When does the OW stop being the OW?

[Worldwide2]

Hello all

Due to a couple of other threads regarding affairs with married men and men creating second family's with the 'ow'. It has got me thinking when does everything get forgotten and forgiven? As in when does the OW stop being referred to as the OW and is accepted as exes wife/girlfriend. Is it normal to get over such betrayal and move on without feeling bitter or is hard to not harbour a feeling of resentment for a long time towards them?
When you hear someone being referred to as the OW after a number of years you kind of thing ok let go now it's time to move on but is it so simple actually?
I'm not condoning affairs at all but I do know of people who were desperately unhappy with their then spouse had affairs and are now very happy with the other person. Doesn't everyone deserve to be happy or not when it comes off the back of someone else's happiness? I'd like to hear other peoples thoughts on this without it turning into a bun fight of course.

Also this isn't just affairs between married men and women it goes for married women too.

@Namechangeapologies

"However, meeting that new person who does make your heart skip is what what should prompt you to end the relationship"

the above is limerence not love.

If you are the type of person who will leave the mother/father of your child because of limerence you are telling the world you are the type of person who is happy to use people for your own ends and are driven by your own self interests primarily

If you are the type of person who will have an affair, of course you're driven by your own self-interests primarily. Most affairs are based on limerence.

If you want to cheat, just end your relationship. It's the last act of kindness you can do for your partner.

If you leave a long term relationship and have a short-term fling that doesn't go anywhere, of course your ex will be pissed off you left and it wasn't even worth it for you. However, they won't be traumatised by you shacking up with someone else at the same time as them. They'll get over the former in a normal amount of time. The latter will be much harder.

@itsallgoingpearshaped

I'm not condoning affairs at all but I do know of people who were desperately unhappy with their then spouse had affairs and are now very happy with the other person. Doesn't everyone deserve to be happy or not when it comes off the back of someone else's happiness?

Of course (almost) everyone deserves to be happy (some people are just evil), but you don't get to do it at someone else's expense in this manner.

If you're unhappy in your marriage, then look to fix it or look to leave, and follow through. That's being honest and treating your spouse/partner with the respect they deserve, even if they're not happy about it.

If you're unhappy in your marriage and decide to betray your spouse/partner (and family) by focusing your attentions on someone outside the marriage, that's really shitty. It's doubly shitty if the OW/OM knows you're married, have a family etc, and carries on anyway. So they both suck for just looking elsewhere rather than trying to fix the marriage or leave it respectfully.

So I think the OW/OM label can stick forever since there were better options, frankly. They brought it on themselves.

Agreed. The sole options are not 1) stay in an unhappy relationship or 2) cheat.

No one should stay miserable in an unhappy relationship that can't be fixed. But they shouldn't cheat in a relationship, no matter how unhappy it is. They should just end it and let both parties move on and find happiness elsewhere.

I hate how the onus is always on the ex wife to forgive and forget the cheating otherwise she’s described as a bitter harridan or some other misogynistic bullshit, and blamed as the reason for any wider family trauma because she wasn’t instantly fine after hideous trauma. As a PP noted, having your husband and supposed closest person in the world cheat on you is an incredibly traumatic event. I would feel totally sexually violated if I found out my husband had been sleeping with another woman at the same time as me. In how many other situations is the victim told that there is a time limit on her trauma, that she is being bitter if she remains affected and that the perpetrators of that trauma are owed her forgiveness? Very few.

And incidentally how many men whose wives cheat are expected to forgive and forget instantly or face being accused of bitterness? Once again the venom is saved for the woman. Rightly in that case, if she’s the cheater, but I think most people remain sympathetic to a wronged man over the long term whereas a wronged woman is accused of being bitter.

People who cheat need to take responsibility for the often long term trauma that their actions cause the victims. You don’t get to blow up someone’s life in the most horrific way, often compound it with a painful divorce and ongoing nasty behaviour and then just expect them to get over it overnight. The ‘bitter ex wife’ has my utmost sympathy in 99% of cases.

