Why Men Cheat

Your husband could be one of those dogs who, no matter how good you look, how well things are going in your marriage, how much attention you give him, or how willing you are to meet his sexual fantasies, he will cheat on you. Your problem is you are you, and he wants something new. Doesn't even matter if she's not as good as you; she's different.

It's hard to compete with different. Or it could be the other woman is there, and you are not. It's hard to compete with there when you're not there.

Men are really no more complicated than that. Some may have morals or restraints or inhibitions that make them resistant to women who are a) willing, b) different from you by just not being you, and c) there when you are not. Many men do not have inner cops. They may be, for the most part, good husbands and fathers. They just have this impulse and no moral compass to keep them from acting on it.

Then there are the men that we push into the arms of other women who are a) willing, and b) different. They may be even very similar to us, like a younger version who happens to be around, even if we are also around.

How does that happen? We let it. Consciously or unconsciously.

Last night, my husband and I were discussing a friend we had not seen in awhile, and to my surprise, he told me this friend had left his wife. How could he leave his two children, I asked? I grew up in a time when couples stuck it out until the kids were grown or 'til death did them part. My parents did. His parents did. Both marriages were doomed from the get-go, but they put in 25 years before making their escapes through death or divorce. But my husband said he understood how you could leave your little kids behind.

How?

Well, if she's nagging you all the time, if things are never good enough for her, he said.

I was stunned. That's all it takes in his mind to break up a marriage with kids?

Which brings me to the marriage of Elizabeth and John Edwards and the mistress Rielle Hunter. If you were ranking this trio in terms of who is most at fault, you'd probably rank them 1. Rielle 2. John 3. Elizabeth. Or even 1. John 2. Rielle 3. Elizabeth. What bastard would put Elizabeth first? I would.

Elizabeth was once slim and lovely, and with such a family fortune, she could hire a trainer and a plastic surgeon and stay slim and lovely for a long time. But after the awful tragedy of their teenage son dying in an auto accident, she was determined to replace him. It took two tries to get another son and she was 52 by the time she accomplished it, after years of hormone treatments and rumored egg transplants.

You can imagine that in John's eyes, a replacement son probably wasn't that high a priority, especially if it turns his wife into a lab experiment and their sexual relationship into a breeding chore. Maybe he knew no new baby could ever replace the one that was lost, and the best thing to do would be hug each other a lot and move on. After the physical punishment of two pregnancies followed by menopause, Elizabeth ended up looking exhausted and shaped like a sack of potatoes.

Then they go through a second major disappointment of not being elected vice president of the United States, and then she gets cancer. (And you have to wonder if all the hormone treatments late in life to carry two more babies to term had anything to do with that.)

Right in the middle of all this, a dumb blonde waltzes into John's life, her video camera pointed at him all through the campaign, and tells him, and I quote, "You're so hot." That's all it takes. Really. That's all. Men are that easy.

Let's put that dynamic on a scale and weigh it against the cancer-ridden, shapeless, exhausted wife who tried to replace your beloved son with a couple of new babies that you have been too busy to bond with. Which way does the scale tip? "You're so hot" or "You failed to make me First Lady"?

Tiger Woods cheated because he could. He's away from home being fawned over by pancake waitresses. David Letterman's wife is frumpy looking for a woman married to a multi-millionaire. It can't be because she can't afford a pilates class and a great haircut. Meanwhile all these happy, ambitious, young interns are working with her husband, a man whose ego needs massaging because Leno is beating him in the ratings. Hillary Clinton is busy and bitchy. Monica is adoring, brings pizza, and isn't opposed to trying new things like thongs and cigars. Like Chris Rock says in one of his comedy routines, it was Hillary's job to give the president blow jobs. She wasn't doing her job. Angelina is beautiful, has lots of babies, and wants to save the world. Brad is beautiful, wants lots of babies, and wants to save the world. Jennifer wants to make another crappy romantic comedy and doesn't have time to save even one Third World baby. Who's trying and who's not?

It's a cautionary tale, and it crosses my mind whenever I am less than thrilled with my own husband's accomplishments, or I nag, or I take stock of how much weight I've gain since we met. I'm not really trying, am I? You may say I shouldn't have to keep qualifying for the job of wife that I already have…but that's in a perfect world. In the real world, we are married to men.