"i think of a man, and i take away reason and accountability." i was recently made aware of a phenomenon known in professional relationship circles as "emotional cheating." this is one of those terms that really requires no extra verbiage to describe. everyone who's anyone knows what emotional cheating is. maybe we're not sure exactly where the line is drawn but here to help us out is 32 (of 180) emotional signs that he's cheating. number three is hilarious.

"your mate's behavior is causing a gut feeling in you that something isn't right. if this happens, pay attention to your instincts. ignoring them means you want to blind yourself to the truth. you know your mate's habits, routines and attitudes better than anybody, so be suspicious when these things change."

read some of the other "signs" of cheating from the site. i didn't realize that a relationship was the equivalent of inviting big brother into your life. oh wait, i did realize that. but c'mon now, we're supposed to go on our gut feelings about when our mates are cheating on us? aren't we past this by now? didn't that seminal tv program "cheaters" show us that it's best to have irrefutable visual proof (and an enthusiastic late night audience) before confrontation and accusation? if couples were to follow up on every hunch they had about their partner cheating on them we'd become a nation of paranoid freaks. oh wait.

studies have shown that 75% of women said that emotional cheating would leave them feeling more betrayed than sexual cheating. their point is pretty much that emotional cheating will inevitably (75%+) lead to actual cheating. nothing sends a woman into histrionics faster than the potential threat and promise of cheating. that's what this study tells me.

as a veteran of the emotional cheating circuit, i'm here to say to those who take the moral emotional high ground, in defense of all emotional cheaters out there: "emotional cheating happens; deal with it." it's impossible to go through a relationship without having some other object/person/thing be the source of your daily joy. maybe it's the emails you exchange with a co-worker, maybe it's your thursday night dinner with the guys, maybe it's march madness, maybe it's your record collection. all of these can be sources of emotional cheating can't they?

if emotional cheating is loosely defined as directing attention and attachment toward something, then anything could potentially be a source of emotional cheating. i'm here to say that our relationship experts are taking things too far. sure, we should be wary of who our partners are talking to and hanging out with but at the end of the day, it's still about trust right? coming up with new categories and finger pointing definitions of cheating just doesn't seem right in these troubled times. cut people some slack. give them a chance to live a little before you break out these newfangled ideas about physical/emotional/spiritual cheating. bottom line, if you doubt them, you probably shouldn't be with them anyway.

as one woman told me, "in my mind, an emotional affair is far more threatening than a sexual one, because to me the emotional part is really the foundation of everything you have. for me, the whole idea of marrying someone would signify that we were best friends, confidants, and the first person we each turned to when something great happens or when things aren't so great. the idea of him turning to someone else would break my heart."