When you're in a relationship, the last thing you want to do is probably cheat on the person you love—or worse, have them cheat on you. Despite our negative attitude towards cheating, the latter is unfortunately a common occurrence in relationships.
According to a survey conducted on the Ashley Madison extramarital affairs portal, which included more than 1,300 participants, 41 percent of people in a relationship considered cheating on their partner, and as many as 64 percent had already been cheated on.
To be honest, this number isn't even that surprising considering the many articles on the web dealing with this topic. Just one quick keyword search "why people cheat", returns thousands of results. The final answer to this question is of course subjective. Relationships are different, so the reason someone cheated on you might not be the same reason your best friend cheated on her boyfriend.
Some even have pretty shallow reasons for cheating. For example, a 2018 Ashley Madison study found that 52 percent of people who cheat believe their the partner is not in good enough shape. Or people cheat because their partner tells them to he doesn't give them the attention they crave. Regardless of their ultimate reason for infidelity, such people always drop subtle hints that they are about to jump the fence.
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If you know what to look out for, you can take the necessary steps to prevent cheating in your relationship. The biggest clue often comes in the form of a question that rreveals the state of the level of intimacy in your relationship. And if your partner asks that one question, there's a good chance they'll decide to cheat (or at least think about it).
So what exactly should you be looking out for? The biggest sign that someone is cheating on you is packed into this question:
"Can we try something new in bed?"
Sure, it sounds pretty innocent. But the emotions behind this question run deep and have probably been building up for a long time in your partner who finally found the courage to pop the question.
For example, take first hand a man named Dylan who has been using Ashley Madison to cheat on his wife for five years. Dylan says the cheating didn't happen until after he found out they were dating "sexually incompatible". He explained: “I'm always very attentive, loud and communicative about our sex life and things I'd like to try. But she never agrees with that."
And if you think men are the ones who set their expectations too high in bed, it's important to note that yes women also need sex in their relationships.
Sociologist Alicia M. Walker, author of the book The Secret Life of the Cheating Wife, studied female infidelity and found that most of the women she spoke to "reported either a marriage without sex or a marriage without orgasm", although they tried everything they could to improve sexuality.
Another survey conducted by Ashley Madison shows that 90 percent of people believe that regular, mutually satisfying sex is important or very important. This confirms what we already know – sexuality is a healthy part of any long-term romantic relationship.
Photo: cottonbro/Pexels
Unfortunately, the research also showed that everything too many people don't have the sex they want (and ultimately need) to feel loved and satisfied in a relationship, with more than half of respondents revealing that they are not at all sexually satisfied in their current relationships – 52 percent to be exact.
According to Paul Keable, vice president of communications at Ashley Madison, right lack of connection between partners what drives people to sites like theirs. "We find that the fact that someone is cheating does not mean that they are in a completely unhappy marriage. Sometimes it just means they're looking for that one missing component, whether it's intimacy or excitement, and they don't want to leave an otherwise satisfying marriage.”
There is no magic formula when it comes to how much or what kind of sex you should have, but according to the aforementioned research 58 percent of men and women want to have sex several times a week. For 27 percent, it would be ideal if we had sex every day. Ultimately, this varies from relationship to relationship, and it's up to you and your partner to keep the lines of communication open to discuss your sex life.
