Being cheated on is one of the worst feelings in the world. When you love someone, you give them everything, and you want the same in return – naturally. You’re scared of losing them, and you want them to remain loyal to you. However, the world isn’t all black and white – it has a lot of technicalities and problems that make people stray from their goals. A lot of people cheat in relationships because they’re unhappy, most cheat because they just felt like it.
Reddit user u/Quackerz001 asked the people on Reddit why they cheated on their partners. Here are 13 of the top answers:
1. Dyn085 simply stated:
“I cheated because I was a selfish piece of sh*t, though at the time I gave a bunch of excuses because I was also a piece of sh*t who couldn’t take personal responsibility. About as simple as I can make it.”
2. Midnight_Barbara wrote:
“Pretty much this right here. I never had actual physical relationships with anyone but it was still cheating. I’d get dr*nk and it wouldn’t matter what I did in my mind. Then I’d sober up and just feel disgust at my actions. I was a terrible and selfish person. I really wanted women to like me. I don’t know why it was important but the SECOND we get to the point where meet ups are discussed I noped tf out. I needed the ego boost and hurt a lot of people for it. Now I’m alone and miserable and barely able to even entertain another relationship, ever. It is what I get for being the worst partner, in every sense, ever. If you’re gonna cheat just end it. I wished she had ended it with me 20 times over. She finally did and yeah, it’s what we deserve as selfish a**holes at the end of the day.”
3. MboiTui94 shared:
“Cheated on my first adult “long” (3 years) relationship. I was narcissistic, selfish, and I was hiding a lot from her because we were not communicating very well. I was young and just realised I could pleasure women after years of in securities and being b*llied as a teenager. so I wanted to explore my se*uality more. But instead of being a respecting adult and communicating that, I kept it all to myself, lied about my fantasies, flirted with anyone, etc. I was also too much of a coward to leave the relationship. So instead I cheated while acting like nothing happened in the relationship. She eventually found out of course, it destroyed her cause she trusted me 100%. We tried fixing things for a year and only made ourselves more miserable. Eventually broke up. We now talk every now and then, and we’re both in happy communicative healthy relationships. But we will never be able to be friends as I hurt and disrespected her too much, and it’s probably better we go our own ways.”
4. Chromedomesunite wrote:
“I was miserable, trying to make an unworkable situation work. Lack of communication, no love – mostly clinging to comfort and familiarity, little se*ual chemistry and neither of us were brave enough to call it quits when we should have. An ex came back into my life “the one who got away”, who was also in a relationship. It felt like everything I was missing had magically appeared in my life again. Was the worst decision I could have made. My partner never found out, but it only made things significantly more complicated. I wasn’t in a place to make things work with “the one”, nor was she and we lost our last chance to make it work. The biggest lesson I learned was; if you’re not ha”ppy- leave. If you’re seeking something elsewhere – leave. Get yourself and your life together before chasing someone you have feelings for. you don’t get as many opportunities as what you’d hope for.”
5. Blackrockmuscle shared:
“Growing up, I was teased relentlessly. From my ethnicity to my se*ual orientation. To say i had low self esteem was a understatement. Even though i was in a happy relationship, cheating was in a way for me a “win”. A boost of confident to show my younger self that im not that kid that nobody se*ually wanted.
Had nothing to do with my partner. She was a wonderful partner. It was due to personal childhood trauma that fested into this feeling of what i believe masculinity should be.
This is a real answer to this question. It took me years of therapy to realize why I would cheat on my partner without remorse. Low self esteem. Once i realized and came to the understanding, my desires completely dissipated.”
6. Vickyinredditland still regrets it:
“Because I was immature, stupid and lonely. That was 15 years ago, I’d never do it again.”
7. Winterwolf78 shared their story:
“Its the worst thing I’ve ever done, but you asked, so here we go.”
“We had A bad year and a half. She was so depressed and stuck in her own head that we couldn’t be intimate with eachoer no matter how hard we tried. Even feeling detached from one another during s*x. I asked her to get help. I couldn’t fix what was wrong. She didn’t. If it was me and her in the same room, we were alone. I didn’t want to leave. I loved her. Thought I’d marry her the moment school was done. She’d also talked about bringing a third into our relationship, but we never decided on who that would be or approached anyone.”
