It is often assumed that a husband who cheats on his wife ultimately does not want to remarry. This is especially true if the husband cheats more than once. People assume that a man who can be classified as a multiple or serial cheater is a man who, in his own passive-aggressive way, is trying his hardest to get rid of his wife or his marriage.

And yet I think people would be quite surprised how many of these men indicate that they love their wives more than anything. Many of them are desperate to keep their marriages. I hear of some of them. And they are looking for advice on how to convince their wives not to leave them. Most have promised themselves they won’t cheat again. And yet sometimes they do.

There are several questions here. Why do they want to stay with their wives when they have shown that they cannot be faithful? And why do they keep cheating if they are so in love with their wives?

One of these wives might ask these questions like this: “This is the third time I have caught my husband cheating on me. I admit that in this case, he had gone longer between cheating. This time, he actually did six years before he cheated on me again. In those six years, I was stupid enough to trust him again. I thought we were finally over him. Because, frankly, we almost got divorced after the first two times. But my husband was so pitiful, begging me not to leave him. Honestly, I think we were happy in those six years. And as soon as I found out this time, he dropped the other woman like a hot potato, so I don’t understand why he would even cheat on me. I said honestly we should get a divorce because I can’t keep being with a man who won’t be faithful to me. But now he’s lost 15 pounds. He won’t eat. And he says he’s not sleeping. I just don’t get it. He doesn’t love me as much. enough to be faithful to me apparently, but he acts like it’s the worst thing in the world to let me go. I love him. I really do. But I can’t keep dealing with deception. Do men like that ever change?”

A man has to be very motivated to change: I think they do. But from my point of view, it takes a lot of work and determination to buck the trend. Man has to be willing to take an honest look at any and all contributing factors and vulnerabilities. And this can be painful. Because very often, repeat cheaters run away from their feelings and problems from him. They use deception as a way to “numb” what they are dealing with.

To be rehabilitated, a man has to be willing to change his lifestyle, put up safeguards, and perhaps change his belief system (because, again, deception can sometimes stem from cultural, family, or work beliefs or cultures). be willing to be held accountable consistently and endure good scrutiny for quite some time before he can rebuild trust. Of course, in this case, her husband already knows, since it seems he worked hard to rebuild the trust for six years and then somehow managed to fall back into the old habits.

What contributes to repeat the deception: Often the contributing factors are a lack of impulse control and a lack of forethought/discipline in not allowing yourself to get into a familiar situation. It’s not that these men don’t love their wives. It’s that they get into a situation where they act before thinking it through. As a result, they get stuck again. Men can learn to change this dynamic. But they have to be willing to do it. And they have to be willing to endure some scrutiny and analysis to find out why they keep ending up in the same place.

Try something more effective when the old methods don’t work: It was not mentioned if there was counseling. If not, I would highly recommend it or some very specific self help. Hitting the same problem three times is indicative of something that is very difficult to overcome without help. Getting very specific help could provide information and safeguards that haven’t been put in place before.

Because if nothing else is clear, let it be clear now that the old method, whatever it was, hadn’t quite worked. It should also be clear that her husband is not looking to get out of her marriage. So if you want to stay and he wants to stay too, doesn’t it make sense to do whatever it takes this time? Men I’ve heard say they don’t want to get divorced. And they insist that they do want to change and don’t quite understand why they keep cheating. But maybe if they had some help figuring this out and putting in some safeguards, the suffering wouldn’t have to continue. But you have to be willing to accept help and do what is asked of you to forge a new path. (If he’s not willing, he’s just prolonging everyone’s pain and that’s not fair.) Often the wife can also benefit from this help because she can learn to support herself during this process.