By Lizzy Francis
Some men have affairs. Some of those men are fathers. And although it’s rarely discussed out in the open, plenty of men have varying levels of guilt about their infidelities, whether their partners know about them or not.
So, we wanted to speak to some men who have cheated about the guilt they’ve felt and how it did — or didn’t — persuade them to be better husbands and fathers.
Some of the men here felt temporary guilt for their infractions; others were more anxious about their partners finding out than truly guilty. And, well, some had no regrets at all. All helped illustrate the cocktail of emotions that take place when you decide to be unfaithful.
Here 5 men reveal how they really felt after cheating on their wives:
1. “I felt dirty afterward.”
“It was always, ‘This is the last one, this is the last one. I won’t do it again,’ says Tyler, who cheated on his wife for 20 years. “And that didn’t really happen,” Tyler says that, in recent years, it’s become clear that he has a problem and that he’s been going to therapy for his addiction.
“I never considered confessing to the affair because I wasn’t sure how it would be taken, and I would have felt a lot of guilt. And I feared it. But after every time I cheated, I just felt dirty afterward. But I kept doing it. It’s not like that feeling of guilt happened just once. That happened multiple times. But like any addict, you stop and you go through a period of — for lack of a better word — sobriety. But the call is there.”
— Tyler, 41
2. “I felt conflicted.”
“I didn’t have any intention of starting the affair or leaving my wife. I felt conflicted. I had someone that I could talk to who was outside of my relationship, without causing any problems to my partner,” says Sean, who had an affair with his coworker that began after he started to confide in her about job stress.
Then, it morphed into something deeper, something he didn’t expect. “In the beginning, it was a relief to feel that there was someone I could talk to. But I didn’t know how to end it.”
“I was worried on a daily basis that my partner would find out, or that the girl that I was seeing would find out,” Sean continues. “I could tell the girl that I was having the affair with that it was over and continue with my long-term relationship on one side, but the biggest worry that I had is that if I did that, she would find out about my long-term relationship and tell my ex-wife what I had been doing and then I’d wind up alone.”
— Sean, 36
3. “I don’t actually regret my affair.”
Jack and his wife cheated on each other throughout the course of their 13-year marriage. Although he has regrets about the way their relationship played out, Jack says he was also so deeply angry about the way his wife cheated — and the lengths she went to keep it concealed and lie about it — that he doesn’t really feel anything for her.
“I don’t regret anything, or staying through the affairs. Because, if I didn’t stay, I wouldn’t have had my daughter, she is my world. No regrets. But it could have been a smoother ride.”
— Jack, 48
4. “I don’t know that I could’ve done it any other way.”
“Honestly, I want my marriage to work. I love my wife. She’s a good person. She’s a good partner. If we were being intimate, then there wouldn’t be a problem,” says Jeremy. He and his wife had been living a routine, nearly loveless marriage as she sorted through her mental health issues; in the meantime, Jeremy had two affairs.
“The once-a-month intimacy had become so uncomfortable that it was difficult to perform,” he tells us. “I began thinking maybe I needed to see a doctor. Once I had an affair, I realized I was completely fine. I realized how much I missed that part of life. That’s how my wife and I got to couples therapy. I wish I made it to the realization I’m at now without having to have gone through all that, but I don’t know that I could have done that any other way.”
— Jeremy, 44
5. “I had regrets. But only after I got caught.”
David told us he had never been faithful in a single relationship in his life. He even cheated on his wife before they got married. It wasn’t until he got caught a second time that his wife pointed out that he had a problem. He immediately checked into a halfway house and has since made serious steps to achieve addiction sobriety, which includes weekly therapy and 12-step-style models.
“Of course, there is regret there,” he says. “I spent so long trying to cover up and not experience uncomfortable emotions, that I don’t really remember spending time in regret and remorse. It wasn’t clear to me at the time, but the reason I went out and sought an affair partner was because I was fundamentally unhappy and unable to express that.
As soon as I got done, so to speak, sure, there was guilt and shame and remorse, but also, I really just felt like I needed to get it again., I’m certain that I was feeling guilty, but if you’d asked me at the time? I would have told you no. I wasn’t in touch with most of what I was feeling,”
Although he didn’t feel guilt then, David does feel it now. “The first step toward getting over that guilt and shame was putting it out there. Giving my wife an opportunity to react to it. As bad as the guilt is that I feel now and the shame I feel now about what I did, it was a lot bigger in my mind before I told her.”
— David, 39
Lizzy Francis is a writer and editor who has had fiction and poetry published in magazines associated with New York University like the West 4th Street Review and the Gallatin Review.
