1. “I was feeling trapped in my current relationship. That doesn’t really excuse cheating but I really felt like I couldn’t leave but I wanted to. I met someone who really showed me my value and helped me through it, and it got romantic before we meant for it to happen. We dated for years afterwards, but it’s something I still feel bad about.”— Kyle, 25
2. “I’ve cheated on more than one occasion. And it’s because I never feel invested in the relationship. I’ve never cheated on a serious girlfriend, but I don’t feel bad sleeping with someone else just because I’m ‘seeing’ someone. Especially if I don’t see it going anywhere.”— Nathan, 27
3. “I was young and we went to different colleges and I convinced myself that she was going to cheat on me anyway. So my thinking was, if I do it first she can’t hurt me. And I ‘win.’ And I had it there in my back pocket so that if she did cheat on me, I could say I did, too. Looking back, that’s obviously such an unhealthy and immature way of looking at it.”— Aaron, 28.
4. “It’s funny, but asking me this question now, years later, I have a real answer. Back when I did it, it was just because it looked cool. Like, that was alpha to me. But honestly, in hindsight, it was because I had a really bad view of relationships; my parents’ relationship, my early relationships. I just felt like they weren’t going to last so I didn’t bother.” — Luke, 28
5. “I was drunk and she was hot, and I’m not going to lie, I mostly saw it as an easy out of my current relationship.” — Tim, 25
6. “I was a serial cheater for a while and it was because I needed this… I don’t think ‘boost’ is the right word… but I needed vindication. I needed to know I was wanted. In a relationship, I felt like I had ‘won’ already and that made me feel restless. I had a lot of problems to work through.” — Anthony. 28
7. “I cheated because she cheated. Unsurprisingly, our relationship didn’t last very long.” — Ethan, 26
8. “I promise I’m not a piece of shit or anything. I was seeing someone I met on Tinder. It was pretty casual. I liked her and I was having fun and had just come out of a long self-inflicted dry spell after a bad break up. And I thought she saw it as casual, too. I ended up meeting my now-wife when I was out one night. It was instant sparks, just animal chemistry. I broke it off with this other women and she was so upset. I felt awful. I honestly didn’t even realize I had really ‘cheated,’ but she saw us as being in a relationship. I still feel bad about it.” — Joel, 28
9. “This one is honestly a technicality. I was dating a girl in college. She was great, she made me happy and I didn’t have any real complaints with our relationship. She went abroad for a semester and during that time we were long-distance. This was a few years ago, by the way. We had email and IM and ways of getting in touch but it wasn’t like we could talk 24/7. A lot of foreign carriers had insane price plans and stuff. We couldn’t really Skype. Anyway, the point is that I met the woman of my dreams and then I could not get in touch with this girl to break up with her. I didn’t want to do it over email or something. I wanted to really call and talk to her and show her some level of respect and let her yell at me over the phone. It took a week until I was able to actually speak with her and at that point she was… not that mad. She was obviously enjoying herself in Europe. So it worked out, but for that week, I was a cheater but only because the paperwork hadn’t gone through yet, so to speak.” — Greg, 26
10. “I usually cheat whenever I feel like the relationship is stalled or fizzled out. Well, not literally with every relationship, but the handful of times I have cheated have been when things weren’t great. I don’t know why, specifically, honestly. Maybe it’s my way of making sure things are over instead of trying to work on something I know won’t work.” — Will, 29