To tell or not to tell? This question, for some reason, has come up a few times in the past few weeks in girl talk conversations...if you know one of your friend's husbands is cheating, do you tell her? Do you keep your mouth shut? Does it depend on the friend? Does it depend on if it is hearsay or if you actually see it with your own eyes? Hmmmm....you may think you have the answer, but until you are actually faced with the situation, do you really know what you would do?
I would like to say to all my girlfriends "oh, I would tell you." But, really, I don't think that's the case...if it is a close friend (a BFF of sorts) then yep, I am telling you. I am not happy about it, but I'm telling you. Because I think you would do the same for me (right, Michelle? Peggy? Sandy?). You would be surprised at who will keep the cheating spouses secrets and their motives for keeping the secret. My ex had an affair or two or three...who really knows? I found out after the divorce that there was at least one for sure the last two years we were married. There were people who knew that I thought I could trust...they have their reasons for not ratting him out, and I totally get that. You have to deal with the fact that the person may not believe you and you have ruined a friendship. The husband or cheating spouse WILL lie to cover their tracks and try to get out of it. (I know this one first hand.) If your friend believes them over you, then you have lost a friendship. Which is why I think it depends on the level of your friendship...what do you think?
It's not an easy situation...here's a tougher question - why has cheating become such common place? Is nothing sacred anymore? It seems that everywhere you look, someone is cheating on someone else. If you are that unhappy that you would inflict that much pain on someone you supposedly love, then why not just get divorced? Divorce hurts, but what hurt much worse was dealing with the affairs and other women...the things that go through your mind, the depression, the questions...it is the worst thing I've ever gone through. WHY would someone make a choice to inflict that kind of pain on someone they love? It doesn't make sense to me and didn't even before I was the "victim" of a cheating spouse. This is a topic that I've always been able to get on my 'soap box' about and can get me riled up b/c I just don't get it! I could go on and on...but I will spare you my lectures on cheating and being faithful...just know this - if you are so unhappy in a relationship that you feel the need to cheat, be decent and just walk away from your current relationship first. It may be painful, but not nearly as painful as what you are about to do.
Bringing me back to the original point - knowing what kind of pain you would start in your friend's life - do you tell or not? In what circumstances do you tell? Would you want to know? It's not fun being the one that doesn't know while everyone else does... but someone has to have the guts to let the cat out of the bag...would you be that person?
**disclaimer: do not read this and think Kevin has cheated - ha! For whatever reason this has seriously been a discussion at least twice in the past two weeks among girlfriends. I just wondered what some of your opinions were! :-)
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7 years ago
5 comments:
Woah - that's a toughie! Depends on the level of friendship and what you actually know. If I saw it w/my own eyes I might be more inclined to sort of say something like... "I saw 'so and so' out last night. He was sitting w/"blank type" girl." Then sort of just pose it a question of "where were you?" - like perhaps she was already aware of the outing. Course if I saw any of my girlfriends hubs out w/other women I'm the type to just walk right up and say HI and ask where the wife is. Now if it's second hand knowledge you have to do some digging and some further investigating and some deep soul searching to decide if you want to let that info out. Cause once that's out it's out and it sure is hard to take back stupid if it's not true. Just my two cents....Whew - I'll get off my soapbox now!
This actually happened to me with my sister. It wasn't her husband but her boyfriend of like 8 years so he should have been her husband, but thats a WHOLE nother topic...Anyways, My sisters boyfriend had told my boyfriend at the time how he met "some" girls online and was hanging out with them and "some things" happened and things went a little to far more than once. Anyways my boyfriend told me so I could tell my sister and she didn't belive me. Even though my boyfriend and her boyfriend were friends. Needless to say things were very awkward between us until she finally wised up and dumped him, but not for at least a year of the silent treatment from him towards me and my boyfriend.
I have no idea if I would ever do it again...
Well as being on the hurt side of a cheating spouse, I would hope that everyone would tell me, as one of my ex's best friends told me..
But I think I would tell me friend if I had just heard it, I would say "this is what I hear around town, you might want to take time to check into this yourself" and blah blah blah..I have told a friend that he was being cheated on and I had the silent treatment for awhile but I still stand by my decision to tell and I would do it again... I think everyone should have the right to now and let them figure it out for themselves and being the good friend I am I would stand beside them no matter what they deceide and I know that I was the good friend trying to protect them...
I think I have always been very direct on how I feel about cheaters and liars and I have said it is unforgable by me, but I know others that can forgive and forget..(its the forget I have a hard time with!) but I agree if someone that 'loves' you cheats on you then what else are they doing..
Oh by the way, I am Queen E (Etta), I popped over from DOUBLE DUTY's site...
I would only tell a really close friend who understood that I was doing it only for her benefit and only if I knew first hand. Otherwise I might mention it to someone closer to the person and have them keep an eye on the situation.
I think I would confront the cheater. I would tell him I know what he is doing and that he should come clean with my friend. I'd make sure he understood that if he didn't 'fess up then I was going to tell her what I know. Of course, I am assuming this is a very good friend. If it was just an acquaintance, I'd probably stay out of it. It's sad but I think in lots of these types of situations the other party already knows, and for whatever reason they allow it to continue or overlook it. I could never do that. People do make mistakes and things do happen, but to keep happening over and over again??? They say one time is a mistake, but two times....get rid of the scumbag. Oh, and I agree with you. If someone is unhappy enough in a relationship to cheat then why not just end the relationship and move on??
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