Man here - interesting to see the theories being spun about. The pushover gets cheated on. No wait, its the smotherer, the clinger. Nope, its the bitch, the cold one.

All wrong.

Anyone read the thread about how often men think about sex? It's a lot. It's dominant thought process. Multiple times a day. It's about your wife, and other women. That part, no one can control. It's biology.

What you can control is where your husband's sexual energy is directed. If your sex life is stale, or non-existent, it will fixate elsewhere. This is where most (not all) men and women are different. There is no "off" switch for male sex drive. Which is why your DH is pawing at you even though you are exhausted, touched out, the house is a mess, you are sweaty and bloated. If you become his asexual wife, he will stop seeing you as sexual.

Of course, some women are great, giving lovers and they get cheated on. Monogamy is hard under the best of circumstances, people mess up. There are also a small percentage of men that are dirtbags. Men know who these men are more than women do. We see them out at conferences, business travel. They are prowling just as if they were single. Vows meant nothing to them, literally.

The rest of us, we made a commitment. We know cheating is wrong, but more than the moral aspect, we know how much we have to lose by cheating. We don't want to lose our families, which is why, as these threads say, men never leave their wives for their APs. Its sexually driven.

I promise you, if you sexually neglect your man, the risk of him cheating goes up exponentially. Which isn't to say you can ever affair-proof your marriage any more than you can accident proof your commute. But you are deluding yourself if you don't think the number 1 predictor of faithfulness is sexual satisfaction.

Anonymous wrote:The best indicator of what women will get cheated on is who they are married to and how their sex life is.

There is a lot of truth to the old saying that a man is a faithful as his options. If your DH is attractive, confident, successful, charming, funny, he will have opportunities. Whether he acts on them is going to come down to a combination of his character/will power plus how happy he is at home, sexually speaking. He can be the most honest and loyal man in the world, but if the sex life has fallen off the table for years since the kids came, at some point he will cave. Monogamy is super difficult under the best of times. It's near impossible if your future is maintenance/duty sex.

This is true for women too. I have stayed in shape, whereas my husband has gained about 40 pounds. I am not happy sexually; H can't be bothered. We were married 8 years before I succumbed to temptation. Now we have an open marriage which is the best for both of us, and the kids.

Anonymous wrote:People who choose relationships with mentally ill partners get cheated on.

This is true. My H was abused as a child (I did not know this). After going through tons of counseling I have found abused boys are very caring, loving, giving and sensitive but they have terrible coping mechanisms and often have unleashed anger... which is not revealed usually until children are born.

Of course when the biggest decision as a young married couple we faced was should we buy the house with the aupair suite or the one with the 1st floor den, who knew.

Agree with you OP. Men who cheat are very often narcissists who need constant validation. The doting wife is not enough, they need someone on the side.

Hoping for the best for your friend.

My friend is like this. She's been cheated on in every relationship she's ever had, including her first marriage. In her case, I believe after the first one, she because so afraid of it happening again that it's been a self fulfilling prophecy. She clings too tight, she smothers, she's codependent, she kisses ass, she does all these textbook keep your man techniques but ultimately she's a bad chooser of men.

OP, it's possible that your friend is the type to overlook stuff. She's put him on a pedestal so she's maybe not paying attention and picking up on the signs she might be missing?

It may also be really, really, really important to her to have a man in her life and for everyone to see that she's "winning" in this area. If she's so public about how she feels about him, some of this is for the image. Maybe she's over-compensating because she knows there are cracks in the perfection.

I agree with many of the previous posters with the concept that when a man cheats it is let's say 80% about his character/inclinations/ego etc.

That said, regarding your observations about doting women getting cheated on, I don't think the doting behavior is the problem but rather that super nice, agreeable, doting people tend to be people-pleasers, and it can be really unsatisfying to be interpersonally involved with a people pleaser.

In my observation, being with people pleasers feels like being alone. You have this wishy washy, bendable, chameleon person who over-defers and has no personal identity. I don't think men like "bitches" per say, but I do think that they like women with back bones who have a personal identity, preferences, and standards.

It can feel damn lonely, boring, and exhausting to be with a people pleaser.

Anonymous wrote:I think this can happen when things aren't so good in the bedroom.

It can also happen when things are fine in the bedroom.

People who choose relationships with mentally ill partners get cheated on.

When I cheated on former boyfriends it had way less to do with them and more about stoking my own ego. I enjoyed the thrill of a fling while maintaining the comfort of a relationship at home. But the guilt...it tears you up inside and it makes you feel like a lousy person.

I'm glad that I learned to own that behavior and not to blame it on anyone else. I've been with dh for over 25 years and never cheated on him.

I think this can happen when things aren't so good in the bedroom.

Anonymous wrote:I just learned that one of my friends' husbands is cheating. She is beyond devastated and I actually asked another friend to go over to her place because she sounds as if she might harm herself.

They were together for three years before marrying and have been married for a little over two years. She is a very devoted wife and was an adoring girlfriend. Everything he does is the best, everything he says is the funniest, and she is constantly complimenting him. Her Facebook is plastered with images of them together. For his part, he seems to just be a nice, average guy. Average height, average looks, average intelligence, okay sense of humor, average job. I don't see what is so amazing about him, but until now, he seemed hard working, genuinely loving, and good to her.

Anyway, in my experience, it seems women like my girlfriend are always getting cheated on. What's up with men that they can't seem to appreciate women who dote on them? I am happily married to a loving man, but doting isn't in my nature and I have a rather difficult personality. Men have always liked and stayed with me, even when I couldn't understand why -- even when I, myself, cheated (never cheated on DH but for some reason, he worries about it).

My already rather low opinion of the opposite sex [b]isn't improving when I see that men mistreat sweet girls like my friend and chase emotionally distant borderline misandrists like me.

1) Maybe her Facebook posts have nothing to do with the actual reality of the relationship. Behind closed doors... you never know.
2) Other the other women may not be as open about how they've been cheated on.
3) Wow. And you're married? Is your DH the only one you have a high opinion of? Why? B/c he married you?

Don't they say nice guys (gals) finish last. Maybe if you are too nice you just seem boring.

It all comes down to bad coping mechanism. There was a study that was referenced in Blink .. they could predict which marriage would fail and which would not by watching how the couple communicated.

The 17 year marriage died because the wife had a bad way of coping with the minor issues in her marriage.

The best indicator of what women will get cheated on is who they are married to and how their sex life is.

There is a lot of truth to the old saying that a man is a faithful as his options. If your DH is attractive, confident, successful, charming, funny, he will have opportunities. Whether he acts on them is going to come down to a combination of his character/will power plus how happy he is at home, sexually speaking. He can be the most honest and loyal man in the world, but if the sex life has fallen off the table for years since the kids came, at some point he will cave. Monogamy is super difficult under the best of times. It's near impossible if your future is maintenance/duty sex.