Insidious act men commit when caught cheating exposed

Discovering your other-half is cheating on you is traumatic – but women are now exposing a common act men commit that adds insult to injury.

Discovering your other-half is cheating on you is a deeply traumatic experience – but women are now exposing a common act men commit that further adds insult to injury.

After perpetrating the ultimate betrayal, guilty men often go to extreme lengths to cover it up, telling an elaborate lies as justification.

But some guys go too far with their false depiction of the truth, and now women who have been cheated on are having the last laugh, airing the “bizarre excuses” they’ve been told by their adulterous spouse.

“‘You’ve gained weight’… I was 7 months pregnant. With his child,” one ex-wife shared.

“Mine said, ‘you’re at work and I don’t see you much anymore’. We worked at the same place,” revealed another.

“‘You’re just too depressed to pay attention to me’. I had just miscarried our baby,” said someone else.

While the lies seem so obvious, leaving many to question why a guilty party would dare claim something so blatantly not true, Melbourne psychologist Carly Dober explained the insidious act actually stems from an innate human need to minimise the damage.

But don’t be fooled. It’s entirely selfish, she told news.com.au.

“Infidelity and hurting someone who cares for you is a very, very difficult thing to talk about and to fess up to,” Ms Dober, who works at Melbourne’s Enriching Lives Psychology clinic, said.

“Men can often create elaborate lies to minimise their part in the infidelity, to preserve their sense of self, to try to minimise the damage caused from the betrayal being found out, and many lie because honest communication is too difficult for them to do.

“Many will also lie by omission.”

Women are exposing the ‘bizarre excuses’ men give for cheating in a new dating trend. Picture: TikTok/

The act of lying after being caught further adds insult to injury Picture: TikTok/@trevorandemelin

One of the most shocking details about the viral video, one of many on the topic currently on TikTok, is the sheer volume of culprits displayed by “excuses” shared.

Ms Dober said this is because those who are guilty of hurting others often can’t face the truth about their own behaviour.

“Not many people can sit with the realisation that you’ve hurt someone, that one (or many) conversations will need to occur, or that their behaviour has been pretty hurtful,” she explained.

“It can be difficult to accept that maybe, in the act of cheating, they don’t act in ways that are congruent with how they would like themselves, or others, to see them.

“Panicking and lying is a short term relief from this psychic distress, and often very unhelpful.”

Melbourne psychologist Carly Dober explained why people make up extreme lies when they are busted cheating. Picture: Supplied

Indeed, while many of the “excuses” given by men are shocking, there are some that are so awful, they’re kind of funny.

“‘I forgot to break up with you’ is somehow what my ex deemed the most reasonable excuse.” one shared.

“Mine told me it ‘didn’t count’ because he couldn’t finish as he was thinking of me the whole time,” scoffed another.

As another simply said: “She looked like your Bitmoji.”

“‘I have split personality. That was my other personality, Derek’,” wrote one frustrated woman.

In a separate video, one woman shared the excuse a guy made for cheating on her, explaining he said: “I just teleported to her house somehow.”

But while a ridiculous excuse might be easy to spot, Ms Dober said not all lies are so glaringly obvious.

“Being able to spot a fibber depends on how talented the person is at lying,” she said.

“Some people are very good at lying straight to your face and you would believe them, others have physical tells that might betray them- however some of these physical tells can also look like anxiety or general stress.

“Some people’s stories may change, but this also isn’t evidence of a lie as memory is fallible.”

One said he had a ‘split personality’ and it was the other side of him who cheated. Picture: TikTok/@jessica.stocker

Another blamed bad weather. Picture: TikTok/@heyitsjess800

One of the most pressing questions anyone who has ever been cheated on wants the answer to though isn’t why did their partner lie, it is why did they do it? Ms Dober said it’s complicated.

“People can engage in infidelity for many reasons, and it’s not always about sex,” she told news.com.au.

“They might be angry at their partner and engaging in an active revenge, they might have low self-esteem and want attention or validation, they might have low investment in their primary relationship or low commitment to the relationship, they might have a desire for variety, or feel like their needs aren’t being met in a relationship, and they also might have stressors such as relationship conflict when then might drive them to engage in this behaviour.

“None of this excuses betraying your partner if you have both mutually agreed on monogamy and your partner is of the understanding that this is how you’ll behave.”