Distraught Wife Bares All After Husband Confesses to Cheating on Her With 17 Men

Discovering that your man is cheating on you with another woman has to be one of the most devastating experiences imaginable.

But learning that they are cheating on you with a man would be, well, cataclysmic.

Not necessarily because he is having an affair with a man; it’s more about fraud. The fact that, leading up to that point, his identity was a charade, the opposite of who he had been pretending to be.

Fortunately for most women, being an unwitting beard in a marriage is rare.

According to the glbtq Encyclopedia Project:

Up to two million gay men, lesbians, and bisexuals in the United States are or have been heterosexually married. Of the 27 million American men currently married, 1.6 percent, or 436,000, identify themselves as gay or bisexual.

That 1.6 figure represents mixed-orientation marriages (MOM), in which one partner is straight, and the other is gay or lesbian.

However, the true figure of closeted MOM situations is unknowable.

There is just too much secrecy surrounding these types of relationships — no thanks to the social, professional, or even safety risks associated with not conforming to heteronormative standards.

But just because it’s rare doesn’t mean stories of women discovering that their boyfriends or husbands are in the closet don’t pop up from time to time… like in this story narrated by Anhar Awadh.

Where a young woman found out in the worst possible way, that her husband of 10 years was not only cheating on her with women, but with men too — 17 to be exact — making him potentially gay or bisexual depending on how you view these things.

Just to be clear, this is not something that personally happened to Anhar.

Her whole schtick is sharing stories like these in the hopes of highlighting the plight of women in the Middle East. I suspect her and the woman in the story share the same Egyptian heritage, judging by the flag on her TikTok profile page, but that’s neither here nor there.

with that out of the way…

Infedelity is sadly all too common

I feel for the young lady in the story. Seeing that she is a mother of four, and to have the rug pulled from under her feet by the very person she thought had her back, is nothing short of despicable.

But I’m not the least bit surprised.

While a man cheating on his wife with men is uncommon, infidelity in general absolutely is.

In the United States, 20% to 25% of married couples experience infidelity. The number can sometimes be as high as 40%, depending on the source, making cheating in relationships about as common as catching a cold in any given year.

But the lady in question is not American; she’s Egyptian.

And for those of you familiar with the place, know that finding reliable data on infidelity is like chasing ghosts. Not to say it’s impossible, it’s just difficult due to the country being hella conservative.

You see, Egypt is predominantly Muslim, and adultery (often referred to under the umbrella of zina) is considered a crime with some pretty severe penalties.

This makes conducting a survey a risky affair for those involved.

No one in their right mind is going to admit to what constitutes a crime, lest they get outted. Anonymity be damned.

In Egypt, universities are generally not independent from the state in the way many Western universities are, meaning that confidentiality protections are not always absolute.

And just because you are an academic doesn’t mean you are safe either.

Should the results reflect poorly on the state’s moral image, they too risk the authorities coming down on them for “inciting debauchery.”

Which brings me to the husband in the story.

Conservatism forces gay men into the closet

Given the hardline stance on preserving Islamic norms by both the state and society at large, anything outside heteronormative ideals is a major no-no.

Now, to be fair, there are no Egyptian statutes that literally say “same-sex relations are illegal.”

Yet, in practice, the state does routinely criminalize LGBT people by using public immorality laws, which can be wide in scope.

Staying in the closet for gay and bisexual Egyptians becomes a means of survival, such that it wouldn’t surprise me if most queer men end up in traditional marriages to fend off unwanted attention…

It doesn’t mean I condone the heinous act of cheating, but I can see why someone would keep that kind of information secret. Self-preservation can make us act in funny ways after all.

Why doesn’t she leave?

I know a lot of you might be wondering, “Why doesn’t the wife just leave the cheating husband?”

Well, as much as I hate to say this, Egypt isn’t exactly the bastion of gender equality. In fact, according to the 2025 Global Gender Gap Report, the country ranked 139th out of 148 countries. It is officially among the 10 worst countries in the world for gender parity.

To say women have it bad would be an understatement.

Keeping it just on divorce laws, women often have fewer rights when it comes to divorce, custody, and inheritance.

The Personal Status Law creates a “guardianship” culture that mandates that women may need a husband’s permission for certain things we take for granted in the West, such as travel paperwork, opening a bank account, or access to reproductive healthcare.

There’s no comprehensive law against domestic violence or marital rape, and enforcement of protections is weak.

Men can divorce unilaterally, while for women, they have to jump through hoops, and if they aresomehow successful, they often have to forfeit financial rights or future support.

Government-enforced alimony is nonexistent. Once a woman leaves her husband, she is on her own.

Add to that the lower labor force participation for women, and you can see why the poor lady in the story cannot leave, even though she wants to.

She would need to come from a wealthy family or be a woman of means for her to leave without facing dire consequences, and from the sound of it, she is not any of that.

What can we glean from this?

Since I’m not on the ground in Egypt, I couldn’t even begin to fathom what options this betrayed spouse has at her disposal. Though I’m sure there are NGOs and independent women’s rights organizations available that would offer aid if she decides to leave, it’s just a matter of finding them.

In closing…

If there is a single takeaway from Anhar’s story, it’s that relying on a man for your very existence is a risky endeavor.

There is just too much that could go wrong: for starters, you could fall out of love, he could lose his job, become abusive, or cheat on you.

Worse still, there is no foolproof way to know which camp you will belong to in the future. And this holds true even if you vet the person thoroughly, something I’m already convinced the vast majority of people are incapable of, given the minuscule number of happy relationships that last a lifetime.

Unless you happen to marry someone with a substantial nest egg and live in a country that guarantees your equal share if you separate, being independent is the only safe choice. At least, with money you have power, and with power you have control over your life.