What Makes Cheating Spouses Cheat?

By Larry Bilotta

Have you ever wondered what makes cheating spouses cheat in the first place? They certainly didn’t get married with the intention of being unfaithful to their spouse, so why did they do it?

Many “infidelity experts” on the internet these days are offering solutions on how to find PROOF that will expose your spouse or catch them “in the act”. But instead of putting 100% of your effort in finding solid proof, your energy would be better spent understanding what went wrong in your marriage.

It’s fairly common for “chronic” cheating spouses to give up on a relationship the moment things start to become a little difficult.

Rather than admitting and accepting that there’s a problem in their marriage, they look for someone else to fulfill their needs. These “needs” could be anything from a physical connection to strictly intellectual relations leading to an emotional affair.

Affairs take place because one spouse’s needs are no longer being met by their partner. Cheating spouses are then drawn to someone else who WILL (temporarily) meet those needs.

What increases the chance of an affair taking place is when a man marries a woman who idealizes love and spends her whole life going in and out of marriages in search of her “perfect soul mate”.

Soul mates may exist in romance movies but in real life, it takes work to create a lasting relationship.

Like it or not, marriage is WORK…but it doesn’t have to be “hard” work.

If you want win your spouse over after an affair, you need to know how to meet his/her needs.

Every couple goes into marriage with expectations of each other that are NEVER CLEARLY DISCUSSED simply because they don’t REALLY understand, nor can they clearly explain what their own expectations are…let alone their spouses!

Cheating spouses cheat because they’re in search of unmet, yet unspoken deep emotional needs. It’s as simple as this…..

If YOU aren’t meeting your spouse’s needs, they will find SOMEONE ELSE who WILL!

This fact is also one of the reasons why most affairs don’t last. Let me explain…

When your spouse met this other man/woman, they THOUGHT that this other person was meeting their needs, but what was really happening is they were blinded by the “Romance” stage of a relationship.

You and your spouse went through this stage also. If you think back to the beginning of your relationship, you may not have noticed at the time, but the two of you were on your BEST behavior.

Looking back, it might even seem like your spouse was a different person back then.

The reason?

There is actually a chemical released in your brain that makes you feel “infatuated” with this other person. It would even be safe to say that cheating spouses can’t think straight when they’re caught up in this “biological phenomenon”.

This is also why some couples make irrational decisions early in their relationship, like going off to Las Vegas and getting married on a whim. Down the road, after the Romance stage of their relationship is over, many of these couples eventually get divorced.

So if you’re worried that your cheating spouse is “in love” with this other person, chances are, the affair is VERY short lived…which means you STILL have a chance to win over your spouse!

You owe it to yourself (and your children if you have them) to give your marriage a second chance. In fact, here’s a statistic that might give you some inspiration….

A study from the Institute for American Values found that “almost eight out of 10 couples who avoided divorce were happily married five years later.”

If you can just get over this affair, this obstacle in your marriage, and start meeting each other’s needs, I promise you, your marriage will be much stronger and more fulfilling than it was…even BEFORE the affair took place.

1 reply
  1. Deatha
    Deatha says:

    THough there may be some truth to that, I dont totally buy into the notion that men and women cheat because their needs aren't being met. That's really a cop out. Most of the time, we don't know HOW to be happy with what we already have. THe fact that some ppl have had so many partners leaves this room to always compare. There is no perfect person. WE simply need to learn how to enjoy, appreciate and grow with what we already have. Additionally, we have the coping skills of a piece of lint. Any challlenge in our lives is an opportunity for some to bail out, whether it be mentally, emotionally or sexually.

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