April 7, 2020 | Melissa Budish

People Share The Dumbest Excuse Their Partner Had For Being Unfaithful To Them


In romantic relationships, no one is ever perfect. However, sometimes, one partner messes up to a much greater degree than the other partner. These are the dumbest excuses people were told by their partners regarding why they had been cheated on. Read on for some shake-worthy stories:

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#1 Ironically Impressive

My friend from college was fooling around during a party and his girlfriend heard it was happening, so she ran to his room and nearly broke the door down. He was busted red-handed, naked with the other girl. In his tipsy stupor, he called out to his girlfriend and said, "Baby, it doesn't mean anything to me, I'm not even turned on!" He obliterated the confidence of two girls that night with a single action. Not quite admirable, but certainly impressive!

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#2 An Open Relationship

“Remember when we talked about having an open relationship?” No, I don’t remember that... at all. I worked with a girl like that. She claimed she and her husband were in an open relationship and he dated other people so did she. But she'd complain about a guy sending her flowers because she couldn't bring them home. Made it pretty clear that day it wasn't an open relationship.

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#3 An Invalid Excuse

"I didn't think you'd find out." We had been together for eight years, married for three months and had a young child together when this happened. We are no longer married.  I'm in a much better place and everyone involved is much happier. My ex-husband and I actually get along as well as a divorced couple can. Our daughter has handled the whole thing very well.

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#4 I Don't Care

"I didn't say it was right, I just don't care." That messed me up man. Honestly, this is the best one and almost the only one that makes sense. They didn't try to justify it or blame it on me... It was just basically, "I messed up and I don't care." It's the only real reason people do cheat. All the other stuff is just pulling punches or embarrassment.

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#5 Classic Manipulation

I caught her cheating on me with someone I knew. It was someone I kind of figured she was seeing behind my back and I had brought it up to her before. Her defense was accusing me of being jealous so apparently I made her do it. Me being right is somehow my fault? I just... what. Classic manipulation. It's always my fault, even when she got caught red-handed.

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#6 Out Revenging

"I thought you were cheating on me, so I got revenge!" My ex nearly cheated on me with this excuse. She downed a bottle and then started attacking me because I was "sleeping with Ellie." We then went to the pub to meet some friends and she started flirting with guys to try and get at me. She did cheat in the end, about eight months later, but her life is going downhill, so I'm not too mad at her. Her dad's in prison, and her mom, brother, and older sister are all messed up. She lives with a creepy pervert landlord, so I can revel in that.

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#7 Girl's Night Out

Not anyone I've dated, but a former coworker. She'd cheat on her boyfriend around twice a month, it seemed. She'd go out with a friend to the bars, get with some random guy in his car, and then tell us about it at work. Her justification: "What am I supposed to do? I'm turned on and my boyfriend isn't there. That's his fault." She was a trash person, so I didn't care enough to engage. But, one of the older women we worked with asked, "Well, did you invite him out to the bar with you?" Her response? "Heck no, it's a girls-night-out."

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#8 God's Plan

The guy she was with was apparently closer to God than I was. It's the Christian college approach. These people have also been known to use: “God showed me a vision of my future husband, and it definitely wasn’t you, but it looked a lot like this guy”. Added color: appearances are very important to people in these communities. It’s not important what you do, what’s important is that you frame it in a way that makes yourself look good or better than someone else. In a situation like this, God is a great way to remove responsibility from yourself and a great shield to hide behind, because if anyone questions your excuses then you can accuse them of questioning God.

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#9 The Poetry Clause

When I caught him, he referred to a poem that I shared with him a few months prior. He said: "Remember 'The great, blue sky of unspecified desire?' Remember when I agreed with that line?" He thought we agreed to sleep with other people... because of poetry. Here is the poem: "How will you know the difficulties of being human if you're always flying off to blue perfection? Where will you plant your grief-seeds? We need ground to scrape and hoe, not the sky of unspecified desire." Yeah... I still can't see how he got 'an open relationship' out of this.