“This was college, and another ‘friend’ came along and lit a fire in me. The fire I’d been missing. I was enraptured and I fought that off for months but eventually the right glance and circumstances happened. I cheated like a giant f***ing a**hole. Didn’t do it the right way and got swept up in the moment. Biggest mistake of my life. That ‘friend’ was also f***ing my roommate and had no interest in actually caring about anyone in the end. She had her own demons and I made the voices shut up for a while. S*x was a weapon to get the comfort she wanted. I was a fool on all fronts. When I asked her to make things right with me, I got silence and separation.”
“It all blew to pieces eventually. When my girlfriend came back for the next semester she had gotten treatment at home and found a medical issue that was causing a lot of it. I confessed and it broke her heart like nothing ever had.”
“She was shockingly understanding after the initial hurt. I was honest with everything she asked and I spent another 5 months making it up to her. Focusing on her and genuinely trying all I could to make it up.”
“In the end, it was distance that killed us. She went several states away for grad school. I tried to find a job there, or where I lived but it took me a year to get a real job after school. Too much time apart made us used to being without each other, and when she called and said”
“I think this is over.” I had no rights to argue. I wanted her heart but no longer deserved it. We parted on good terms. I loved her, but I’d wronged her and failed her when things got difficult and stayed difficult.”
“It’s been 10 years now, and I miss her often, I’ve loved and lost since then, but the first three years of our relationship were the best relationship I have ever had. We would still talk for a while, but it didn’t take long for it to be uncomfortable when we defaulted back to how we had spoken to each other for years. Phone calls that should end in “I love you, and I miss you.” But can’t and don’t are really too f***ing painful and awkward.”
“She was worth sticking by and I f***ed it up. I defintley learned my lesson. It’s 1000 times better to break up clean, or have a 25th screaming match over what you know you have to fix, that ever cause that hurt in a loved one ever again.”
8. amaths wrote:
“Was married, wasn’t happy, tried very hard to make it work.”
“Met a gal at a new job… Left and never looked back.”
“New gal and i have been married almost 2 decades and i still can’t forgive myself for cheating.”
9. FancyPantsMN commented:
“Our relationship was one sided; he was physically, verbally, and mentally ab*sive, spent no time with me nor me and my family, and was very self centered.”
“What I did was the beginning of the end for me. I decided if I was able to cheat, I was able to leave. So, I did.”
10. tw69 wrote:
“It was a perfect storm of many factors.”
“I was in a long distance relationship in uni and my gf was pulling away. She told me she wouldn’t care if I slept with someone else but then later implicated that she would care. I didn’t know what to think. I yearned to have new se*ual experiences. I yearned to be a selfish a**hole because I felt I had always put others first and been a pushover.”
“Then one dr*nken night with a friend pushed me over the edge.”
“I had thought I was a good person up until then but it was pretty difficult to think so afterwards. My actions were incongruent with the belief and I was ashamed of myself for a good while. After that I made the conscious effort to do good things, since it was clear that the belief you’re good is useless, it’s only the actions that matter.”
11. Individual_Lemon_139 wrote:
“I was guilted by pretty much everyone around me to stay in an abusive relationship I did not want to be in anymore. I would have gladly left if I was given a clear option to do so. I was trying to make it through each day at a time and found something that was able to make life tolerable at that point. Not saying that what I did was right or even acceptable but only saying what I felt at that time. I still regret doing it to this day and it has been over a decade ago.”
12. Ham3rs shared:
“I was in a physically and emotionally ab*sive relationship with someone who would frequently cheat and then tell me to obviously upset me. I ended up cheating on her with a long time friend/crush and I think I did it because I was desperate to feel the opposite of how I was treated in that relationship. Thankfully I eventually got out and not long after met my now soon to be wife. We’ve now been together for 13 years and we both feel extremely secure in the relationship. I’m not proud of what I did back then but I understand why it happened.”
13. DancingthruDartmouth said:
“Assuming this doesn’t have to be about current partners.”
“But I actually cheated on an old relationship while entering into the one I have currently. I was 19 and an idiot honestly. My previous partner and I went to separate co-op job experiences for the summer. He started neglecting me only to ask for help with money. I tried to be a good partner and keep with contacting him but he wouldn’t reciprocate or only send short messages days later. I started paying attention to my current partner at work and then eventually that boundary was broken with him. I was too chicken sh*t to just break up with partner 1 and ghosted him. We had a proper break up eventually but I should have stopped things at least a month beforehand when I realized my feelings for current partner. Old partner turned shitty really fast that summer but he still deserved a proper end”
This post has over 4.3k comments, you can read them on Reddit here.
Have you ever cheated on someone? Share your story in the comments below.
