If you've ever had your heart broken due to infidelity, you know that it's a special kind of gut punch that takes a surprising amount of effort to overcome. You may never again be able to fully trust your partner after they've cheated. According to Today, cheating (including emotional affairs) is one of the main causes of divorce.
Although the Institute for Family Studies reports that more husbands than wives admit to being unfaithful, according to The Cut, psychoanalyst and writer Esther Perel cites an increase of 40% in unfaithful women since 1990, while men's statistics have stayed about the same.
We went to Reddit to find out why more women than ever are cheating.
“I wasn't quite ready to leave him because of the kids"
"He had cheated on me multiple times and I wasn't quite ready to leave him because of the kids, so I tried to exact some kind of revenge by sleeping with someone too. In retrospect, I wish that I had kept the high ground. I left him two months later." -Redditor Orange_Paisley
“I desired an emotional attachment”
"I have cheated, yes, but on my husband before we were married. It wasn't physical, but more of an emotional attachment that my husband (then boyfriend) believed was cheating. Which, after settling down my pride, I agree with. It was unnecessary, and it's something I still have to deal with today. There was a lot of trauma in between the time that I did it, and while it's no excuse, it's the sole reason I desired an emotional attachment.
"My husband had left, out of the blue, for nearly a year, and when he came back I was unsure of whether or not I wanted to be with someone who could so easily leave after developing such a strong relationship with me. During that year, I developed a relationship with another man, which I cut off once my husband and I started dating again. However, there were still problems between him and I, so I reverted back to the other man." - Redditor pleindesprit
“It was not really a satisfying and healthy relationship”
"I kinda sorta cheated on a boyfriend way back when. In my defense, I was only 19, so not a grownup, and said boyfriend came out of the closet not long after, so it was not really a satisfying and healthy relationship." - Redditor emmster
See the rest of the story at Business Insider