#10 Pattern Of Behavior

He started dating me. He told me he broke up with his ex right before meeting me. She contacted me and told me what was happening. He told me that she didn’t understand that they are broken up. She was delusional and thought they were still together. He cheated on me a year later. After we broke up, he tried to say he was sorry and that he has cheated on every girlfriend he had ever had. It wasn’t his fault. It took him a year to cheat on me, it only took a few months with everyone else. Like that was going to make me feel better...

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#11 Prom Night

I got one. She cheated because she thought I didn't care and when I broke up with her, she was angry that I didn't hit her or shout because it meant I didn't care. We were around 18 and she told me that her father cheated on her mom, which was the ultimate reason for their divorce. She was actually kind of happy since it happened during her prom night, while I waited outside, per our agreement. The worst part about that was that both our mutual friends chose her after we split up.

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#12 A Real Bro

I was dating this girl for about six months when she said her boyfriend was coming back from Afghanistan. She never brought him up because she thought we were keeping it casual, or it might ruin the mood, and she didn't think I would mind. I found the guy, told him what happened, and he was cool. He said he figured it was happening anyway so he wasn't to upset about it.

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#13 Cheers, Mate

It happened to me while I was deployed. The dude hit me up three weeks before I came home to come clean about it. When I confronted her, she denied it, even when I showed her the email. She didn’t believe it, then after continuing to bring it up, she asked if I could just drop it, ignore it, and come home. We were together for four years and she had planned to leave me for him the day after I got home. He had a change of heart, spilled the beans to me, and ran as far away as he could. He bought me a few drinks years later and she married one of my former long time friends.

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#14 A Red Flag

"Well, you were looking at videos. It's the same thing." And then, after marriage counseling, which she wanted to try to save the marriage since we had a young child, she wouldn't stop sleeping around... "We may have been in counseling but that doesn't mean we are together, so it's not cheating." After that, I finally filed for divorce. Usually, I can't really tell red flags in a relationship, but this I can tell. This is a red flag.

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#15 Gut Feeling

To my ex, she said that me having alone time meant that she wasn't good enough. She said it bothered her and made her feel uncomfortable. She had no problem with staying the night at my best friend's house though, coming up with all the excuses in the book as to why I couldn't come with. After we broke up, they got into a relationship, so... I'm pretty sure my gut was on the right track that night. I feel stupid and I should have not been cool with it. To clarify, we aren't friends anymore. Two exes out of one situation.

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#16 Sharks To Rabbits

“She is a shark and you are a rabbit. She took what she wanted and you let this happen to you. Sharks eat rabbits.” Okay... I think I’ll just hippity-hop right on out of this stupidity. Sharks... sharks never even see rabbits. On account of sharks not being terrestrial predators, and rabbits not being so much into trans-oceanic swimming trips. What a moron.

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#17 We Were On A Break

Well, it only happened once, but she said we should go on break. We did, and she hooked up her ex the next day. Then she asked me why she couldn't just be with both of us and have us be cool with it? There were a lot of red flags throughout, but that's when I finally realized it wasn't worth it. When we went on break, it was understood we were still together, just taking a week of solitude. Many seem to interpret breaks as being broken up, but that's never been the case for me. If I don't want to be with someone, I break up. I don't ask to go on break so I can get back with my ex. That's some shady business.

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#18 The Lonely Card

I went away on a field trip with my university class for a week. I came back to find out he'd slept with two other women. His excuse? "I missed you. I was lonely without you and couldn't cope. You shouldn't have left me alone." Ugh, there was so much wrong with that man, and that relationship. And my emotionally damaged self let him talk me into believing it was. I actually bought him a present to apologize for getting mad that he cheated on me. That's the level of messed up that relationship was. I did finally get out of it, but it took far longer than it should have. Looking back, I just wish I'd done it sooner.

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#19 Naked CPR

He was out with her in her car. I was out with two friends in their car. We pulled up to a popular parking area up on a hill, a vantage point where people often sit. I noticed her car and knew he was out with her. He had told me his two buddies were also with them. I decided to go to the passenger side window and scare him. He was not in there. He was in the back. With her. His claim was that he “passed out” and she was giving him CPR because she panicked and thought he “had a heart attack.” He was 16, in perfect health. I couldn’t explain the naked part though. Or why his two friends weren’t there.

