Anyone had an affair and not regreted it?

[kitty1]

I had fling with someone and never have regretted it. It helped me realise that my marriage was well and truly over and i couldnt go back.
By the point i had this fling my ex h and i hadnt had not been having sex because he had some issues he coudnt/wouldnt deal with.

I read some where once that when a woman emabarks on affair she has mentally packed her bags and left the relationship , when a man does it its usually because he is bored and craves excitement.

Anyone here feel the same?

"This is also a cultural issue- in France it is accepted that people have affairs. maybe the French are more realistic about relationships- they are certainly less hung up on sex, affairs and monogamy although there is much less divorce than in the UK. They put the family first- which means they divorce less, but accept that partners may need more than one person can offer."

Yes, affairs are much more accepted in other countries, such as France, Brasil, Russia, Italy, Japan... they put the family first. Pity that "they" usually means "the women", and without fail, the affairs that are overwhelmingly accepted are the ones the husband carries out. In many of these countries some of you seem to speak so highly of, women who cheat are beaten up and/or labelled as "whores" in public. And the ones who keep the family together, while the man chases as many skirts as he can, are the wives. I invite any of you to spend some time in any of these countries and pursue a relationship with a local. Then come back and tell me about your wonderful, understanding, free, liberating experience.

I won't even bother to comment about the rest of the crap that has been going on in this thread. Unfortunately, it speaks for itself.

Back to the point in the original post "I read some where once that when a woman emabarks on affair she has mentally packed her bags and left the relationship , when a man does it its usually because he is bored and craves excitement." - I'd say that is far too simplistic a view.

As for people jumping on the OP with criticism, I'd say we often reserve the strongest attack for what we fear the most.

I think it would be interesting to start a new thread on the Shirley Glass method, its pros and cons, keeping out names of all posters and personal attacks on those who explain it on here. Personally I think it has some really helpful advice and some damaging advice. Got to work now though so maybe later...

[Jelly] thank you so much for your post, I appreciate the understanding. I came here for support, and have ended up feeling like [justfor], like I just want to run away from this as well. But honestely [crispy] why do you feel the need to take your anger toward your dh and the ow out on us lot who are trying to understand our own side. All OW are not the same, it happens for different reasons, I myself am trying to gain perspective on how I ended up being the OW, I know in my head how wrong it is, but somehow I ended up there, and I don't regret it. As [justfor] says, it often is our DH's who are the lowlifes, and we get villified for the one thing, whilst our DH end up being the 'victim'!!!!!! I am still in contact with my EA, and I know I need to finish it, it has of course fizzled out, but emotionally I am struggling to let go. I know I need to, I just... I don't want to throw away something that is good in my life. I know we can never be 'friends', but I keep on kidding myeself that maybe if I gave it time we could. He has very strong feelings for me, but it is not right. We actually saw each other over a month ago, and he made sure he would leave at a particular time so that we would not be tempted to book into a hotel. I can imagine what others must think, but only people who have been in this position can truly understand what I am going through. Being called a 'lowlife' is not helpful, and it is less than I have called myself. Go on [crispy] take your potshot. open season on OW declared

aurynne why are you so angry? have you ben touched personally by any of what you write about?
I was trying to open up the debate away from the rants.

A couple of weeks back oneof the broadsheets carried a feature on affairs and the French in particular- it included comments from men and women- and the situation you describe was not there at all.

I just despair TBH that if anyone posts anything on MN which does not support women 100% they are absued .

Why can you not comment on the rest of my post? I KNOW families where the women were at fault- one of my friends had an alcoholic mother who was also a hypochondriac- and her Dh left her when they were in their 60s- for someone else. She has opted out of the marriage about 40 years back but as they were strict Methodists he had to keep her drinking a secret.

It is crazy not to acknowledge that there are women who are to blame for theri husbands straying .

THe trouble is that a lot of the advice generally available to people dealing with infidelity is that it starts from a deeply heteronormative, monogamist viewpoint, and very often a sexist one as well (men want sex, women want love, blah blah). I am not singling out any individual poster BTW though some are a lot more open-minded than others.
Infidelity is definitely not the worst thing that can happen, and it's a massive mistake to make the focus of your whole life enforcing fidelity on another person - and feeling as though you have 'failed' if the partner you have chosen decides to flirt or have sex with someone else. Monogamy only comes naturally and easily to a minority of people, those who have a fetish for it.
And the fact that women who breach monogamy are more often subjected to physical violence than men make it pretty clear that the cult of monogamy has a lot to do with keeping women in their place (men are entitled to own women etc).

Hello Catwalker,
Yes to your first part of your question/comment on my post. No to the second. And yes to the third.
The man in questions is also completely scrumptious. I think you'd like him ;) But I saw him first - so I have dibs.

Crispy I dont know if calling someone a lowlife will get your posts any respect. you dont know what went on in alot of those marriages - no more than anyone knows what went on in yours or mine that might have contributed to our husbands straying.

