What Is Micro-Cheating, And What Can You Do To Prevent Your Partner From Committing It

The act of cheating or infidelity has been around for as long as there has been commitment. As humanity evolved, their ways changed too. Now we’ve got the internet and life has never been better. Unfortunately, that opened up a whole other can of worms because now we’ve got cyber-bullying, cybercrime and cyber affairs.

We’ve heard of people using Tinder or some other dating site to meet someone in real life and have an affair with them, but what if the pair doesn’t meet? What if the entire affair including sexual encounters was kept online?

The world of “Micro-cheating”

Micro-cheating  is the term used for things that one does that could lead to infidelity, like flirting with someone online or obsessing over another person’s Facebook profile page. But questions remain: did you know about it? Did he keep it from you knowing it would hurt you to find out? Many men usually come up with excuses like ‘We’ve never even met.’ or ‘It’s not like we’re actually having sex or anything.’, but the fact remains that he broke his promise. That’s all really cheating is; a broken promise. What’s worse is now they’ve got internet anonymity to justify themselves with.

The damage of a broken promise can inflict on a relationship can be bad or in these cases, even devastating. Trust becomes difficult because now you know the mere presence of a device gives them an avenue to be unfaithful. It’s no longer about keeping them away from where their secret lover is, because that person could be anywhere now.

Another way it could be worse is how emotional these affairs could become. If you thought a physical sexual affair was bad, you can only imagine how damaging an emotional one can be. The fact that these two people will never meet in person means that everything they ‘do’ happens in their imaginations. This is dangerous because this brings it close to a more emotional affair in which feelings reserved for the partner are being shared to and felt by someone outside the relationship. After all, relationships don’t exist just for sex, they exist primarily for emotional connection.

How likely is it to happen?

The Internet is a whole new world for people looking to do things they aren’t supposed to. They could be drawn in by the fact that anonymity makes it unlikely that there are going to be any consequences for what they’re doing. The fact that all they need to do to hide it from you is to keep their phones or laptops away. Then it’s all about what you won’t know won’t hurt you. Even the moral implication make it easier for them to justify their actions by telling themselves that ‘it isn’t a real affair’ or something around those lines. Then it’s all downhill from there.

What can be done about it?

Recognizing the signs can be the first step. A cyber-cheater will hide their phones and laptops from their partners more often. They may also share their feelings less with their partners, possibly talk about bad days less or negative feelings because they’ve already shared them with someone else. You may also feel that they spend more time on their phones than having real quality time with you. If these signs cause you to feel insecure talk to him about it. Tell him straight how these things make you feel, while being careful not to jump to conclusions. Again, communication is the key past most problems. A cyber-affair doesn’t mean the end of a relationship, but it is a problem that needs to be taken on by both of you.