Can't Keep My Mouth Shut - She Said, He Said - What is Cheating Anyway?

Episode Date: March 16, 2020

Is cheating just physical? Or can it be emotional? Is kissing cheating? Or is full-on sex only classed as cheating? Is sexting someone else cheating? We discuss all here.... tune in!

This podcast contains strong language and discussions about relationships and sex. It may not be suitable for younger listeners. This is the Sex in Singapore City podcast and I'm Nixalina Watson. Hey, it's Nixalina and I'm back with another episode of She Said, He Said with my co-host Paul Buster. Hello, hello. Hi, darling. Welcome back. Thank you. Thank you, as always, for having me.

And I hope you're ready for today's episode. I don't know. Am I ready? Do I ever know what's actually going to be happening with you? So hit me, hit me. I come up with more and more obtuse ideas as I throw at you. Yeah. Okay, so we're going to discuss cheating.

Specifically, what is cheating anyway? Okay, wow. So I'm looking at between couples, the behavior, is it physical, is it emotional? I want to really nitty gritty what actually is cheating because I personally think a lot of the issues in relationships arise in this blurred cheating boundary where someone might think it's okay, this and this is okay because I haven't done anything, but the other person already feels cheated on. Right.

Yeah, that makes sense. i know where you're coming from okay okay so let's kick off with flirty texts and sex to another person of the opposite sex okay so flirty texts and sexting okay so i mean sexting is technically cheating i guess you could say it's digital cheating but nothing's happening i guess there's a context there in a in a line that's being crossed if you're being sexual in nature with with another person i mean sending photos nude photos is absolutely cheating right of course yes of course and like sexting i mean like oh yeah i can't wait to like you know what are you wearing yeah take you to take you to the bedroom and go on rip your blouse off

You haven't sexed very much, have you? No, I'm a good boy. I can't wait to take the hair scrunchies out of your hair. Mobile phones didn't exist back then, so there was no sexting. Gosh, I think sexting is, to me, cheating, but flirting is not. I'm a flirtatious guy by nature. that's that's just me but it's not like a sexual flirtatious and like coming onto someone i'm just very friendly isn't that the essence of flirting is well that's what i mean sexual attachment or

i fancy you physically hence i'm flirting i i guess that's one way to look at it i guess that's the extreme way if you're openly able to flirt and you want to flirt to yeah try to hit on someone perhaps or try to connect with someone but i think if you're just um friendly but not doing it out of any sexual intention then then it's not yeah so i don't like crack on to every single person because there is for me i'm a very friendly person yeah and like guys think i'm flirting yep yep and then when they then come back at me i'm like whoa because i thought we were just banter joke joke joke just like at the circus remember totally right no actually no i don't really yeah you don't you're pretty drunk can i just tell everyone we met at the circus at

press event i had an intern with me from a magazine and um she woke up in hospital she did right yeah i forgot about that actually poor thing from that night out not not by any fall of mine though because it was her that did everything before i actually had met them yeah she was under my care and we there was because it was opening night hi intern by the way if you're listening she's in germany now she's having a lovely time but she was absolutely mortified because it was a free flow champagne bar that's right circus and we all had a wonderful time i personally didn't make it into work the next day either i was a hungover mess and she definitely didn't gosh greetings to her but uh yeah so uh yeah look we're friendly yeah and and i think

that doesn't cross any boundaries no no but then again what's the intention what's the intention behind your mannerisms behind your messages behind your actions i think that's what it all stems from and if someone's going to cheat they're going to cheat there are multiple levels of cheating sure because again it boils down to that intention are they doing it for those reasons so how would you know say just i don't think you ever do do you i'm sorry did i cut into the end of the episode yeah and to sum up you never really know yeah but like say you you go out you go to toilet the bar whatever you with your boyfriend or girlfriend and you come back and they're and they're physically close or look like they're flirting with a member of the opposite sex

someone they you don't know or they don't know and they say well i'm just being friendly like how do you know the their intent right so so again that's that's another line i guess right where i mean there's always personal space but for example like i said um i actually had this conversation with joey recently you're at a club the music's really loud you have to be physically close to people to talk you have to like kind of talk in their ear then you have to turn your head and they have to talk in your ear so by proximity already it can come across as oh man they're just why are you so chummy you've just met this person was like yeah i've met this person and we're having a chat we're actually getting to know each other right it could be about work or family or

