Why do I keep attracting emotionally unavailable partners that cheat? How can I stop this?
Recently I opened my email box and found something unexpected and exciting. It was an email from one of my former clients, letting me know how happy he was and how in love he was with an incredible woman. (For privacy reasons I will refer to him by the pseudonym John.)
In the email, John included a photo of himself cheek to cheek with his new love. The happy couple exuded happiness and joy in every way. The email made me tear up not just about John’s happiness and new relationship, but also about the incredible journey he took to get there.
You see, before he started working with me he had over a decade of failed, toxic relationships including a recent marriage that like many before it, ended due in large part because he was cheated on.
When John and I began working together he asked me the question, “Why do I keep falling for cheaters?”
It’s a simple enough question, but the answer was strewn with complexity and took many coaching sessions to fully flush out. In the end, we got to the root of the problem, allowing us to fully answer the question.
By doing so it paved the way for him to heal some childhood trauma, forgive himself for some of the choices he made in life, and rearm his dating picker with new tools to help him locate and keep only the best partner for him.
John’s journey from someone who continually found heartbreak and sorrow at the hands of cheaters to someone who took back control of their love life and found true love should offer hope to any of you reading this that want the same for their life. Being cheated on by someone you love hurts to no end, but the good news is that bringing cheaters into your life is completely avoidable.
That’s why I decided to put my fingers to the keyboard today and write this article in hope that I might inspire some of you who have continually suffered at the hands of cheaters and follow a path to love much as John did.
My empathy goes out to any person that has ever been in this situation. Trust me I know all too well the pain and hurt that comes after catching one in the act. Unfortunately, if you are attracting many cheaters and then there is another common pattern in your relationship, it is you.
We are the common denominator in all our relationships in our thinking and actions. In order to help you avoid choosing the same kind of partner again, I am going to share some of the limited thoughts (beliefs) and behaviors that make singles ignore cheater red flags and what you can do to break the pattern.
I’m Afraid of Being Alone
If you’re someone who tends to go from partner to partner because you hate being alone you’re setting yourself up for letting cheaters into your life. Cheaters are drawn to insecurity or feelings of loneliness like flies to honey.
It’s super important that you build yourself a suit of armor that begins and ends with not having to be in a relationship and are comfortable in your skin. So it’s important to know that every smart single starts their journey to find lasting love by first dating themselves and falling in love with who they are before they can ever consider falling for anyone else.
I Tend to ‘Give’ More than I ‘Take’
When it comes to former relationships so many of my clients come to me with this “I give more than I receive” mantra. ‘giving’ is a wonderful quality, but when it comes to committed long-term relationships, giving more won’t make someone love you. Especially, if you are doing all or most of the giving and it is one-sided.
Quality relationships need balance in the give/take department. If you’re dating a person who takes more than they give then the idea that this person might undertake the ultimate ‘taking act’ of cheating is not such a huge leap. They have already shown you how selfish they are.
I Lack Proper Relationship Boundaries
Directly, connected to the give/take balance referred to in #2 above is the idea that many of those who attract cheaters cannot express their proper boundaries early in a relationship to protect themselves from being taken advantage of.
The boundaries I’m referring to can be as simple as making sure a potential partner knows not to call you after 9 pm or ask you on any weekend dates after Wednesday or not coming to pick you up at your home until the fifth date.
Setting up clear boundaries that you and they will not cross will do two things for you: protect you from being hurt or taken advantage of and let you know what kind of person you’re dating.
I Keep Saying that Next Time will Be Different
Albert Einstein is widely credited with saying, “The definition of ‘insanity’ is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” I’m not implying that you’re insane here, but the fact that you see a pattern of falling for cheaters over and over again should tell you some things.
First, it lets you know that you’ve not learned much from your previous mistakes. Second, it tells you that you haven’t done the work to develop skills to screen out the cheaters and screen in quality partners.
If you want to start having different dating results, it starts with letting go of your false programming about love. Replace your limiting thoughts with positive ones that serve what you want.
