Are all men unfaithful? - Marriage Builders® Forums

Would the men out there who have been 100% faithful physically to their wives please post this information? My husband believes all men are unfaithful to their wives sometime during their marriages. He says he doesn't know a single married man that hasn't cheated on his wife. He's from India so that also may have something to do with it.

I'm proud to say that I've been 100% physically and emotionally faithful to my wife throughout our 19 year marriage.

I had an EA some 18 years ago so I cannot stand up and be counted. I did read something to the effect that 3 out 5 men are unfaithful in the first 5 years. You should also realize that 2 out of 5 women are unfaithful in the first 5 years.Regardless it does not make it right. I found out what I did 18 years ago just hurt everyone involved including myself. I believe that a unfaithful spouse is the worse and most cruel thing that could happen to the other S with the possible exception of a child dying. Even that has certain and reasonably short closure while an affair can and often does go on for years.J W

Hi Peace loverAll men don't cheat, my h isn't part of this site but i can tell you that he has been faithful during our marriage, i was the *bad* one, it hurt him, promised not to do it again and i'm trying my hardest not to do it again, but he's not making it easy either. i'm usually on the EN side.mrb[This message has been edited by MrsRaBull (edited May 03, 2000).]

PL, Well,your H knows one now.I never even thought of cheating on my W of 22 years.Not that the opportunity didn't arise,I just couldn't of done it.Maybe it's more acceptable in India? --Murph

Peace Lover,I've stayed faithful to my W....it hasn't been easy, but it takes a stronger man to resist than to give in.Maybe ask your H, why would he risk you health by having an affair and run the risk of giving you a STD or break your heart?Hang in There!

My husband and I have been married 8 years May 23. We have been together for 12. He has never ever ever been unfaithful in the time we have been married. He did however have an outside relationship when he was 19 and in college if that counts for anything. it was never physical more emotinal, but why the heck did that happpen? anywya, he is a great husband. mercy

Are all days cold and barren?... Are all nights starless and cloudy?... Are all birds vultures of prey?... Are all dogs vicious?... Are all clouds full of thunder and lightening?... Are all winds torents from hurricanes?...I too humbly... ...am a faithful husband.To hurt and devasted women... ...the male world could look very cruel...There are many men who are faithful... ... the struggle we all have is to find partners who fill that need of faithfulness. [Linked Image from marriagebuilders.com]

[Linked Image from marriagebuilders.com]

Jim

Yes we do exist, I have been 100% faithful to wife from day one in our relationship and marriage of 5 years.

HI, I'm sure some men here wonder if all WOMEN are unfaithful. I have been faithful for 15 years. My W is living with OM and I'm STILL faithful, completely faithful. I hope I can remain that way under the circumstances. I believe I will. GOOD LUCK & PRAYERS FRANK

Thanks for your comments and keep them coming. I'm going out of town for 3 days, but when I return I'm going to printout these postings and have a "heart-to-heart" with my husband. Peace lover

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>Originally posted by peace lover: Would the men out there who have been 100% faithful physically to their wives please post this information? My husband believes all men are unfaithful to their wives sometime during their marriages. He says he doesn't know a single married man that hasn't cheated on his wife. He's from India so that also may have something to do with it. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>In nearly 15 years of marriage, I have NEVER been unfaithful to my W. However, I take none of the credit. God gets it all. He has kept me sane through this whole ordeal. He has given me the sense and where with all to sense those feelings and not act on them.Besides I NEVER want her to feel what I have felt. But alas I have failed because OM did it to her by cheating with another OW besides his W with my W.Besides to top it all off she has had 8 affairs in the last 7 years.------------------ God Bless, Rob regilmor@swbell.net [This message has been edited by professorg (edited May 04, 2000).]

Peace Lover,Your H is WRONG. It sounds like he is engaging in self-justification ("if everybody does it then it's OK for me too")Count me among the faithful (nearly 17 years)------------------ But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Galatians 5:22-23

Count me in the faithful category---12 years

I meant what I said, and I said what I meant. A husband faithful, 100%.

While I have to admit there have been times when I've "lusted in my heart" ala Jimmy Carter, I can honestly say that I've never had an EA/PA in twenty years of marriage.