whatever everything non-sexual totally innocent but when you stand back and you and you look on that situation like oh why are they so close doing it but it's just by nature of your environment as well so you know again that's just a circumstance of where it could look bad but it isn't and I think you can tell I think you can tell if someone's really trying to flirt again have that intention I think I think you can tell if the person's doing it and you're in the same club and they have that intention yeah the person's an idiot well yeah there you go right how ridiculous can you actually be I mean you wouldn't believe this has totally happened before for instance I was working at a barmaid i was a shit barmaid like my pints undrinkable yeah or you were just

drinking a lot behind the pants like sorry your order and then there was like i remember distinctly it was a really busy friday night once again loud music etc there was a set of couple with another couple so it's four people clearly two couples all like out together one of the girls goes off to the toilet upstairs one of the guys comes up to the bar and starts hitting on me wow okay and i'm like i have just watched you for like two hours she's clearly your girlfriend yeah and when i wouldn't give him my number he got semi-aggressive across the bar yeah and then as soon as she come down he walked away and obviously made it look like he was coming to bar to buy a drink yeah yeah yeah but he walked away with no drinks yeah no that's how shit of

a barmaid you were oh yeah yeah no i didn't upsell no i didn't go that's lovely what can i get you give me a tip why don't you buy four drinks for your group and then i'll give you my number do the transaction be like right so no i even had another guy actually refused to pay for his bar tab because i wouldn't give my number and he'd got like 10 drinks and got aggressive again to point that the security yes exactly let's see when you go big man yeah i'm like it's like won't pay and he's like she like him anyway digressing but that's how cocky i've seen men can be yep and again not the best people probably and they probably have the intention to cheat there you go so blatantly right then and there and obviously wrong so do you agree then this is where i feel

the lines are super blurred is cheating doesn't have to be physical it can be emotional that's that's a tough one i'm sorry that's a very tough i know and it's a tuesday night you've had a long day but I give no fucks yeah tell me the good stuff uh you know when you're younger uh it's only oh cheating is only physical because I don't think you have the emotional capacity when you're younger and you're like school and you're growing up and it's you know and I think as you get older and again this is all for all our listeners out there of varying ages and backgrounds and whatnot I think the emotional cheating comes into play as you as you do mature yourself and you've you've gone through life a little bit more i dare say that when you're

younger you that doesn't come into play no and it's just a physical thing and then when you experience love and all that other jazz yeah and you know and you've had real kind of proper mature long-lasting relationships i think that emotional value does come in and yes again they always say oh yeah but nothing nothing happened right nothing happened we were just like uh consoling each other over something and and and whatnot so it's like why can i do that and yes i mean again as long as there's no intention technically that's that's correct but i think when people have to look back we can never tell if someone doesn't tell us if they're if they're cheating or they're guilty of it you can never really tell but the straight answer is you yourself will always know if you

cheated on someone yeah if you look back and you look back on yourself and you feel you look at you know you introspect me like yeah i i did have more feelings than i probably should have or yeah that action probably and yada yada yada yada but that line is did you cheat or not what what extent you did you go past what line did you cross and you know i guess the thing is you can always say i never cheated but if i was if i was single if i wasn't with someone or that person was single as well and in in an ideal situation we'd probably hook up yeah yeah like for me i think there's if i'm texting someone who i've the team i've said is a friend but i care more about that conversation and i look forward to hearing from that person more than i do my partner yeah

that's cheating-esque for me wow emotionally cheating oh okay because i'm almost like say like my phone rings it's my boyfriend but then the other friend yeah i'm just example which has never happened never happened never rings and then i'm like two of your boyfriends right yeah not the same time yes i don't have two boyfriends at the same time just two in general for your whole life my whole life we've established this every time you put this into such context it makes it sound like i had two different boyfriends and i was choosing which one i preferred to hear from I was never that lucky if I feel emotionally invested in one person I want to hear from them in the morning I want to go through their Instagram I ask him when they're

free and my partner is not in my mind or doing like I would then know mentally I'm a bit more connected to the other person that's interesting so me I don't go that far I've never because that's a boundary step right from friendship to like yeah I guess so because there are relationships it's out there like this and they would say the other person is just a friend and then the partner has to basically put up and shut up it's like for me i wouldn't be able to handle that on the other if someone else was constantly calling and texting another girl and i'd be like i just can't deal with that yep yep yep no fair enough i i can see where you're coming from i wouldn't go that far for me um you know if my partner has a lot of friends and has a lot of friends of the opposite

