The "Other Woman"

Nearly everyone has been through it, or at the very least they've known someone who has. Whether on the giving or receiving end, the result is always the same. When people cheat, other people get hurt. The pain of an unfaithful mate is worse only because it seems to always come as a surprise. Can anything really prepare you for infidelity?

How do you deal with the pain of having a lover who is unfaithful? While the person who was cheated on goes through a heart-wrenching, gut-twisting sort of agony, an avalanche of "why me", the cheater often feels a similar pain. The word is guilt, and it is a powerful ailment. When nothing else will provoke a confession, guilt often will.

Then again, it depends on what sort of person it is doing the cheating. Some people, you will find, are addicted cheaters. Some men can keep two women at the same time, each woman convinced that she is his girlfriend. He may even declare love to both. The very clever ones (usually of the independently wealthy type) can manage three.

When you discover your lover has been dallying with another, the first rage is at the other person. We've all heard of her, and we know that she exists - the other woman. Whether men will crumble to her temptations or not is a question that plagues many single, female minds. Don't worry, ladies, the men are probably thinking about her a little bit, too.

The Other Woman is an evil entity that you trash to your girlfriends - some things so foul they cannot be printed out. Eventually she is shredded to pieces, after all your girlfriends reassure you that you are so much cuter. Finally, most single women come around to the realization that the fault lies not with the Other Woman…but with their boyfriends.

But in your heart, you really just hate her. Every time you meet another gal with the same name, you almost automatically and instantly dislike her, too. She is the Other Woman, ergo she is all that is bad and wrong in the world. Until, of course, you discover what it is to be her.

Something that never feels good. And many times, a single woman can become the Other Woman without even realizing it. Men lie. Then, so do women. So he (or she) can look single, talk single, and walk single - he's not actually screwing single. When you are an average, independent, single woman, you would never imagine that a single line from a mutual friend could be your undoing. "He has a girlfriend." Suddenly you are thrust into the role of the Other Woman - a role that is all the more dreadful if you have once been in a position to hate the Other Woman. Not only do you have the sting of discovering just what a liar your new man is, you also know the guilt of abetting a cheater. Taking on the role knowingly often comes at a hard decision, a guilty pain. Being tricked into it is a whole new ball game.

The first thing you do is to blame yourself. -"Poor judgment, too trusting"; you might even get around to accusing yourself of being downright foolish. But why should believing a person be the wrong thing to do? Whatever form it takes, whatever part you play, infidelity causes heartache. The sort of heartache that is true and lasting, remembered often with bitterness and sometimes with tears.

The truth is, no matter who you are, the blame goes in one place and one place alone. You might be the Other Woman, you may be the girlfriend who walked into the apartment to discover your man with your best friend, you may be the person fooling around on the sly. The only person to blame is the person doing the cheating. Don't make commitments that you cannot keep.

They're the ones with the problem. All the wondering if you should lose five extra pounds, all the worrying that you weren't good enough in bed, all the heartache and pain and questioning in the world will not change that fact. Even if they could not be faithful to you because of something they did not like about you, he (or she) should have broken things off before they went looking for a romp in the hay of greener pastures. It is not necessary to tear yourself down or make yourself over. It is only necessary to find someone else.

Lay the blame at the right doorstep, and move on. In the end, he is probably better off with the Other Woman (he'll cheat on her, too). The real question is, should the Other Woman come forward and tell the girlfriend?

An individual question, with individual answers.