AIBU to think husbands usually leave because there is someone else?

So do some wives, I’ve known. Always easier if someone is waiting. 🤷‍♀️

It's just a wid guess, but I would imagine there are a lot of couples who only stay together until the last child leaves home.

I can think of more than a few, when there was no OW.

I am sure there are plenty when men left because of the OW, but just as many when the marriage was over but they waited until they found the OW.

But as many of these "OW" were married themselves, I am not sure why we generalise on just one side of the couples?

I dont blame them for leaving my mother.

I don’t know a statistically significant number of divorced people. Certainly the cases I’ve known when the husband initiated the separation there was another woman on the scene suspiciously quickly. Where it was “by mutual agreement”, no one else seemed to be involved (but you don’t know). In cases where the woman has left the man there was often abusive or at least unpleasant behaviour involved. As I say, not necessarily representative.

My friend’s husband left her for another woman, though he denied it at first. It very quickly came to light.

A friend of a friend was the OW for years and he did eventually leave his wife for her. AFAIK they’re still together. He made his landing very very soft.

Another former colleague was on the verge of leaving his wife for his affair partner. She left her husband. Then he changed his mind. 10+ years on he is still with his wife.

My DP left his ex-wife because once the kids left home, they just didn't have anything in common any more, and he wanted the next 25 years to look different than the previous 25 had with her.

Generalizations of the sort you're making, OP, are rarely supported by hard evidence. People leave for all sorts of reasons, men and women.

Not true.

I know two men who've asked for divorces and in both cases the issue was money.

1. wife insisted on being a sahm, would not even consider a part time job when kids were school age. He was working all hours trying to cover the bills.

2. Wife was a secret spender/impulse buyer. He was constantly find credit cards, subscriptions, unpaid bills etc.they hadn't had kids yet and she was absolutely ruining him financially.

My ex husband left because he changed his mind about having children…… after me giving birth to twins (children 2 and 3 by the way). I know for a fact he didn’t have an affair because what man in their right mind would lie and say he didn’t want his kids to hide another woman? TBH I’d rather he’d had an affair - emotionally I think that’s easier to deal with than the man I married and spent 2 decades with announcing something so awful

When my husband left there was definitely no one else involved, and when my now husband left his previous wife it was definitely down to her abusive behaviour and to keep the kids safe, there was no one else involved.

My husband’s best friend left his wife when he found out she was sleeping with her personal trainer.

It's more the leaving the kids part.

Id say it's truer to say that men often leave when there's another women. That's not to say they were happy before, just that the new woman is a trigger to move on.

Not necessarily an OW, but ime men are very passive and either have to fall or be pushed.

Apparently she is, was hard to live with. However, he can’t fault her as a mother. Just a partner.

I don't really know of too many divorced people. I do think when a man leaves it is usually due to him having a new woman although I am sure it happens that a man leaves for other reasons. My older brother left his long term partner when he got his dream job in a city which wouldn't have been able to support his girlfriends careers progression. I was really surprised as he found it hard to meet someone he could even be in a relationship with but he did. He's been single since they split a few years ago while his ex recently married.

Not always. A friend of mine asked his wife for a divorce, moved out and lived alone nearby for about three years before starting a new relationship. I worked and socialised with him a lot and was often in his new house. There was no one else at the time.

I think a health scare alerted him to the fact that it was an unhappy marriage, entered into when they were both on the rebound and wanting to have children. They’re in fact both better off out of it, though his wife was understandably heartbroken and blindsided at the time. She’s single and looks like a new woman. Unfortunately, his second marriage seems to be heading the same way as his first.

Well if anyone says it about my mother i cant say they are lieing.
Because she was and still is the crazy ex.

Left his kids and calling his ex crazy. Nice.

My boyfriend left his partner and their kids because he was sick of the arguments he said she started and he stayed until the kids were early teens. No one else involved. My dad and mum, well dad was an alcoholic and wouldn’t stop drinking, again no one else involved. My nana, first husband was a con man and ended up in jail, naturally she divorced him. Second husband (my grandad) both of them were playing around during WW2, grandad apparently came back with the clap from prostitutes in Paris, my nana did have a boyfriend though same time who she subsequently married. My auntie, married to an evil abusive man, no woman or man involved divorced him because he was an evil bastard.

Not true at all.
You do know men can be abused aswell.

Looking at the marriages I’ve seen fail.

It’s either he has another woman or he has caught her cheating.

None of the men have just had enough and want to be single they are either betrayed or betraying.

Same my mother was just awful, oh and the lies she would say.
She wouldnt let our dad see us as he didnt pay enough money to her.
We found him years later and he showed us all the court papers and bank payment slips, he really did try to get us, but she lied lied and lied so good at it she believed her own lies.
His money for us went on herself.

Mother said he hated bla bla bla.
Mumsnet dont seem to see that some woman are worse and more toxic than men.

My dad left my mum due to her constant moaning nagging fingger pointing and making drama.
No other woman.
Step dad left because of the same reasons and more.
No other woman either.
Both men was never right always wrong and always the blame.
Mother thinks men should be her ATM and do what she says.

Shes now in her 60s and still the same i recon i have no contact with her she is such a bully.
Dad moved on and married a lovely woman 10 year later, he`s still with her now.
Step dad stayed single and fucked off to india.

I think most men who are unhappy in their marriage will seek someone out to make sure there is someone else to go to before they leave. Very few seem to decide their marriage is over and then strike out on their own.

From what I’ve seen a husband leaves because he has another women and a women leaves due to feeling neglected. Even if cheating isn’t proven 3 weeks after a separation moving on is suspect.