In this monologue episode of the Dad Starting Over podcast, the host first promotes the Help for Men Brotherhood as a support network for men dealing with dead bedrooms, divorce, loneliness, and relationship rebuilding. He then delves into the most common concerns among his listeners: sexless marriages and women’s infidelity. The host describes a typical anxious‑avoidant attachment pattern where an anxious, pursuit‑oriented man is paired with an avoidant, emotionally distant woman, a dynamic that often precedes extramarital affairs. He outlines two evolutionary explanations for female cheating: the mate‑switching hypothesis (cheating as an exit strategy to find a better long‑term partner) and the dual mating strategy hypothesis (cheating to obtain superior genetic material while retaining a provider partner). Citing a 2024 study by Macken Murphy published in the Journal of Evolutionary and Human Biology, he reports that the data favor the dual mating strategy—women rate affair partners as more physically attractive but less reliable than their primary mates. The host interprets these findings as evidence that status, confidence, masculinity, and novelty are powerful evolutionary triggers for women, and that men who ignore them become merely providers rather than lovers. He advises listeners to watch for red‑flag traits in women (poor boundaries, chaotic family background, lack of accountability) to avoid being cheated on. Finally, he promotes his own resources—the book The Dead Bedroom Fix and a free course—designed to help men become both lover and provider, thereby reducing the risk of infidelity and revitalizing their sex lives.
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Okay, if you're a frequent listener of the Dad Starting Over podcast and you find yourself saying, "Yeah, that sounds like me," well, you don't need another podcast episode. What you need is support. The Help for Men Brotherhood is where men go when they're done pretending that they got it all handled. You know, your dead bedrooms, your divorce, your loneliness, your rebuilding life. We have private forums, frequent live Zoom meetings, one-on-one coaching, courses, all my books at no additional charge. And yes, we get together in person. Real men and real conversations. So stop doing this alone and join the Help for Men Brotherhood today at help4men.com/join. I look forward to seeing you in the next member meeting. The two big topics that men love to talk about in my world. Number one is dead bedrooms or sexless marriages. That's the the one that really gets men going. Not far behind it, the number 2 most popular topic is women's infidelity. Cheating wives, to be more exact. And the big question that every man has, either a man who has incessantly worried about his partner cheating, often for no real reason, or the man who has discovered, unfortunately, his wife did in fact cheat on him, they both have the same question, which is, why on earth did the woman do that? As I've often mentioned in my material, a big portion of my audience, if not like the vast, vast majority of the men who watch and take in my material, are what we call anxious dudes, and they have an anxious form of attachment. They're always pursuing their partner. They're preoccupied with the health of the relationship. They're the guys that watch all the YouTube videos and read all the books and all that good stuff. And they are ironically matched up with a gal who's the complete opposite in that world. And that is that she just does not give a shit. She's apparently not a very sexual person, not a loving person, that's for sure. And she really doesn't want to talk about the old relationship stuff all the time. She's your quintessential avoidant woman. And ironically, it's not unheard of for these avoidant women to have extramarital affairs. That really blows a lot of people away. A seemingly asexual, or at least sexually dormant woman, suddenly has all these feelings for somebody that she barely knows. And it just completely blows these men away. Why on earth is this woman doing this? Now, we could go on and on about some of the psychological aspects of all this, of which I've talked about incessantly. And one thing that I've seen that is a commonality in a lot of these stories is that the woman has a very damaged background. And as a result, she has very little in the way of boundaries. And also she tends to shut down sexually and emotionally when a relationship gets real. When they move in together, when they get married, when they have kids, she just flatlines. There's no spike of emotion, let alone sexuality anymore. But she's a human being and she still has needs. And so she goes outside of the very real, comfortable, safe environment to get that need met. And often it's with a guy that makes these men say, "Him? Really?" The Mr. Lover Man, the affair partner to the wife, doesn't seem to check any boxes for good long-term partner. And there is this feeling amongst a lot of people that women cheat to exit a relationship. In broader terms, people tend to say that women cheat for reasons, and men, on the other hand, cheat because they can. And the sentiment didn't just fall from the sky. This is a stereotype for a reason. When we look historically at men who have cheated, it's often very high-status men with a lot of resources. And they have a lot of options or opportunity to fool around on the wife, so they do so. And it's not uncommon for those men historically to father children by more than one woman. And then we flip it over to the ladies, and it seems like a lot of ladies in our life cheat and then leave their spouse for the new affair partner. So we have deducted that, well, it seems that women cheat as an exit strategy out of, you know, relationship A so they can jump to relationship B. B. And science has caught on to this trend and they call this the mate-switching hypothesis. Just as it sounds, she is, I guess you could say, test driving the waters with new partner and seeing if he's good enough for us, you know, for spouse material or partner material at least. And then when she determines that yes, he is, she will say goodbye to partner A. Is that the case though for all such relationships? Or even the majority