AMA My marriage started as an affair.

[LavenderRoseBush]

I’ve been contemplating this post for a while and been hesitant for obvious reasons. But I’ve seen a few posts recently making the assumption that people who have affairs are somehow a breed apart, rather than a significant proportion of the population. So here goes!

To pre-empt the most obvious questions: we were both married, and neither of us had kids.

I think it is that simple though. If you take the idea of marriage seriously.

I get that you might fall for someone else while in a relationship, and that it might take some time for you to work out what to do. But having feelings for someone else doesn't mean that you have to act on those feelings while you're still committed to someone else? It is a choice, is it not?

It's ok people. OP's now husband was 'not that fussed' about the secrecy aspect of it. Which means it will happen again.

16 months before I ended it to go be single while he stayed married, having decided he couldn’t leave. I actually started seeing someone else (and did not cheat on him, although I wasn’t 100% emotionally invested). Eventually DH did leave his wife but I was so pissed off at him for not doing it sooner I wouldn’t dump my new bf. Until DH started dating seriously and I realised I couldn’t risk losing him again. I did feel a bit guilty about the boyfriend, he was a nice man. He’s married too now though so I guess he got over it!

We never got properly found out, although his ex wife was very suspicious. My ex only found out we were in a relationship two years later when we became “official”. We told a couple of people during the affair. Otherwise some people were suspicious, or knew there was emotional entanglement, but no more. A lot of people were very surprised and delighted when we got together “officially”.

Do you trust him? Did you trust your ex?
I couldn't imagine ever feeling safe in a relationship that started this way. I'd be waiting for it to go wrong.

Didn’t talk for a week, then a phone call “to clear the air” which instead turned into “of course I love you”.

Was this before or after your 10th birthdays?

It all sounds incredibly high school drama-ish. I feel sorry for the dumped spouses, although I suppose it's better that they be free of the cheating pair. I never understand people who are happy to behave in such a manner.

Fair enough, we are all entitled to our opinion.

but I stand by my views, especially through personal experience (I was very devoted to my 20 year marriage, and even without the complications of an affair, it has been heart breaking and devastatingly difficult to dissolve).

yes, everything is a choice, and I choose believe that even good people make bad choices sometimes. it really doesn’t sound like OP made rash decisions and leaped into bed, but she did make those choices.

At what point did you see it as an affair? When you were emotionally entangled or when it became more physical?

I've been married to my husband for over 20 years he was still married to his first wife when we met we were friends for years, nearly a decade, before something just clicked and he moved out and in with me within 3 weeks. No one has to stay in an unhappy marriage. In a ideal world everyone who falls in love would be single but sometimes that isn't what happens.

You are not alone, many find their second marriage to be so much better and live happily. I hope you continue to do so.

That's not the same as an affair.

Not usually when it starts as an affair.

Of course, breaking up a long marriage is always going to be difficult. I totally get that.

I'm not for a moment suggesting that the decision to walk away from a marriage is ever going to be easy. I am saying that I think it's easy to make a decision not to have an affair while you're still figuring out what to do.

Both married less than five years. My marriage was on the rocks, it was a textbook exit affair. I still left to go be single when DH wouldn’t leave his ex. His was more complicated, they had been together since they were teenagers and had zero communication (the whole “it must be okay because we never argue” thing) and an entrenched parent-child dynamic. He wouldn’t leave because “she couldn’t cope without him”.

Of course this was nonsense, she is now remarried with her own children and a good career.

DH has done several years of therapy since then!

But it sounds like your husband had the integrity to end his previous marriage before he got involved with you?

I agree with you on that point!

DH's Grandma had an affair after 40 years of marriage. She had 4 DC and several DGC at that point. When it came out, it caused untold misery with her DC taking sides and a couple of the rifts didn't heal.

But realistically, despite not condoning cheating at all, it's not as black and white as people think. She was in an abusive marriage with an alcoholic, financially dependent on him and struggling with one of her DC being seriously ill. She found kindness and then love with somebody else. She didn't know what to do and after 40 years of being treated very poorly, didn't really have the strength to end her marriage immediately. She made the wrong choice, yes but I don't think she was morally bankrupt or an inherent cheat. She did find the strength to leave after a few weeks and she has been married to her affair partner for 25 years now. They're incredibly happy and she deserves that happiness.

It isn't always the tale that gets told on here.

How long had you known the affair partner before the kissing on the sofa bit?

Not 100% but he was completely honest about it he left her for me. She would call it an affair I wouldn't

Honestly, not really. I tried hard in that marriage and he just didn’t do a thing. I read so many miserable mumsnet posters dealing with the same sort of low-key neglect I had and thank god every day I left before we had kids.

I actually did (even do?!) feel some guilt about DH’s exW. She’s a nice woman and did nothing wrong. Thankfully from mutual friends I know she is now happily remarried with her own kids, so I just hope she has really been able to move on and it hasn’t affected her new marriage. Ultimately though, it was my husband who cheated on her.

Within my own family, a sibling who was married with children had an affair. They have since married the affair partner and had more children, while we retain a relationship with that precious partner as they had no family.
I do feel a barrier there with my "new" in law and wondered how your relationship is with your in laws is, and whether the fact of an affair has had any impact.

I know a few couples who are happy and who met as an affair. People don’t like to hear it because it makes them feel insecure about their own marriage so they tell themselves that the second marriage will never work and that they will always end up cheating again. Sometimes that happens but often not. It’s easy to make a mistake and marry the wrong person and you only realise when you meet the right one.

If you've talked about it, do you both view your situation as a kind of 'it happened as a one off because of the strength of chemistry between you both and therefore you'd never cheat on each other' or do you subscribe to the 'once a cheater, always a cheater' view?

(To be clear, I don't think that's true, but lots of people say it and I wonder if you both see how you got together as an unfortunate but ultimately positive one-off or not!)

With my first partner his best friend left his wife and their gorgeous 18month old for a new partner and I really struggled I wouldn't have her in the house for ages and I never warmed to her. That was 30 odd years ago now all those relationships have broken up she has a new partner and they are very very close friends with my ex and his latest wife. I still think it was a shitty thing to do tbh.

I disagree that it happens less often than not. I have known three couples who started as affairs, they all broke up. Two broke up owing to infidelity, the third because they weren't compatible.