15 Signs She Cheated and Feels Guilty

Infidelity in committed relationships is more common than you think. 

Based on latest research, Among ever-married adults ages 18 to 29, women are slightly more likely than men to be guilty of infidelity (11% vs. 10%).

However, this gap reverses among those ages 30 to 34 and grows wider in older age groups.

Do any of them feel guilty, though?

It appears so!

Cheater’s guilt affects most men and women who were unfaithful to their partners.

What is Cheater’s Guilt?

Simply put, it’s a feeling experienced by cheaters as a result of having an affair with someone and not knowing what to do next.

People who cheat may feel mild to intense guilt after being unfaithful. That’s when they realize the gravity of their actions and start feeling remorse. 

However, this realization won’t make them confess their actions…

In turn, it does have the potential to change their behavior significantly and often leads to feelings of shame, mental and emotional exhaustion, as well as depression.

If you’re interested to know how cheater’s guilt really affects cheaters, you’ll find more information below. 

But before we get into that, let me ask you a personal question:

Do you think your girlfriend or wife cheated on you and now she’s experiencing cheater’s guilt?

In case you do have this doubt, then learning the truth as soon as possible can save you from further heartbreak. 

How? Look out for the next cheating guilt signs…

15 Signs She Cheated and Feels Guilty:

1. She throws your accusations right back at you

If you’ve been suspecting your girlfriend or wife of cheating, then you’ve probably tried to hint at it more than one time.

You probably playfully joked about it and teased her or maybe you simply asked her. Either way, her reaction can give you the indication you’re looking for.

If she tried to defend herself without getting defensive and reassured you that she won’t ever cheat on you, you could be dealing with an honest partner.

However, if she appeared to be outraged by the idea of infidelity and made you think you offended her while accusing you of being unfaithful, she might be lying to you. 

If that’s what she did, it means she was trying to shift the attention away from her. Instead of focusing on her and what she did, she started blaming you.

Maybe she pointed out that you often go out with your friends or that you spend too much time at the gym. Either way, her reaction was based on her guilt.

2. You notice that she’s more thoughtful and affectionate

How else would she behave? After cheating on you, your partner could try to make it up to you because of the cheating guilt she is facing. 

You might notice that she suddenly buys you more thoughtful gifts, cooks meals for you, and is more affectionate. 

Even if she has always been sweet to you and liked to buy your presents and spoil you in other ways as well, if she’s suddenly going overboard with this, something is going on.

Maybe she’s not cheating on you, but she’s definitely hiding something from you. People don’t do these things without a reason. 

Any kind of change in your SO’s normal behavior should make you think…

3. She makes changes to her communication pattern

If you want to figure out if she cheated and feels guilty, don’t let any change go unnoticed.

Especially when it comes to the way she communicates with you.

Here are a few examples:

• She tells you all about her day and includes many details when she talks about it. Moreover, she tries to find a reason for everything she does. 
• She doesn’t complain as much or at all about the things that bother her in your relationship, such as not spending enough time together, and so on.
• She has the tendency to give you defensive answers even when you don’t accuse her of anything (i.e. “I had to go there to help out my friend. What was I supposed to do? Leave her alone?”)

4. She asks you weird hypothetical questions

The next indication your SO suffers from cheater’s guilt is when she begins to ask you all sorts of weird hypothetical questions. 

If she cheated on you, she must regret it terribly. She probably wants to come clean to you, but she doesn’t know how you’d react.

That’s why she might try to make you imagine various situations that could help her figure out what you’d do if you knew.

Can you relate?

Is she coming up with twisted scenarios lately?

In case that’s true, then it could be the unmistakable sign you’re looking for.

Knowing all of these ahead could be an advantage. You could give her answers that would encourage her to confess her affair.

5. She encourages you to take time for yourself away from her

Unless the woman you’re in a relationship with or you’re married with isn’t an introvert (she needs to spend time alone to recharge her batteries) and she wants you to spend time away from her, take it as a red flag. 

This is one of the common cheating guilt signs that She could be facing for being unfaithful to you and that’s why she doesn’t want to be near you right now because she doesn’t know how to proceed.

Or, she is still cheating on you (many married women have long-term affairs) and wants to have more time to focus on the other man.

So, don’t believe her intentions are honorable when she encourages you to go out with your friends or to spend more time doing something you enjoy. 

6. Insomnia has become one of her main issues

Betraying your trust and going to bed with another man can have serious consequences on your girlfriend or wife. 

One of the most common ones is insomnia. Cheating men and women often suffer from insomnia because they keep thinking about what they did. 

The guilt she’s feeling could be eating her from the inside and that’s why she can’t have a good night’s rest. 

Now, I know you might not be interested in her well-being given the situation. However, it’s her sleeplessness that indicates her consciousness doesn’t her sleep at night.

On top of that, she might experience shame and other belittling feelings as a result of her behavior – that’s why she can’t sleep.

7. She avoids making eye contact with you

Making eye contact is a form of communication. Lovers use it to talk to each other without words, flirt, tease, and build an emotional connection. 

But what if your partner started to avoid making eye contact with you?

Not looking directly into your eyes during tense conversations or fights could give her away. 

As discussed in this report, it’s enough to look at her eyes to tell whether she’s lying to you or not. 