I Don’t Know What Good Looks Like
If you come from a broken or dysfunctional home then you weren’t given the luxury of seeing what “good” looks like when it comes to healthy, loving relationships. However, there are models of healthy relationships and healthy relationship traits all around us that you can model even if you have never experienced them yourself.
Seek out friends, family, co-workers, or anyone whom you can watch interacts and/or ask questions about what makes their relationship work. Understanding what “good” relationships look like will arm you with an important tool to help you avoid picking the wrong partner who could end up breaking your heart.
I’m Drawn to Dysfunction and Drama
I can assure you this one described me to a ‘T’ in my previous single life. I grew up in a home full of dysfunction that led to plenty of trauma. This in turn brought all kinds of toxicity and chaos into my romantic relationships.
As weird as it sounds, dysfunction in my relationships was a warm blanket that I could wrap around me and give me comfort. This was very much an unconscious habit of mine. Of course, this comfort led me to choose horrible partners who, yep you guessed it, who cheated on me.
Breaking this cycle was hard, I realized a lot of my comfort was being drawn to things that felt familiar in my family upbringing. It was not healthy for me, I had to study and learn what a healthy relationship looked like. That helped me recognize the pattern of dysfunction and stopped me from repeating the toxic cycle.
I Ignored or Explained Away the Red Flags
A study by the Archives of Sexual Behavior called “Once a Cheater, Always a Cheater: Serial Infidelity Across Subsequent Relationships” found that if someone cheats in one relationship they’re three times more likely to cheat in the next one.
Let me write that again… THREE TIMES more likely to cheat again. That is a mind-blowing statistic that means when dating someone you must find out early on which side of the cheating fence they fall on. How do find out?
Ask them, their friends, family, or anyone in their life. This is not prying it is dating survival. All you’re doing is doing what any smart single does, look for red flags. And knowing if that person is a serial cheater is a red flag of the brightest color.
If you want to avoid dating cheaters you have to start not only paying attention to any red flags but also actively look for them. Nobody should get the benefit of the doubt before they win your heart.
Flags are red to tell you that danger lies ahead so don’t ignore them, don’t try to explain them away and act quickly once you see them.
Here is a quick list of my top dating red flags to help spot potential cheaters.
- Secretive about how they spend their time
- Display abusive or jealous behavior
- Treat others in their life poorly
- Your family or friends don’t like them
- Their actions don’t match their words
- Take more than they give
- Your gut tells you something is wrong with them
I Tend to Fall in Love Quickly
I like to say, “You need to slow things down to speed things up.” This simply means that you must take things slow early on in a relationship to reap the rewards of falling head over heels love.
Jumping into relationships too quickly is like driving so fast that you are not seeing any of the stop signs and your driving through street lights. Like in #6 above cheaters almost always wave their red flags high and mightily, but if you move too fast into a relationship with them you’ll fail to see them.
I am Drawn to Narcissists
A narcissist is someone who has an inflated sense of self-importance. They’re also some of the most likely offenders when it comes to cheating. That’s because narcissists are driven by what makes them happy, not what makes their partner happy.
Unfortunately, they also often bring with them other more attractive traits such as being fun, confident, and full of adventure. If you’re someone who tends to fall for partners who display narcissistic behaviors you must work to identify them quickly and keep them out of your dating pool.
I Don’t Know my Non-negotiables
One of the most important tools in my Conscious Dating Programs is understanding your non-negotiables. Non-negotiables are the core values you must have in a relationship or it will fail every time.
They’re not superficial traits like someone’s height or body type or what kind of car they drive, rather are those core value-building blocks that make forever partnerships possible.
Most people have 10-15 of them. They are things like “they treat me as a priority” or “they’re financially stable” or “they’re family-oriented.”
When armed with your non-negotiables, falling for potential cheaters is nearly impossible as you’ll be able to screen them out way before you give them your heart. At the same time screening in quality, partners will eventually lead you to that forever relationship you’ve always desired and deserved.
If you’re tired of being in relationships with emotionally distant partners and want to break the pattern, I invite you to schedule a complimentary Relationship Readiness Review with me here. During this discovery session, you’ll discover effective strategies to attract a partner who will provide the emotional security and support you deserve.