Friend is OW

[giantnannyknickers]

I'm so beyond frustrated with my friend, she's been having an affair for over a year with a married man. Man has a wife and 2 kids (young adult & late teens) who he says he can't leave as he doesn't want to upset the kids. I've made it very very clear to friend I don't approve of the situation. She says she is not the one who is cheating, she's single etc. Lacks any general guilt. This person is a nurse, empathetic and caring normally but in this situation she seems to have set that all aside for his family as she feels she was won a "prize" and can't believe someone like him would "choose her"

Today she bumped into the wife (knows her from online stalking) and seemed to find this quiet thrilling when regaling the story. How the wife wasn't much to look at etc. I'm beyond frustrated how can you gleam any joy from this situation?

I'm actually thinking of cutting this friend out of my life. I can't handle her talking about this anymore. It's driving me mental. What would you guys do?

[polarpig]

I'd be distancing myself if they were my friend.

[PlainSpeakingStraightTalking]

I'd mind my own business and not project my morals/standards/whatever you choose to call them onto someone else. Other peoples relationships are invariably boring. She will get burned, when she does be her friend, pick up the pieces and dust her off. Until then, if you really don't want to talk about her love life, distance yourself from it.

[Sunshine1239]

It would annoy me -I’m not sure I could tolerate being around her. That said he’s the one cheating so I guess it’d try to avoid discussing it and cut contact if she didn’t respect my opinion

[Smotheroffive]

I'd be feeling a bit sick tbh.

I certainly wouldn't want to hear her sick excitement at her power over this poor woman who has no idea who she is. It's vile.

I agree, the guilt is totally on him for breaking his marriage vows,but she's being pretty naïve to believe his reasons for staying etc, and also a bit bonkers to want to be with someone who's already with someone!

So on many levels would struggle with a friend of mine doing this.

On the sad side, I don't think she rates herself terribly highly to be doing this. Poor self-esteem.

I guess it does depend what lines this guy is feeding that she's swallowing though.

[giantnannyknickers]

I can't seem to avoid talking about it as she will pop over unannounced to tell me snippets of said relationship.

@PlainSpeakingStraightTalking I know I shouldn't project my morals but I just can't condone someone getting joy out someone else possibly getting hurt. I can't emotionally connect with that on any level.

[PlainSpeakingStraightTalking]

Which is why I say to distance yourself.

Other peoples relationships are tedious.

[FissionChips]

Tell her you don’t want to hear about it. Then when it all falls apart laugh in her face.

[homethenababy]

I could probably tolerate it up to the point until she starts slating the wife. Is it not bad enough she's shagging her husband that she has to be nasty about her too? Smacks of insecurity to me.

I had a colleague once who suddenly split with her fiancée and got together with their mutual friend (they were couple friends with her ex-fiancée and his ex-gf) she spent a lot of time at work FB stalking his ex and slagging her off. Felt sorry for the ex-gf as she had already "stolen" her bf. She also supported/suggested she had an abortion a few months previously. She herself was pregnant with her new bf 3 months after they got together. The mind boggles.

It's all well and good saying "I'm not the one cheating" but where are her morals. Still, what goes around comes around as they say.

[KellyW88]

Wow - just wow... I’m with you on the situation having experiencing something similar when my friend started sleeping with our manager knowing full well that he was married had two young children with his wife and they were expecting their third!

This Manager was also a known adulterer and only started approaching my friend because he had failed with several other women in the department, myself included... it eventually came out that he read through the personal files looking for women who had been documented as suffering from mental illness (mainly if they had suffered from depression at any point during employment) - so he could use the information provided in “return to work” meetings to attempt to seduce them, with me he knew I had recently ended an abusive relationship so would often tell me how he’d protect me if I were with him, how he wished he could meet my ex so he could beat the crap out of him etc. - so a total scumbag, thankfully as I’d just left a total scumbag I didn’t fall for his routine. I lost that job after turning him down despite reporting his behaviour to HR... ah well.

Back to the point, she has struggled for years with severe body image issues, she is really fit after years of hard work to lose a lot of weight, because of her obsession with not going back to the weight she had been she developed a serious food aversion and he used this to get to her, she had the rose tinted glasses, was convinced she could get him to leave his wife/family as she was “younger and thinner”... I tried to tell her how he was using information she hadn’t told him to manipulate her and she wouldn’t listen - I decided after she said that, that this friend was not the person I knew anymore and yeah, after that I cut her out of my life, making it clear I just couldn’t consider her a person I liked or could get on with at this point. But I didn’t close the door completely - I said if she ever finds herself in the situation where the affair ends and she needs to talk, to give me a call and I’ll be there - sadly haven’t heard anything from her yet, but hope one day I will.

I don’t know if this will help, it’s just the circumstance I found myself in :/

[giantnannyknickers]

@FissionChips I couldn't laugh

[giantnannyknickers]

The reason I haven't distanced myself so far is that she is incredibly insecure and vulnerable. Which is why she can't believe her luck that's she's bagged such a 'great guy'

But he's not great, he's a cheater, he's a liar, he's also sleeping with men as he is bi which she knows about. She constantly analyzes why he's cheating, why he's with her, why he behaves the way he does but doesn't look at the reasons for her own behaviour in all of this?

I've sat on the fence and listened and made it clear I don't support both their behaviour but she still offloads on me

[giantnannyknickers]

@KellyW88 Jesus he sounds like a nasty piece of work! And isn't that against data protection? Surely that's emotionally abusive behaviour right there!