I was cheated on and I’m trying so hard not to be bitter but fuck me is it a shitty hand to be dealt when you’ve got young kids.

In the very raw first stages you’re stuck alone at home with the kids every night imagining them off out doing whatever. All the break up advice is to distract yourself, go out, break up your routine, cinema/gym etc but toddlers really preclude you from that.

Once you’re ready to move on there’s the ethical dilemma of how do you feel about someone new in your kid’s life and the practical issues of dating in what is typically 4 nights a month.

And you just never get space from it to heal- every other week they come back saying how great the OW/their step mum is. You get the scab ripped off over and over again. That’s just your kids- also some if your closest friends will decide to socialise with them too.

I’m getting through it and I’m trying not to be bitter but Christ- what a burden to give someone else when you could just tell the truth and leave.

Oh and to add to the above, how many other victims of trauma and sexual violation and forced to have ongoing and regular contact with the perpetrator of their awful treatment? Again, not many. Another factor making it entirely reasonable that the woman will have long term struggles to ‘move on’.

I'm the OW ...

Been married to DH for over 30 years.
Had a BBQ in July with DH . His Ex . Her DH my Ex and his Wife and ALL our children. (and grandchildren)

Pretty glad my lot are not grudge holders .

It's hard I know but me. DH and his ex were simply married to the wrong people. We have ALL been remarried for over 20 years. Almost twice as long as our first marriages .

Interestingly none of us had further children with our second spouses. I think children are the hand-grenade in any marriage .

I mean, without kids if someone cheats you’d just I imagine do everything you could to forget both their names, right? With kids you have to still be texting him updates on the kids every week. It’s really hard!

Well they do say when you stop being the OW you create a vacancy, so maybe best to keep it a side thing.

@Namechangeapologies

StoneColdBitch did you or your now husband leave behind children?

I didn't. My husband had two children - now in their teens. He continued to see them almost 50/50 after the split. We waited almost a year to introduce me, and were very child-led (the children wanted to meet me, and we tried to take things at their pace). Until recently DH paid approximately double the recommended child maintenance amount. The children's mother has always told them that she does not want them to have any relationship with me, which put them in a difficult situation (they got on well with me but felt they were being disloyal to their mum by doing so). By the agreement of all parties we cut back on the 50/50 access voluntarily so they felt less caught in the middle. They do seem more settled now.

The eldest child told us that they were relieved their mum and dad had split up, and that they felt we seemed happier as a couple than their parents were. I know that children are affected by infidelity, but children are affected by arguments and tension at home pre-split too.

TrufflesAndToast I agree.

This having happened to me, other traumatic side effects are:

• knowing that your private life will, inevitably and whether to a greater or a lesser extent, become public knowledge/gossip; and
• knowing that there will always be certain types of people who label you after you have been abandoned by your cheating spouse as "the woman who was dumped" or "the single mum whose husband left her" etc

If you have children, the woman who is cheated on by her husband is then left in the invidious situation of having to be a single mum and explain the fall out to her children, whilst knowing that any choice to start a new relationship for her will be much more loaded and consequential (her children from the original marriage to take into account ref their wellbeing and safety) where her ex husband is free to "go off" with the affair partner or a-another.

I am not saying that married mothers never leave their spouses for new men and make their children go through that. I am just saying that for me the possibility of a new relationship is far more loaded as the day to day wellbeing of my kids has to be the priority.

I hate how the onus is always on the ex wife to forgive and forget the cheating otherwise she’s described as a bitter harridan

I don't think people are saying this, more that these feelings are in a lot of cases, natural.

I think people are referring to when a relationship clearly isn't working. Maybe he is an arsehole. Maybe she is a nightmare. Maybe it's as simple as it all went too fast and they were never that suited, it just wasn't apparent in the honeymoon phase. I think when one leaves via an affair and ten years later the initial partner still bangs on about the OW/OM as if there was a glowing relationship that would have lasted if not for that. It's a welcome excuse, rather than the more personal admission that the relationship simply failed at their hands as much as their partners well before the affair arose and one/both was miserable but kept up appearances.

