# Does Cheating Undermine a Parents ability to Discipline Kids?



## Arnold (Oct 25, 2011)

If a spouse cheats, how can he or she, realistically, expect the kids to listen to the rules that spouse tries to enforce? I often wondr what my wife plans on telling our daughters re fidelity and premarital sex.
My kids are really smart. The hypocrisy will be called out, I am sure.


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## joe kidd (Feb 8, 2011)

Well.... like a lot of things we try to teach our kids hypocrisy creeps in from time to time. When telling my step daughters about why they shouldn't smoke pot I had to think back to my youth. lol When they asked me if I did it I said yes, now ask me why I don't now.


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## TeaLeaves4 (Feb 19, 2010)

joe kidd said:


> Well.... like a lot of things we try to teach our kids hypocrisy creeps in from time to time. When telling my step daughters about why they shouldn't smoke pot I had to think back to my youth. lol When they asked me if I did it I said yes, now ask me why I don't now.


Ummm, well... yeah he's right. I don't mean to be harsh but can the OP get down off your self-righteous bully pulpit for a minute. 

A lot of things we tell our kids not to do... and we do anyway. I doubt you are an exception. Please don't stop telling your kids to do the right thing whenever they can. Life (and doing the "right" thing) is a lot harder than it looks. Doesn't mean we don't stop trying. No matter what mistakes we made in the past.


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## Shaggy (Jul 17, 2011)

Yes, kids aren't morons.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## 45188 (Sep 13, 2012)

Yeah, of course lol


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## Vanguard (Jul 27, 2011)

Yes, but that's not the real issue.

It doesn't undermine it. It molds it. And that's a hideous truth none of the WS's want to admit.


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## Chris989 (Jul 3, 2012)

So far my kids have seen a once reasonably happy family destroyed by my wife's infidelity.

Not pleasant but a lesson.

Worryingly, my wife saw both of her brother's families also torn apart by their cheating and one nephew go totally off the rails because his father (my ww's brother) cheated.

It didn't stop her either.

My point is: if a child does not learn from very real world examples then a spot of advice will make no difference.

I would therefore contend that whether children believe advice is not going to be the driving force behind their behaviour.

My wife saw her father get away with cheating and that is the lesson she learned. Cheat but don't get caught - as her father wasn't as opposed to her brothers, who were.


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## Count of Monte Cristo (Mar 21, 2012)

Chris989 said:


> My wife saw her father get away with cheating and that is the lesson she learned. Cheat but don't get caught - as her father wasn't as opposed to her brothers, who were.


:scratchhead:

Chris that's quite a conundrum. She saw her father get away with cheating but he wasn't caught? 

I suspect what she saw was the rugsweeping of her dad's affairs by her mom.


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## MattMatt (May 19, 2012)

Count of Monte Cristo said:


> :scratchhead:
> 
> Chris that's quite a conundrum. She saw her father get away with cheating but he wasn't caught?
> 
> I suspect what she saw was the rugsweeping of her dad's affairs by her mom.


Oh. And she thought: "Well, if Dad can get away with it, so can I!"


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## SadandAngry (Aug 24, 2012)

If the kids don't highlight the hypocrisy, the bs might very well do so. Maybe not overtly, maybe passive aggressively. A look, or a raised eyebrow here, a barely repressed snicker there. pfft! tcshhh! ha! at the opportune time, just to shove the knife in, and give it a little twist.


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## RWB (Feb 6, 2010)

My wife was cheating for years during our kids teenage years. She admits that she was ashamed of herself and found it hard to punish knowing that she what she was doing was 100 times worse. We never had a combined effort. She was painting me as the harsh parent to our children. Cheating is not a one on one betrayal. It is a one on family betrayal.


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## Count of Monte Cristo (Mar 21, 2012)

My wayward ex compensates by trying to be buddies with our teenagers instead of their mom. Just a few weeks ago, we took my daughter to buy her a new car (that I was going to pay cash for) and she refused to test drive it because it wasn't what she had in mind. And what did the ex do? She told me and my daughter that she was 'Switzerland' - basically neutral in the disagreement.

P!ssed me off because she should've backed me on this one instead of leaving me flapping in the wind. The correct decision was for my daughter to accept a fully paid off new car that may not have been her first choice. So, I just told her and the ex that I would contribute $7000 and THEY can go find a used car.  

(BTW, I didn't get my first new car until three years ago.)


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## Count of Monte Cristo (Mar 21, 2012)

Damn, got eaten by another Zombie thread. (At least the topic in this one is timeless.)


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## EI (Jun 12, 2012)

Only once has one of our sons tried to throw my indiscretion in my face when I was pointing out what I knew would be the negative consequences of a choice that he had made. He is my 19 y/o (turning 20 this month) and he has a "scrappy attitude" just like..... Well, I'm not mentioning any names... but it is genetic.....  I, calmly, reminded him that I am his mother, I love him, and I will be respected in my home. I told him that his actions and choices will affect his future much more than they will affect mine and that it was he whom I was concerned about. I, then, reminded him that living here is a privilege, at his age, not an entitlement!


Beyond that, all I can say is that when you discipline your children, say it like you mean it.... because you do. If only "perfect" parents, who were without sin, were "allowed" to raise children, well.......... Raise your hand if you're perfect.... Exactly!!!


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## Bellavista (May 29, 2012)

I think that perhaps it is the overall mentality that contribues to the sometimes inability to disipline the kids.
The WS can be distracted from family life by planning their next encounter with the AP. They may be going off into daydreams about the AP & resent the intrusion of discipling kids. There can also be the guilt factor, for those who allow themselves to think of that.
Now, I have never been a WS & my fWH left the discipline to me all of the time no matter how engaged or disengaged he was from the marriage, so I cannot actually speak from first hand experience.


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