Feeling of Regret: “the Cheaters Guide to Love”

“The cheaters guide to love” is a short story in which Junot Diaz (Yunior), the author, goes through life slowly getting what he deserves, as he had been completely disloyal to his prior fianc© who he had claimed to be so attached too the entire time even while he was cheating on her. As the story starts out noting to us that he had been cheating on his fianc© for quite a long time, it was a little more than just cheating for Yunior at this point as his poor decisions to cheat on her tuned into an immense pattern for him and turned into something that he had been doing for so long it was pretty much impossible to take back at this point. This feeling of “Regret” is there throughout the entire story, even though Yunior tries to ignore it throughout most of the story, it really surfaces at the end when he opens up the file folder under his bed and reads how many woman he had actually been with while engaged. This feeling of “Regret” Yunior finally grasps is a reflection of how he was thinking in in the beginning of all of this to how he now views it towards the end of everything, with immense regret.

Junot Diaz reveals the story through a narrator's voice (Yunior). The narrator is not simply an observer in this story, however. The narrator himself knows, for example, that for the most part, he did not love his fianc© like he says he does. (“She could have caught you with one sucia, she could have caught you with two, but because you’re a totally batshit cuero who never empties his e-mail trash can, she caught you with fifty”!) We know see that Junot had been caught sleeping with at least 50 other women over the past 6 years and this is just the beginning of the story where we can kind of piece together how the rest of the story is going to go but it doesn’t exactly end up exactly how you would think as I myself am a very firm believer in the saying “everything happens for a reason”.

It is obvious that the narrator knows more than can be physically observed. Yunior, however, never tells the reader or lets the reader know in any way what he is feeling towards his fianc© and his decisions. Instead, the reader must look into Yunior’s actions and words in order to understand what his true feelings are. Yunior tries a number of things to try and forget about his fianc© in order to try and keep his mind clear of the terrible past he had made for himself through his choices. As he seriously struggles to cope with his mistakes of cheating, he tries to continue to have sex with other women as he feels that by doing this will grant him some peace as by doing what he is addicted to and loves the most will have to make him more calm and relaxed. This is not the case for Yunior as he still continues to think about his fianc© on a daily basis. He starts to drink on a constant basis as by doing this he thinks it will make him forget as he will be living in present time drunk and not thinking about his horrible life choices in the past. As this doesn’t work either which we could have guessed, he also tries going to the gym and working out, the only healthy choice he has chosen and even this still doesn’t change Yunior’s mental state as the actions of his past were too brutal for him to face.

After sleeping with these women for so long, Yunior finally gains the ability to realize that he is a serious sex addict and that he was mainly sleeping with them only to regain his true feeling of being a man. (“Whether it is for love, control or stress reduction people have sex”). This is a line from the story in which Yunior tell to his best friend Elvis who is trying to help him through all of this stress and horrible emotion but his friend Elvis’s decision might not be of the most help for Yunior, even though they might be good suggestions. He tries activities like running for instance where he cant help to notice a beautiful young lady on his running path but as he continues to run he eventually hurts himself resulting in him having to stop the daily running exercises meaning he will never see this young lady again throwing another opportunity for love again right through the door cracks.

In conclusion, Yunior wound up cheating on the love of his life, his fianc©. He cannot seem to re-gather himself as an individual and continues to struggle to find true love that he is content with once again. He now knows that he had let his sex addiction and week mind get in the way of his perfect relationship and desperately wishes he could take it all back. He finally comes to the conclusion that no one individual can be blamed for the mistakes made while struggling from an addiction but everyone is responsible for their own actions and it is the individual’s fault if he notices the problem and does not take the necessary steps to fix it for himself.     

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