be somewhat naive when it comes to ego stoking, so what we see right through, they get all starry eyed over.)--I think these sort of things appeal to a man on a very gut instinctive level that don't appeal to women as much. When women cheat, it tends to be more for what they perceive as a lack of emotional support at home. There are plenty of men who get emotionally connect with a woman first too, but I think that the serial cheaters, the one-night-stand/convenience cheaters, the casual cheaters are probably more prevalent in men than women, and they probably form the higher percentage of male cheaters.
I do wish that all these folks who write the self-help books, articles in magazines and therapists that talk about how a woman can prevent her man from cheating would allow that cheating does appeal to men, that it's important to acknowledge it, and then help men learn to manage and channel that desire into ways commiserate with a committed monogamous relationship. I don't think it's bad to publicly acknowledge that most men (not all, and maybe not the vast majority, but a significant percentage) would cheat if they thought there would be no consequence. I think it's biological, not just a mental thing. I would rather my hubby get tools to cope with it now than having to deal with the aftermath of a cheater husband. We adjust women's biology all the time (we don't have to give into our body's natural desire to have children in our late teens and early 20s, for example through BC) so why not a man's?
But I think that whether a man is at your level or not, a man might cheat. Lawyers cheat. Pastors cheat. Fine upstanding citizens, (previously) great husbands and great fathers cheat. There's a very good article in April's O magazine called "The After Wife," and it's a story about a wife dealing with her husband after he cheated--a man that she would never have suspected of cheating initially.
The more I live, the more I think that it's a man's nature to WANT to cheat, and he spends his (married) life fighting/managing that desire. The things that cheating gives men--excitement (versus the "boredom" of day to day married life); anonymity (only having to show one side of himself to a woman versus the transparency needed to have a successful married relationship); the focus on the "sex" (versus the focus on the intimacy); the ego stoking (a new woman doesn't deal with the issues the married wife deals with so she stokes his ego with the 10% she does know about him, versus what the wife sees daily. Men can be somewhat naive when it comes to ego stoking, so what we see right through, they get all starry eyed over.)--I think these sort of things appeal to a man on a very gut instinctive level that don't appeal to women as much. When women cheat, it tends to be more for what they perceive as a lack of emotional support at home. There are plenty of men who get emotionally connect with a woman first too, but I think that the serial cheaters, the one-night-stand/convenience cheaters, the casual cheaters are probably more prevalent in men than women, and they probably form the higher percentage of male cheaters.
I do wish that all these folks who write the self-help books, articles in magazines and therapists that talk about how a woman can prevent her man from cheating would allow that cheating does appeal to men, that it's important to acknowledge it, and then help men learn to manage and channel that desire into ways commiserate with a committed monogamous relationship. I don't think it's bad to publicly acknowledge that most men (not all, and maybe not the vast majority, but a significant percentage) would cheat if they thought there would be no consequence. I think it's biological, not just a mental thing. I would rather my hubby get tools to cope with it now than having to deal with the aftermath of a cheater husband. We adjust women's biology all the time (we don't have to give into our body's natural desire to have children in our late teens and early 20s, for example through BC) so why not a man's?