Still doesn't justify the affair. But conveniently negates any fault of their own that might be as pertinent.

Stonecold

"He continued to see them almost 50/50 after the split"

That must have been difficult if the two of you had moved to the other end of the country.

Never

My Dad had an affair a few years ago and left for the OW. She’s still the OW to me and always will be. I have absolutely no interest in meeting her and she will never be part of my life or family.

My siblings are much younger than me (only starting high school) so didn’t see as much of the shit show that I did as it unfolded so maybe in time they’ll be able to accept her but I’m not so sure. I’ve only just made peace with my Dad for what he did.

Yawn ... yawn ... creates a vacancy. ?
What a lazy platitude.

How about wrong person .
My husbands ex wife has been spectacularly happy with her 'new' husband . .. married more than two decades after they split . As have we.

"I think people are referring to when a relationship clearly isn't working. Maybe he is an arsehole. Maybe she is a nightmare"

Sure the above could be the case before the spouse and the OW ever set eyes on each other. But you can bet your bottom dollar that nothing will compound him being "an arsehole" and her being "a nightmare" in a marriage as much as the fact that a secret extra marital affair is going on.

"The eldest child told us that they were relieved their mum and dad had split up, and that they felt we seemed happier as a couple than their parents were"

In my limited experience, the cheating spouse and the OW / OM are always extremely keen to somehow "prove" that they did the right thing but openly concluding (as reinforced by the thoughts of friends, heck even the children of the first marriage) that they are far far happier with OW and their marriage to the first spouse was misreable and they were ill suited.

That seems to happen far far more than if you meet someone who is single but who had past relationships which did not work out - and in those cases they can often be magnanimous about their first spouse.

When the fucking bitch stops trying to prevent my dad from seeing me.
My mum and dad split up 40 years ago when my dad left for the OW. My mum moved on after a few years but my sister was seriously affected and despite being married several times has never been happy. I think she’s still searching for a father figure who loves her unconditionally and puts her first.
Unfortunately that’s not going to happen as my sad dad died several years ago. I’m just waiting for the bitch to die so I can dance on her grave.

•However, meeting that new person who does make your heart skip is what what should prompt you to end the relationship - leaving you free to either pursue a new relationship with that person, or someone else.•

@fashionSOS I agree but is that really any less painful? Strictly speaking, there's no actual cheating but fuck me, it wouldn't be particularly nice being divorced purely because someone else caught your eye. That would probably make me feel even more like I didn't matter.

@Namechangeapologies yes and kids who’ve already seen a parent leave and learnt that love might be conditional might well seek to appease

Resentment hurts the one who resents.
Better to move on.

You just don’t hear about kids commenting on their parents’ relationships very often- unless it’s to do with an affair. Then the kids apparently wax lyrical

Yawn ... yawn ... creates a vacancy. ?
What a lazy platitude.

How about wrong person .
My husbands ex wife has been spectacularly happy with her 'new' husband . .. married more than two decades after they split . As have we.

Of course you can marry the ‘wrong person’. But tell them that, there’s no need to cheat. End the relationship and then move on.

If someone has done it once, they’ve shown they’re capable of telling all the lies that that involves.

Being unhappy in a relationship isn’t an excuse for cheating, If unhappy then end it and have an adjustment period for everyone involved before moving on.

I’m not sure there’s ever an end point especially if vows were broken.

@Onyernelly

The ow is always the ow. It doesn’t matter how many posters come on to say otherwise. The ow is universally disliked and the cheating man is regarded in the same way.

By whom? The world at large couldn't give a toss, many in the closer circle won't care either unless people behave appallingly post seperation, and ex spouses and children also have a choice - as this thread demonstrates - in how they view the situation. Nothing universal about it whatsoever. Did you know that Tom Hanks was very much married to someone else when he met Rita Wilson? The universe hasn't decided they are the work of the devil, that's for sure.