I HAD AN AFFAIR AND HE DIDN’T KNOW

I had an affair and he didn’t know
Monday, April 22, 2013

ACCORDING to a tri-nation study carried out in Jamaica, Haiti and the Dominican Republic in 2011, more women are cheating on their partners.
While for the most part men were usually considered the culprits, many Caribbean women have now been labelled as also guilty, the report, commissioned by Panos Caribbean, said.
The research showed that many married women, as well as single women with steady boyfriends, took lovers on the side.
“For some it is an occasional fling, while others form medium to long-term sexual relationships outside, that run parallel to their recognised union,” the study said.
And the men are usually the last to know.
This week we asked women, have you ever cheated? And did your main guy find out?
Abigail S, in a relationship 12 years:
At the time it didn’t really feel like cheating because I had found out about my partner’s own cheating and we just were not on the same page even though we were living together.
My friendship and intimate relations with this new person actually came at a good time and helped with my pain and confusion. We were friends apart from the intimacy, so I had an outlet to talk with someone who genuinely cared about me.
It was hard for my partner to find out because we worked together, so it wasn’t hard to see my lover. We would get together after work before I went home, or on weekends (we were part of a group of friends, and so we did a lot of socialising). I think part of the reason my partner didn’t notice anything either was because he was probably doing his own cheating.
We kept phone calls to a minimum and mostly texted or spoke at work. No late night calls. He was cool and laid back. There was no drama, or potential for drama, so it worked for me. I really didn’t have to do any hiding per se…it wasn’t a full relationship, so there was no pressure or demands that would have created suspicion. The bottom line is, working together made it easy. We were fully accessible to each other almost every day.
Toni M, 34, single:
I am not sure I would classify it as cheating, but when I was younger — about 22 — I had five men at one time. All of them used to come to the house and they used to even meet up together and everybody would sit and chat and laugh and none knew that I was sleeping with the other. Everybody felt the others were just friends. I never acted in any way different. I was quite neutral with all of them when they met up. I would sit in any of their laps and it wouldn’t look any way because remember, they all felt we were just bredren. I would kiss everybody, hug everybody. And to this day none of them know I was sleeping with the others.
Viveen M, 52, divorced:
This is something that I saw my mother do when I was growing up. She was married to my father but she was bad, I mean bad! One day my mother took home a man from her workplace and while my father was sleeping in one room she and the man were in the other. What happened is that when my father came home he went straight into the back room and we (myself, two sisters and a brother) went in there and started rubbing his back because my mother told us to. He loved when we did that. We picked out ingrown hairs from his face, and picked out grey hairs from his head. By the time we were done with him he had fallen asleep. It was when I was bigger that I understood the full extent of what was happening. My father and the man were co-workers and he never knew.
Winsome B, 30, in a relationship two years:
I just let my man know the man that I am sleeping with so they both become friends. So when my man comes to the house and sees him, they just hail up each other, chat, and everybody’s all right. He never suspects that we are involved. Because, remember that my man wouldn’t expect me to be so barefaced as to bring a man to introduce to him when we are living together.
Melani W, 42, married two years:
That was easy. I had an affair going on for about three years – before I even married my husband. And even today, he doesn’t even suspect. I changed his (lover’s) name in my phone book to a female’s name so if he called me and I was around my husband all he would see was a girlfriend’s name. Plus I made sure to use the name of a girlfriend he knew well. That girlfriend knew the situation so if push came to shove, she would defend me. We have broken up now though, but it had nothing to do with my husband finding out.

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