Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think husbands (or indeed wives) cannot be 'stolen'

139 replies

VladmirsPoutine · 26/01/2018 11:25

I was thinking about this earlier. Many many years ago I was married to a man I was wholly in love with, he destroyed our marriage by taking off with an OW. I of course went through the obvious emotions but can happily say I'm out the other side and we have somewhat of a cordial relationship these days. (Thankfully no dc and nothing else that required us to keep in touch).

However, I don't like to think that OW 'stole' my husband; as a self-governing autonomous individual he made his choice. He did later say that he regretted this as the grass apparently wasn't greener but that's not the point of this thread. I was thinking about Geri Horner and a lot of the discussion at the time of her being a 'husband stealer' similarly to the stories regarding Kristina Rihanoff.

I just don't buy the narrative that men somehow accidentally find themselves being subdued by seemingly exotic fruit and can't contain themselves.

I carry no resentment toward other-women and often feel sorry for them if they have fallen for 'the script' but the buck stops with one's husband. Regardless of the state of the marriage. He chose to break the vows and therein lies the issue.

OP posts:
LuckyBitches · 26/01/2018 11:28

YANBU at all. But I think that when someone you love runs off with someone else, you can't switch off their love for them, and look for someone (OW/OM) to blame instead, which is understandable. In time you realise that you were married to a shit.

Imnotposhjustquaint · 26/01/2018 11:28

I agree.

Trinity66 · 26/01/2018 11:29

I agree with you and yes you're right that in most cases the OW ends up being cheated on too. I still think it's a tacky and low move to pursue a married man or woman when you know they're already in a relationship and I'd have zero sympathy for them if they eventually "get" the man/woman and they end being cheated on aswell

GetShitDone · 26/01/2018 11:30

It's well known (certainly within F1 circles, not sure about outside if that)that Geri Horner went out of her way to snag Christian. She pursued him in a manner that imo could be described as husband stealer. Yes, he is absolutely complicit and is responsible for his part, but he was chased for a not insignificant length of time.

TripTrapTripTrapOverTheBridge · 26/01/2018 11:32

You're right in a sense but the OW/OM is far from a saint themselves and knew they were doing wrong.

CuriousaboutSamphire · 26/01/2018 11:32

I don't think I would ever 'blame' the OW, but would always wonder how/why she fell for the 'poor me' script so much that she wouldn't demand a clean break before taking up with a man she knew was married. It does tend to make them equally culpable if they knowingly enter into a married man's affair.

Of course that doesn't include the OW who are lied to...

Graphista · 26/01/2018 11:34

No people can't be stolen BUT if the ow/om knows their affair partner is in a committed monogamous relationship they are JUST as to blame as the cheating spouse. It's not difficult. If someone is in a relationship you don't kiss, flirt with or fuck them! It doesn't happen by sodding accident.

Helllllooooooo · 26/01/2018 11:35

Just because something is on offer doesn’t mean you have to take up the offer.
Even if Geri was sat on his lap naked everyday for an hour he would have still played his part.

Helllllooooooo · 26/01/2018 11:36

I think blame is equal if the ow/om is fully aware of the situation and hasn’t been told the other is single

GoldenBlue · 26/01/2018 11:42

I do not believe someone happily in love with their DP will cheat.

An affair is a symptom of an unhappy marriage not a cause of it.

fuzzywuzzy · 26/01/2018 11:44

My personal view is that both parties are complicit, a person cannot be stolen but the ow/om can walk away they choose to have an affair.

I think both parties behave equally badly in their own way.

Ex cheated on me and I actually don't feel angry at ow for that, it was her subsequent behaviour to twist the knife so to speak that makes me dislike her.

I had a friend who deliberately targetted a MM, and he left his wife with a newborn for her, I think her behaviour was awful, quite apart from the MM who actions were beyond awful.
They're both to blame.

taskmaster · 26/01/2018 11:44

No, another woman cannot steal your husband. Carrying on with man she knows to be married does make her an awful weapon though. She doesn't owe anythng to his wife personally, but we all owe it to each other and to ourselves not to do such a thing.

Pidlan · 26/01/2018 11:48

Those of you who think the OW is equally to blame unless she has been lied to- how big do those lies have to be? What about if he says that his marriage is dead and that they've decided to separate but hasn't actually moved out yet? What if he tells the OW that his wife is abusive and has affairs? What if he says, I want to get out but she is abusive and I am scared?
I would genuinely like to know at which point the blame lies with the OW, because I've never ever heard of a situation where the OW wasn't lied to as well as the wife.

AuntLydia · 26/01/2018 11:49

I agree. I don't think you can be 'chased for a significant amount of time' unless you want to be either. In the unlikely event of some bloke starting chasing me I'd tell him to do one. I'd remove him from my social circle. If I didn't do that then my husband would have every right to question why I wanted the bloke around in the first place

TheRealMrsClarkson · 26/01/2018 11:49

I agree with GolddenBlue. I find it hard to believe it when people say 'we were perfectly happy, I had no idea anything was wrong'.

I think this is often said to remove any blame for the demise of the relationship from themselves.

