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Infidelity during a manic or hypersexual episode leaves partners with a brutal question: was that really him/her, or was it the illness? In this episode of The Other Side of Bipolar, we dig into the connection between bipolar disorder and cheating — why impulsivity and hypersexuality during mania can drive infidelity, how it differs from "ordinary" cheating, and how partners and caregivers can process the betrayal without losing themselves in the process. If you're navigating trust, boundaries, or the aftermath of infidelity in a relationship affected by bipolar disorder, this conversation is for you.
Suggested tags/keywords: bipolar disorder and infidelity, bipolar cheating, hypersexuality mania, bipolar relationships, partner of bipolar, betrayal trauma, bipolar caregiver podcast
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Hello everybody, I say this at
every podcast.
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I was married 10 years to a
woman, bipolar woman with
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psychosis.
I'm not a therapist, I'm not a
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psychiatrist.
Only only talk about my
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experiences this time with
infidelity.
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Infidelity and I don't want to.
You can call it whatever you
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want, infidelity, emotional
cheating, cheating, whatever the
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heck it is.
In my firm opinion, I'm going to
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say it out loud that it's just
the way it is.
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If you allow it to happen once
and you stay, it will happen
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again.
I'm sorry, After all the
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research, all the reading I've
done to try to see if I'm nuts
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or not, I can extremely say that
actual thing.
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Mine emotionally cheated with me
five years ago.
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Meeting a guy at the gym at 5:00
in the morning when nobody else
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was around and then trying to
tell me that it was OK, he's
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just a friend and I'm being
insecure.
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OK, you know what?
For me whether they did anything
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or not in physically was
irrelevant.
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This guy was talking trash about
his wife and I said OK that's
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wrong.
You don't meet at 5:00 in the
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morning and married people and
talk shit about each other.
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You just don't do that if you
want a solid marriage because
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her and I had always been solid.
Well, for three months it
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devastated me.
She could clearly see that she
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would, that I was devastated and
she just didn't care.
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Now, if you do research into
this stuff, that's very common.
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They just don't care it and then
their baseline does.
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They might look at it later and
might apologize.
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The thing about mine was she
never apologized.
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Even five years later, if I
bring it up, she'd go crazy.
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Nothing happened, nothing
happened.
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That's because she just couldn't
face the reality of what she
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did.
That's what I'm trying to get
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across is that if they're have
we, I actually call it a
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cheating gene, which not in
technically a, you know, DNA
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gene, but if they have
propensity to cheat when they're
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hypomanic, because a lot of them
are hypomanic when they're in
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mania or hypomania, they're
going to do it again, especially
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if you don't hold them
accountable.
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In other words, I don't know if
that first time, if I would have
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just walked out and been gone
and then come back in a month or
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two, maybe that would have
changed her.
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I don't know, but I didn't.
I loved her.
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I tried to do the right thing.
I tried to work it out.
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Even though I look back on it
now and I was a stupid one.
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Don't get me wrong.
She never admitted to it ever.
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She I then she would bring in
her, they call it in the states
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flying monkeys friends to say
oh, nothing happened.
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How the hell can you say nothing
happened and no cheating ever
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happened if you weren't actually
there?
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That's why I say whether they
did anything physical or not,
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it's irrelevant.
The relevance is that she saw
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what she did as a wife that
destroyed her husbands mentality
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and emotional structure and she
did nothing about it other than
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deflect, say I was the problem
and run from it.
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This is a classic sign that I
see over and over and over again
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in my research.
And don't get me wrong, you're
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no different.
If you're listening to this and
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can resonate with anything I'm
talking about, this is going to
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happen to you again.
Mine wasn't.
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I mean, I've read stories of
people that, you know, they,
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they go into the psychiatric
unit and they come back and, you
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know, whatever all the extreme
stories, I don't know.
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I really don't.
All I know is it happened again.
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And once I left and started
talking to some other friends of
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mine, I had numerous friends
tell me she checks me out up and
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down and made me, you know, the
friends of mine, very
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uncomfortable.
And that happened over and over
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again.
And then at the very end, she
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was openly flirting with June
with men in front of me without
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her wedding rings on, only to
end the the flirting with those
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men by saying, oh, there's my
husband.
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Can you imagine?
I'm sorry if you're a dude,
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that's the most embarrassing
thing in the history of the
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world.
But what I'm trying to get to
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is, and I asked her about the
emotional or the flirting right
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in front of me and she said, oh,
he's gay.
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They won't take if they won't
take accountability for it,
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won't apologize for it and just
go on down the road about it.
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Run, don't stay, run.
You're stupid if you don't.
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I'm sorry.
I'm just going to say the truth
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from now on because I've done so
much crying and so much self
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reflection to think that I put
up with this crap for so many
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years and it's awful.
Just don't do it because it will
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happen again and again and
again.
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And I'm sorry, the stories I've
seen too, it'll probably get
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worse.
In other words, if they're
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flirting right now, they're
going to end up sleeping with
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somebody else and then you're
going to get a disease.
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And by the way, if you do get a
disease, it'll be your fault,
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not theirs.
They're not going to apologize
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for it.
Or some of them apologize, Some
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of them get caught cheating and
they profusely apologize and
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say, oh, they're going to go
back on meds and everything's
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great for six weeks or six
months and then boom, here we go
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again.
Do your research.
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If you don't believe me, do your
research.
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I'm telling you right now, if
they're going to do it once,
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they will do it again.
And the very fact of you being
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nice and loving them and trying
to overcome it will only give
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them more power to do it again.
So if you want your heart ripped
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out on a daily basis, stay after
that garbage.
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Otherwise, don't feel bad about
leaving.
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It's their responsibility.
They're an adult, they can make
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a decision every day.
I mean, come on, when I'm
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married, I can look at a woman
and think might be interesting
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to go, you know, do the boom
boom with them.
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That might sleep my mind.
But I'm a loyal guy.
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I may look at him and say, well,
that's really interesting.
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I'd like to hit that, but I'm
not going to act on it because
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I'm a human being and I care and
love about my wife.
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Oh, and by the way, there's
always a double standard.
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All I had to do was look at a
woman a couple of times
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literally talk about a common
acquaintance which she was at,
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and I got raged on by her
absolutely screaming and yelling
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at me about somehow I was doing
something awful.
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I didn't do anything.
What I'm getting to people is if
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you're still listening, cut
yourself some grace.
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Understand that this is going to
happen again and again.
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It's not going to quit.
OK, if you want to think that
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you're going to be in the
literal less than 1% of all the
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relationships that are bipolar
and this shit doesn't happen
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after they're they cheat, go
ahead.
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But the odds are heavily stacked
against you anyway.
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You take care.
This is a tough subject.
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I've had to wrestle with this
for over a year.
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Bye.