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#20 Mental Acrobats

I have an ex whose favorite excuse was along the lines of: "Men's urges are instinctual, uncontrollable driving forces. I didn't want to be with her, I just really didn't have any choice in the matter! Because, hormones!' The same dude honestly did not believe that women had the same drive as men. I was literally always turned on, so I can't imagine the mental acrobatics he must have done to maintain that belief.

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#21 Never Looked Back

“You don’t have a job.” True. I had been "between jobs" for about two months. That was enough for her to toss out the marriage and sleep with her boss. I was okay with it... she was insane. Two weeks later, I filed for divorce. One week after that, I got a job paying double my old salary. Never looked back. Sometimes you need to go through bad to get to the good.

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#22 Dodged A Bullet

When I was in high school, I showed up at my friend's house for a birthday party for one of my other friends and walked out back to get fresh air. When I walked outside, the girl I was dating was in the pool with some guy, playing tonsil hockey with him. I alerted her of my presence, then walked back inside and she followed a few minutes later. When she came in, I asked her what was going on. Her response was, "Well, I called your house and nobody answered. I didn't know where you were, figured you were out cheating on me, so, I thought I'd return the favor." I told her (honestly) that I hadn't been home because my family had gone to dinner at Red Lobster to celebrate my mom's birthday. She apologized, I laughed, then we split up... and I actually found out later that I dodged a major bullet.

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#23 Playing Dumb

I was living in a hostel and this girl was dating an African American guy. The guy went on vacation for a week. We were having a party and this girl messed around with another African American guy. She then said she thought he was her boyfriend... It was such a horrible excuse that nobody dared to question it. Also, they didn't look similar at all. The only thing in common was that they were both quite tall.

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#24 Good Riddance

My ex-husband, 21 years ago. I was pregnant with our son. At five months, I was three centimeters dilated and had already had my labor stopped several times. I was on bed rest. He felt completely justified in going out and finding some. He never would concede that it was cheating. It was my job to take care of his needs and he felt completely within his right to get it elsewhere if I refused.

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#25 "You Deserved It"

“You deserved it.” I was angry all the time because I was doing all the household chores, yet he complained I didn’t do enough. Taking care of our seven-year-old... working full time... all of the logistics. And I had a husband who treated me like an afterthought. Going to happy hours with work friends was more important to him. And I especially deserved for him to cheat on me while I had cancer. I saw a message to the AP telling her how boring his weekend was. And she said he deserved something better and more fun. Sorry I wasn’t more fun during chemo.

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#26 The Worst Saboteur

My ex said he used it to “sabotage our relationship because it wasn’t going anywhere" and he "didn’t know how to end it.” Really jerk? You couldn’t just say, “I’m breaking up with you” instead of destroying my ability to ever trust any other boyfriend I ever have again? "I wanted it to end but didn't want to break up." Okay then. I freaking hate cheaters.

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#27 Forced Miscommunication

“We’re in an open relationship!” Except we weren’t. The day before, she asked if I would be open to one, and I said let me think about it and we can talk tomorrow. The next day comes around and she said she had to go to a study session with one of her friends when I get home. I found out she was cheating on me when she was telling her best friend immediately after.

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#28 Not A Saint

Because I gained 5 pounds. Seriously. He thought cancer would make me lose weight, but when I put on some sadness pounds at the beginning (literally 5, I had a doctor's appointment earlier that day), he claimed that I became unattractive. They’re still together. I wish him no ill will and I'm glad he’s happy, but the petty side in me is kind of happy he’s gained some weight. What can I say, I’m not a saint.

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#29 The Brotherhood

When I was in my early teens I was actually on the other end. This girl I was seeing already had a boyfriend, but I had absolutely no idea about it. We were seeing each other for a good eight months or so. I thought everything was going super well; she even came to my aunt's wedding with me. When I was out with a mate at some shops, we bumped into her. She was with another bloke. I approached her, and she just immediately snapped and said to this guy "This guy hasn't left me alone, he keeps harassing me!"

