Should OW expect to be welcomed into family?

[Nattyjackie]

Scenario: woman has long term affair with man with kids. Wider family (mother, siblings) find out. Marriage breaks down and man moves on with OW. Long term should the OW expect to be welcomed and accepted by family?

Please put aside Man's role in this for the moment which is of course the instigator of all this. I'm really interested in what the OWs expectations should be towards wider family.

@Leighhalfpennysthigh This thread here details a woman her 2 daughters' experience. It is horrific. So much so that had to hide the thread for awhile because the updates on it were heartbreaking, depressing and infuriating for the poor woman and the girls. I dare anyone to read it and still comeback here with the same cold-blooded blase' approach to victims of an affair - especially one with children. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/3625387-Husband-having-affair?pg=1

I don't really think many people on here are arguing that an affair is fine - at most people have said if you forgive one party you should forgive the other.

People are defending leaving to be with somebody else, because a few people have suggested that is also unacceptable or that you need to wait a certain amount of time before getting in a relationship out of respect for the ex.

The issues are getting conflated.

There's usually some sort of overlap between ending one relationship and beginning another, especially if you're surrounded by monogamists banging on about marriage being for life. Even if the existing relationship is pretty grim, it's a big upheaval to put an end to it and often it's only the arrival of someone new that gives people the strength and motivation to make the change. Quite a lot of the time this is for the best and all the whining about the evils of affairs is missing the point.

Man has long term affair which would indicate the previous marriage not perfect.

Please point out to me the mythical "perfect" marriage.

There's usually some sort of overlap between ending one relationship and beginning another

What?

@SaraNade I can't be bothered engaging with you to be honest. I also can't be bothered reading any thread you highlight to educate me. I am entitled to my opinion just as you are. Let's just leave it like that.

Charming. Posting an opinion that affairs don't destroy lives, then when someone tries to give you a perspective of a wife and 2 girls who have been, it's all, 'I can't be bothered'. Don't want to be challenged to think or see in someone else's shoes. Pretty cowardly but whatever. OW is my guess.

@ReanimatedSGB speaks a lot of sense.

On a slightly unrelated note, is @ReanimatedSGB the original SolidGoldBrass?

Sara Nade. I think people are challenging your view that affairs ruin universally people’s lives. That’s obviously not true and some people are pointing out that it’s crazy to allow anyone else to have such an influence over your life. The only people that this kind of black and white thinking hurts is people who have bought into this myth.

You've got to be on the shitty side of an affair to really understand what it does. If it's not happened to you, or if you've been the OW, then understanding is not really possible. It's like trying to explain bereavement or parenting to someone. It's a heartbreaking, life-changing experience that you don't get until you've been through it.

Forgive the OW? Not today.

@AnybodyWantAChip describes it perfectly. You are jogging through life. It's not quite the Disney Princess shit you expected. But hey whatever. Its not necessarily hideous. There is no constant arguing. No drama. No discord. Then boom. Then it becomes clear the person you've been married to / living with / committed to has been committed to someone else. Lying & pretending for months or years. Your whole being is called into question. Your whole past made meaningless in a moment. When did it start? Is this the first time? When did he stop loving me? Last week / month / year / decade? How much of it was lies? Oh fuck we had sex last week. Was he repulsed? Why didn't I notice. It fucking destroys you. Not because he's shagged someone else - it's not the monogamy argument, it's the lies, deceit and utter disrespect. Someone has taken your life and ripped it into pieces. As has the OW/OM. Any adult with half a brain would fucking get that.

In no other scenario are people expected to accept that level of betrayal and arrogance and then smile, be the better person and all the other trite bollocks that is trotted out. If I stole from a friend I would expect to be called out on it by others. But treating your wife/husband/partner as described above is excused as a mistake, shit happens, whoops, I wasn't happy, made a mistake. Aye. Not today.

Do you live in South East London by any chance OP?

All affairs are different with different results.

Thinking about I know of four. Two were fairly public a lot of school gate gossiping. Those two had the worst short term effects but after sometime all things settled.

The other two were more private with teenage kids, no major issues.

It's all down to how bits handled by the parties involved IMO.

The issue is that sometimes marriages are hanging by a thread. There is always a rational reason to stay outside of the relationship between the parents: loneliness, fear of losing children, fear of supporting two houses, social judgement, feelings of failure. It is often the love of an OM/ OW that gives people the courage. Awful for the spouse who is left, who can feel inadequate, humiliated and jealous on top of all the fears above. However, that is the reality from the affairs then went on to become second marriages.

