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Do Women Cheat More Than Men?

By Kwadjo Panyin
Love & Relationships Photo-Blackloveadvice.com
OCT 15, 2018 LISTEN
Photo-Blackloveadvice.com

One may think losing your virginity is every young man’s fantasy, right? I know I started having those fantasies at a very early age. I dreamt of losing my virginity to one of the many girls I had developed serious crushes on. I pictured the action going down just like the steamy love scenes from the movies.

Sadly, my first experience was not even close to any of my fantasies. I can’t say the exact age I lost my virginity as I do not want to alarm anyone. Let’s just say it happened around the time I started secondary school. At that ripe young age, for all intents and purposes, I was made a man by a nymphomaniac who also happened to be (get this) married. Sometimes I think back to this experience in my youth and attribute my screwed up love life to that episode.

A married nymphomaniac skinned my fish for crying out loud! I mean, she was the first one to screw me for life, literally! All it took for her to introduce me to sex was some comic books, meat pies and french fries from Bus Stop, a popular fast food joint in Accra at the time.

To make matters worse, she and her husband were family friends. I played at her house with her kids after school and she and the husband visited our house sometimes. It was at one of my play visits to her house that she first made me a man. I could not have envisioned the fact that I was about to make my initial entry into the world of women when she sent all the kids out with the driver to go get ice cream and kept me behind.

I still remember her laughter when I prematurely delivered my load under a minute. Hey, hey, hey! Don’t judge me. That level of titillation was unknown to me and I did not know how to quite handle the intensity so cut me some slack. That was lighting fast though, I must admit. I recall sitting at the edge of the bed with a perplexed look screaming “what just happened!?” in my mind over and over again

Every now and then, her husband will come to my house and I will be scared the whole time he was there. My young mind could not comprehend why he will smile every time he saw me and gave my twin brother and me some cash. “Does he know his wife screwed me?” “Is he playing mind games with me?” “Will he take me to the woods and make me disappear?”

His wife, on the other hand, went about her business as if nothing had happened between us. She barely looked at me in the presence of other people. Needless to say, I was a nervous wreck every time they came to visit my house.

On one of my recent trips to Ghana, I run into her and the husband at a social function. Now in her late 70’s, she obviously did not look anything like the sexy woman who let me into parts of her when I was a boy. She smiled broadly when saw me; the same smile she flashed the first time she took off my shorts decades ago.

Gosh! I could not believe I had had carnal knowledge with her. She and her husband chatted with me for about an hour. As we talked, it dawned on me that he never found out about the intimate moments I had shared with his wife. She had kept this secret for decades and he was none the wiser.

While at dinner with a female friend in Accra last year, the topic of women and keeping secrets came up. My friend was lamenting about how her female friends were always gossiping and how women, in general, could never keep secrets.

“I beg to differ,” I interjected. “I believe women are capable of keeping the biggest secrets ever.”

“Why do you say that?” She asked.
“You are a beautiful woman. How many married men have hit on you?” I asked

“I can’t count them.” She replied

“How many will be in trouble should you expose their attempts at infidelity?” I pressed on

“Hmmm, if I include my two pastors at church, my former company’s CEO who forcibly tried to kiss me in his office, one top politician, my dad’s best friend, and a popular Hiplife artist, the number will be six, I think,” She responded

‘Have you exposed any of these guys including the CEO?” I inquired

“No, I haven’t and I don’t plan to. Men misbehaving is normal here.” She replied

‘If you met the CEO’s wife, will you disclose what her husband did to you? I asked

“I met her a few times after the incident but I said nothing.” She said with a smile

“Well, you just made my point. You are walking around with deadly secrets. Secrets that could wreck marriages and careers. That makes you very powerful, don’t you think?” I asked

“I guess you are right!” She laughed. “I am holding on to a lot of damaging secrets.”

Personally, I think we should be grateful to women for their ability to keep secrets close to their chests. This ability of women to stay tight-lipped leads me to the question of who cheats the most; men or women? Men have always had the worse reputation for being unfaithful, but I happen to believe that women are not that far off. Women are just less likely to get caught.

Most women, in my opinion, are better keepers of secrets because they are more psychologically sophisticated. Men are impulsive but women, on the other hand, mutate into planners and strategists when it comes to cheating in a relationship.

