Is Sexting Cheating?
Is sexting cheating? In the age of smartphones and social media, the lines between innocent online banter and genuine infidelity have become blurred. In fact, many people now in a committed relationship will have met online via a dating app. Those relationships may have started with flirty exchanges and inboxes overflowing with explicit photographs. It’s no surprise then that many people have trouble separating what’s acceptable when texting someone who isn’t their partner. However, what isn’t acceptable is when those messages veer close to sexting behavior.
What is Sexting?
How do we define sexting? This isn’t rocket science. If you’re sending sexually-loaded messages to someone else or firing off nude photos or video clips to someone else, you’re guilty of sexting. Not everyone is comfortable with these kinds of exchanges, but it’s par for the course in the digital age of today.
However, it’s not something you should be doing if you’re currently attached and in a committed relationship. You may not plan on meeting up with your sexting target in real life, but these exchanges have the potential to evolve into online affairs. It’s an emotional betrayal, plain and simple. Get caught out, and you run the risk of putting the brakes on your relationship or ending a happy marriage.
Navigating the Grey Area
Just because you’re not pursuing a physical relationship with other women, doesn’t mean you’re not guilty of emotional infidelity. For many married couples, it’s this emotional betrayal that really throws a spanner in the works. In fact, many women will admit that they can forgive their partner engaging with physical sex with someone else. However, a secret exchange that’s been simmering away for some time is far harder to forgive.
Men might dismiss sexting as a fairly innocent activity. Even if they’re sharing explicit photos and heated exchanges, the fact they haven’t actively pursued someone else for sex makes them feel as though they’re innocent of any wrongdoing. Although gender differences do come into play here, some women may have a more relaxed attitude toward sexting. If you’re confident that your other half is comfortable with you flirting with other people online, sexting isn’t a relationship-ending activity.
Is Sexting Really Cheating?
Although sexting lacks physical contact, it can bear all the hallmarks of an intimate relationship. If you’re currently in a relationship, there’s a good chance you’ve engaged in sexting with your partner. For many couples, filthy exchanges and the sharing of erotic photos are part of the courtship ritual.
Is Sexting Cheating?
Once you’ve committed to somebody else, sexting with someone else is definitely something you should avoid. Being committed to someone and enjoying a fully-fledged physical relationship with them doesn’t instantly qualify sexting as harmless fun.
You might not be entertaining the idea of meeting up with your sexting partner in person, but your other half doesn’t know that. Any intimate connection, be it physical or virtual, is a risk factor in any relationship.
It All Depends on Who You’re Asking
As with casual flirting in everyday life, many men and women consider sexting as harmless fun. However, the secretive nature of sexting complicates matters. If you’re currently involved in a long-term relationship and sexting with someone else, you’re almost certainly not letting your spouse in on the action. If you’re keeping your digital devices locked down and your sexting activities a secret, you’re already guilty of committing low-level emotional infidelity.
The person doing the sexting likely has a multitude of reasons to justify their actions. They might have a high sex drive and reason that occasional sexting satiates their appetites, without them having to physically act upon them. Others might be easily led. Perhaps you’ve been approached via direct message on social media. However, just because you didn’t start the back-and-forth, doesn’t make it okay that you’ve continued to volley messages back and forth.
Sometimes, the stage of a relationship can factor into how acceptable sexting is considered. Is it still early days? If you’ve only been going steady for a few weeks or a couple of months, sexting is likely to be written off as nothing to worry about. If you’ve been committed to someone for years, however, sexting is a clear violation of trust.
Can Sexting Lead to Affairs?
Historically, most affairs started between colleagues at the workplace. The gym is another breeding ground for infidelity. However, in recent years, social media has provided cheaters with another platform to sniff out sex partners. While some sexting is innocent enough, there’s always the potential for a steamy exchange to turn into something more serious.
Can sexting derail your current relationship? There’s also the potential for a flirty exchange to turn into a full-blown online affair. To understand why let’s explore some factors that make sexting such an unhealthy phenomenon.
It Promotes Unhealthy Sexual Fantasies
There’s been a lot of chatter in recent years about how online pornography has skewed the perception of sex for younger people. Sexting plays into this somewhat. Those engaging in sexting regularly run the risk of skewing their perceptions about what constitutes a healthy sex life. Sexually-loaded texts and messages loaded with explicit content aren’t how most people talk in day-to-day life. However, if you’re engaging in enough of these conversations, it can make you reconsider your primary relationship and the current state of your sex life.
If you have a regular sexting partner, there’s probably little room for small talk. When one person requests a nude picture, the other will quickly oblige. This kind of transaction doesn’t typically happen in long-term relationships. When was the last time you asked your partner to drop their top or record themselves performing an explicit act? You’ll have probably had to field several questions before getting the desired result if indeed you did at all.
