Photo by Flickr user Den Harsh.

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THERE IS NO DEFINITION OF CHEATING
For some reason, women and men's magazines have sought to codify betrayal by obsessivey helping couples recognise what constitutes cheating on a case-by-case basis. Some might argue that it only counts as cheating when genitals interact with other genitals, that you can't really define texting multiple pictures of your erect penis to someone as "cheating". "I only had cyber sex with her!" I once heard my sister's boyfriend cry as he was shoved out the door of our parents' house.
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When you're in a happy, sexually content relationship, you have no business hunting for fun in other people's underwear. Looking back on the times I've been unfaithful, the only distinguishable behavioural pattern is that they all happened at a point when I was semi-consciously struggling to maintain a relationship that was making me eternally bummed out. Sometimes I wasn't that into the guy I was seeing, sometimes the guy I was seeing had moved country to become a Scientologist. Whatever your reason, cheating can actually be a good thing, because – unless you have absolutely zero scope for self-reflection – it can function as a pretty effective gateway to clarity. As soon as you find yourself aggressively scouring the room/street/gym/toilet for the sweaty body parts of complete strangers, you realise that being used to the way your boyfriend holds you at night doesn't really mean you're ecstatic with your relationship.
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That means don't tell your friends and don't perv over any of your partner's friends, unless you actively despise the person you're with and your only wish is to humiliate them into a state where all they can do is listen to Nick Drake songs and rarely wash for a month while constantly refreshing your Facebook profile.All that crap about how the truth always manages to get out is only based on the assumption that all people are idiots who share their indiscretions with other idiots. I have cheated on all my boyfriends. Oh wait – have I? I have? Is there a way for any of you to find out? No, because I'm not an idiot. So don't be an idiot, either. If you have to vent, tell your mum (she has to love you and ignore the shitty things you do because she made you) and if you absolutely have to fuck someone from your shared immediate environment, fuck their best friend in the whole wide world. They always have more to lose so they'll keep it on the DL.

You're barfing up shameful chunks of guilt and the only thing you can think of to make you resemble a functioning person again is to tell the truth, bow your head and await your sentence (which you secretly hope will be the termination of the relationship because if you liked them enough you wouldn't have cheated in the first place). This way you can move on with your life, safe in the knowledge that you're a decent, responsible human being who might have slipped up once but at least has the guts to come clean.
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Your relationship sucks, but you've both been too busy farting silently into your shared takeaway-covered duvet to notice. Granted, what you've done is wrong, but it's also much more exciting than grumbling at each other throughout weekend Curb Your Enthusiasm marathons and gives you a sneak-peek into what promiscuity tastes like without having to go the whole hog and fuck a bunch of different people.It slowly restores a sexual confidence in yourself that you knew was there but has just been dampened by years of solely dancing with each other at parties, and helps you feel more comfortable in your relationship. Now add all that newfound guilt and the sexual tension that stems from it into the mix and you're looking at a sure-fire way of stopping yourselves from morphing into a slightly younger, marginally less depressing version of your parents. At least for a while.IT'S UNLIKELY THAT YOU'LL END UP WITH THE PERSON YOU'RE CHEATING WITH
It really is, so snap out of it. You might be swept up in a typhoon of oestrogen, testosterone and all the other 'gens and 'ones that make people want to do things like present their mouths to other peoples' crotches, but the problem is that all this emotion is blossoming in the driest of climates. It's not love that's driving your hormones, it's boredom and a niggling fear of being forever alone. Plus you're far too crazy during that stage to create anything of note that isn't just going to implode a couple of months down the line.
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