Perhaps my view is coloured as I have known people say this when I've witnessed them treating their partner appallingly.
RL example, she treats him like shit, he has an affair, she's the innocent victim...I don't think so.

monopoly5 · 26/01/2018 11:50

I tend to agree that a partner can’t be stolen & if course in many cases the OW/OM has also been strung a yarn. However there are definitely cases where people are sneaky & do everything they can to engineer situations. I have been on the receiving end & it can be very intoxicating. I resisted but it was hard, admittedly I was young then.

I have also seen if from the other side & the girl would always be a shoulder to cry on, etc. Plus my friend dated a footballer in the 90s & OMG women would literally throw themselves at him, regardless if she was there. I think he was one of the good ones but she broke up with him because she thought she could never trust him.

EggsonHeads · 26/01/2018 11:51

No, just ruined. Who would want a husband like that?

HanutaQueen · 26/01/2018 11:52

I think that it's a different sort of 'bad thing' if you pursue someone who is in a relationship to being the one who has an affair.

We are competitive by nature; as animals we compete for food, warmth, to be the number one in the group, to get the 'best' mate. As humans we compete for assets, wealth, relationships. It is only social construct because it is 'not very nice' that we don't go after people who are by our own social rules 'taken'.

If we are saying that it's possible to steal a partner from someone else it implies that they are somehow property. In every other area of life we move away from this; by conferring 'property' status on a person you diminish them to a thing, without agency and without responsibility. Usually nowadays people get upset by this but in this instance it is used I feel as a convenient escape for the person who has more genuinely wronged the party who has been left; the partner is the one who has damaged the relationship, not the other man or woman. By saying they were 'stolen' it absolves them of the responsibility, they didn't have control over their actions. They are actually the ONLY person who had control over their actions.

It doesn't excuse that it's a dick move to go after someone in a relationship just because at best you are causing a nuisance and at worst it starts a cascade of problems that could cause a lot of hurt for everyone. But no, you cannot be stolen.

ChalkItDown · 26/01/2018 11:53

Some years back I made a new friend while commuting on the train.

We got to the point of meeting for a night out and after a few drinks she confessed she had met her current husband at work.

His wife was pregnant but she decided he was the man for her so she went for him and won him over. She
Told me that night that she had totally manipulated him because she wanted and thought she ‘deserved’ him as a high earner.

He left his wife while she was still pregnant with their first child.

I’ve never met her or socialised with her since, and don’t get me wrong, I am not in any way a prude, I am a person of some pretty low moral standards but that is well out of fucking order.

For those of you with a heightened sense of
Schadenfreude, life dealt sunsequently dealt them the worst fucking blow in the world and at the worst timing. No babies were harmed in the making of this anecdote - only culpable adults.

Summary. Some people are cunts. Sometimes it bites them in the arse.

Lizzie48 · 26/01/2018 11:56

It's not the right word to use, no, as it implies that the man/woman who cheats isn't able to control their actions, which is of course rubbish. But they can't completely avoid any of the blame for the hurt caused, if they know they're in an illicit relationship. This is especially the case if they're doing the dirty with a friend's partner, that really does cross a line.

TieGrr · 26/01/2018 12:00

On the one hand, no. Nobody can be 'stolen'. But if someone is breaking up multiple relationships - like Kristina Rihanoff - than it's harder to look at her as the blameless party. The man was at fault for breaking marriage vows but when someone has been the OW more than once, it's unlikely that their behaviour is innocent.

Original poster
VladmirsPoutine · 26/01/2018 12:01

@Lizzie48 I agree with you on that point. My OW was a woman on the peripheral of my social circle. So I knew of her but didn't know her iyswim. What rankled the most I suppose was thinking back to evenings out and now knowing they were having at it whilst I was totally oblivious. When they exchanged glances and so forth it wasn't just a group jolly but two individuals fully in the know of their sordid carrying-on. I think I'd have been better at the time had she been a total stranger. But I remain in my position that the onus was on him.

I guess the fall out is that these experiences change you as a person, I'd like to think for the better but they still do change you in some way.

OP posts:
CuriousaboutSamphire · 26/01/2018 12:01

What about if he says that his marriage is dead and that they've decided to separate but hasn't actually moved out yet? What if he tells the OW that his wife is abusive and has affairs? What if he says, I want to get out but she is abusive and I am scared? From within a happy relationship they all sound like aspect of The Script, but I have no doubt some people sell them / believe them well.

I have known a couple of women who chose to believe similar lies, they were open in that they knew the man was over egging it to win them round.

So I would always assume that an OW has an inkling no matter how vague - unless she has met he wife and had his tale verified by her!

Then again, I am naïve enough to believe that both DH and I would do the honourable thing, should it ever come to it!

BoredOnMatLeave · 26/01/2018 12:03

I agree you can't call them a "husband stealer", he decided to cheat... doesn't stop her from being a massive twat though if she knew he was married.

IHeartHoumous · 26/01/2018 12:04

Completely agree with you OP, from a young age I remember hearing the phrase "she STOLE (male) from (female partner)" even in Soap storylines affairs were always described this way.

Can't help but feel we rarely hear 'wife stealer' as if to say if a wife cheats/leaves her husband it's all on her, if a husband does it some evil manipulator OW cast a spell on him and made him do it Hmm