Count me in. I have been completely faithful to my wife of 9 years and it has been easy. When all you want and desire at home, why stray away from that? [Linked Image from marriagebuilders.com]

Faithful 3 years - young marriage but still. Wife unfaithful once (still in debate) But I love her and we are going to get over it.

Add me to the list of being Emotionally AND Physically faithful to my bride - 21 years and counting.SHAP.S. I wasn't the greatest husband in the world during all those years - but I am now [Linked Image from marriagebuilders.com]

[This message has been edited by Sir Hurts Alot (edited May 04, 2000).]

My bride is the woman that I pledged eight years ago "Have and to hold from this day forward, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until we are parted by death." This was not an earthly contract, but a holy covenant witnessed by the Lord God Almighty. He will continue to give me the strength and the will to keep my covenant, although with divorce pending, this is certainly one of the "for worse" times.I have been and remain true to her.

Our 18th anniversary is in a couple of weeks. Never. Her or me. If something is wrong, it is wrong even if everyone does it.If something is right, it is right even if nobody does it.Tell your husband that.

Faithful here too. 20 years+------------------ Prayers & God Bless! Chris For relationship info check out <A HREF="http://www.pcisys.net/~chriscal1/resources.html" TARGET=_blank>Marriage & Relationship Resources</A>

Count me in. I have been faithful, to my W for our 24 years of Marriage.JL

Count me too. Married 13 years. I have always followed the practice of staying away from situations (i.e. lunch alone with co-worker, giving advice to friends, etc.) that could potentially allow feelings to grow. I agree with the others that your husband is trying to get your focus off of him.

100% Faithful for 14 years...and counting.Arrow

I am not a preacher or anything other than just a plain old average everyday ordinary kind of guy and I have NEVER (repeat) NEVER been unfaithful to any of the women I have had relationships with. It's just plain wrong to be unfaithful to a person that you have committed yourself too, even if you have'nt "officially" taken vows. Cheating is wrong, it's selfish and it hurts. ...........Semper Fi........(ALWAYS FAITHFUL)

Could you please tell me what EA/PA stands for and any other abbreviatons similar? <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>Originally posted by TomH: While I have to admit there have been times when I've "lusted in my heart" ala Jimmy Carter, I can honestly say that I've never had an EA/PA in twenty years of marriage.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

EA= emotional affair PA=physical affairHey, it took me awhile to figure it out, too [Linked Image from marriagebuilders.com]

Ahhh thenewbie... if only I had the e-mails to prove your undying faithfulness. Can we say EA?

16 years and never unfaithful (9 years together and 7 years married). I like to think that I have some sort of in-built reflex that triggers immediately when I'm in danger of doing something I shouldn't. I have never been to close either though.Sorry to say that my wife doesn't seem to have the same reflex. Or maybe the trigger has stopped working?scandinavian

For jarvislee...Check out ===> <A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/forum/Forum29/HTML/000008.html" TARGET=_blank>Acronyms, Smilies, UBB Codes</A> [Linked Image from marriagebuilders.com]

Jim

Count me in as never having ventured outside the marrital bed. I will admitt to lusting after a few women but I was never willing to pay the tab of infidelity. I have been chaste now for 7 months and will also admitt to needing/wanting to get "my ashes hauled." Bill------------------ BB

I don't think we could generalize all men being unfaithful anymore than we could generalize all women being unfaithful, but I will say that infidelity is very, very common. I don't know if this says something about the overall moral decay of our society, but I do feel that it speaks volumes about how most people are completely ill-prepared to maintain a successful marriage.Think about it, natuarally on this site there's going to be a large number of faithful betrayed married men and women. People here are trying to rebuild marriages. But, the result might be very different if we issued an anonymous survey say in a Hooters, a strip club, a golf course, or even just any sports bar at happy hour on a friday night.

MrsRabull, <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>i was the *bad* one, it hurt him, promised not to do it again and i'm trying my hardest not to do it again, but he's not making it easy either.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>How is he going to influence you into having an affair or not?------------------ Prayers & God Bless! Chris For relationship info check out <A HREF="http://www.pcisys.net/~chriscal1/resources.html" TARGET=_blank>Marriage & Relationship Resources</A>

No, all men are not unfaithful. I have been tempted daily, had many opportunities, had explicit offers, yet have remained faithful. We will have been married 24 years in June 2000.