at sex and they're in touch that's fine for me i don't i don't particularly care um daily calls would that bother you i mean every day i guess what are the calls about i mean who who calls nowadays anyways fuck that you know you say you want to pick up a call from someone that you know you'll be like oh yeah cool i want to speak to that person i don't answer anyone's calls really i'm like uh fuck it i don't want to speak to that person and you know uh mom i'll message her later joey's gonna now be like i know why you don't fucking pick up my call yeah it's not because you're busy i always pick up her calls that's good that's a good way to put it i always pick up her calls which is good step in the right yeah yes progress um okay yeah i guess it depends what

the calls are for i mean i usually call someone if it's for a pretty valid reason if not you can message someone and they can reply immediately or not and it doesn't matter i call my girls all the time yeah so if I had a boy mate he was purely platonic I would probably speak to him a lot probably yeah I don't know good call I mean yeah I'm not saying I don't speak to people but I'm never gonna fucking call you exactly have I ever picked up one of your calls I've never called you dude um so yeah I don't know I I I can't agree with you on that one I think that would be too far for me and right if I had a girlfriend who had an issue with that and was bringing up to me i mean we'd have to have a conversation about it obviously but i guess we would be

discussing those boundaries and and the day i guess what you need to do is you gotta look exactly what you said you gotta know the boundaries when you're when you're with someone so we can both agree the fact that physical intimacy is cheating oh fuck yeah that's that's the game that's the Game over. Some people think that if it's not full on sex, it's not cheating. Gee, what world are they living in? London. Yeah.

Again, no wonder you left. No wonder you left. Look, different cultures, different. I think it's more of an excuse, love. I think it's guys fucking up and then being like, oh, I didn't have sex with her. Yeah. We just like snogged. Yeah.

And that's not cheating. Hey, look, but again, different strokes for different folks. That does work for some people. so i and i don't know and but again the same thing is you need to establish those guidelines from the beginning whoever you're with it's just going to be like okay what's the deal yeah well i've never been in an open relationship and every time they've gone near another woman that's cheating oh okay but like for me you're single right now right yeah yeah totally um yep yeah i'm really knowledge here i mean like if i saw my boyfriend put his hand on a girl's ass

oh yeah that's for me yeah i mean that's wrong yeah yeah that's wrong because it's the intent yeah and disrespectful so it's okay so wait so let's backtrack it yeah shoulder just so everyone knows he's he's putting his hand on an imaginary shoulder he's just not saying shoulder yes hand on a shoulder around like but do you the thing is do you know the woman or is it a stranger no no i mean yeah like a friend yeah yeah uh no that's you do that for a photo yeah well okay see again environment context yeah of course yeah uh okay so yeah like meeting them and saying hi hugging and then like maybe leaving there for a moment being like okay like okay oh top of the back same thing yep small the back oh i don't know okay so i see where you are

so you're top half you're good yeah on the on the back side not the front uh and then you're talking small back and below is almost no no no go territory but then even say he hand on the shoulder if the girl is then holding your hand and they're like leaning into you that's a very intimate little thing going on and i'll be like why the fuck is this bitch holding your hand old friend known each other for 30 years what's our national insurance i will hunt her down yeah i mean like if it's a complete stranger oh yeah yeah yeah so i guess friends she's okay right if you're at a club and i come out the bathroom and you've got your arm around a girl she's holding your hand she's resting her head on your like you're still only

putting your hand on her shoulder she's really drunk and you're holding her up and helping her she just fell over when you need to reconsider your friends no no it's a stranger you said oh yeah yeah and you're like oh shit oh my goodness you know like oh man helping i'd like to think i'd be able to know the difference between an absolute hammered woman you gotta do these situations man you need to go and actually like you know candid camera these situations and then see people's reactions yeah but no the smaller the back and the bum uh bum bum no no no no chance but um i'd say still small the backs okay for photo yeah because depending on yeah situations especially when you have like a whole group because someone's already taken the shoulder

and you have nowhere else to put the hand so you have to go lower and then sometimes you just go over and you hold the two other hands and it's yeah i mean there's many different ways but i've been a lot of group photos obviously yeah and i'm always conscious about that who is standing next to me do i actually know them because then do i touch them or not so there's a lot of times in photos if i don't really know them and i respect it's a female i have my arms out like we are touching the group photo but i'm not actually touching them i'm hovering behind them so there's no physical contact are you smelling them because i know you like to smell yeah no it's too much it's too much smell so yeah so but again if i know the girl it's and we're friends that's

different story so what about hand holding because for me that is still cheating if i caught my fellow holding a hand of another girl friend or not like that's a very intimate thing for me wow I don't hold any dude's hand. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And if I did, I would be doing it because I'm into him. I think it's going somewhere. Again, I just totally think it's situational. If they're suddenly talking about...

