Infidelity is the most painful betrayal a person can experience in a relationship.
It is a terrible experience that shatters the trust of the victim.
The saddest part is that it even shatters the victim’s trust in their own judgment.
They start asking themselves several questions like…
“How did I not see this coming?”
“How could I be so foolish?’
These two questions show the victims’ tendency to blame themselves for the ordeal they have gone through.
They start thinking, “If I had just been more alert,” or “If I hadn’t been so trusting.”
The truth is that there is no excuse for cheating and infidelity.
Self-flagellation for something someone did to you won’t help you.
Another question that could be on her mind is, “How can someone who claims to love me hurt me this way?”
She may wonder if he still loves her as she considers the next steps to take while moving on.
When a man cheats on his wife, it is usually assumed that he no longer loves her.
While this may be true for some men, the reality is much more complex.
Many men who cheat still claim to love their wives.
Infidelity can occur for many reasons, and some of these reasons have absolutely nothing to do with love.
I know it’s shocking because love and infidelity seem to be two opposites.
Yes, they are, but in reality, two opposites can exist alongside each other.
This is not a healthy situation, but it can happen.
Let’s examine some reasons why this happens…
7 Reasons Some Men Love Their Wives But Still Cheat
1. Lack of boundaries
I lived a sheltered life as a kid.
Had no friends, hardly ever went out, and all that…
You know the drill.
When I finally started mixing with people my age, I realized that some didn’t understand the concept of boundaries.
They had none and didn’t expect that others should have boundaries.
I had rules.
I didn’t like people touching me unnecessarily.
You couldn’t take my stuff without permission.
Because of this, people usually coordinated themselves around me.
No one was passing their boundaries with me.
My point is that the reason some men love their wives but still cheat is because they lack boundaries.
They pride themselves on being free souls and so tolerate all sorts of nonsense from other people.
I remember once in school, a coursemate wanted to ask me a question.
She had to apologize before she asked because she felt she may be crossing a line.
She asked, “Are you in a relationship?”
And I laughingly said I was very single.
She didn’t believe it.
She said I usually behaved like someone who was engaged.
It was funny that people felt my clearly defined boundaries translated into me being in a relationship.
They were accustomed to seeing guys falling over each other to talk to them, but I was just aloof.
I see many married men “playing” with other women outside in very inappropriate ways, and it gets to me.
The truth is that if you have no clear boundaries while relating with the opposite sex, you may soon find yourself in compromising and tempting positions– positions where saying no may be a very dicey business.
2. Sexual dissatisfaction
It is possible to love someone and still be dissatisfied sexually with them.
People mistake love for sexual satisfaction.
They are two different things.
Sexual dissatisfaction is one of the leading causes of infidelity.
If you ask the average cheating husband why he is cheating, his response is most likely to revolve around sexual drought or boring sex with his wife.
What annoys me the most is how some of them say it as a justification for cheating.
Well, I will emphasize it once again…
There is no excuse for infidelity.
None at all!
While the man may still love his wife, he might feel unfulfilled sexually and seek out an affair to satisfy his physical desires.
This can be a result of mismatched libidos, lack of intimacy, or unmet expectations.
When a man starts complaining all the time about sexual issues, it is a sign that he is dissatisfied with something.
Perhaps he wants to spice up the relationship by trying out new things.
Or he may be going through a period of sexual drought.
Either way, these situations could be why a man who loves his wife still cheats on her.
In uni, we used to joke and coin motivational punchlines.
One day, I just looked at a friend who woke up with an erection and said, “Your erection should not be your direction, or you may never reach your destination.”
It was all in fun, of course, but the lesson stands.
A man who is guided by his erection and how sexually dissatisfied he is may never remain on course to enjoy a successful marriage.
3. Opportunity and temptation
When opportunity combines with temptation, it becomes a recipe for disaster.
I remember talking to a friend who strongly believed in not having premarital sex.
He was very intolerant of those who practiced it, and I advised him to focus more on his life than on what others do with theirs.
Anyway, a few months ago, he contacted me and told me that he had done something really terrible.
Turns out that he met a young lady he liked.
She was very attractive, and for the first time, he was already imagining what it would be like to be married to her.
Of course, he was also physically attracted to her, but he was ready to wait for the wedding night.
One day, she came to visit him…
They watched a movie, cuddled, and in a blink of an eye, he found himself doing that one thing he said he wouldn’t.
For him, it was a terrible letdown.
But I had seen it coming a long time ago.
He had been courting danger for a long time and didn’t know.
This also applies to married men.
Sometimes, all that is required for a man to cheat is for the opportunity to present itself and the temptation to become too strong to resist.
Every man has a breaking point.