If a man meets a woman he wants to cheat with, he focuses mainly on how to get into her panties, handle his business and move on. Most men tend to be big risk-takers so we do not always consider the consequences of cheating until it’s too late. The lies most men tell are easily unraveled because we plan for short term gains when we cheat.

Most men hardly think through their lies when they cheat. We utter what makes sense as an excuse when confronted. Two weeks after we lie about being at Kofi’s house, we forget and replace Kofi with Kwame when the topic comes up again. This lack of well thought-out lies is what gets most men busted all the time.

Women, in my opinion, are more methodical in their approach to cheating. Most women who cheat are not interested in a one-time encounter, they plan for an arrangement which will last for a while. Unlike men, most women take the time to plan an affair so their lies are more solid as they have time to absorb the facade.

My friend Maame Adwoa has a saying which goes;

“If you are a cheater and your wife or girlfriend knows but never complains, you should be very worried.”

Maame goes on to explain that your wife or girlfriend may not be complaining because she believes her time is better spent planning a long term exit strategy or formulating a plan to get her needs fulfilled.

A married woman who started a discussion with me about a possible affair had very interesting questions for me when we first met. First of all, she only wanted to talk to me on her company’s land line and not on her cell phone. She asked a series of questions concerning the frequency of my business trips, the details about the cities I visit, the hotels I stay in and whether or not I rent cars when I am out of town. When she started asking about STD tests, I became aware of her intentions.

She was setting up a long term affair and she was being very strategic about it. When I asked her why she wanted to start an affair, she explained that her husband was not giving her the attention she deserves. She told me she still loves him but after 18 years, the spark had vanished from their marriage.

A friend of mine; let’s just call her Abena, returned from Ghana this year having married her boyfriend there. I started teasing her about the fact that he will cheat for sure. She completely turned the tables on me by uttering these words;

“Women cheat more often than men. We just hide it better.”

Obviously, my interest was piqued at that point and I wanted to know more. She went on to share that she loves her man but she has needs as a woman. She was not naive enough to think her husband will not cheat on her. In her opinion, she is cool as long as she does not know about it.

She disclosed to me that she had another man she had been seeing here in the States. “My cheating is situational.” She explained. “I am not cheating to disrespect my husband. I have needs and I will continue to see this other man until we are together again.”

I disagree with her assessment that she is not cheating to disrespect her husband though. Cheating in my opinion is disrespectful even if the other party is not aware. She added an interesting tit-bit to the conversation. “To my husband, I am an angel.” She told me.

Her last statement leads me to another reason why I believe women may be better cheaters and liars than men. If you ask unfaithful men if they think their wives or girlfriends have had affairs also, they will be shocked at the very thought.

Most men are quite comfortable with the thought that their women will never cheat on them. I happen to believe that most men do not realize that women need to be fulfilled emotionally in order to stay happily married or remain committed to a relationship.

Most men overlook the fact that women tell simple and altruistic lies to protect other people’s feelings and quite frankly, to boost the egos of men sometimes. A woman, for example, may say that she had a lovely time during a date when in reality, she hated the entire experience. A woman may say she is sexually satisfied convincingly but in reality, she is not. These are just some of the small ways some women lie to oil the wheels which maintains the peace and keep their true feelings and secrets tugged away.

It is the year 2017 and the same aspects of life which made it easy for men to cheat ages ago, are now available to women as well. Women are receiving more education and they maintain jobs outside the home. Women are no longer staying home to raise kids and playing housewives. They are out there and experiencing the same life which affords them with ready-made excuses for working late or business travel.

The internet, mobile phones, social media and other modern conveniences make it easier to fuel intimate encounters. While women’s lives and sexual behaviors have changed, their strategic approach to keeping secrets has not. Often, women keep secrets because they are more conscious of how much they stand to lose especially in a society which shuns women who are caught cheating.

Cheating is never pretty no matter who is committing it. Lying and keeping secrets comes with the territory. I cannot state conclusively that women cheat more than men or vice versa. I will, however, argue that women are better at keeping secrets hence the thought that men cheat more may actually be a myth.

By Kwadjo Panyin

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