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Original poster

When does the OW stop being the OW?

332 replies

Worldwide2 · 12/10/2021 13:16

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.

OP posts:
5thnonblonde · 12/10/2021 18:41

All the ‘how do you leave then?’ What I would have liked would be for ExH to honour the time we had together and the fact that we were our kids’ world by asking me to attend couples therapy as he was unhappy. I would have absolutely attended as I’d be worried he would leave. He may well have raised things/requested things that I wouldn’t have wanted to do but that would have given me, over several weeks, time to adjust to the idea of living apart and time to think about what I wanted, and time for us both to prepare our kids. I’d have all the same information as him.

shakehandswithdanger · 12/10/2021 18:41

I have no sympathy for someone being called or thought of as the "other woman"/"other man", if they were involved in an affair while one or both participants were still in a supposedly monogamous, committed relationship. If you're part of the reason a marriage breaks up, you'll always be the OW/OM in my opinion.

I don't think I'd ever forgive someone who cheated on me, or the person they cheated with, if they knew he was married. I would move on with my life, of course, but I wouldn't wish them well or ever want to see or think of them more than I could help. I wouldn't even try to forgive, tbh.

There's always the option of doing the honourable thing and ending the marriage first rather than being a selfish cheating coward. Being thought of as scum afterwards is a small price to pay for turning someone's life upside-down.

Meceme · 12/10/2021 18:47

You can forgive the cheating partner and the OW/OM but you don't forget what they did. You know what they are capable of and that colours how you view them as people .

Infidelity is inherently dishonest and selfish.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about this subject:

Relationship problems
Polkadots2021 · 12/10/2021 18:48

OP, the OW will always be the OW, regardless of judgement or otherwise. It's a descriptor and relates to a specific point in time where the relationship originated.

The OW or cheating H don't have the right to judge whether ex spouses are too bitter or not, either. First, the ex spouse has every right to despise the both of them, and second, the exW being bitter toward the pair of them doesn't mean she is bitter toward anything else in her life - probably noone else has pissed her off or ruined her life like them, so they are the only ones to get her bitterness (although I'm sure that fits their preferred narrative to say she is 'too bitter' and 'needs to move on'). She might well be a ray of light to everyone else.

Polkadots2021 · 12/10/2021 18:57

[quote 5thnonblonde]@Namechangeapologies yes and kids who’ve already seen a parent leave and learnt that love might be conditional might well seek to appease[/quote]
100% this, I can't believe that people can be so unbelievably unaware to not have reached this conclusion themselves. It feels like yet another situation where the kids get dumped with emotional pressure and baggage and the adults continue skipping along happily ignorant.

LittleMysSister · 12/10/2021 19:19

@DoYouLikeOwls

I think if there are children then the OW may stick for a long time because more people have been hurt. If there isn't I think people move on quicker and she will just become his new Girlfriend or Wife to his Friends & Family which is basically all they will care about.

I don't agree with affairs at all but this is what I've seen happen.

I think where there is children it is also much harder because obviously the exes have to stay in touch and watch each other move on. They may also keep ties with their in-laws in a way they wouldn't if there were no children in the picture.

I think most people could move on more easily if their ex left them for someone else but they never had to see them again.

Anordinarymum · 12/10/2021 19:22

Sideorderofchips

As I said I was never the other woman.

Namechangeapologies · 12/10/2021 19:27

I also think one of the really painful things for me from my ex H cheating on my and leaving me (and our kids) was not just the deception but the - what felt like really very calculated - way he re wrote history after leaving - he cheated and he left me and yet after he left he was just incredibly cruel and mean to me.

In the immediate aftermath I thought "but I have not done anything to make you angry with me" and yet he was, incredibly angry with me (and still is for some reason). Plus the projection - for example - he left the family home and me with the kids and then said on multiple occasions I was preventing him see our kids - rubbish, he has seen our kids exactly when he wants and for as long as he says he wants from the day he walked out.

And he has never ever "admitted it" to me. I am not sure that him turning round and saying "yes I have been a shit, I have had an affair and now I am leaving you" would have necessarily made me feel better, but it would have helped not to have been gas lit and just to have had the feeling that he respected me enough to own and and admit to what he had done. He never did that, and that leads to massive amount of damage.

And the other woman - I have only spoken to her once - I cannot remember what it was about now (i only met her once) but I remember her saying really sarcastically to me "Good for you" - in the most sarcastic voice. Horrible.

Teddypicker · 12/10/2021 19:32

Have an affair with the right person, you could end up being Queen of EnglandConfused Is she still the OW?

5thnonblonde · 12/10/2021 19:36

@Namechangeapologies yeah I’m past it now but for a really long time the fact that he wouldn’t admit it drove me slightly crackers.

He was living with her (not his parents as he claimed after I’d found the texts) but wouldn’t admit they were having sex, said whether or not they were or ever had was their private business.