What distinguishes disciplined men from undisciplined ones is how they react to opportunity and temptation.
While disciplined men run away before the temptation becomes too strong to handle, indisciplined men have no idea of their limits.
They have no boundaries; hence, they don’t know when they will reach the threshold of their endurance.
They may end up giving in to the temptation to cheat.
This doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t love their wives.
It only means that they struggle with controlling their impulses.
4. Emotional distance
While the man might still love his wife deeply, he might be experiencing an emotional disconnect within the relationship.
This could stem from several reasons.
Communication breakdown in a marriage can leave a husband feeling this way, especially if it is frequent.
Unresolved conflicts could also be another major reason a man who loves his wife may feel emotionally disconnected.
The truth is that you shouldn’t allow emotional disconnection to exist in your relationship for any reason unless you are actually done with it.
Unresolved conflicts should be resolved through effective communication, not silent treatment.
Communication breakdowns may occur from time to time, but they shouldn’t be allowed to become frequent occurrences.
In this position, some men may start seeking the emotional connection they are missing at home, which could lead to a downward spiral in the relationship.
You must note that I am not justifying infidelity.
Infidelity is wrong.
However, if your response to everything your husband does is to give him the silent treatment, you are not also doing the right thing.
5. Negative influence
As a kid, my parents always stressed the fact that a man is only as good as the company he keeps.
Sometimes, the people around us influence us to do things that we would never have considered otherwise.
A viable reason why some men can cheat on their wives and yet still love them is the negative influence of friends and people around them.
A man may have a happy marriage to a wife he is in love with, but if he is friends with men who cheat on their wives, he could be negatively influenced into giving infidelity a try.
I used to hang out with a bunch of guys in school.
These guys were womanizers of the highest order.
They were playboys, and while I wasn’t innocent, I felt like a choirboy compared to them.
Soon, they started rubbing off on me.
I started picking up some of their negative attributes and traits.
It took a lot of willpower to stop interacting with them.
The day they tried to make me smoke with them was the day I ended that toxic friendship.
I am asthmatic, and they knew it but still wanted me to smoke with them.
That day, I knew they didn’t have my well-being in mind.
Negative influence can come from other sources as well.
In Africa, it is not unusual to see a man pressured by his extended family into getting a second wife.
This is especially true if he and his wife are still trying to conceive or if they only have female daughters.
This is an archaic element of culture, but some men may cave in to the pressure because they lack the strength to stand against their family.
6. It is normal to them
A lot of guys still think that men are polygamous in nature.
These guys believe that they can never stay with just one woman forever.
Of course, they may love her enough to marry her, but they still want to be able to have “fun” on the side.
Everyone is entitled to their beliefs, but I believe that these guys say things like this to justify their weaknesses.
We all know how hard it is to stay committed to one person.
But rather than admit that they are struggling with it because they lack self-control, they chalk it all down to males being polygamous in nature.
It sounds right until someone steals and says, “I just can’t stop it. It is my nature, so I don’t deserve punishment”.
Anyhow, I am just airing an opinion.
You don’t have to share the same.
7. Personal issues
Infidelity can sometimes be caused by internal issues.
Many men have harmful personal habits.
They struggle with harmful addictions to pornography, alcohol, and drugs.
This could be a problem.
Growing up, I struggled with pornography.
For a sheltered kid, I got exposed to it at a very young age, and it was a struggle to get over it.
I didn’t think that elderly people had this sort of issue too until the day I came across an uncle’s phone.
His phone was practically brimming with pornographic videos.
The kicker is that he also had issues with infidelity.
He didn’t even hide his extramarital activities.
My point is that many of these additions are related to unresolved personal issues.
I know a guy who used to masturbate because he felt that was the only way he could get sexual pleasure.
He thought he was ugly and no one would like to have him.
A lot of these addictions are linked to unresolved personal issues like self-esteem issues.
Some men have turned to affairs as a way to escape their problems.
Imagine a man who feels inadequate in his marriage.
Instead of working on those things that make him feel that way, he decides to see if he can still attract other ladies.
This is how infidelity starts for many men who are dealing with low self-esteem.
They start, and they get hooked on the excitement of infidelity.
They stop feeling inadequate and think they have found the right therapy for their issues without knowing that they are only worsening things.
So, yes, a man can love his wife and still cheat on her.
However, if he does it constantly without repentance, then his love for you is very questionable.
Don’t let any man bamboozle you with the “it’s you I love” excuse.
If he truly loves you, he will be ready to work on controlling his impulses.
Mistakes happen, but some are not meant to happen more than once.
It is impossible to betray, hurt, and disrespect someone you love constantly.
A man’s love is expressed by his actions, and fidelity is definitely a way to express love!