When you find out that your partner is cheating on you, some of the questions you may ask are:
- How did the relationship start?
- Why did I not see the danger to my relationship and stop it before it went far?
Tempting situations
In our research on multiple concurrent partnerships, we found that people who are dissatisfied in their relationships as a result of abuse, lack of attention, lack of fulfilment or for any other reason, generally look for another partner for solace.
One way that people get into the concurrent relationships is through confiding in someone of the opposite sex about their problems hoping for relief and comfort. These relationships develop into sexual relationships as the parties interact.
Peer pressure
Respondents also reported that these relationships can also start as a result of peer pressure. The way these relationships start emphasises the casual nature of the sexual relationship.
“It might happen that we visit one of our girlfriends and we find her with a friend. In order for the couple to have time and space with his girlfriend, the other two would have to come to keep each other busy. I may not love this person but somehow I have to keep her busy so as to balance the equation. The intention was not to meet her but maybe you will have sex and she will then set up another meeting and eventually date if you both want. So you entertain her by having sex with her,” says a 29 year old rural male from Swaziland.
Proposals
A relationship can also start when a man proposes to a woman, expressing his attraction to her, or a woman challenges a man to propose to her. The people who took part in the research discussed the various strategies used by men to lure women into relationships.
“This thing is habitual. It starts innocently by proposing to girls for no particular reason. All you know is that if there is a girl next to you, you must propose love to her just for the sake of it. You can’t even talk about something else apart from asking her out,” says a 29 year old man from Manzini.
“Nowadays there are many tools for socialising. So I can invite a girl to in my house to listen to music. …there are many things that can bring us together nowadays compared to yester-years… so things are easy… I mean the social tools make things easier because … they are irresistible. You can stay at home and listen to it the whole day then before you know it she will be standing at your door and be like ‘I was passing by and I heard you playing some nice house music, so I thought I should come by and listen to it…’ another man from Manzini said.
Talk about it
What can we do to make sure that partners who were not originally interested in cheating remain faithful?
Acknowledgements
This article was taken from the report entitled Multiple and Concurrent Sexual Partnerships in Swaziland
