But I'M Not Cheating, He Is!
First of all, let's define "cheating". Two people have an agreement, either explicit or implicit, about how their relationship should look. If implicit, the "cheater" knows that the spouse would not approve even if they never made any vows on the subject. What that agreement is about is not relevant to this definition. It could be about sexual
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I cannot trust someone who is willing to violate their agreements or facilitate someone else violating agreements of their own. I also could not remain in a loose don't ask don't tell relationship because it was too close to some of these points.. while I know at one level that all the relationship parts were _okay_ - and people were sincerely _okay_ with the arrangement - the fact that I couldn't openly enquire to each person, individually, to be reassured.. meant that it was not okay with me.
I also, honestly, have a hard time trusting former cheaters. It would never have been okay in my ethics to have cheated, by any justification. So, I don't understand how people were once able to justify those heinous actions for themselves.. nor understand the transformation that could allow them to behave ethically now?
While I understand that people can choose to be someone else and behave differently I have a hard time understanding that it was okay to them at some time and still see them as a trustworthy being now. What has really changed? Perhaps you could help me to understand that as I get to know you better.
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The problem is that it's hard to explain what's different without ending up, at least sounding like I'm justifying myself for when I used to cheat. And I just can't do that. I was wrong. Period. I can maybe try to tell you what was going through my head at the time, but 1) I was a teenager and 2) it's really just the standard cognitive dissonance that pretty much everyone goes through over something.
The entire reason I became poly in the first place was so that I wouldn't cheat or contribute to cheating anymore. I had decided I could no longer accept myself as a cheater so I swore off "relationships" and settled for casual sex, until the night I went on a date with a man who said I could have both freedom and commitment. I adopted polyamory in that single night.
I could go through the list of boyfriends I had when I was a teenager and tell you all the stupid things I did as a kid, but that would be a whole other post, and a long one at that. But I never once, even at the time, believed I was doing something "right". I always knew it was wrong and I did it anyway. My guilt drove me to give up committed relationships (as I didn't know I had any other option) rather than cheat again, because I didn't seem capable of abstaining. I just kept falling in love with new people before falling out of love with the old people. I had no relationship models for anything other than "meet in high school, get married, finish college, have kids, buy a house in the suburbs". I never knew anything other than that, even in books or movies, and I had no concept for having relationships any other way. But I was clearly not made for that sort of relationship.
I don't know how to explain how strongly I feel about this now, that I just can't bring myself to go back on my word. It has become a part of my identity that I am a person who does not do that. In fact, I continue to be told that I need to learn how to not be so brutally honest about my relationships, because apparently too many details makes some people uncomfortable. I've actually broken up with partners because they didn't want as many details as I wanted to share.
I can say that it has been more than 15 years since I cheated on anyone and that I wasn't yet legally allowed to drink alcohol. I think many people were very different people as children and things we rationalize to ourselves as kids do not necessarily even make sense to us as adults.
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