Covering for others' infidelity?

I'm speaking of people in supposedly committed relationships, be it marriage, cohabitating, LTRs, serious dating, etc. Basically any situation where monogamy was clearly promised, strongly implied, mutually expected, etc.

I'll probably add some questions & thoughts later. Please feel free to add your own!

Have you ever been asked to help a friend or a family member cover their infidelity?

Yes, I have. The requests usually came from a party buddies (PBs), but at least one close friend (CF) broached the subject. I make the distiction between PBs & CFs because in my misspent youth I had plenty of PBs and few CFs. The PBs were straightfoward is asking me to lie for them, while my CF made some feeler comments to judge my receptiveness. I'm guessing that most of my CFs didn't ask because they knew me better than my PBs. The one CF who put out the feelers was my Best Friend, and he probably figured that I might be willing to cover for him because we were close.


If yes, how did you handle it?
Why did you choose to handle it a certain way?
Did you handle each situation differently, depending on the circumstances?

I said no. I didn't care if the significant other (SO) was a total bitch, an asshole extraordinaire, or even having affairs. My theory is if you're wanting to cheat, you need to figure out why, and sort things out in your current relationship. Something inside me said I wouldn't want anyone covering for my SO, so I declined to cover for anyone.


Has your attitude regarding covering for cheating friends changed over the years?

Not mine, I've been steadfast in saying no. That said, it's been a long time since anyone asked me to cover for them. I will say that after nearly 27 years of marriage, and 29 years of monogamy, I can understand the temptations that goes beyond simply being young and horny.


To your knowledge, has your SO covered for anyone?
If yes, how do/did you feel about it?

To my knowledge my wife has never covered for anyone (I fully admit that it's possible). I do know that some college friends--hers, not mine, I was an 'outsider'--offered to cover for her if she wanted to 'date' someone other than me. I strongly suspect that a married friend suggested that both of them should enjoy other guys. While my wife has never directly said that, she has hinted at it, and I know the friend well enough to justify my suspicions.


What say you?



Edit--Why won't the edit function let me underline the questions?????

 

Have I ever covered for anyones infidelity?
No. absolutely not, without question. NO.

Why did you choose to handle it a certain way?
Because I have been cheated on.

Did you handle each situation differently, depending on the circumstances?
No. there are NO different circumstances. Cheating is cheating and I will NOT tolerate knowing about it.

Has your attitude regarding covering for cheating friends changed over the years?
Fuck no.

To your knowledge, has your SO covered for anyone?
No. It's a deal breaker for OUR relationship.

 

I'm fortunate that none of my friends has ever asked me to lie (with a Capital L) for them.

The two most important qualities of life for me are integrity and respect.

Integrity isn't something you pull out when it's convenient. It's what you do when no one is looking. And I feel a massive responsibility to impart that to my daughter. Covering up something like this would require my to act without integrity and that's not something. I'm willing to do.

Respect is what you should have for every human being, but particularly for someone you've chosen to live your life with. Infidelity is disrespectful to your SO and it's disrespectful to any children involved. If the relationship is broken, then be a man (or woman) and end it. Don't sneak around like a guilty child. Even if the SO never finds out, the cheater has disrespected regardless.

 

missed one, but the answer would still be the same.

Have you ever been asked to help a friend or a family member cover their infidelity?

Family, no. The rest of my family is like me on this one - so of course not. Friend, yes. ENORMOUS mistake on their part. I pulled out my phone, rang their significant other, said " >The person right in front of me that had just told me < Needs to talk to you NOW." and handed them the phone and said, "Tell them. Tell them N O W. Then put the phone down and get the FUCK out of my house, and don't EVER come back. I will be calling them in 30 minutes, and if you HAVEN"T told them, I WILL." and said it loud enough that the Sig Oth on the phone heard me.

 

I mentioned family because some family members are close, too close, close enough to cover for a cheating brother, sister, even a parent.
I knew a couple of guys who used to go out 'chasing tail' with their BILs....yes, the guys MARRIED to their sisters.


Thank y'all for the replies!

Please keep them coming.

 

As I have written here previously, this sort of thing doesn't seem to happen much among the people I know well. If I hear about it, it's after-the-fact.

Fidelity is easy / infidelity is hard | The TFP

 

Fortunately, I have never directly had anyone ask me to lie for them concerning infidelity. I did once, many years ago, have an acquaintance whom I caught stepping out on his SO, and he asked me not to tell her. We weren't close friends, and I barely knew his SO, so what I said was that I would not make it my business to find her and tell her, but if she and I ran into one another and she asked me, I would not lie, but would tell her the complete truth.

I think if it had been a closer friend, I wouldn't have been able to even passively enable his infidelity. But since I barely knew him, I felt like it was not sufficiently my business to become actively involved. I heard that he and his SO broke up not too long after that, so maybe he did the right thing and came clean to her. Or maybe she found out anyway. But I never regretted it when that guy drifted out of my life.

