My wife cheated on me. Should I cheat also?

Would it be easier to cope with the guilt if I cheated also, instead of the devastation from her cheating?


Or would it just make it worse?

Why sully yourself by descending to her level ?


Assuming yo have done the right thing, and she's a bit of a whore, if you did stray now you would end up feeling grubby, and she would be unaffected.

If you cheat, are you going to do it for yourself, or will you let her know about it?

Two wrongs dont make a right...


And if you dont have kids, I would seriously consider ditching the cheater...and if you do have kids, I would seriously think long and hard about how you can remain married to someone who was willing to bin you and the kids for someone else to horizontal shuffle with! *SMH*


If you think cheating is gonna make you feel better, consider why you haven't already done it to this day. Its not you. And revenge doesn't make you feel better, it only makes you feel like you have become someone you are not.

Yes, and with her best friend!


No, seriously. As often said to the ladies who finfd their husbands stray, you need to consider why she has done this. Have you been working too long, travelling too much, partying too much and therefore not fulfilling her needs? A satisfied person doesn't stray. Is there something you need to do or change to "improve" the home front?


If after careful consideration the answer to the above is no, you have been fulfilling her needs, then you need to, as JC2 says, seriously consider ditching the cheater. If you have given her all she needs and she feels she needs more, that is not going to change.


A horrible situation for you.

Thanks everyone for your replies. It's great to hear opinions since I can't really talk about this to our friends and I certainly don't want to talk about it to my mates. Here are my thoughts on the replies.


My Hong Kong,


I haven’t really thought it through. I guess I would be doing it for myself simply on the basis that guilt would be better that feeling crushed. And no, if I actually did it, then I wouldn’t let her know. There’s been enough hurt dished out in our home.


Justin Credible,


it’s not about revenge. It’s whether feeling guilty is better than feeling the hurt. I suppose feeling guilty AND hurt would be worse. But I think you are right. I’m not a cheater but that makes it more difficult for me to understand how someone could do it.


Spurtio,


she had self esteem issues, especially after the kids were born. I wasn’t a good husband as I should have been and in particular I should have complimented her much more on how good she looks. But I never imagined it would come to this.

Paxinou, as Justin has pointed out, two wrongs don't make it right... and at least now she may feel guilty for her cheating, but once you cheat, then that makes you two even and she feels no guilt at all....


I can understand the hurt feeling, do not make any drastic decision now, let it cool. Then start thinking about if you still love her (considering that her stray is just a fling and not something serious), and is willing to forgive her and start anew, as you have admiited yourself, you have faults too. Talk to her and see if she still wants this marriage and hopefully you two can move on. I know it is very hard to forgive someone who betray you, indeed very hard... but it is something you need to do if you want her and the marriage. Good luck

Don't blame yourself. if she felt neglected she could have said something to you. Was it a one night stand or long-term relationship ? Here is what I would do but please consider the fact that I am Italian. Invite the guy she cheated with over to your apartment on the premise that you want to forgive and forget and then explain the sanctity of marraige to him before tossing the f**ker off of your balcony !

If you are to cheat as a form of revenge, I would say don't do it. However, if it's a way to make you feel more balanced (ie she doesn't know) and make you more capable of staying with her and bringing up the kids then it might not be such a bad thing (ie it may reduce the resentment). However, it would mean cheating and not getting involved too much with the other woman. Brooklynexpat's vendetta strategy is appealing but it's not so easy to disappear into the Sicilian wilderness out here - well it may be possible to take to the hills above DB. Anyway, don't feel too bad about it. You're not the first and you won't be the last.

Brooklynexpat, it happened during a conference. So I don’t know whether it was a one night stand or a three night stand. I did send him an email saying that I hoped to run into him sometime. And I meant it literally. The Sicilian wilderness is very appealing at the moment.

The Italian way sounds good to me...

and darling if she is ok with cheating I think she should be able to hadle face to face both of you and then you can see how serious she is about you 2 other wise you can just dump her....

once cheater always a cheater ....

If you care for her, revenge will only turn you into a bitter person.


But the question is not what you should be doing, but rather what is she doing? She's the one that needs to be doing all the talking at this stage.. make your decisions after you've heard what she has to say.

rob is right, and also, dont let her turn this all around on you and blame you for her failings.


Some people are really good at that. Of course, as you have stated, you feel like you may not have been the most attentive and maybe not the most caring husband...and that is a problem with a lot of men and how they come at problems, I hear it time and again, "I knew we had problems, but I always believed those problems were small enough to handle...I never thought it would come to this." When asked by the women they are with, "How long did you think we could go on living like this?" (insert exhasperated tone), most men really, genuinely, had no idea things were that bad.


