If you mess with married folk you...

[readywithwellies]

deserve everything you get?

OK, so here is the scenario:

You chase (or are chased) after a married/attached person and they leaves their partner to be with you.

AIBU to wonder how the hell you can trust that person not to do the same thing to you?

Why can't people find a SINGLE person to pester????

Sorry if last post was a bit harsh.

Totally get the concept of treating people how you wish to be treated and that if you treat people nicely then that is reflected back at you.

I do however have a real problem with extending the concept on to bad things happen to bad people. Shit stuff happens to lovely people and nasty people sail through life untouched, so as a general rule I consider it to be self serving smug wank

Just becasue monogamy is a fetish I don't have, doesn't mean I think there's anything wrong wit hthose who have that fetish and watn to fulfill it in their own lives. It's just a matter of, as with any fetish, finding a partner who shares it and is willing to do it with you.
WHere the monogamy cult is a problem is that monogamy fetishists feel entitled to demand that others fulfill their fetish - monogamists who start to date someone who is not interested in monogamy often feel perfectly justified in putting pressure on that person to engage in monogamy, insisting that 'real' relationships are monogamous and suggesting that the non-monogamous person get therapy etc. People who have no interest in monogamy get patronized and verbally abused on a fairly regular basis (as do single people who haven't got the 'decendy' to pretend to mind being single and atart looking for a partner) and it takes quite a lot of strength to stand up to it and not just give up and allow some or other monogamist leech to take possession of you at least for a while.

I blame the cheater in the relationship mostly, but the OW does get the majority of the blame Im sure.

One of my friends found out after she was married that her DH had been seeing one of her friends (I think it was only kissing and before they married) and he seems to be totally off scot free. They regularly bitch together about the old friend, write awful things about her on facebook, him just as much as her. I think in that situation he was totally forgiven and the OW carried the whole blame.

The friend is a nice girl, she just made a mistake. And I actually think the man is a serial cheat (no proof) and he still got away with it!

I think it is definitely the case that the OW gets a lot of flak when the man gets forgiven. Do you think it's because we expect more from other women? For them to understand how devastating it is to be cheated upon and therefore they should be more 'sisterly'?

It's quite patronising to men really - as if to say that the poor man couldn't help it and was led astray by the evil woman. She may well be an evil woman, but I doubt she held a gun to his head. He ought to get his fair share of the flak.

I think that if you want to maintain the relationship with your spouse, it is easier to put all the blame onto the other woman/man. They owed the spouse nothing, but the spouse doesn't owe them anything either and has no emotional investment in them. therefore it is easier to bung it all on her. My sympathies for her would be limited though. Yes it's unfair, but she made her bed so to speak.

I agree it is incredibly patronising towards men to suggest that they got led astray, but it undoubtedly makes the cheated spouse feel better to believe that their DP acted in a way that was wholly out of character and as a result not of a flaw in their relationship, or indeed that of their partner but because some hussy tried it on.

You are right, Karm. Some people talk like husbands are handbags left unguarded just waiting to be stolen! A man cant be stolen off someone else, he does what he wants to!

I dont think that all OW are all evil husband stealers, each case probably has to be looked into. She might have been lied to for example. I couldnt say in that case that they deserve all the flack that comes from being an OW.

I think the onus should be on the person who made the committment. They're the one who's breaking a promise that they chose to make. If they didn't want to be monogamous or don't want to continue the relationship they should have enough respect for their partner to say so.

As for the 'other woman' well some people actively target people who are already involved because they don't want a relationship that involves pairing socks and arguing over washing up. They don't want their lover to leave their partner. Others get an ego boost from being taking someone away from another person. Some are in unhappy relationships themselves and looking for affection. Basically there are dozens and dozens of reasons.

It's easier to blame the outside party for targeting a married man than accept that the marriage means fuck all to the person who made the promise- which it obviously does if the prospect of a different vagina is enough for them to destroy it.

to all those of you whose husbands have never cheated. So you say....

mjihiding - you don't deserve a slap.

mjihiding - I wouldn't describe you as the OW in that relationship. Your partners ex had already ended the marriage to all intents and purposes. It's a bit different where the spouse has no idea that their husband/wife is seeing someone else.

I think the blame always has to be 50/50 unless one is a vunerable adult ,in which case the relationaship is probably dubious anyway. My friend is going through hell at the moment with her DH ,who two years ago slept with another of her friends and said he was going to leave , he didnt and they remained married but he refuses to give up speaking to this woman ,goes to her house etc .The sad thing is the other woman doesnt even really want him ,she just wants his cash ,but if he leaves his wife their business will dissolve and he wont have any . He will sleep with this woman again and eventually when she can take no more ,my friend will leave , i just keep hoping for her sake its sooner rather than later, so the mental torment will end and she can get on with her life .

My ex was seeing me and another single parent for over 18 months. We found out when he was on tour (army - surprise surprise) and he persuaded her to stay with him (I heard some of the stories he wove to explain the situation - there had been three of us at one point - and they were pretty impressive).

So far as I know they are still together, he was posted to the other end of the country and last I heard he was trying to get into the knickers of a friend's cleaner...

Of course, it's not that uncommon for the 'betrayed' partner to thoroughly deserve it, to habe been either physically or verbally abusive, or utterly lazy and selfish and to have so demoralized the other partner that it was only when someone new appeared and started showing that person that s/he was lovable, that the person got the strength to move away from the crappy relationship.

They are both to blame if the OW/OM (don't get why everyone is concerntrating on the OW alone) willing pursued the partner of another person ..they are not children...tbh I do believe the commitment was made with the married person..but I find those who actively pursue married/attached persons pretty sad

I think it's far too easy to say that the cheater/om/ow (women do cheat as well) are evil despicable people and are unloveable and deserve to be condemned etc etc.

Sometimes, humans are fallible. Sometimes, people cheat and then bitterly regret it. Yes their actions are wrong and they need to realize that, but that doesn't mean that they should have to pay the price for a one-off mistake for the rest of their lives, does it?

Given that 60% of men and 40% are reported to cheat on their partners there has to be more to it than just evil man-stealing woman vs unable-to-keep-it-in-his-pants man.

Mil has an aunt who was the ow for 40 years - she even had a child by her mm. His wife was a mentalist; she told him that if he left her she would kill herself, and kill his children - this was later confirmed by his children. When his wife died he and mil's aunt had lived apart for so long that they never actually moved in together, but she was with him when he died and has a close relationship with his children now. It's easy to paint her as the home-wrecking hore and him as the cheating bastard, but in reality life just isn't as black and white as all that.

I think you're probably right wannabe

'just leave' is so easy to say but there are so many reasons why it can be hard and yet someone feel their life is being wasted in loneliness

It's not a wise road to take but it's never black and white- well almost never