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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

My married lover is renting me a flat and l am devastated.

130 replies

findyourwayhome · 21/11/2013 18:50

l know l will be shot down in flames. Please don't judge me too harshly. l have been seeing a man for just over a year. We are both trapped in marriages with zero sex and we met and made a semi formal agreement involving exclusive sex and no more. The trouble is that in the last few months we have both fallen in love with each other. One moment he wants to leave his wife and be with me, the next moment he is ending it with me. Now he has rented me a flat. l am confused and fairly devastated as this signals to me that that will be all he will commit to longer term. Should l walk away? We have both been in unhappy marriages for nearly 8 years now. Does he want the best of both his wife and me? Is this it?

OP posts:
FraidyCat · 21/11/2013 21:42

Because if a man wants a free housekeeper for 30 years, from 16 to 46, he can't then turn around and say those contributions to the family lifestyle are worthless.

I think you have made a mistake justifying the 50:50 split. I believe a divorcing partner of 30 years will get 50% even if they contributed fuck-all to the marriage, no need for them to have done the housekeeping.

Shonajoy · 21/11/2013 21:46

That is skanky behaviour indeed.

perfectstorm · 21/11/2013 21:51

As has been said, no legal aid available for private family law unless abuse proven by a third party statement (doctor, police, women's refuge, social worker etc) is proven.But mediation would be the best step here anyway, if the OP wants to leave.

I do wonder what attempts to talk to her husband have been tried - does he know how desperately unhappy you are? Is he unhappy, too? Perhaps he'd not actually be as upset about a split as we're all assuming?

perfectstorm · 21/11/2013 21:55

I believe a divorcing partner of 30 years will get 50% even if they contributed fuck-all to the marriage, no need for them to have done the housekeeping.

Oh yeah, that's the legal position. But honestly I doubt such cases are what anyone could call common (and these days, almost all women work outside the home and do the vast majority of the housework/family labour). But in this instance, the OP has mentioned she gets housekeeping from him, which certainly implies she, you know - keeps the house.

The OP is lucky she's married. She'd be entitled to nothing, otherwise. I often wonder when women on MN know that, when they post to say they have kids and don't see the point of marriage.

FortyDoorsToNowhere · 21/11/2013 22:09

I think you need to wake up.

You are still young enough to go out there get a career, a flat and interpendance.

FortyDoorsToNowhere · 21/11/2013 22:10

Would the OP be entitled to any thing if the husband found out about the affair.

bellasuewow · 21/11/2013 22:47

You only know what he has told you of his marriage. For all you know he could be having a decent sexual relationship with his wife. He is playing you because you are vulnerable or is this a joke thread?

QuintessentialShadows · 21/11/2013 22:50

What would you rather be:

a) Trapped in a marriage
b) Trapped in a flat belonging to a married man
c) Leave them both and find yourself and your freedom

perfectstorm · 21/11/2013 22:50

Forty, conduct is completely irrelevant, except that adultery can be used as a proof that the marriage has irretrievably broken down (the only grounds for divorce - the adultery, desertion, unreasonable behaviour etc are how you prove that irretrievable breakdown has occurred). It doesn't factor.

FortyDoorsToNowhere · 21/11/2013 22:51

You learn something new every day

perfectstorm · 21/11/2013 22:52

100% agree with Quint.

OP you're looking at throwing your life away with both hands. Outside a bloke, what are you interested in? What do you enjoy? Who are you, as an individual, not an adjunct? Don't you think it might be good to find out?

Mimishimi · 21/11/2013 22:54

Perhaps he has a string of rental properties all occupied by lovers whom he he is promising to leave his wife for? Grin It's a pretty extreme way of securing long-term tenants.

AnnieJanuary · 21/11/2013 22:55

He's still with his wife because he loves his wife. And probably still has sex with her. Because he loves her. And he has a mistress too, so really, he's happy. Very happy. And scum.

mumandboys123 · 21/11/2013 22:57

bleurghhhhhhh......
no sex.....yeah, right. My ex told that rubbish to his girlfriend....I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when he had to tell her that I was pregnant when he finally walked out.

