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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Am I a horrible person?

159 replies

sunset3000 · 08/12/2024 23:06

Please don't come on here to just bash me verbally!

I'm 38, single and my 20 year old son lives with me. I've been single for about 6/7 years and I like it that way, I don't enjoy relationships as I've never had a good one.
I think I'm a kind, caring, thoughtful, helpful and just generally nice person.
In the last 6/7 years the only relationship of sorts that I've had is a friends with benefits kind, the problem is both men had partners, one of the fwb situation went on for 3.5 years the other around 9/10 months. I only ever like taken men and I was driving earlier and thought, I consider myself a very nice person but does this actually make me a horrible person, I don't know either of the men's partners and both have remained secrets. I know nobody is perfect but I feel like o don't really like myself for it at the moment.
I'm not asking for anyone to tell me what I've done is fine or tell me I'm evil, just maybe some possible reasons I might be like this and if it does make me horrible?

OP posts:

Original poster

sunset3000 · 08/12/2024 23:54

@IchiNiSanShiGo I have no idea what I want! Everyone around me believes I'm a strong, done need anyone or anything kind of person but I think it's a front and has been for so long I can't let anyone see any other side

OP posts:

Original poster

sunset3000 · 08/12/2024 23:55

Thank you for all your replies, I dont want to be a horrible person, I just think im a lot more messed up than I ever realised

OP posts:

Thunderpants88 · 08/12/2024 23:55

Yeah you’re an awful person.

StormingNorman · 09/12/2024 00:02

You don’t want to be a horrible person? Stay single until the therapy has worked its magic. Wives everywhere will thank you.

IchiNiSanShiGo · 09/12/2024 00:06

sunset3000 · 08/12/2024 23:54

Have you got some good friends you can talk to about this stuff, that you can really be honest and yourself around?

I don’t think you need to know now what you want, but I think you do need to figure out who you really are.

I get the “one who’s been strong forever” thing. It sucks, cos sometimes you just want someone to recognise you need a bit of help or a cuddle or for them to make a decision instead of you.

You’ll be ok. And you’re not horrible.

recipientofraspberries · 09/12/2024 00:12

OP, you're not a horrible person. You're not a "bad" person. You have different sides and aspects to you, like everyone else. You'd identified this thing about yourself that you feel uncomfortable with now. I think it's a really good thing that you want to explore why it's been a pattern for you. Would you get some talking therapy to work through it? You don't ever have to have a relationship with a taken man ever again. Changing our behaviour when we realise it's wrong (or when it really hits us that it's wrong - you probably knew it wasn't great when you did it but things don't always fully hit us) is a really great thing to do.

ByHardyAquaFox · 09/12/2024 00:25

OP, you MAY be a horrible person, but we don't have enough information about these relationships.
Were you aware of them having partners when the relationship begin ? Did they give you false promises ? The devil is in the details.
If you were aware of that, then, by all means, you are horrible and unkind. However, if they manipulated you, then you are just unlucky.

DoYouReally · 09/12/2024 00:32

You might not be a horrible person overall but this aspect of your behaviour is. That said, if you stop it immediately it's over snd you can be better.

CharlotteLucas3 · 09/12/2024 13:42

OP, I don't think you're a horrible person...if these men hadn't been sleeping with you they'd have found someone else to sleep with.

I think ....and I say this a lot....you need to ask yourself why you felt the need to come on here and subject yourself to loads of negative comments. If you've spent any time on here at all, you'd have known the response you'd get.

No-one else gets to decide whether you're a good person. Someone saying 'Yes you're a horrible person' shows a lack of reasoned thinking because there are just too many variables. We're all a mixture of 'good' and 'bad' and we cannot predict how our actions might affect others over time. What about the person is so 'good' that they end up seriously ill (because that's a thing - see Gabor Mate for details) and dying? Their good behaviour then wrecks the lives of their family.

However, if you don't follow your own moral code then you'll feel bad about yourself and that will be detrimental to your mental health. I do believe in doing the right thing whether or not someone is watching.

Agix · 09/12/2024 13:46

I don't think you're a horrible person.

You made no one promises of monogamy. Those blokes did, they're the ones who broke their promise and commitment.

Still think you may need therapy to work out why you only want to have dealings with unavailable men.

But you're not the horrible one here. The other women just get blamed because no one wants to blame the blokes, for whatever reason.. like to think they cant help it or something and it's the responsibility of other women to keep them faithful... despite those blokes being the only people who made them any promises and those other women owning them nothing.

toucheee · 09/12/2024 14:01

Maybe you get a thrill from the chase of the taken man.

