Welcome to the cellar, Wendalz. To quote a post, just click on the "post" button, at the bottom of the post that you want to quote.

By "good" reason, do you mean legitimate? Hypothetical: How about if you've been married to a woman for twenty years, and have kids. You love your wife and family. Your wife doesn't want to have sex with you anymore, yet sex is a very important part of a relationship to you. You treat your wife well, are still sexually attracted to her, have never, and don't want to, cheat on her. You've discussed the issue, ad nauseum, and the situation remains the same. You can:

divorce
cheat
rape your wife
whack off
go without sex

Remember, there's a lot more to the relationship than sex, but it's very important to you. What do you do?

I don't think it's as easy as "she just doesn't want to have sex". Does she have health issues? Have you changed and she's just no longer attracted to you, even though you're attracted to her? Are there other issues going on in the marriage or in the family that may be more important to her than what's going on sexually? If you have a healthy and normal sex life at the beginning of your marriage and then things suddenly or drastically 'fall off', that's generally the sign of an underlying issue that needs to be addressed. Find out what the source of it is before you go traipsing around outside of your vows.

Divorce is always an option. Cheating, should never be. You can always change hands and feel like you're with someone new, if you're resorting to the self gratification option. And well, I have feelings on the whole 'rape your wife' option, but I'm not going to bring them up here.

For some people, cheating means giving away your heart, and not sharing your genitals. Unless one has permission from one's S.O. to be in love with someone else, it is wrong. Sharing one's genitals without a similar understanding is also wrong.

However, everything is predicated on the relationship's stated exclusivity to begin with.

Breaking one's word is always wrong. It all depends on what topics you have given your word.

In marriage; "forsaking all others" is just that...ALL OTHERS.

simply put, it is NEVER ok to cheat. i have been the cheater and the cheatee, and both times the results were never as anticipated. One of two things happen, you either split, or the experience makes you/your partners relationship stronger, thankfully in my case, the latter applies.

Let me make sure this is clear. You think it is better to give up a loving, caring relationship, stable home environment, two-parent household, and break apart a family, rather than cheat?

Do you think the wife should just give it up, once in a while?

If that person is considering cheating, then I have to argue that the relationship is NOT loving, caring or stable and a breakup seems immenent because of those factors.
Cheater can be either wife or husband. Lets not lump the "cause" all on the poor wifey, now...

I don't think he meant the wife was cheating when he asked if you thought she should, "give it up once in a while".:lol:

I suspect he was referring to wives that lose interest in sex 10, 20, 30 years before their husbands, driving them out of the house to seek release.

So many here say they have been the cheater in the past, and yet saying cheating is wrong. It makes me wonder, if you know it is wrong, then why on earth did you cheat in the first place?

I have never been the cheater, but I have been cheated on. I was the other woman, but that situation was very complicated. I was asked to participate in a threesome with a married couple, and I agreed. The wife was ok with it if we were all together and so we fooled around a little other than the actual threesome. However, afterwards the husband and I had some experiences on our own. I know this was wrong as she was not ok with that aspect. I did try to abstain from doing what I knew shouldn’t be done, but in the end I made a mistake. At the time I told myself it wasn’t a big deal because she knew we had had sex before.

I should add that I thought the marriage was stable when I agreed participating in the fantasy. I was not attached at the time and I just thought they wanted to explore a little. I found out later that this was not the case and they divorced not long after our experience. I would never have agreed if I thought for a moment that I could be a catalyst for their divorce, but I was young and naive.

Actually, the husband (now ex- obviously) is my SO. It has been over 4 years since this event and we have been together through thick and thin since then. He and his ex-wife married not long after high school and didn’t really know what they wanted. He is almost 6 years older than me so he had already been married for a couple years when I met him. He says that he now knows they married for the wrong reasons and the relationship was doomed anyway. I still feel I made a mistake.

Some of you might say that I should be worried that he will cheat on me. But we have talked extensively, and there is no one I trust more. That is why I feel we can be together for the rest of our lives. We have a polyamorous relationship so if he finds someone he wants to be with it is ok with me. It is understood that I will know what goes on, but since I know he has no reason to cheat since I am ok with him being with other women then I feel no reason to not trust him. That and we have a much more honest relationship than him and his ex-wife.
But I am allowed other relationships, so it isn’t one sided.

I do know that I have been hurt deeply in the past because I have been cheated on. I would never do that to my mate especially because of our relationship. Why lie when I can tell the truth and share in the joy with my SO?

Just my 2 cents.

Iggy, you've answered your own question, in so many words...'complicated,' 'mistake,' 'young and naive,' etc., etc.

Love, trust, commitment, respect--these are the ideals we work toward. If you really want them, you have to be willing to put in the work to maintain them--don't ever take them for granted.

Iggy that polyamorous attitude seems contradictory to "That is why I feel we can be together for the rest of our lives." I just don't understand how that can work. I'm not being judgemental - I'm honestly tying to understand that philosophy.

just because one has cheated doesn't mean it was right, i regret that decision.
if one really needs a release and the woman cannot or will not comply, then a man can go to the supermarket, buy a can of tuna, head down to the animal shelter for a stray cat and then rub the tuna on his genitalia
i know, that's cheating, too i'm just trying to be funny ( @ )( @ )

My wedding had no such statement included on the part of either the minister or Selene and myself.

For some, being certain of the continued love and trust of one's S.O./Spouse is the only way they can even begin to think about a polyamorous/open relationship.

If anyone here thinks for one moment that I'd be letting my wife have off with other men if I didn't love and trust her completely, they'd have another think coming. I assume she feels the same way about me (although I am not exactly active at the moment).