What the heck. I literally spoke to her two days prior to that... I was more confused than angry. A bit of a fight happened, but when cooler heads prevailed my mate mediated a talk between me and her other boyfriend, and we chatted about what happened. Needless to say, he apologized for attacking me, and I apologized for not being aware. We both had no idea how she kept her secrets for so long. He became a close friend after all that. Turns out, they were dating for two years, and after he confronted her after our talks, she said, "I was gonna tell you when the time was right." That was her excuse. I lost a girlfriend but made a pal. Better trade in my book.

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#30 Life Is Weird

She felt like I was trying to control her too much by not allowing her to be with other dudes. Mind you, she was unemployed, she and her daughter lived in my house, she drove a second car that I purchased solely so she could find work and drive her daughter to things, and the list goes on and on. This is the same woman who had dangerous type 1 diabetes and would check her sugar maybe once a week, then berate me for asking her to check it. She passed away from diabetic ketoacidosis. around four months after we finally broke up. Life is weird.

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#31 Finding The Humor

After hiring a private investigator and having my husband (at the time) followed, I caught him coming out of a hotel with a woman, among other atrocious financial crimes. I asked why he did it and all he could come up with was, "Because you picked at your food." My friends and I still joke about that to this day! At the very least, at least we could find some humor in the situation.

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#32 Unapologetic

“I made a mistake that all women make at some point. I’m sorry, and I never say that I am sorry, so you know that I mean it.” She minimized what she did by trying to normalize it. She rationalized it for herself without paying any attention to the hurt that it caused, and lastly, she flaunted her incredible virtue of never apologizing. Never apologizing does not make you strong, it makes you an asshole. Red. Flag.

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#33 Joke's On You

She cheated on me with her ex-fiance. When I found out, she said, "We were together all the time before I met you, so I figured it wouldn't be a big deal." To which I replied, "Oh, well then I'm going to start randomly going #2 in my pants again since I did it all the time when I was a baby." She laughed. So did I. Then I broke up with her.

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#34 The Case For Polygamy

She said that monogamous relationships were started by men as a way to keep women under their control and that polygamy was a common practice for men until women started doing it and that the practice stopped because men were jealous. It seems like the kind of thing you should talk about before starting a relationship with someone. Oh, we're in a committed relationship? Did I mention that monogamous relationships are a construct of the patriarchy?

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#35 For My Healing

My ex-husband had an affair from about August to November because God told him that I was going to die. Apparently, the chick he cheated with had the gift of healing and was his soulmate who was going to take care of him after I died. She was going to heal him of all the trauma from his past. I'm not kidding, he legitimately believed this.

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#36 Format My Brain

I don't know the concrete answer, and this is going to sound like a stretch but... I think she was angry at me because I was a good parent to her daughter (her daughter didn't appreciate mommy calling her an "evil little girl") and that I actually had a career and my life together. It was that, or she really was a sociopath who only used me while her real boyfriend was cool with me taking care of her. It was such a mess at the time that really I needed to figure out a way to format my brain.

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#37 Nice One...

We'd been dating for a short time, but exclusively. She claimed to be a virgin and intended to remain so until her wedding night. Then, I found out she'd cheated on me. When I confronted her and asked her why she would go sleep with someone else, but not with me, she said that she didn't want me to think she was a tramp. I kid you not.

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#38 A Yikes Moment

We were at a party and I walked into a room. He was making out with a guy, so I pulled him off the dude and yelled, “What the heck,” pretty much calling a huge chunk of the party to our attention. He said, “It doesn’t count if it’s same gender” He identified as bi, so I’m pretty sure it counts. When I called him out on it, he had the audacity to say, “Well, I thought you’d think it was hot.” I was in the other room. Great Hail Mary, jerk.

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#39 It's Going Down

If it actually happened (it's incredibly likely she's lying), it was because she did it "each time we broke up," and "every time it felt final." The funny thing is... I don't remember any of these break-ups. The only one I remember was when she said she wanted to end it because she fancied someone she'd just met and then begged for me to take her back a day or two later. It didn't last long after that (a month or so), but man, everything just went down the toilet after that.