Sexting also runs the risk of altering perceptions about ourselves. With both parties pursuing sexual gratification, there’s rarely room for self-conscious thought. As such, it’s easy to become overly confident in our sexual prowess and abilities. This might lead you to consider pursuing sexual encounters in real life. Alternatively, you may struggle to understand why you’re not getting the same results from your partner in the bedroom.
It Can Drive a Wedge Between You and Your Partner
If you’re sexting regularly, you’re probably distracting yourself from your primary relationship. Sexting can quickly become addictive, especially if you’re in contact with multiple people. All that time spent checking your inbox and finding stolen moments to send a message will have a huge impact on your regular relationship.
If you’re using sexting as a way to fill a void in your current relationship, it’s a surefire way of driving a deeper wedge between you and your other half. Furthermore, if you’re sexting to compensate for something else, you’re more likely to act on the urge to cheat in real life.
Sexting isn’t good for anyone’s mental health. For the offender, it can blur the boundaries between what’s acceptable and what isn’t. For the victim, it can cause huge mental health issues and lead to feelings of inadequacy. If your relationship is at a crossroads and needs work, it’s time to talk the issue through. You don’t need to invest in marriage counseling or relationship guidance, but you definitely need to sit down and discuss what’s working and what isn’t.
Repeat Offenders Will Get Caught Out
Think you can get away with sexting indefinitely? Unless you’re an expert in espionage tactics, you can’t. Spouses are often suspicious of contact texting and secretive phone calls. What’s more, many people see nothing wrong in asking to see the contents of their spouse’s phone.
If red flags are raised elsewhere, don’t be too surprised if your partner is focusing more on what you’re doing with your digital devices. Keeping your smartphone close by will only go so far in keeping your virtual dalliances private. If your other half is particularly suspicious, there are all manner of ways they can delve into your virtual private life.
They could use a monitoring app to see exactly what you’re up to. Alternatively, if your passcodes aren’t exactly bulletproof, they can easily log into your device when you’re not around. If you’re eager to keep your sexting activity a complete secret, you’ll need to be cautious about any interaction they have with your device, especially if you’re using online dating sites.
Look out for supposedly innocent requests to use your phone. Maybe they want to use your smartphone to deliver takeout. Maybe they’re claiming to need a number for a mutual acquaintance. If you must keep up with sexting, a burner phone they have no knowledge about is the only guaranteed way of keeping your activities a complete secret. Even then, you’ll need to find reasons to excuse yourself so you can use this device without drawing attention.
It’s Not Always Innocent
Just because you consider sexting innocent and unlikely to go anywhere, don’t assume the person you’re messaging feels the same. Is the target of your texts becoming too attached? Sexually-charged texts can quickly boil over into something more serious.
If you’re currently in a relationship, it’s easy to compartmentalize sexting. You might get a cheap thrill from someone sending you naked photos, but you’re unlikely to consider this a prelude to a full-blown sexual affair. However, if you’re messaging a single person, any response they get might come across as being more loaded than you intended.
Ultimately, you can’t count on the other person becoming more emotionally attached than you are. If they’re putting a lot of stock in your exchanges, you put yourself in a precarious position. If you don’t want to take things to the next level or attempt to step back from communicating with them, things can get nasty.
It Can End a Relationship
Even if your partner never suspects that you’re sexting, there are other ways your activities can come to light. You could find yourself being blackmailed by the person you’re talking to. You might have put a lot of effort into concealing your antics from your spouse, but your personal details will be easy enough to source online. If you’ve given your name and revealed a few snippets of personal information, a wronged party will have no trouble sniffing out your social media profile.
Furthermore, your photos could become compromised. Many celebrities have fallen foul of nude photo leaks and the general population isn’t immune to such cyberattacks. Admittedly, it’s unlikely that your other half will stumble upon these photos, but you still don’t want this kind of content ending up in the public sphere.
Can Couples Move Past a Sexting Scandal?
Generally speaking, most couples can move on from a sexting revelation. If the guilty partner owns up to their behavior and accepts what they did was wrong, both sides can put their best foot forward and work on mending their relationship. If you’ve been sexting to compensate for a lack of passion at home, post-scandal conversations can also be used to carve out a better, healthier relationship.
Obviously, this doesn’t apply if you’ve allowed sexting to turn into something more serious. While it’s tempting to give into your urges and meet a sexting partner in real life, remember that actual intimacy isn’t going to rival the level of conversation you’ve been having up until that point. It’s easy to talk dirty and look your best with a well-posed and perfectly filtered photograph, but the reality of casual sex is something else entirely.
If you’re feeling the urge to cheat, there’s probably something profoundly wrong with your relationship. If you don’t see a long-term future with your partner, now’s the time to take stock and, if needed, take a step back. Think about your options and consider negotiating terms. Your other half might feel the same way, leaving you both free to pursue other options.
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