If you don't count harmless white lies and keeping quiet about things that irritate but aren't really that important, I've only lied once in a serious relationship, and that was a lie of omission - not telling my wife about something that had happened because I knew would make her very upset.
It was my second marriage, and we were going through a slightly rough patch. My relationship immediately prior to meeting my wife had lasted about three years, and it had ended in an unsatisfactory way, with neither of us really wanting to break up, but us agreeing that external circumstances meant it would be better if we did. My wife and I were in a semi-long distance relationship at that point, with us only being together every second weekend and for a couple of months in the summer. This was long before facetime even existed, so the best we could do were nightly phone calls. I felt down one night, and got in touch with my ex - mainly, I'd like to believe, just to catch up with her. But one thing inevitably led to another, and we hooked up a couple of times.
I enjoyed it, not least because the woman was a lot more relaxed about sex than my wife, but I felt incredibly guilty. So I told the woman that I couldn't continue, and she was very understanding about that.
After that incident, my wife and I were happily married for nearly twenty years more and the marriage only ended when she died. I'm sure she never knew that I'd been unfaithful. I'm also sure that, given how things turned out, us being together made her final years a lot better than they might have been if I hadn't been with her.
My ex noticed the obituary notice for my wife, and she got in touch a few months later. We met up, and it was nice to see her again, but there was zero sexual chemistry. It felt to me like we'd worked out whatever we needed to work out, and that was that.
So, I guess the bottom line of all this is that I believe habitually lying about serious stuff is never a good thing in a relationship, but sometimes even very big lies don't have to matter if it's a one off thing, and about something that you need to get out of your system in order to better see the positive aspects of your relationship.
is it ever ok to lie to your partner
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If you don't count harmless white lies and keeping quiet about things that irritate but aren't really that important, I've only lied once in a serious relationship, and that was a lie of omission - not telling my wife about something that had happened because I knew would make her very upset.
It was my second marriage, and we were going through a slightly rough patch. My relationship immediately prior to meeting my wife had lasted about three years, and it had ended in an unsatisfactory way, with neither of us really wanting to break up, but us agreeing that external circumstances meant it would be better if we did. My wife and I were in a semi-long distance relationship at that point, with us only being together every second weekend and for a couple of months in the summer. This was long before facetime even existed, so the best we could do were nightly phone calls. I felt down one night, and got in touch with my ex - mainly, I'd like to believe, just to catch up with her. But one thing inevitably led to another, and we hooked up a couple of times.
I enjoyed it, not least because the woman was a lot more relaxed about sex than my wife, but I felt incredibly guilty. So I told the woman that I couldn't continue, and she was very understanding about that.
After that incident, my wife and I were happily married for nearly twenty years more and the marriage only ended when she died. I'm sure she never knew that I'd been unfaithful. I'm also sure that, given how things turned out, us being together made her final years a lot better than they might have been if I hadn't been with her.
My ex noticed the obituary notice for my wife, and she got in touch a few months later. We met up, and it was nice to see her again, but there was zero sexual chemistry. It felt to me like we'd worked out whatever we needed to work out, and that was that.
So, I guess the bottom line of all this is that I believe habitually lying about serious stuff is never a good thing in a relationship, but sometimes even very big lies don't have to matter if it's a one off thing, and about something that you need to get out of your system in order to better see the positive aspects of your relationship.