I'm back in town and have finally settled down to read your postings. I'll talk to my husband tonight. Oddly enough, it gave me a lot of encouragement to see so many men wanting to be true to their commitments. Thanks for all of your posts. Peace lover.

We have been married 15 years and I have been 100% faithful the whole time. Yes, I have flirted and I have been tempted, but I have never seriously considered going outside my marriage.The statistics for North America are 60% of men cheat at least once duing their marriage and 45% of women cheat at least once. The percentage for women is rising. In some cultures some men are pressured to feel they have to cheat to be a "real" man. In such countries the percentage of male cheaters may be higher, or men simply boast of it to feel like one of the guys. All these statistics should be taken with a grain of salt as they rely upon self-reporting and are therefore subject to exageration or denial.Kenneth

Kenneth,That 60% of men, 45% of women statistic is widely cited, and some (e.g., Peggy Vaughn) suggest that its too conservative. But there are problems with it, too, as you note. One of the biggest is self-reporting bias.That said, the General Social Survey is IMO a very good instrument for studying extramarital sexual conduct. And here the data paint a far different picture: while infidelity rates are rising, especially among women, they are nowhere near the 50% mark. Take a look here: <A HREF="http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/GSS99/codebook/evstray.htm" TARGET=_blank>http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/GSS99/codebook/evstray.htm</A> Which puts the rate of an individual (not broken down by gender, I admit) *ever* having had extramarital sex at about 18.6% for 1996 (i.e., 369/[369+1618]).This lower statistic seems to dovetail with another argument I've had against that "60% men, 40% women" thing. Elsewhere, self reports in the General Social Survey indicate an annual infidelity rate of about 2%. If that's correct, then we'd expect the mean length of marriage to be be log((1.6+1.4)/2)/log(1.02) or about 21 years. If the 18% or so is more accurate, we'd expect the mean length of marriage to be log(1.18)/log(1.02) or about 7 years. With divorce rates as high as they are, I'm having trouble believing that the mean length of marriage is 21 years. As a result, I'm having trouble buying into that 60% of men, 40% of women thing.Bystander

I'm with Peggy Vaughan. I think if anything the 60/40% numbers are conservative. No, I don't have any concrete methods for my deduction, but I base this on several observations. 1) The vast majority of people are totally unprepared about how to maintain a successful marriage. Several years ago when I found this site I was knocked for a loop at all the things H and I did wrong! So, if more than 50% of marriages end in divorce, then I bet a good many of those marriages that end have encountered infidelity. Very few people have the insight (or guts) to leave a troubled marriage until they have someone else to run to (or at least the prospect of someone else). I think it's just human nature. People often rebound from one relationship to the next. And 2) I see infidelity almost everywhere I go and amongst so many friends, acquaintances and co-workers. I see countless overt flirting, spouses hiding and outright lying to each other, etc. It's literally everywhere.Unless I'm living within a bubble, this has to be a reflection of society at large.

new woman, Maybe you're in a bubble, or I'm in a cave. Of all my friends, relatives, and acquaintances, I can count only a handful of marriages that have been affected by infidelity. Its absolutely devastating when it happens, but I don't see anywhere near the 60% mark. I agree that a lot of people don't know the first thing about being in a relationship, though. That's fixable, fortunately! Bystander

Bystander,Yep, you're right, it is fixable, however most couples don't even know it's broke until after the fact! My H and I were clueless. We both felt something was wrong, but we had no idea what and we had no idea how to fix it. Most couples don't come to the conclusion that the marriage needs to be rebuilt until some type of crisis, trauma or devastation to the marriage occurs. Often, this crisis is infidelity.And no, I'm not living in a bubble, and you're not living in a cave either. Let me clarify and say that I don't know for a fact how many friends/acquaintances are cheating, but I see the danger signs that could spell trouble. Very few people brag about or even admit to infidelity. That's another reason why I feel the survey results are conservative.I guess after going through this I'm very perceptive and in tune with all the signals..... only wish I'd been this on top of things before H and I destroyed our marriage.