How to Catch a Cheating Lover

We prefer honesty in our relationships, but reality doesn't always measure up to our expectations. Cheating is an everyday occurrence.

Some cheating isn't even considered cheating. Football games are won by trick plays and earn quarterbacks the title of hero, along with multimillion- dollar salaries. Other cheating is entertaining, like the magician's repertoire of card tricks, sleight of hand, and beautiful women who disappear or survive being sawed in half. Military strategy often involves camouflage, which throughout history has won wars, going back to the Trojan horse in ancient Greece.

Most cheating however is undesirable, whether it's a gambler trying to beat the casino, the student who cheats on exams, the citizen who fudges numbers on a tax return, or the CEO who pays himself a multimillion- dollar bonus while shareholder profits plummet. But perhaps the most disappointing, and personally painful, cheating is that which occurs among lovers and spouses.  An unwritten expectation of fidelity is the core of our sexual relationships.

We expect our partners not to cheat. Sometimes lovers release each other from that expectation, as in the 1960s and '70s when ''open'' relationships and ''free love'' were part of a sexual revolution that valued experimentation.  The vogue continues to a much lesser degree in the twenty-first century.  For the most part, when two people are in a committed relationship, monogamy is not only implied, it's assumed. One mate at a time is the expectation when you've given your heart and soul
to another. 

Fidelity, unless mutually exempted, rules adult sexual relationships and helps bind two persons together. Infidelity, or cheating, is a serious threat to that bond and when suspected needs to be addressed seriously. Cheating rarely can be ignored. The injured party might try to ignore
their suspicion, shove it to the back of their mind through some complicated form of self-preservation coupled with denial. But such a defense mechanism rarely works either short or long-term.

The gnawing reality lurks in the background, only to resurface. Cheating when faithfulness is expected by the partner signals something beyond sexual indiscretion is wrong in the relationship. There's a break in the emotional fabric of the relationship, too. Whatever is wrong will not heal itself.

A cheater lives a life of deception based on tricks that go unnoticed. A cheater's success depends on how well they sustain a hidden life. A victim of cheating only survives to the degree they can discover what is being hidden. Whether surviving ultimately means ending the relationship or healing it, knowing how to catch your cheating lover is the first step. The practical information presented here will help you along your journey. 

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CHEATING IN CYBERVILLE

Technology has changed relationship cheating forever. Mobile phones, PDAs, beepers and computers make it easier than ever before to cheat on a lover or spouse. Email, instant messaging, chat rooms, dating websites, social networking and text messaging mean the cheater doesn't have to leave home and wander bars to meet a potential partner.