I used to think cheaters were just people who couldn’t keep their pants on.
Like the problem was impulse control or attraction to other people.
One thing I’ve realized?
Cheating isn’t really about sex or attraction.
It’s about lying!
You literally cannot cheat without becoming a liar first.
The moment you decide to pursue someone else while in a committed relationship, you have to start lying.
You’d be shocked at how creative you can be when you start cheating.
Because you gotta lie, bro….and sis.
You have to lie about things that don’t even seem related to the affair because maintaining a double life requires constant deception.
Oh, so exhausting, but you gotta do it because there’s no other way to cheat without getting caught.
Even when you get caught, some people will still lie.
And cheaters don’t just lie when they get caught.
They lie from day one, about everything, in ways that are so predictable it’s almost like they’re following a script.
So let’s talk about the lies that every cheater tells, because understanding these patterns might help you spot them before your world gets turned upside down.
12 Things Cheaters Always Lie About
1. They Lie About Their Relationship Status
You think someone who wants to cheat with you will tell you the truth about their marriage? lol
Something like, ”My wife is so amazing, but I just wanna have some fun, you know? I want to enjoy my marriage and enjoy something on the side.”
Nah.
They have to lie about their marital situation.
Some cheaters are so brazen they’d claim to be single, because well, some humans have a conscience and might not want to mess with a married person.
But some don’t, so they’d lie to themselves and everyone else about the state of their marriage.
Suddenly, their happy marriage becomes complicated.
Their loving partner becomes someone who doesn’t understand them.
Their relationship becomes something they’re working through, or trying to figure out.
Because you can’t justify pursuing someone else if you admit you’re in a good relationship.
So cheaters rewrite their relationship history to make their betrayal seem more understandable, more justified.
2. They Lie About Their Availability
Nobody understands the ”you only have time for what you make time for” self-help advice more than someone who has to be somewhere they’re not supposed to be.
Cheating is time-consuming, and if you are going to do that, you have to create time.
And yep, you have to lie.
How else do you think?
So, it’s not surprising that cheaters become masters of manufacturing free time they don’t actually have.
They create fake work meetings, imaginary social obligations, nonexistent errands.
They volunteer for projects that don’t exist, claim appointments they never made, invent emergencies that never happened…anything just to be with whoever they need to be with.
3. They Lie About Their Intentions From the Very Beginning
Every cheater always says that their affair “just happened.”
That they weren’t looking for anything, didn’t plan it, never intended for things to go that far.
You don’t expect them to say they knew exactly what they were doing.
Or that they knew they were intentionally hurting their partner.
Yeah, they have to lie about their intentions because they know they create opportunities to be alone with their target.
They complain about their relationship to create an opening.
They escalate physical contact gradually to test boundaries.
These aren’t the actions of someone who stumbled into an affair.
These are the actions of someone who orchestrated one.
Admitting intentionality means accepting responsibility, and cheaters often prefer to frame themselves as victims of circumstance rather than as architects of betrayal.
4. They Lie About the Nature of Their Communications
When questioned about their contact with their affair partner, cheaters suddenly become the most boring people on earth.
Everything is work-related or nothing important.
But you don’t text about quarterly reports at 11 PM.
You don’t have work conversations that make you smile in ways your spouse hasn’t seen in months.
You don’t discuss project deadlines that require deleting message histories.
The content of their communications is intimate, personal, emotional, messy, atrocious; exactly the kind of conversations that a third eye is not supposed to see.
5. They Lie About Their Emotional Investment
Let me tell you one dangerous lie cheaters love to tell: that it doesn’t mean anything.
This is probably the granddaddy of all the lies.
They’ll cheat and still look you dead in the eye and say, “It was just physical. I wasn’t emotionally involved.”
Excuse you?
So you were texting them day and night, confiding in them, sharing things you don’t even tell your spouse, calling them pet names, buying gifts, planning getaways… and that’s just physical?
Make it make sense.
Even if it was just physical, how does it make anything better?
The truth is, cheaters lie about their emotional involvement so they don’t look like the villains they really are.
Because it’s one thing to say, “I slipped.”
It’s another thing to admit you intentionally nurtured a whole second relationship.
So they lie.
They act like the side thing meant nothing, just a distraction.
Meanwhile, some of them are deeply attached.
In fact, they’re in love.
Yet they look their partner in the face and swear that it wasn’t that deep.
It was that deep.
If it truly meant nothing, they wouldn’t have hidden it.
And they definitely wouldn’t be risking everything to keep it going.
6. They Lie About Their Level of Satisfaction at Home
Cheaters love to paint their home as a war zone, just to justify their nonsense.
They’ll make it look like they’re suffering in their marriage, like they’re just managing, just surviving, when in reality, their home is fine.
Or at least, not nearly as bad as they make it seem.
Why do they do this?
Because guilt is real, and nobody wants to look like the bad guy.
Instead of owning their actions, they seek pity.