Women feel the weight of emotional emptiness far greater than men. So yep, hmm...I dunno, talk it though and see where you go from here. My own personal experience though, once someone has cheated, its pretty frikken hard to recover from it. Not saying its not possible, but I aint the one holding cheerleading pompoms at the sidelines if you were to ask me....

Justin Credible,


“"I knew we had problems, but I always believed those problems were small enough to handle...I never thought it would come to this." When asked by the women they are with, "How long did you think we could go on living like this?" (insert exhasperated tone),”


That was exactly part of the conversation that we had at the time. I still want to talk about it and understand how it happened, but she gets upset and says that we talked about it already and we need to put it behind us. Not so easy as you say. So I honestly don’t know where to go from here.

Agree with Justin that for most couples its hard to move on. The problem is that its always going to be present, whether you want to forget it or not. A song on the radio is going to pop up with lyrics about cheating.. it comes up always as a subject in movies. Somehow you just cant escape from it.


You might also want to work out if the reason your wife doesnt want ot talk about is because she simply just cant be bothered repeating herself (and is insensitive to your needs to talk about it), or if she is so troubled by it and regrets it so much that she wants to erase if from her memory.


You should know her character better than anyone else, and if you suspect it will happen again, then you might as well save your energy and forget her. If your instincts tell you that she truly regrets it, then its up to you if you can live with it and forgive her.

How did this come out? Did you catch her out or did she fess up?


My reason for asking is it sounds as if she wants to brush it under the carpet and move on as if nothing had happened, which made me think she was caught out. My concern would therefore be that had she not been caught out would she have been continuing, with him, or others? If that's the case you really do need to understand where you want to go from here.

The cheater, guilt ridden or even genuinely sorry, doesn't need a reminder about having made a mistake no more than the one cheated on needs to hear that song or watch that movie with that line in it.


Its not like your wife is trying to sweep it under the rug, its probably because there is so much that has been left unsaid (or repeatedly said but unheard) for so long, that it seems almost too painful to face the reality of how far one has slid down the slippery slope to the bottom.


If you two decide to put it behind you, it will take BOTH of you to do so, and as spurtio highlighted, sweeping it under the rug is not an option. But the reality is that at least for the one who was cheated on, its hard to look at the other without feeling someone else has touched what you have touched, someone else has held what you hold dear and someone else has done all the things you once did...but trust me on this...with love and hopes of forgiveness, you will be able to get past that feeling and you will be able to be intimate again...but...you will never be able to make jokes about cheaters, and yes, movies, songs...the lot, it will always happen that it scrapes at the surface of the varnish you put to get over the tear in your marriage...


Where once you could talk to each other about cheaters as being "those people" as you both looked at each other knowingly and full of confidence, you will no longer be able to say "those people" nor look at each other in the eyes when someone else says "those people" without knowing how much it hurts you to hear it.


As you said, you would never do it, so it is hurting your very soul that this person you love, you trust, could be so careless with your heart...but you should also know that in some way, you had a hand in making her that careless and she should admit that in her actions, she had a hand in being careless with your heart.


Love, marriage, family, none of its made to be perfect, but if you want it to work, then you can achieve it...its just not gonna be as easy as sweeping it under the rug. There are gonna be a lot of hard truths that you will have to face and to see whether you two are willing to put in the hard work it takes in being honest with each other and taking a long hard look at how worthwhile you feel it is to keep having faith in the vows you made.


I honestly hope things work out for you...and remember, its possible. Forgiveness can be had and given, even if forgetting is near impossible...but you have to think about what it is you both value the most and then do the right thing to make it happen.


Seriously, good luck to you...


And if all else fails, there is always divorce court...but let me tell you, divorce really sucks nads...and your family will never be the same again...but that too can be made to work if its what you two truly want. So yeah, good luck to you both in finding a way to cope and work through your problems in an adult and can-do manner.

I think the reason she doesn’t want to talk about it is because she regrets it and because it is an extremely difficult subject to discuss with your spouse. I’ll be patient for the moment, but there will be a time very soon when I will insist that we do talk about it.


Spurtio, the concern you mentioned, that had she not been caught out she would have been continuing with him, is what keeps me awake at night. Luckily, for our kids’ sake, there is still a chance to repair things. But we shall see.

Seems to me that she does not want to talk about it as it is still going on!...?

She doesn't want to talk about it because she doesn't want to be confronted with her own misdeeds. 2 possibilities here : Either she's contrite, and regrets it, or she wants to preserve her facade as a good woman, so she can manipulate you in the future ... you need to decide which.

purple crayon had that last line down pat.


Dont be a chump and let her do it again...