And thanks for the tip, leaving her know I'll be there for her down the line is a really good point. She is a good person deep down, it makes me sad that she is settling for this situation

[LilQueenie]

Tell her you found out the wife is related to you in some way you just found out about.

[PlainSpeakingStraightTalking]

@Kelly888 - what have HR done about this person? he's exploitative, grooming vulnerable women, undermining the work force.

Interesting that you accept he grooms and manipulates people yet you chose to isolate out your friend. That's how abusers work, they make sure their victim is isolated, you did his work for him there.

[WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll]

Technically, she isn't the one who's cheating. In the same way that the getaway car driver isn't the one who's robbing the post office with a gun....

I couldn't stay friends with somebody like this. She clearly couldn't care less about the man's poor wife, but she's also willing to devastate the children's lives (even though they are older).

Even if she only cares about herself and her own happiness, she does realise, doesn't she, that if she is hoping for any kind of committed longer-term relationship with him, she's deliberately choosing somebody who has gone out of his way to explicitly demonstrate that he is NOT interested in, or to be trusted to keep to, that kind of relationship? It's a bit like seeing somebody who's beating a puppy and then choosing them to ask them to babysit for you.

[KellyW88]

@giantnannyknickers

Oh he was, sadly I was the first forward and so to avoid the company facing a messy investigation they opted to sack me instead. It came out a few years later after several other women came forward and the company couldn’t ignore it anymore. He was promptly fired at that point (along with a few other managers who had also been sleeping with employees) but when I tried to take my case back to them I had no real response and couldn’t afford any legal help.

But yeah, I know my friend was one of those who came forward afterwards and that she is no longer seeing him (mutual friends update me occasionally) but I haven’t heard anything from her as of yet. She has a good heart and given what I know of how he operated and her low self esteem at the time they were seeing each other, I think she just clung to the persona he presented. So I’m currently debating whether to take action first and message her to see if we can’t forge a new friendship, now that we’ve both grown up a fair bit, she is now in a stable healthy relationship and whilst she still has body image issues, he balances her and she balances him and I became a Mummy - complete life overhaul :’)

[giantnannyknickers]

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll see this is my problem, she has chosen this. But she has also come from a life whereby her father had regular affairs on her mother. She has a terrible relationship with her father now. But part of me wonders if this history is steering her somewhat. That's why I've been patient so far but I've just reached a point where I can't listen to the bullshit anymore

[giantnannyknickers]

She wants me to come over tomorrow, what should I text? Should I tell her how frustrated I am with the situation etc?

[Sparklesocks]

Deep down she knows this man doesn’t love her, if he did he would leave for her. This way he gets to tap her up for sex whenever she likes and still come home to his wife and family. She feeds off the drama and excitement because that’s all she has. She is second best, she always will be.

Confident, happy and secure people don’t engage in affairs because they don’t need validation in that way. She’s clearly very insecure.

It might be best to distance yourself so she can understand that people aren’t ever going to be supportive of this type of relationship. If you can’t do that, very firmly tell her you don’t want to hear about it anymore - you’re not interested and aren’t supportive of cheating. Shut her down every time she brings it up.

But really she is not a happy person if this is how she finds validation. It’s a very miserable existence.

[AceOfSpades123]

I dumped a friend for this exact thing. She kept sleeping with married men and then doing the “well it’s not my problem, I’m single” thing. Put me off her massively.

[Smotheroffive]

Agree to meet up, bit if she starts simply say 'just stop', 'I don't know if you realise how deeply upsetting I find a this'

[Smotheroffive]

She needs a friend as is clearly insecure,but goodness only knows what he says to her about his feelings for her and his wife!

She needs a friend bit she can't assume you are ok with this. That you don't find it fun y or in any way exciting but sad, and quite cruel.

I think her cruelty towards his wife would show me a side of a friend I wouldn't like and probably wouldn't be comfortable to stick with

[SleepingBeautyonwheels]

I would be tempted to ask your friend whether she has at any point considered the sexual health of herself and this mans wife! Or whether she really believes that she has won a prize, when he is not only still sleeping with his wife, but shagging other men and women on the side. That means he has zero care for her or anyone, he is purely using her for sex and is a dangerous, manipulative and cruel man to risk the sexual health of his wife like that.

I am honestly gobsmacked that a nurse would willingly endanger her own sexual health and allow this man to endanger his wives sexual health when she knows he is engaging in multiple sexual relationships with both sexes.

Let me guess, this man is a doctor/ consultant/ surgeon...

[JAPAB]

"echnically, she isn't the one who's cheating. In the same way that the getaway car driver isn't the one who's robbing the post office with a gun...."

There's all sorts of examples to show up the oddness of this thinking. The person who buys a fur coat or cosmetics tested on animals isn't the one killing animals and performing animal cruelty. Let a drunk friend borrow your car and if someone gets hurt well it wasn't you that was drink driving.

I suppose it comes down to whether you think providing tools amd assistence to someone else in their harmful endeavours is itself morally neutral.

Anyway, Knowing the harm adultery can cause I would struggle if a friend was doing it. And them acting like providing the tools/assistance for it doesn't elevate them from the status of 'innocent bystander' would also grate.

at the bare minimum I would make clear that I just don't want to hear about it.

[giantnannyknickers]

@SleepingBeautyonwheels editor in chief of a major national paper (not in the UK) so very high up, intelligent, well connected blah blah blah