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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think that any man who takes 35 years to stop cheating on his wife is no "prize"?

203 replies

Cerseirys · 20/02/2016 08:55

Depressing article in today's Guardian. The husband in question sounds like a complete creep yet his wife stuck with him through it all and now, after 35 years, he's finally stopped cheating on her and she thinks that's her reward for standing by her man.

AIBU to find it sad that some women put up with this? And before anyone says that maybe she was happy with the situation, it's quite clear in the article that she wasn't.

OP posts:
Purplehonesty · 20/02/2016 17:46

I know someone like this too. Puts up with it so she can have the 'lifestyle' she is accustomed to.
If she divorced him she would have to pay bills and get a job and not spend all her money on shoes...
Plus he is hardly ever in the country so she doesn't have to see him that much.
Awful role model for her children though.

scarlets · 20/02/2016 17:47

They deserve each other, I guess. She sounds as calculating as he does.

WhereYouLeftIt · 20/02/2016 17:50

Must have been a very lonely life, ditching every friend your husband shagged, and ditching every friend who tried to raise his infidelity with her. So, basically ditching every friend Sad. Or never really making any in the first place, because you're going to have to ditch them one way or the other.

I don't think it is a class issue, she describes herself as the 'right' sort of girl for him - in context, it also suggested the right sort of girl for his family.

DeoGratias · 20/02/2016 18:18

This is what happens when women give up full time or any work and live off men instead - it's never going to work. it's anti feminist and it takes all economic power away from women. Bound to fail.

Yseulte · 20/02/2016 18:24

The 'right' sort of girl implied the same to me.

Original poster
Cerseirys · 20/02/2016 19:07

I don't know about that DeoGratias, I'm sure there are plenty of men who don't cheat on wives who are SAHMs!

OP posts:
missbishi · 20/02/2016 19:23

"He still works long hours..."

Yes love, I'm sure he does.

EnthusiasmDisturbed · 20/02/2016 19:34

Though this story does seem quite DM in its style I don't think it's unusual situation maybe a little exaggerated

Many partners turn a blind eye they fear being alone more than they fear having a cheating partner

If you haven't worked for some time and totally reliant financially on one income that might influence how you feel. You may have been aware your parents relationship was not so perfect yet they struggled through you might just be so in love that being with them even if they are cheating is better than being without them

It's sad and will never bring happiness but I think for some it's better I have him/her than anyone else I guess if that is what you self worth comes down to in the end he returns home .... Then one day he/she probably won't

Believeitornot · 20/02/2016 19:38

I agree with Deo. It certainly changed the power dynamic in a relationship.

I read that article and concluded that she stayed because the alternative (find a job, possible have less money) was just too much to bear. Plus low self esteem.

She walked in on her husband shagging someone else and she did fuck all. She had the proof with her own eyes and could have strung him up with that alone.

DeoGratias · 20/02/2016 20:27

Or she just might be too lazy to work and prefers tolerating adultery to having to get her finger out and work full time.

peaceoftheaction · 20/02/2016 21:04

sounds like gratuitous SAHM bashing to me! I'd have thought if she divorced she'd be entitled to something financially anyway

UsedToBeAPaxmanFan · 21/02/2016 08:41

How is suggesting that she may have had to trade his affairs with financial security "SAHM bashing"? It's a fact that women who aren't economically independent have the odds stacked against them if the relationship fails. That will apply to the majority of SAHM.

IndiansInTheLobby · 21/02/2016 08:52

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

eatsleephockeyrepeat · 21/02/2016 10:06

I don't think it's entirely helpful to feminism to suggest this woman has "wasted her life" on account of her unenviable relationship and total lack of likeability.

Okay, the article makes it sound like her whole life has dedicated to her marriage, but it is an article about her marriage, so I think that might be misleading. Who knows, perhaps she's done endless charity work or written a really good book. Life not wasted.

Young feminists out there, your relationship with a man (or otherwise) is not the thing by which your life's worth will be judged

Maybe she didn't give two damns about having a better man in her life and doesn't feel she's missed out. I would obviously like us ladies to feel empowered to leave a cheater, but not obligated to choose to.

hooliodancer · 21/02/2016 11:13

It's nothing to do with her choice to not work. It's to do with his choice to sleep with other women.