You would never hold a girl's hand other than Joey's. If I was talking to someone and, you know, a family member just passed away and you're consoling them, right, it's okay, it's all good. Or they just had a really shit day. I mean, again, there are circumstances where I believe the line of physical contact can be crossed with holding hands i don't believe we're actually talking about this holding hands my god it's not

like we're patting them on the bum and be like it's okay yeah but it's okay you know like exactly yeah but say i got a photo and my girlfriend said is this your boyfriend and it was a photo of my partner at the mall with one of his friends but they're holding hands and like walking yeah oh yeah that's weird what the fuck that's weird if it's like but she's just a mate i've known her for five years or whatever that was still really hurt me yeah yeah yeah that's a little bit weird but same thing again though open communication you'd be like uh hello what was this about and then you have to see what his excuse is yeah an excuse is the right word exactly not explanation excuse oh excuse i've just learned something that's that's gonna go down in my notes

every day is a school day with me babe yeah okay but we've established physical kissing sex yeah physical attention with intent yes yes that that's where i would come from right yes so even sexting with intent right yeah yeah of course or even messaging with intent technically yeah yeah okay good it's all about the intent that's what i'm that's what i said that that's the basis for me yes so emotion there is an emotional element of cheating as in it doesn't have doesn't have to just be physical. Do you think that platonic relationships between men and women can then end up in that emotional cheating level? Wow. Again, you're really posing the tough questions today. Sorry. You know, this is going to help a lot of people. Yeah, I know. Look,

you already used the keyword platonic. Yes. Right. And because you've used that word platonic, then that's it. Platonic relationship is a platonic relationship. I think that's another special connected connection you've you've established with someone whether it's a an old friend or a newer friend but i think the lines have been drawn on that and that's why it's a platonic relationship i'm a firm believer in platonic relationships because i have many many many platonic relationships not in me yeah this is strictly professional fucking i am we are again listeners we are we are like you know a meter and a half apart We've got Ken here as well,

making sure that nothing happens physically between us. This is strictly professional. Oh, he gives me such hazy answers. I just want to know what cheating is. I don't want to know it's circumstantial. I don't want to know it depends on the person. I want black and white. So I can go back and say, listen to this.

Do you touch her hand? Right, this is what Paul said. That's right, yeah. But no, no, you can't use me because you need to use yourself for you. Oh, yeah, that's very true. Yes, yes, yes, yes. he'd get away with it with me yeah so paul says so yeah yeah you're like it's okay it's okay i'm

like it's fine yeah take your hand away from her hand and no one will get hurt no no no so okay another question then because i think this is a very difficult issue what if it's not an official relationship so you're seeing each other because the guy can't do labels or he's commitment phobe or he's like, babe, I just want to see how it goes, all that bullshit. But you're only, you're sleeping together, you see each other all the time, maybe it's three months or six months, and he still won't put a label on it. Is he technically cheating if he goes with another girl? Well, technically, yes, I'd say.

You've salvaged the friendship with that response. I'd say yes, but again, I think that conversation actually needs to happen. same thing with me and joey um i think a few months in yeah two months give or take she genuinely asked that question and i think that's what you need to do you need to kind of know yeah how official your relationship is because it's not actually if he hasn't committed to you yeah it's not actually cheating because there's a reason there's no label and he's like i'm not your boyfriend we're just seeing each other so technically he's within his right as are you that's right that's right so the question was basically are we exclusive are we now exclusive

to each other and i was like yeah i mean yeah she's like okay just checking because i wasn't too sure if you were like maybe going on dates with other girls or whatever and i was like what the hell time do i have to go on other dates with other girls when i'm in singapore i'm with you and that was when i was filming my travel show so i'm out filming my travel show i'm coming back i'm either at home or i'm with you you know we're in touch 24 7 you're traveling was you away from home yes i was hadn't labeled it had you not sleeping you know not sleeping at all no oh what was she doing then yeah exactly filming a travel show that's what i was doing um so i basically said even if i had time yeah to actually go on another date with another and