Spot on sofato. And those cases aren't about sex, this why the vagina comment is so crass

Well then if it isn't about sex, then don't have sex with a married man until he's divorced, and then nobody will call you a mattress or a vagina. ;) easy, isn't it?

What if it's an emotional affair and never had sex (which I know one case) would you still consider them a mattress?

@beautifulharmony you sound vengeful, bitter and a bit unhinged by anger. Internalised misogyny too. Frightening.

I just don't get it. I really don't. People who see it through your lens have so little understanding of humans. And in places like Syria cast the first stone, and not a metaphoric one either. Fucking rocks to kill.
How on earth is that right?

And all this wonderment by PP that people are selfish? Or course they are. It is an ubiquitous human trait. I would argue that it wasn't lack of selfishness that keeps people in unhappy marriages but fear.

... if it isn't about sex, don't have sex with a married man until he's divorced, then nobody will call you names ...

Beautifulmelody has been roundly denounced for using 'bad' language about the OW whose affair with her father caused her and her family so much distress, but in my opinion she's hit the nail on the head here.

Respect the contract. Respect the family. Even if he's so (trend/bored/abused/ready for out/entranced with you/insert whatever pressing reason) ... that doesn't mean to say you have to have sex with him until he's decently free.

We are supposed to be civilised and not ruled by our baser instincts. What beautifulmelody has raised, and I applaud her again for doing so, is how it's the physical relationship that is so hard for the family to deal with. And it's never fair to ask them to. There is no justification ever for that.

If, after divorce or obvious separation (to a different house), Dad shows up with a gf, that would be hard, but everyone would have to get on with it.

I think beautifulmelody's point is that if you behave with disregard for the pain and humiliation and shame you're causing to others, then you get what's coming - if they want to be rude about you, so be it. You gave up your rights when your knickers came off ...

Of course, it's not great for beautifulmelody to be angry like that, it won't help her, and she's going to have to resolve her feelings and find peace again some time, but there's no way we can defend the OW from her anger.

Having sex with a married man is always, always playing with fire.

And some of us see it as a line never to be crossed, and some of us don't even see the line. Until people start shouting and calling names. And then instead of apologising, we say well who cares about the line anyhow? But that line is there to keep children safe and protected from the turbulent world of adult sexual feelings. Cross it, and you end up hurting them. Beautifulmelody is a hurt child.

And I can also add, as I have done it, that leaving a marriage with no OM or OW has been no walk in the park. It has been bloody horrible, despite being amicable and my exDH would take me back tomorrow. My family were devastated; "If there is no-one else then, whhhyyyyy?" This is despite us not having sex for 7 years and me close to loathing him and hoping that he had an affair or, even worse, died on a daily basis as I felt so trapped by the guilt of splitting a family up.

I finally did it and I cannot tell you how many people who have told me how brave I am. Which gives me insight to their unhappiness.

To do it, when there is no-one to support you is something that takes real, real strength.

She has every single right to be angry, I'm not denying that .

But that view is also simplistic as not all affairs involve sex. Some people DO fall in love while married with someone else and don't have sex until officially separated.

They still left the wife for an OW. Is that couple slightly better? (Morally speaking).

The case I know she was judged exactly the same way because the wife couldn't believe her husband would leave everything behind for someone who he had no sexual contact with. And even though the EA was short lived, again nobody could believe it all happened within 3 months.

There was a massive drama at the school gate, she was called a slut in front of everyone. From what I've seen the lack of sex made no difference in the psyche of the local community.

Sofato well done!!!!!! Yes it does take amazing courage and determination! I really hope you're beginning to feel the reward of having got your life back. Good luck!

@lottielupin thank you. But my children don't see it that way. I truly feel like one of the most selfish people alive. But I only have one life and I and am not subjugating my wants entirely for my children and definitely not for my ex.

@rainbow that poor woman. How bloody awful for her! Honestly, you can see the appetite for public executions just under the veneer of civilised behaviour. Communities just LOVE TO JUDGE. Quite often to protect the fragility of their own situations. Put.The. Fear. Of. God. into people.

I'm not saying if she deserves it or not. Just that by your own comments it's the sex that makes the difference. By all accounts they had no sex until they both had moved out.

Nobody knows the truth but them. They're now an established couple and they all coparent as best as they can. (You can see the new couple and the ex spouses at plays and other school events).