He’d used a mutual colleague as an alibi and I’d got so desperate as he wouldn’t admit it I’d asked her about it. He then claimed that she gossiped that I must think that he & the OW must be having an affair and that was what pulled them together- they hadn’t even been seeing eachother beforehand Hmm Obviously all complete bullshit but ffs he literally tried to blame me for the actual affair (that- if you’re keeping up- he wasn’t having Grin ) Enough time has passed that I find this ridiculous but for a long time I was just so hurt.

IComeInPeace · 12/10/2021 19:37

I do think there is a statute of limitation on being labelled OW

When they live together. When it's all out in the open (no matter how much pain caused)

Namechangeapologies · 12/10/2021 19:46

IComeInPeace

Statute of limitation determined by telling everyone you have run off with a married man and you are living together.

Then you become what? The universally respected girlfriend/wife?

What a great philosophy! (not).

I suppose the only thing to recommend your theory is that statute of limitations applies when someone has a claim against another person, (which is the case in the case of infidelity) but in your world that claim means nothing because (and i assume you are talking about yourself) you just have to have your eyes on the prize of living with the married man yourself and jobs done.

JustLyra · 12/10/2021 19:48

@IComeInPeace

I do think there is a statute of limitation on being labelled OW

When they live together. When it's all out in the open (no matter how much pain caused)

How does that work though when the living together and it all coming out happens quickly?

One of the affairs I know of blew up on a Friday. By Tuesday they were living together and everyone knew.

In fact pretty much every affair I can think of where the married one left they went straight to living with the OM/OW

IComeInPeace · 12/10/2021 20:02

Welĺ it depends of course but i wouldnt go on calling a woman 'ow' forever.

Im not and never have an OW but this narrative puts all the blame on the woman indefinitely and there is no term for the man really.

5thnonblonde · 12/10/2021 20:09

@IComeInPeace fair enough- I think I thought the question was a bit less literal and more about when the couple as a pair are less the subject of gossip

Original poster
Worldwide2 · 12/10/2021 20:11

@icomeinpeace Yes you right it does seem most of the blame and hate is aimed at the OW more so than the man.

OP posts:
IComeInPeace · 12/10/2021 20:14

I like to blame the man. I am a bitch and a gossip! Id be saying look at casnova with his new family, trail of distruction behind him. What a prize she has for herself.

All said les dawson style, hoisted up bussom

TrufflesAndToast · 12/10/2021 20:14

I don’t think it is at all. This thread is specifically about the OW issue. The man is derided as a cheater and in most of these threads is repeatedly stated to be the worst of the two.

LittleMysSister · 12/10/2021 20:27

The problem is the blame will naturally more fall on the 'other woman/man' because (mostly) the ex doesn't know them as well.

It's so much easier to pile all of your hate into a faceless, evil stranger than to try and reconcile such a huge betrayal with someone who you may still love, or a the very least have shared many years of your life with. AND on top of that, who you may still have to see and talk to for children's sake.

Bananarice · 12/10/2021 20:50

People should always be allowed to feel what they feel.

I don't think anyone should lose their ow label. That counts as trying to rewrite history in my opinion.
It is how their relationship started. I see it as a factual representation of a couples origin. I also know ow who are very pleasant humans. They are known as the good, fair or great stepmothers.

KurtWilde · 12/10/2021 20:54

I don't think anyone should lose their ow label. That counts as trying to rewrite history in my opinion. It is how their relationship started

This is just silly. My relationship with my exh started with me being his girlfriend, so should I still call myself that even though we're divorced? It's not rewriting history it's moving on.

5thnonblonde · 12/10/2021 21:12

@KurtWilde the OW in my scenario was his employee so I. Lund refer to her as his staff but that’s probably MORE offensive given the nature of their relationship! Grin

DoYouLikeOwls · 12/10/2021 21:14

I'm a bit confused to be honest. Who is calling the woman the OW? Surely if you have been split up from your ex a few years and you still refer to his wife he cheated on you with as the OW it's a bit odd. Surely she is your ex's wife. Yes you may refer her to as the fucking wankers new wife but how would she be the OW?

Original poster
Worldwide2 · 12/10/2021 22:03

@doyoulikeowls this I think is part of moving on isn't it? Accepting the OW is now gf/wife no longer the OW but it seems some people will still refer her to OW

OP posts:
TalkedTooMuchStayedTooLong · 12/10/2021 22:32

@5thnonblonde

All the ‘how do you leave then?’ What I would have liked would be for ExH to honour the time we had together and the fact that we were our kids’ world by asking me to attend couples therapy as he was unhappy. I would have absolutely attended as I’d be worried he would leave. He may well have raised things/requested things that I wouldn’t have wanted to do but that would have given me, over several weeks, time to adjust to the idea of living apart and time to think about what I wanted, and time for us both to prepare our kids. I’d have all the same information as him.
Yes... I asked my ex to try counselling once he confessed the affair... his response was " I will if you want, but I don't see the point"... so of course there was no point... if he was unhappy and had had the balls to talk to me before having an affair, maybe we'd have been in a better position for counselling to have stood a chance? As it was, he'd already moved on by the time he came clean so The end of our 20 year marriage was effectively presented as a fait accompli...