you know i don't go on dates i mean it was very cute and very i laughed but it was that moment when basically we labeled ourselves as official which is good she needed it exclusive yes she asked exactly when she needed it it was obviously on her mind that's right you can't and she was just making sure yeah because she's like if you're if you are then i am but i'm not so i'm hoping you're not and i was like well i'm not so if you're not and i'm not that's good because then we are and then that's it that's insightful so again back to communication i think that's where it's very important and um anyone in that situation where one of them says they can't label it or then it's not exclusive i think the other one has to really work out yeah whether

they're okay yeah because there's an alarm bell yeah and if the person's saying look maybe they're still early days maybe like i'm not ready or i'm not sure technically they're not in a relationship technically it's not cheating but it will still probably hurt yeah if one of the other ones perhaps committed already or not seen anyone else you're not on the same level yeah yes totally different pages yes so i feel like if you are in that situation and you know you know that there is someone else on the scene or whatever whilst it isn't technically cheating you just have to be very firm with yourself whether you're okay yeah to be on the receiving end of that man don't even get to that point no i mean you gotta lock someone in if you if you if you are committed and you're

not doing anything and you really like this person and this person's supposed to really like you i mean you just gotta say it like yeah are we official are we officially together when we're not seeing anyone else and doing anything else and you will know from the answer straight away yeah and i think that's when you're going to deal with it either which way but you're right that that would hurt if you know you thought you were with someone officially and they're like oh no time sorry i sorry i no i was i was going on dates with other people and doing you know whatever doing stuff would be even worse but oh shit yeah but it happens a lot or like i'm just not ready to be tied down i really really like you and there's always that reassurance like i really

like you could go somewhere and it keeps the other one like hanging on i mean that that i think this should be another whole topic for us to venture into later about this whole drink to that about this whole um seeing someone dating someone or seeing people dating people and then going steady or being official officially in a relationship there's all these terms and it can be very confusing because some people think oh yeah we're dating but that dating is not exclusive dating it means you can date as many people as you want until you decide that you want to be with just one person yeah but for other people it's like no but we're dating so it's me we are just us too yeah so let's put it up on another topic another episode so uh ladies and gentlemen boys and girls

you're gonna have to come in and tune in for that episode another time well i reckon a good boundary is if you say you love each other yeah because you could he could be like oh i love you yes i don't know why i make the boys sound so pathetic yes they don't sound like that oh i love you I love you. Poorly love you, I'm not sure. But for me, if someone says I love you, I would not expect him to be going anywhere else. Definitely.

Right? Yeah, like is still like possible. Fancy, I think, is the first step up. Because you already should like someone if you're already like dating and doing stuff. Yeah. And then it becomes like that fancy, like, wow, really fancy, like this is really good,

it's working, everything's falling into place, it's so compatible. and then it graduates to to that warm fuzzy feeling and yeah yeah i love and you say that you think people don't go anywhere yeah when when when they're supposed to be in love but and then people fall out of love unfortunately um sad little mini violin yeah yeah okay she was playing that mini violin on her shoulder too so just to let you guys know i played it so well Okay, so basically, to sum this up, because we could talk about this for ages, but there really is no definitive answer. I mean, physical cheating is cheating, goes without saying.

If someone kisses someone else and says, oh, but we didn't have sex. No, sorry, not buying it. Yeah, agreed. And when it comes to physical attention, such as hand holding, arm around each other, it's very dependent on the situation. Agreed. and when it's emotional connection cheating it once again depends on the situation yeah the intent of the person yeah and the yeah the people involved and the conversations being had like perhaps the severity of the conversations how the frequency of the conversation of the time

and how much attention also is also put into a relationship yeah beyond that connection okay So I think intention is always going to be there throughout all these scenarios and topics or subtopics you brought up. I think I think the primary defining factor is always intention. If there were if you ever had a thought that, oh, yeah, actually, I did really want to, like, do something with that other person, then you're fooling yourself in that sense. You're almost cheating yourself if that means anything. Oh, you've turned it around. Yeah. It's cheating inception.

You're not cheating yourself. You're cheating yourself because, yeah. It's my mind blowing against the wall. Yeah, he said. And on that bombshell, we're going to end this episode. Thank you, darling. No worries. Insightful as always.

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