Generally speaking, I greatly disapprove of infidelity. I really feel like if a person meets someone while they are in a relationship, and they truly feel like they need to have sex with that person, fine: but they owe it to their partner to break off their current relationship first, like a decent and respectful human being. Otherwise it is a great betrayal of trust, and I have little patience with such betrayals, or those who make them.

 

I don't lie on my own behalf, I'm sure as hell not lying for anyone else's.

That said, I'm pretty much "don't ask, don't tell" when it comes to anyone elses sex life, just leave me out of it.

 

I don't think the fellows who asked me to lie for them did so because they thought that I would, they hoped that I would because I would be more believable than their other 'friends.' Women tended to view & treat me as a good friend/brother (much to my chagrin in my youth).

My "party buddies" learned very quickly not to ask me.

What I'm about to write is an explanation, not excuses. The close friend who hinted at me lying for him was a very high libido guy who was used to getting laid just about anytime he wanted with little effort on his part; he didn't need to seduce women, they would practically undress when they met him for the first time. His wife knew about his sex drive and many exploits before thay got married. She even commented that she (very specifically) and women (I assume she meant in general) like having a SO that make other women envious.

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Some posts have already mentioned this, but I since I had already planned to ask the follow-up question , here goes:

If you found out about an affair, how did you handle it?
What factors affected how you handled it?

I've never had to face clear evidence that someone close to me was having an affair.
Suspicions, yes. Hard proof, no.

 

When I was younger most of my party 'buds' were male, as were the majority of my co-workers (blue collar jobs).

After I started college, three and a half years after graduating HS, my jobs were white collar and most of my co-workers were female.

Anybody want to guess which sex was more tolerant & supportive of affairs?

 

Presumably the women.

 

/me grabs her tits and hisses "like HELL we are"

 

Some (most certainly not all) of the women I worked with treated affairs--as long it was the woman having the affair--like some kind of a game. They seemed to get a kick out of it, in a way they reminded me of young teenage girls getting giggly when talking about boys.

I'm not saying some of the guys I hung out with & worked with didn't have affairs. I'm sure some did, I just didn't hear it being openly discussed very often, other than the few who made the mistake of hoping that I would lie for them.

Just because people, male & female, work in an office doesn't mean they have better morals. I've known educated male & female professionals who were the most vulgar immoral pigs that you would ever not want to meet. Nor do folks who work with their hands automatically have lesser morals.

 

Have you ever been asked to help a friend or a family member cover their infidelity?

Yes I have. By more than one person.

If yes, how did you handle it?

Well I helped a brother or sister out. What the fuck did I care what they was doing.

Why did you choose to handle it a certain way?

Because at the time I just didn't care. I figured I might need them to cover my ass at some point.

Did you handle each situation differently, depending on the circumstances?

Aw, they had to be a pretty close friend or party buddy. I've had both men and lady friends ask and receive this favor.

Has your attitude regarding covering for cheating friends changed over the years?

Yes it has. When I was much younger my life and my friends was much wilder and faster than today. The booze and hooch flowed much more freely. Today I wouldn't dream of doing the things I done when I was a much younger man and time was truly on my side. I have mostly the same friends but somewhere through life responsibility found us. Who woulda thunk???

To your knowledge, has your SO covered for anyone?

Don't know, don't care. It has little to no bearing on our relationship.

If yes, how do/did you feel about it?

Again, I don't care. I have done things in my life I don't really regret. I only wish I had taken a slightly different path and being human I'm sure she has also.

 

Of the friends who are married or in long term relationships, I'm close enough to both people that I couldn't cover or make excuses for someone. If it happened, I would push them to admit to it and be there for them as they rebuilt trust in their relationship.

I've seen it happen. Two of my good friends Mike and Pat were best friends for years in college. Mike's girlfriend and Pat were also good friends, and eventually it became more than that. One day, she told Mike "I'm sorry, I can't be with you anymore," and all of a sudden she and Pat were a couple. I didn't talk to Pat for over two years, even when we saw each other in public, and even 5+ years later we're nowhere near as close as we were before the whole thing.

 

I have been in a situation for years where I have kept my mouth shut. It was over years ago, I was not asked directly, and I made a decision. I'm not proud of it. But, it is what it is.

 

Never been asked. The few people who are close enough to think to ask know me well enough not to ask. I don't have party buddies, I'm just not that social. For one, I'm a terrible liar when something is important. Tall tales I can tell, real lies not so much.

My personal opinion is that if you feel like you are going to cheat, then you need to be out of the original relationship first.

I've seen friends cheat on their SOs. I lost a lot of respect for them, and generally quit hanging out with them. I don't have many friends, by the way.

My little brother is a cheater. I don't get it. I've told him as much. The lack of honor and loyalty is probably why he's such a mess. I'm sure it eats away at anyone with a conscience.