No one can say.

Book yourself in for counselling.

StormingNorman · 09/12/2024 14:24

I don’t agree that the OW isn’t to blame, particularly not one who knowingly goes after “taken” men.

My girl code is stronger than that. I would be disgusted with myself if I even unwittingly dated/kissed/hooked up with a man who was already in a relationship.

SleeplessInWherever · 09/12/2024 14:35

StormingNorman · 09/12/2024 14:24

I don’t agree that the OW isn’t to blame, particularly not one who knowingly goes after “taken” men.

My girl code is stronger than that. I would be disgusted with myself if I even unwittingly dated/kissed/hooked up with a man who was already in a relationship.

Even if you didn’t know they were taken? That’s a bit unnecessarily harsh on hypothetical you!

eqpi4t2hbsnktd · 09/12/2024 14:37

You're not doing anything wrong. You're single....

The men you date sound gross though!

ItGhoul · 09/12/2024 14:53

You sleep with 'taken' men because deep down, you find it exciting to be the other woman without actually having the complications of a relationship. It excites you to act the part of the fun, sexy one who can tempt a man while his partner has to be the boring, domestic one who asks him to put the bins out. It's not difficult to see what's going on here, but I don't think it paints you in a particularly good light.

I used to have a FWB thing with a man who told me was single. I then found out he wasn't single, and as soon as I found out I put a stop to the FWB thing immediately. Primarily because I've no interest in facilitating a man's cheating on his partner, but also for my own self-respect. Why would I want to bother with with some other woman's scraps?

SoNiceToComeHomeTo · 09/12/2024 15:30

It doesn't 'make you' anything, but having an affair with someone already in a relationship is likely to contribute in a lot of pain for their partner. Is that a good thing to do? Is it something you want to do?

MrsSunshine2b · 09/12/2024 15:38

There's not enough info to say you are all round horrible. Maybe you rescue abandoned puppies or knit blankets for refugee children in your spare time and run the local foodbank.

But deliberately seeking out married/ taken men and having an affair with them, knowing you are colluding in perpetrating a huge betrayal and potentially causing immense pain to their wives and children, is at best amoral. You either don't care or actively enjoy seeing someone else's life being destroyed which is not nice.

FailureAndSuicide · 09/12/2024 15:42

Having sex with a man married to another Woman is a grotesque thought. If he doesn't want his Wife or she doesn't want him then he has some serious issues. Stay away from the losers. The Wife always blames the OW on Mumsnet. 😂

asrl78 · 09/12/2024 15:58

Whilst it might be tempting to be judgemental and say you are horrible I won't. I am not one for gut feelings as a general rule but mine is thinking you have been badly hurt in past relationships and are suffering from low self esteem and emotional baggage. Hooking up with married men is your way, of at least perceptively getting the thrill and companionship of sex that comes with a relationship, but without having to put yourself in the vulnerable position of committing emotionally to a man. Them being married makes it easy to think of them as emotionless sex machines, eliminating any emotional attachment and consequential risk of your emotional state/esteem being battered by the analogy of a category 5 hurricane if they dump you.

socks1107 · 09/12/2024 16:01

It doesn't make you a very nice person and you aren't someone I'd ever trust or be close to.
Having been very hurt in the past by my ex husband I can't understand why you'd seek taken men or continue to have relationships with them knowing you could really hurt someone

Alalalala · 09/12/2024 16:02

You are behaving in a self-serving way which encourages - glories in - betrayal and deceit. And you know this and are choosing it because it suits you.

That makes your behaviour amoral and selfish. There will be a reason for it if you review your childhood and early life.

DowntonFlabbie · 09/12/2024 16:04

Interesting calling yourself kind, nice, thoughtful, a good person while facilitating cheating and conducting illicit relationships.
Is that what generally nice people do?

ObtuseMoose · 09/12/2024 16:08

Would your taken men's partners think you were a kind, caring, thoughtful, helpful and just generally nice person if they found out about you?

Theseventhmagpie · 09/12/2024 16:09

coldcallerbaiter · 08/12/2024 23:20

I think it is horrible behaviour. Cannot stand women like you.

Completely agree

LadyKenya · 09/12/2024 16:12

It would be ridiculous to think that a person could not be nice, and have an affair. There is no one reason why people have affairs, it is too simplistic to label all these people as not being nice, being horrible etc. In your case OP, I think that there is a reason that you do not want to have a relationship with someone, who is free, and available to commit to you, for whatever reason. If you feel it is such a problem for you, then therapy would be advisable, to work through the reasons why you act this way.

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