Some affairs work out for the better ?

[Everyoneishappier]

NC as super contentious.

Met
My DH when he was unhappily married . (Both would agree on this point)

I was separated but still livng in same house as ex DH.

Move on 15 years and all kids are grown. DH paid CMS and a few extras (with my encouragement) .. Ex wife married the man she was having an affair with...

Both couples are happy.. kids are happy and well blended.

Sometimes you simply marry the wrong person...

(Caveat ) neither couple had kids .. ?

My ex-husband is still with the woman he cheated on me with fifteen years ago. They have 2 kids and seem happy. We didn't have problems in our relationship (unless he was some Oscar-winning level actor), he just found someone he preferred and checked out. He left me with the impression I was something distasteful he'd stepped in.

I second those who talk about the devastating effects of affairs. I suffered from depression for a couple of years afterwards. When I think about it now, I still feel a physical pain in my chest. I'll never trust another relationship and am still single and missed out on the chance to have kids.

My life is pretty good now - I have a lot of friends, many interests, a great career and my own home, but that was by far the hardest thing I've ever had to go through and I still feel the effects of it today.

maybe it’s the right thing for the adult who wants to leave. But not for everyone else involved.

look at the Helen Skelton situation. Husband has left her for another woman, when their youngest is 4 months old. Four months!! There is nothing in this whole world that would have dragged me away from my four month old (or even now when she’s 8).

I mean to put a grenade under your young family to go off with someone you fancy more… selfish just doesn’t come close.

This is a horrible story all round. Both women seemed to value the man for money only and he seems to have nothing else to go for him. I can’t think any of the people here that I particularly have any sympathy for. They all seem like they deserve each other

From my perspective as a child whose father had an affair, I wasn’t bothered about that - my parents were obviously unhappy beforehand.

I remember being young and visiting one of my first boyfriends. I stayed over and throughout the night heard his mother vomiting and sobbing.

I asked was she ill ? He answered his father had left after having an affair, was this recent I asked. Four months on he said, I couldn't believe that such physical symtoms could still be lingering after such time.

I very much know now this happens, people who have never experienced affairs really cannot understand the grief and pain that can occur, especially if it has been a long union, you have children or still a young couple who have still so much physical chemistry between you.

Loss of any kind can be devastating, but a loss which involves being hoodwinked by another couple being in love whilst you are unaware, is really one of the most cruel knocks to take.

Whatever the reasons people feel they need to have extra marital relations, honestly just before you start, think of the pain, devastation and hurt and also the damage that you are willing to inflict, that damage can last a lifetime.

"From my perspective as a child whose father had an affair, I wasn’t bothered about that - my parents were obviously unhappy beforehand."

Even though they were unhappy, weren't you disappointed in him, that he was shagging someone else behind your mum's back and lying to her? Didn't you ever think that if he'd put all of his energy into say marriage counselling instead of sneaking around they might have been able to fix their marriage? I wonder why he didn't just leave. I'm just surprised because all of the adults I know who experienced affairs and their aftermath as children are now quite open about all of the ways it impacted them negatively.

Or they rush in to poor marriages and 'settle' in their 30s/40s and then
have affairs... which mostly work out. It's just Mumsnet folk who would
want you to burn in hell over it. In the real world people move on,
friends readjust and many, many relationships that start as affairs
become solid, long term, or even life long partnerships

I agree there are many that make unwise choices when young and disregard the importance of creating a life and remaining and giving that child the best of advantages.
Maybe it's natures way of getting rid of the duds that will hinder a child's upbringing rather than enhance it.

And as the The Mumsnet folk, I think you'll find the net travels a little further than that. Unfortunately peope are judged for abandoning families and children, like it or not, they may not speak to your face but it definitely happens all the time.
The feckless dad, who kids himself on that his relationship with his kids has not changed, the removal of financial and emotional help towards those children as he has a new family to pretend he cares about.
The women who move on from man to man searching for the next love story dragging their kids behind them.

I think you would be foolish think society does not judge, rather the subject matter is so sensitive that people dare not converse about it as it involves such serious consequences on the betrayed and children of broken homes that silence is the safer option. People will not express the truth, they never do.

What you read on here will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, from the betrayed partners at least.

Why do people have to 'fix' anything. He probably didn't like his wife
anymore. Would you try and 'fix' things with someone you most likely had
no interest in being with? Which is where the not giving a fuck about
hurting people comes in. They no longer care

And this...

There is a serious lack of empathy going on here, you speak as though this would be a random person he is discarding, not the person he married, made vows with, produced children with and made promises with.

Just an unfortunate choice that became an inconvinience, how simply said when it doesn't affect you.
Yes he doesn't need to fix things but you do need to take responsibility for the choices you make in life and if you're happy to reveal to the world your deficiencies of being selfish instead of selfless then that would be their choice to take.

Just don't expect any awards for being the best procreator.

Yes, but officially it's more forbidden to express that view on mumsnet.

"Why do people have to 'fix' anything. He probably didn't like his wife anymore. Would you try and 'fix' things with someone you most likely had no interest in being with? Which is where the not giving a fuck about hurting people comes in. They no longer care."

I have always thought that they were in love at some point, and at the point that starts to change you have a duty - certainly if you have children together - to try everything to regain what you had, couples therapy and so on. I think you should talk to your partner, you owe them that much.