They need you to feel sorry for them, so you’ll excuse the affair as understandable.
Like, “Aww, he’s hurting. He just needs someone who truly sees him.”
Don’t be that someone.
The irony is that some of these men are being treated like kings at home.
Their wives are cooking, supporting them, raising the kids, trying to keep the marriage together, and still, they cheat.
Some women have the absolute best husbands, but they still cheat.
Because it’s not always about what’s missing at home.
Sometimes, it’s about what’s broken inside them.
People cheat not because their partners are terrible, but because they can.
When they get caught, they still run back to that same house they claimed was making them miserable.
7. They Lie About What They’re Looking For
If cheaters were upfront about what they actually wanted, 90% of the people they mess with would run in the opposite direction.
Fast.
That’s why they lie.
So, cheaters rarely admit what they actually want from their double life.
In fact, half the time, they don’t even know what they want themselves.
One thing is sure, though: many of them are not looking for anything serious.
They just want access….access to your time, your body, your attention, your peace, your mind, your soul!
They want excitement without accountability.
They want all the benefits of a committed relationship; affection, attention, intimacy, fun….without the actual commitment.
They want their spouse to handle the practical aspects of life: bills, children, household management, and medical emergencies, while their affair partner provides fun and passion.
That’s why study their victim, figure out the kind of person they are, and then say exactly what they want to hear.
That’s the scam.
In short, they want to be married and single simultaneously.
That’s what they want.
Simple.
Even though there’s nothing simple about this.
8. They Lie About Their Timeline
God forbid, but which would make you feel better?
An affair that happened once during a moment of weakness?
Or one that went on for months, maybe years… with calls, dates, gifts, secrets, and even emotions?
Exactly.
That’s why cheaters rush to edit the timeline.
They want to soften the betrayal.
They know that if you find out how long it truly lasted, you’ll see it for what it really is: not a slip-up, but a full-blown double life.
A “moment of weakness” sounds much more forgivable.
9. They Lie About Their Future Plans
If there’s one thing cheaters know how to do well, it’s selling dreams they have no intention of realizing.
They’ll sit with you and talk about the future like it’s guaranteed.
Marriage. Kids. Relocating. Sunday brunches. Even the wedding hashtag.
But most of it is a lie.
Many of them don’t want to choose.
They want the comfort of their relationship at home and the fun of their side situation.
So they feed both women/men lies.
Different lies, but same selfishness.
10. They Lie About How It Affects Their Family Life
No one lives in La La Land and cheats without consequences.
You can’t be sneaking around, juggling double lives, hiding messages, covering tracks, and acting like it’s not affecting your home.
Impossible.
But that’s exactly what cheaters will tell you.
“It doesn’t affect my family at all.”
“I keep both lives separate.”
“My wife/husband has no idea, so it’s fine.”
”My children are doing well.”
Ah. Look at wisdom. 🙄
They believe and want their affair partner to believe that cheating is this neat, quiet little box that doesn’t spill into their marriage or parenting.
But it spills everywhere.
In their mood, energy, in how they show up (or don’t) at home, in the way they zone out mid-conversation, forget birthdays, act irritable over little things, and start becoming emotionally absent.
You think their partner hasn’t noticed?
They may not know why, but trust me, they feel it.
Kids start feeling it too.
And yet, this man/woman will be claiming everything is under control, like they are managing a company and not a crumbling home.
They convince themselves that because they’re still paying bills and showing up physically, everything is fine.
But what is a body doing in the house when the heart is somewhere else?
You tell me.
11. They Lie About Their Guilt
Except you’re an unrepentant psychopath, you will feel guilty for betraying someone who trusted you.
You might not admit it.
You might not act like it.
But your conscience won’t let you rest completely.
Thing is, most cheaters are eaten alive by guilt, but they’ll never admit it.
They lose sleep, develop anxiety, become jumpy and paranoid.
They feel sick when their spouse kisses them goodbye.
They can barely look their children in the eye.
They’re constantly worried about getting caught, about hurting people they love, about the consequences of their choices.
But admitting guilt means admitting wrongdoing, and they’re not ready to stop yet.
So they rationalize their behavior and pretend they’re at peace with their choices.
12. They Lie About Their Spouse’s Intuition
Cheaters always underestimate one thing: their partner’s intuition.
They desperately want to believe their spouse is completely oblivious.
But when the partner starts suspecting something is off, instead of telling the truth, they lie.
Boldly.
They know their partner is not crazy.
But rather than come clean, they gaslight.
They twist the narrative and make their partner feel guilty for even asking.
Because the moment they acknowledge the intuition is correct, everything crumbles.
Sometimes the betrayed partner ends up apologizing for overthinking, while the cheater continues the affair in peace.
Cheating is messy.
But what makes it even more painful are the lies that come with it because cheating is built on lies.
Lies to the partner.
Lies to the affair partner.
Lies to the children.
Even lie to themselves.
Is it worth it?
NO.