A 'nice life" does not mean being supported necessarily. It means enjoying things together. It means stability.To me, that's what she wanted. Not money. She wanted the man. Stupidly of course, she was /is obsessed by him even though they are living together.

The man I know who does this earns a lot less than his wife, it is she who provides the' nice life'. He cheats on his wife because he is a narcissist and because he can, not because of the choices his wife made. He would cheat on her if she was young, old, rich, poor, fat or thin.

2rebecca · 21/02/2016 11:15

I got irritated with the article over her inability to take responsibility for the decisions she had made. On the first page she wrote "the pain he's caused me is immeasurable".
Er no, the pain you have caused yourself by choosing to stay with an unfaithful man for 35 years is immeasurable. She could have confronted him and/ or left him. She's only a few years older than me. This isn't standard behaviour for my generation.
Yes he's behaved like a rat, but you don't get a medal for choosing to stay with a rat and pretend to be a martyr years later.
I agree there were probably things about the marriage such as the money that made her want to stay, in which case she could be honest and say "I married a man who enjoys affairs but decided to accept it as I liked the lifestyle and I was worried if I made a fuss he'd leave me as he wasn't that in to me" rather than blame him for all the marital problems and for her unhappiness.

WhoaCadburys · 21/02/2016 12:15

Neigbours of ours growing up were like that couple at one point - he was very good looking and enormously charismatic and successful. He was known to sleep around. One day she met another man while doing voluntary work and left him. Interestingly, he became a shadow of his former self, lost his sparkle and fell to pieces. I don't think he ever remarried and the last time I saw him he was looking rather fragile still.

I don't blame his wife at all. A man like him must have a very fragile ego.

bluedark · 21/02/2016 14:30

I have been thinking this story over and over since this morning. It is depressing to see that a woman could live a lie like this and feels like she has won over other women after 35 years...Every relationship is unique and we can't know the dynamics (and they had children) but I can't get my head round it. I feel sad for her.

NoArmaniNoPunani · 21/02/2016 14:44

My mum was just like the woman in the story. She turned a blind eye to my dad's affairs in order to keep her nice house and not have her kids come from a broken home. I think it fucked us all up. She divorced the cunt in the end and got half his excellent pension. So she's happy with how things turned out

BathtimeFunkster · 21/02/2016 15:11

She could have confronted him and/ or left him.

Yes, she could have.

But she was only left with two such invidious options because her husband kept cheating on her.

It reminds me of the way my father talks about women who have been subject to violent abuse.

"She could have left him. She is as bad as him because of what their children witnessed him doing."

But it all comes back to that there would have been no shitty home life for anyone if this wanker could have kept his dick in his pants.

revealall · 21/02/2016 16:42

That's not necessarily everyone's truth though Bathtime. Being a cheat doesn't have to mean a shitty home life for everyone. What if they both were happy to see other people? What if they stayed married and lived apart?
Part of the reason people aren't liking her is because she considers her misery to be worth the prize. Not quite the same as someone who can't see a way out of the relationship.

DeoGratias · 21/02/2016 16:56

Lady Archer and her husband (married 50 years) were interviewed this weekend and it was similar. Lord Archer made the point that most of his wife's work was unpaid and that he had through his books paid for a pretty nice lifestyle. She said she had tolerated all the other women year after year.

Wolpertinger · 21/02/2016 17:37

Lady Archer got a lot out of the deal though on her side. She got to pursue her research interests on his money, became very senior in her Cambridge college where presumably his political contacts helped and then moved into being on boards of various things that wouldn't have been open to her if she'd just have been Professor of something - there's loads of them in Cambridge! If you go to Addenbrookes hospital there's a street named after her Hmm And for most of the marriage he won his libel case and she was the 'fragrant Lady Archer'.

So she clearly got something back even if it did mean having to be married to Jeffrey Archer.

Xmasbaby11 · 21/02/2016 17:44

They both sounded awful. Not my idea of a marriage at all.

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