of women that cheat? If not, then what is the alternative here? Why on earth would a woman take such drastic steps in a relationship if she doesn't have the interest or the desire to jump over to partner B? Well, there is a competing hypothesis in the scientific circles, people that study this type of thing, and the hypothesis is called the dual mating strategy. And this one is, I guess you could say, maybe a little bit more nefarious, a term I often use. Uh, depends on your perspective. I guess, but it goes like this. Woman is with Man A because he is the more, oh, I guess you could say safe, domestic provider type of dude, to use my vernacular. But he doesn't scratch the itch as far as what she needs from a lover, from a more sexual partner, if you will. From a guy that provides the best genetic material. So in very blunt terms, this theory is that a woman may be having sexual dalliances with Guy B so that she can get pregnant from him and then have Guy A raise her, raise the kids and take care of her and the family. This happens to be probably the biggest fear in a lot of men that are engaged in long-term monogamy with a woman and having kids with her. The fear of, hey, these kids aren't mine and I'm investing a great deal of time and emotion and everything and resources to support her and the kids that aren't even mine. So this is not a very popular hypothesis. Not a very nice one anyway. So has anybody put these two hypotheses to test to see which one is the most valid? And the answer is Yes. And the conclusion? You probably don't wanna know. A relatively new study titled Why Women Cheat: Testing Evolutionary Hypotheses for Female Infidelity, which was co-authored by, uh, a popular scientist and social media presence, a guy by the name of Macken Murphy. Um, this study was published in the Journal of Evolutionary and Human Biology in 2024. It was a long-term study over a, a good population size of couples, of those who have, uh, have the cheating wife. And they came to one conclusion, and that was the data seems to support the dual mating strategy more so than the mate switching hypothesis. Based on the data uncovered in this study, they found that women rated their affair partners as more physically attractive than their long-term mate, Guy A, but they invariably found new partner as being less reliable than Partner A. So yes, he's lover material, but he's no provider material. So these affairs aren't necessarily about, quote, falling in love, or more specifically, getting emotional needs met that weren't met in relationship A. Based upon the data in this study, and I will put a link, you know, to the study in the below in the description, wherever it is you're watching this, it would seem that it's not based on the more soft reasons, but rather at a very biological, animalistic level. It's based on very primal stuff, very primal stuff that almost subconsciously the woman seems to be looking for a mate that checks boxes as far as better genetic material. What does this tell us about human nature overall? It tells us that yes, even within the confines of a long-term monogamous relationship, attraction does matter. Status, confidence, masculinity— all these are not just fluff words that have no meaning. They are in fact the foundation of the relationship and function as evolutionary triggers in the women in our lives. If you ignore these facts, you will become the provider that she tolerates instead of the lover that she fantasizes about. Now, with that being said, there is also an arrow in the quiver of the new lover that puts him above the provider husband, if we want to call him that. And that is not necessarily his looks, status, whatever it may be, but it's also his newness. As I've mentioned in other videos, new beats all. It's almost impossible as a long-term partner to compete with the novelty of a new relationship. But if it's a new relationship that also has the combination of, oh, more visceral masculine traits that the wife is looking for, more attractive visceral masculine traits that she she's looking for. That seems to be a really potent combination, a real relationship killer. Now, this isn't for all women, just those women who cheat. And back to my original point, who is it that seems to cheat? Those are the women that have very little in the way of boundaries. Those are the women that don't seem to be wired, whether it's nature, nurture, or however she got to that point. The point is that she's not necessarily wired for a long-term relationship. It behooves you to study her family, who she comes from, see if there's any kind of marital chaos in the background of her immediate family and extended family, to look at her past relationships. Were they filled with chaos? Is she the type to take very little accountability for her actions? Is she the type that always points at others and says, "It's them, it's never me"? These are all things that if you watch them and you listen to them, these red flags, they can help you avoid a lot of chaos. And help you to avoid such women. But regardless, it would seem that at a biological level, regardless of whether or not they have that cheating mechanism within them, this study and others does point to we still have some very real valid caveman code, if you will, embedded within us as the modern egalitarian human being that we so badly want to be. Men and women have our own different triggers for what we consider to be attractive and worthy of calling a mate. As a man, ideally, you want to be a combination, and that elusive combination of both lover and provider. That's what every woman wants, and that's what most women do not get. So how do you achieve this? If I may be so bold as to suggest a book, just so happens I wrote it, and the book is called The Dead Bedroom Fix. And you can learn more at deadbedroomfix.com or go right to my free course, deadbedroomfixcourse.com, and watch 10 videos of yours truly talking all about this stuff and what you can do to cultivate a relationship where you, you know, have both the lover and provider sides to you, which by my estimation gives you the best chance of a long-term relationship, number one, and a healthy sex life. Thank you so much for watching, guys. I do appreciate it.
