5 Lagosians talk about cheating and being cheated on

A new slang now is “Gbo gbo wa la ma je breakfast.” this literally means, “We will all eat breakfast at some point.” It is another way of saying heartbreak is assured for most of us.

Sometimes you are at the receiving end of the cheating spectrum, and other times you are the one giving it out.

Here are some stories of cheating or being cheating on;

Derin was in university when he started dating his girlfriend. He wasn’t a typical campus broke boy. He drove a car, stayed in one of the poshest apartments in school.

The relationship was going good until his girlfriend ghosted him, he would call her, and she wouldn’t pick or reply to her messages.

He was writing his ICAN examinations and went to read in the classrooms one night. On his way there he saw his girlfriend with another man, talking outside her hostel.

Reversing and not really thinking about the consequences of what he was about to do, he approached them.

When he got to where they were, he said hello to the guy first and as I was about to say hello to his girlfriend. The guy stopped him and said, “What do you think you are doing? If I didn’t call her from her hostel, you wouldn’t know you want to talk to her.”

He looked at his girlfriend and she had this blank expression on her face. “I just apologised and walked away.” He said.

Angela met Daniel at a birthday party. From the moment they met they hit it off. One day, Angela was with him in a hotel because according to him he was not able to secure accommodation since he got to Lagos.

“I saw him on different social media applications scrolling through, and I remembered that he doesn’t even follow me on Instagram. I told him to follow me on Instagram but he said; ‘I don’t really post much.’

“Don’t worry” I said “Just follow me.” but he still didn’t follow me on Instagram.

When she got home, she followed his private page and he followed back. However, he suddenly disappeared from her Instagram. It appeared as if she was blocked.

Confused, Angela asked her friend to follow Daniel on Instagram. She did and he followed her friend back. Angela and her friend both scrolled through his Instagram page and then there it was – a picture of his wife.

“Can your boyfriend cheat on you with his wife?” She asks

Ebuka had a girlfriend in the university. He was so in love he used to do her laundry.

So one day, he went to pick up her laundry and there it was, another guy on her bed.

“It was awkward because the guy and I could not be in the room at the same time. So, I asked her for the clothes she would like to wash and left her room.”

“She called me later to try to explain but I didn’t let her. I told her it was fine.”

“One day she came to spend the night in my room. She was sleeping so I went through her phone. In one of her chats she told her friend that she had sex with the guy I saw on her bed and the sex was great but she will try to stop.”

Seun is a married man who believes that he can have random meaningless sex with women when he is out of town or having fun with his guys as long as his wife doesn’t find out.

“I like to keep it casual so that way I never get caught. I keep my phone anywhere in the house and I would never get caught. There is nothing to see there.”

He admits that he has fallen in love with one of these random women but she didn’t have his time so he moved on.

David and Isabel dated for two years. Although they had never had sex, they had steaming make out sessions.

However, David got pretty busy doing his Masters degree and while his attention was diverted to his books, Isabel’s attention was diverted to her co-worker.

With sexual tension steaming between them, one day they left the office and went to a close place to make out.

According to David, Isabel gave her co-worker oral pleasure or a blow-job.

After the confession, David realised she was for the streets, but he couldn’t feel too bad because he also cheated on her with someone else while they were dating.

The rate of unfaithfulness and cheating scandals seem to be at the highest.

Is it a heightened dissatisfaction with monogamous relationships? An increase in people’s libido nationwide or has it always been like this?

*names were changed to protect identities

This series talks about the experiences of young people trying to find love in Lagos.