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#40 Trust Issues

She told me when we were already broken up. It would have been nice to know when I was still with her. I had taken care of her kids for a full week while she had a business trip. To have her tell me two weeks later because the guilt got to her... that was unfair. She still, to this day, has rationalized that she did nothing wrong. I've been finding it hard to trust anyone new lately.

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#41 Showing Empathy

Right before I was about to go to work, she spilled the beans that she had been cheating on me with five people, including an 18-year-old while she was at her job (she took care of special needs adults day and night). She also admitted she was messing around with a close family friend (which I needed to keep to myself and deal with at family functions). Her response to "why?" was: "I felt bad for them." What the heck?

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#42 The Medical Excuse

My ex-girlfriend and I were just casually talking one night when suddenly she told me that she was on a new medicine for her depression and that it was changing her. She later cheated on me and blamed it on her medicine. I talked to her mom a few weeks later when I was picking up some of my things and it turns out she hadn't been put on a new medicine. The whole thing was just a lie so that she could cheat on me.

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#43 No More Second Chances

"I didn't want to tell you no when you asked me out," so instead, she saw both us for months. When I finally confronted her about it, she said she wanted to be with me. It was the first and the last time I forgave her cheating). Two weeks later, she was the one breaking up with me over text because she planned on being with him that evening.

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#44 Knife Deep

My high school girlfriend went to some overnight event with her youth group. While there, she let another dude feel her up all over while watching a movie. She told me about it after telling her best friend, and her friend asked her: "Did it do anything for you? " She replied, "No, not really, " and her friend said, "Then it wasn't cheating." That's the excuse she then gave to me. Knife a bit deeper, she tried to set one of her other friends up with the guy, and then wanted us all to hang out and go on a double date.

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#45 Look Familiar?

She said she wasn’t cheating. Then, I got sent to me a picture of her from the guy she was cheating on me with and he said, “Look familiar?” When I confronted her about it, she said those were old pictures and he was just trying to start drama. I was like fair enough, then I realized that the pictures were literally taken in her dorm room that she had just moved into that year. I was standing in the same spot that she took them in as I was talking to her. Rough time for me on that one.

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#46 Pure Confusion

When dating, she asked me to go steady. She told me she loved me first, then she asked me if I wanted to move in with her. I got sick for a month with panic attacks that crippled my body out of nowhere, and I caught her back on the website we met on. She said she was just trying to spice our intimate life up, but she was liking pictures of local men, going on dates with them while saying she was with her female friends. The next week, she said she wanted to move out, so I ended things. A week after, she said she was never ready for a relationship. It was confusing.

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#47 Shady Business

"You're just too nice. I wanted to feel some danger." She got with a homeless guy in our apartment. I left immediately, got myself tested, and left town on vacation. Her homeless boyfriend later ended someone over $100 while I was out of town on said vacation and they tried to say I was involved. Luckily, I save my plane ticket stubs and receipts due to rampant paranoia that someone will try to accuse me of something I didn't do. So, after I got home and the cops came for me, I handed over copies of all my tickets and transactions, along with pictures of my trip. Last I heard, they got him behind bars, and she fled to Mexico. Good riddance.

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#48 Uber Driver

Mine was so hammered that I gave up and left him at the bar because I had to work the next morning. He called me at 3:30 am, an hour and a half after the bar had closed, because he was too tipsy to drive. He said he was still out because he was paying his tab... for an hour and a half. When I got there to pick him up, he had me give the chick he just messed with a ride home too.

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#49 Totally Overworked

We had just moved into our first home and I was working two jobs just so we could afford everything. Just under 80 hours a week is what I was working. She brought some guy there on one of the nights that I was working because apparently, I "didn't spend enough time with her." To top it off, the other dude and I had the same freaking name. She brought some dude into my home just weeks after moving in!!!

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#50 That's Messed Up

My wife said to me, "It just happened and I resented you. I don't resent you anymore." Well, I'm waiting to sign divorce papers that she supposedly has, but even if I sign, nothing can happen since she's pregnant with him for the second time. The first ended in miscarriage and that's the day she told me about the affair.

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