You deserve each other. Good luck!

thebody · 21/11/2013 23:01

oh dear pet, this isn't a film or a soap.

grow up.

WaitMonkey · 21/11/2013 23:10

Hope your ok op, you're having a tough time.

noddingoff · 21/11/2013 23:10

I take it you're not from the UK, OP, since you say that you were put from your father's passport onto your husband's so that you could go on honeymoon. I believe that in the UK children used to be put on their mother's passport, then had to get their own once they reached, I dunno, 12 or something, or if travelling alone. I don't think women were ever put on their husband's passports in the UK were they? (I expect somebody can correct me on this) Do you live in the UK now?

LessMissAbs · 21/11/2013 23:16

perfect storm OP you're looking at throwing your life away with both hands. Outside a bloke, what are you interested in? What do you enjoy? Who are you, as an individual, not an adjunct? Don't you think it might be good to find out?

Thank you for saying this (someone had to!).

Is the OP living in the rented flat? Or the family home with the husband? Does she use the rented flat as a holiday home (I'm trying to be polite here)? Is it there for her to move into if she leaves the husband? Is it furnished?

Is the married lover a pimp?

perfectstorm · 21/11/2013 23:31

Noddingoff I don't know, but this is interesting. Wikipedia also supports that.

PresidentServalan · 22/11/2013 05:52

There is no legal aid available for divorce cases now.

I hope you take the good advice on this thread and break free from this situation. Flowers

SatinSandals · 22/11/2013 07:04

You have already had the sensible advice, leave them both and be free. You do not want or need either of them.

JapaneseMargaret · 22/11/2013 08:17

You are trapped in your marriage by nothing more than your own mind. You've been with him since you were 16. So what...?

You are a human being in a free country. You are an adult. Guess what? You can do what you want!

You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. Etc...

StrattersInTheTARDIS · 22/11/2013 08:45

I met my XH when I was a teenager. I went from living with my mother, to living with him. I was married to him for 2 decades, totally dependant upon him, and no idea how things really worked in the real world. Like you I had no bank account of my own, had never paid a bill, and barely knew how to put petrol in my car, let alone do anything else.

I've been divorced a while now. I cannot tell you just how sweet real freedom is. I am beholden to nobody, I answer to nobody, I can do as I please.

It is wonderful. If I can do it, so can you.

mrsjay · 22/11/2013 08:53

Because if a man wants a free housekeeper for 30 years, from 16 to 46, he can't then turn around and say those contributions to the family lifestyle are worthless. Domestic labour does not cease to be counted as work because it isn't paid - if you're married, anyway.

I couldn't have put it better i was struggling to reply with the right words but yes legally a woman is entitled to 50% by law if she is married and done all of the above

Beastofburden · 22/11/2013 09:08

Seriously surprised by the lack of knowledge out there about basic divorce law in the UK.

As I understand it, the point about a long marriage is that nobody could really disentangle all the give and take that goes on over that many years. Same with conduct- either partner could be the one to have the affair that ends the marriage, but who knows what the balance of behaviour was like over the full period of marriage? The only pragmatic way forward, if the courts aren't going to spend decades on it, is to say, right, anything over ten years counts as a "long marriage" and you are deemed to be equal partners, unless there are specific factors. Those factors, as others have said, will often work in favour of the parent who continues to have the children, not so often in favour of the partner who was wealthiest when you get married.

You remember perhaps, "all my worldly goods I thee endow?". That's a genuine commitment in law.

As for the whole "who worked hardest" thing it will vary by marriage. Not all men who go out to work are the martyrs, some of them love the work and all the status they get, and have jobs that are not all that traumatic. Equally, some women do sod-all. I have friends from Uni who have gone down the highly maintained gym bunny ladies-who-lunch route with endless staff etc. if they divorced they would get the same deal as I would, with my full time job and my three DC and all the caring and housework that I (and to be fair, also DH) do. Would that be fair, individually between us? Not really. Especially as their men have way more money than mine does. Do I resent this? No, I think it is socially important to have proper recognition of both patterns in a marriage. A few bad examples are no reason to change the system.

Not suggesting OP has done sod all- this is a response to the more general point.