For example, the first sign she’s being dishonest with you is when she rubs the area below her eyes or when she stares at you.

Or, she could do the opposite. She could make prolonged eye contact with you when you’re asking her for answers because she knows looking away could give you the wrong impression.

If she is avoiding eye contact with you then it’s a strong she sign cheated and feels guilty.

8. You notice that she does things differently in the bedroom

As I was telling you before, a cheating partner with a guilty consciousness will change their behavior… including in the bedroom.

In your case, there are three main possible scenarios:

• She focuses more on giving you pleasure than on her own pleasure. This is because she wants to compensate for her wrongdoings.
• She does things she’s never done or does the same things but in a different way. For example, you may notice that she uses another technique to satisfy you orally or kiss you.
• Your partner may seem distracted. You might get the feeling that her mind is elsewhere and that she’s not enjoying herself as usual.

9. She is getting busier with her professional and social life

The lack of free time to spend with you could also be a bad sign. If she has less and less time for you, it means she has more and more time for, well… someone else. 

Your girlfriend or wife may have cheated on you and although she might be feeling guilty, maybe she keeps doing it.

That could be the reason why she appears to be getting busier with her professional and social life. 

So, if lately she’s been telling you that she must work overtime or that one of her best friends need her help with something, don’t take her word for it!

10. She suffers from inexplicable mood swings

If you’re not the one causing her mood swings, then what’s going on?

Is she going through that period of the month, or it’s something completely different?

I hate to tell you this, but… her affair and feelings of guilt could be the reasons why she’s experiencing so many mood swings.

One moment she could be happy and smile, just to yell at you the next for something insignificant such as not folding the clothes right.

If she behaves like that, it means she is really scared that what she did will determine you to break up with her and that’s why she’s trying to point out the things you don’t do perfectly.

11. Your girlfriend/wife shows signs of depression

One definite sign your partner experiencing guilty conscience is if she is showing signs of depression. 

She may have felt adventurous and naughty while doing it, but now that she’s come down from that rush, she knows just how much she screwed up. 

Especially if she still loves you deeply and what she did was a mistake, she’s bound to get depressed. 

Don’t take my word for it, though! This study explains that there is indeed a close connection between guilt and depression. 

What are some of the signs she’s depressed? Psychological symptoms of depression include sadness, low self-esteem, crying, guilt, irritability and intolerance, lack of motivation, and so on.

12. She sounds dishonest when she’s giving you compliments

Experts noticed another thing that cheaters who feel guilty do: They give dishonest compliments and they try to inflate their partner’s ego and self-esteem.

Why do they do it?

After realizing the mistake they’ve made, they want to make it up to their partners.

That’s why they buy more gifts, become more affectionate, and try to put their partner on a pedestal. They messed up really badly and they know it. 

Your GF/wife could be in the same situation. So, if you hear her praising you excessively, know that something is wrong.

13. You notice inconsistencies in the things she tells you

Your wife talks a lot and she tells you about the things she does throughout the day. But lately, you keep catching her with inconsistencies.

She changes her story from one day to another and if you try to talk to her about it, she uses the gaslighting technique on you. 

In other words, she rejects anything you say and makes you think that you’re the crazy one. Has anything like that happened?

If you relate to this situation, then I can tell you one thing for sure: she is lying to you. But is she lying to you because she cheated on you?

Well… that’s for you to find out!

14. She dodges your questions about her whereabouts

Can your partner answer the simple question, “Where have you been?”

If she can’t and she’s always dodging your question and changing the topics, don’t let her fool you. There is a reason why she’s hiding that from you. 

And that reason could be related to her having an affair. But why can’t she give you an answer? 

She feels guilty about what she did and she probably wants to tell you. However, she knows that you might leave her and she apparently doesn’t want that.

15. She keeps her phone well hidden from you

Lack of transparency also points to something fishy. You are right to doubt your SO if she keeps her phone with her at all times.

If she acts very protective of her phone, maybe there is some sensitive data there that she doesn’t want you to see. 

“Why would she keep conversations saved in her phone?”, you might ask. I assure you, your girlfriend or wife is no mastermind. 

She’s just a person who made a mistake or maybe more. So, don’t expect her to cover her traces perfectly.

How Does Cheating Guilt Affect Cheaters?

Look, I’m not trying to defend her, but if she feels guilty for being unfaithful to you, your GF/wife could seriously be affected.

Cheating guilt affects cheaters in numerous ways, as follows:

• They experience mild to intense feelings of shame, self-loathing, self-hatred, and so on.
• They go through mental and emotional exhaustion due to their ruminating thoughts.
• They are often very angry at themselves and can’t deal with what they’ve done.
• They sometimes live a double life because they can’t end the affair although they feel guilty.

Takeaway

The cheating guilt signs shared above should help you a great deal to figure out if she cheated and feels guilty. 

However, you should consider the fact that some people are better than others at hiding their emotions.

In other words, just because you don’t see all the cheating guilt signs, it doesn’t mean that your girlfriend or wife is being faithful to you.

So, if your gut feeling is telling you otherwise, don’t stop investigating. Who knows, maybe you’ll find out she’s indeed feeling guilty, but for entirely different reasons than you think.

Whatever you do, don’t let confusion and uncertainty ruin your relationship. Do your best to find out what’s really going on.