Simone was Warned
IT was only a matter of time. Warnie has allegedly bowled another maiden over, flying the flag for philanderers everywhere by being given a seventh chance – and blowing it.
Once again, we’re forced to bear it as his ex-wife ships out, yet again, declaring (to New Idea) that this time, it’s for real.She knows he won’t change.
This time, it’s hard to pity Simone Callahan. What on earth was she was doing back there in the first place? Especially after the two blondes in the hotel room and his Playboy Bunny undies.
Simone had made great strides in moving on, even going on Dancing With The Stars.
But just when she looked like she’d extricated herself, she dived right back into Shane’s World, failing to see what the rest of us couldn’t miss: that he’s a leopard with the same spots.
As 71 per cent of Aussie blokes admit to cheating, the Warnes are, sadly, a prototype of so many couples trying to negotiate their way out of it.
And it seems Warnie is the most lethal type of libertine: the serial offender who’ll stray any time, anywhere, motivated by a deep desire to feel desired – and far harder to tame than your garden-variety cheater seeking just a momentary distraction.
Rather than being condemned as a seedy love rat, Shane’s copping more pity than censure because after all the texting, he still can’t get it right.
Perhaps equal condemnation should be dolled out to the other woman. It’s not like she didn’t know he was married.
Who are these women without whose existence men couldn’t cheat? According to psychologists, single women in their 30s are the main conduits to affairs. They’re sitting ducks for married men wanting a bit on the side.
“Women are vulnerable at this age because they’re usually looking for a relationship and these types of men prey on that,” New Idea psychologist Jo Lamble says.
And, if you’re the other woman, don’t say you didn’t see him coming.
There’s one big warning sign women tend to overlook, Lamble says. If the man’s past relationship overlaps with the new woman’s relationship with him, chances are they’ll do it to the new flame as well.
In other words, you lose them the way you found them.
These other women are either quite happy with the duplicitous arrangement, or they believe the married man’s insistence he’s on the way out. Or they find it empowering.
Back in 1962, Helen Gurley Brown, the grand dame of independent women, suggested we keep married men as “pets”:
“While they’re ‘using’ you to varnish their egos, you ‘use’ them to add spice to your life.”
A consulting firm in the US suggests adulterers “keep a lid” on it by getting a pre-paid mobile.
Yep, cheating’s all the rage -and big business. Polygraph expert Steve Van Aperen’s mainstay are philanderers dragged in by their spouses to explain credit-card statements.
Funny thing is, when he reports one of them is lying through his teeth, the spouse often shoots the messenger. It’s the test they doubt, not their cheating other half.
But it’s not just blokes keeping lie detectors in business. Men initiated 55 percent of Steve’s business last year, implying it’s their wives who are under suspicion.
He says women stray because there’s something missing – and men stray because they can.
Maybe humans aren’t meant to be monogamous. We’ve convinced ourselves a soul mate is akin to a sole mate. To sway from that is to have failed, to be in need of forgiveness, scorn and therapy.