There are so many stories on here from women who had absolutely no idea anything was wrong. While he is checking out, putting all of his energy into the new relationship, making plans for the future, the wife is often completely unaware.

I also think people are overstating the success of affair relationships and marriages. Of course some work out, we all know some that have. But far more fail. Sometimes the relationship can't survive without the excitement of the affair, or blending the families proves too difficult, or there are trust issues, and of course you will always know what your partners response to feeling a bit bored or dissatisfied is. It's not talking to you or working on the relationship or arranging to separate with dignity, it's seeking an affair and justifying it by making up lies about you.

In the real world people move on, friends readjust and many, many relationships that start as affairs become solid, long term, or even life long partnerships

This is verging on delusional. I dont know of anyone whose affair turned out to be a solid, decent relationship. In the "real world" affairs that are based on lies and sneaking around hardly EVER turn into anything serious because as soon as the excitement of it being "forbidden" has gone, it becomes mundane and ordinary just as the marriage they were escaping was. I know of multiple people who had affairs and their "relationship" with the OW or OM crashed and burned the second they tried to settle down and become a family unit with them. I also know of people who then begged the partner they cheated on to come back to them because the relationship with the affair partner was so dreadful.

"In the real world people move on, friends readjust and many, many relationships that start as affairs become solid, long term, or even life long partnerships."

I work with a woman who now lives with her affair partner. It was a five year affair before they both left their spouses. She is very open about it and feels that everything has worked out - both spouses remain single but are 'over it now' and all of the adult children are now willing to visit them again. She talks in glowing terms about her new relationship but honestly she is deluded about everyone being fine with it. People talk about it behind her back at work. Her ex is still heartbroken, I don't know his ex so she may be fine I guess. I don't know. I suppose just don't overstate how fine things turned out because it may just be a thin veneer of 'fine' for only some of those involved.

It wasn’t the right thing to do - he should have left without having an affair. But like many I think he didn’t have the courage until he found someone else. The affair itself didn’t bother me at all - in fact I’m glad he found happiness.

i don’t think he should have gone for counseling or anything either. Their marriage was over. Anyone could see that including youngish kids. They had a toxic relationship and tbh their staying together so long has affected me more than the affair. I am fiercely independent.

my mother was devastated but not because she loved him. She was concerned about the loss of money and status. But overall after it, I would say she was happier too as the relationship was toxic.

that’s just my experience - not anyone else’s. But I think the op did say SOME affairs work out for the better and I think that can be true.

I know quite a few people who had happy marriages with affair partners. One relative who remarried an affair partner in late 30s recently died in 90s still happily married.

of course many affairs don’t end up well for cheater and cheatee as well. But I don’t think at all that’s a blanket rule. Quite the opposite in my experience (anecdote is not data obv).

It’s just life. while you might like cheaters to be desperately unhappy for the rest of their life, I don’t think they always are. Or even in the majority of cases.

Equally- I have seen the exact opposite play out in real life so the idea that most people live happily ever after with their affair partner is nonsense.

In fact, one male partner who now lives with his affair partner and posts on Facebook how loved up they are often messages me asking if I'd meet him for sex. I have since blocked him. Hardly shocking considering.

I had a friend who tried to justify affairs and chase after an engaged man. She's not a friend anymore.

It’s hard to say what number of affair partners live happily ever after - agreed. Some definitely do though.

that’s creepy re sleazy man. Equally though lots of married men who are married to non affair partners are creepy and have affairs. And lots don’t, same as marriages between affair partners.

I've known a few people who have gone on to have affairs. For one it worked out and they are happy . I lost touch as they moved away but going by what is put on social media they seem alright ( although that isn't a good way of knowing anything)
The other person I knew wasn't happy in the marriage and had an affair years ago. She is now with a new partner , not without its problems. I wouldn't say that any of them found it easy , but it appears to have worked out.

@cantbelieveheletmedown
You can and will get through this.
Be kind to yourself.
It does get easier.
It's been 3years and I can look at it all dispassionately now.
Take it a minute at a time if you need to.
I wrote letters, angry letters, sad letters, venting rants. I kept them for about a year before I binned them.

For me it was a double betrayal as the AP was someone I thought was my friend.

The heartbreak and trauma is unreal, I broke down in tears and shakes on a colleague on Friday because she was nice to me!

He has taken to walking the dog so he can call the OW and has just shouted at me because I have fed the dog and he wanted to take him out, so he shouted that he was going on his own!!!!

He denies that there is anything going on and it's all my fault for questioning his behaviour.

I can honestly say this is the worst trauma I have ever been through and I have been through alot!!!

I have written letters and photographed them and burned them. I even wrote a suicide note in March such was my pain.

There is never any justification to do this to somebody else ever!!! Its selfish and very shitty.

I am curious if any of these posters saying affairs were for the best, have been the betrayed spouse?

Well what do you do if one partner is happy and one isn't? Who gets priority on what they want from life and in the end is anyone going to be happy forcing someone to stay in an unhappy marriage. Feelings change and sometimes it just doesn't work.

I'm not talking about serial adulterers but someone who is desperately unhappy and then they meet someone, should they be expected to sacrifice their life. I think those days are in the past.