Read what you write before you post. you have just referred to someone as a lowlife and are complaining about a btchfest? Catch yourself on please.

Where is the compassion here? Im disgusted reading what you wrote, do you think that people who get involved in affairs have no feelings or reasons for doing it?

I feel sorry for you truly - u have obviously been so hurt by what has happened to you that you are bitter because of it.

its disgusting to be honest.

im sure there are plenty of selfish people out there who do want their cake and to eat it but often there is something that people are not getting within their marriages that they look for outside. That is not to say that they have a right to or should but its just what happens.

I remember for quite a while after my husband cheated I refused to believe that there had been anythign wrong with my marriage - when I calmed down and rationally thought about it I realised there was alot wrong with it and in fact I was unhappy long before he strayed.

I feel for him now, I dont think he is capable of settling down so is unable to sustain relationships however I dont remain bitter because of it as that would then impact me on an ongoing basis.

We are all people, we make decisions, sometimes right and sometimes wrong but we are all capable of fault and all capable of hurting and being hurt. Coming on a site like this should enable a person to speak freely without feeling that they are wrong to discuss a topic like this.

If anyone out there is the OW you can mail me either privately or on this forum. I dont judge you, truly I dont. The girl my husband strayed way nearly ended up destroyed over it. He is single now and very unhappy - bit - I have known people who have had affairs work out for them - its life, it happens. I would give a hug to anyone.

I dont judge someone on their actions, i dont like bullies, i dont condone attack but I will stand my ground about something.

Justthisonepost, come back please, you arent being judged by anyone worth worrying about - promise. Sometimes people are so hurt they just lash out at everyone.

i agree with everything strawberryjelly said,
i understand that there may be live threads ATM where people have been affected by an affair but can you really think of a time when there isn't threads like that live on MN. which therefore means that the other side of the debate is NEVER open for discussion.

it is a very valid discussion, and i agree that as life and reltionships are so complicated there is never just black and white. it's not the worst thing that can happen to you or that you can do to someone else.

i've never had an affair, but did have i suppose what you would call an EA with my ex, ex and i were best friends before we got together many years ago and have never really lost touch or contact since, at that time i needed emotional support that DH wasn't providing i found it in ex, not only was ex happy to oblige but as i was starting to feel better in myself it was ex who helped me focus on my marriage and try to make it better.

i'm still in contact with him although not nearly as often and not nearly as intense. he got me through a very dark time in my life and i would do it again if i needed to.

sorry i just realised how long the thread actaully is, i had only read the 1st page when i posted last msg

deb I just want to say that your last post s very kind and generous- and I think it's great of you to offer your non judgy support to anyone.

What people tend to be unwilling to accept is that there are always 2 sides to everything.

I tend to believe that if people are really happy they do not go looking for something else- and neither do they respond when something is offered on a plate. Yes, there are men who play away- they see sex as pretty meaningless and chalk up encounters to boost their egos.

But what comes over in this thread so far is that most people who have had an affair have done so because there was something wrong emotionally in their marriage and they sought a connection with another person.

It takes a very strong person to be in that place and say to themselves "Oh I must get out of this relationship first".

No one should judge. Rather than saying it's all the man's fault or all the OW's fault, anyone touched by an affair of a partner should be asking where did we go wrong? This can be hard when you have been lied to, but you need to do it.

Thanks "straw". It wasnt easy to get past it I can tell you but I had to for me.

I cant judge anyone on any topic as im no saint myself, nor would I want to be to be honest, i enjoy being human far to much.

Can I just say that I joined this forum because of the humanity that appeared to be shown to people on here - and it generally is consistent apart from when this topic comes up.

I dont think anyone should feel that they cant come on and speak about things as they are for them.

To be honest I dont think I woudl have left that marriage for a long time if ever if not for that affair. It showed me how unhappy I was and him also for that matter. Im much happier now.

x

Deb

sorry didnt mean to put your name in inverted commas there straw - thought I was bolding it! lol - sillybilly as my little one would say :)

JoAlone - wow, what a story!!! It is interesting that your husband seemed to wait for you to end up being 'the bad guy' and could then exit the marriage rather too readily blaming it on you rather than him. Sneaky! That actually happened to a friend of mine - similar situation. The marriage was completely on the rocks, he was verbally abusive and a bully and when she sought solace with another man he had the ultimate trump card to divorce her and make sure she got a lousy settlement. What a creep.

I think your story demonstrates that sticking to a dogma can make people very unhappy. Religion can be used as quite a useful tool to hide behind sometimes. And what people should not forget, if taking an evangelical view on fidelity, is that the bible does preach forgiveness. Anyway, I am an agnostic verging on atheist so I will stop there but I am sometimes quite shocked by the behaviour of people who profess to be religious yet seem remarkably lacking in any kind of virtue.

With regards to the cultural differences, I imagine that the tolerance for affairs decreases where there is a higher social acceptablity of divorce as there is now in the UK. I would rather my partner had a bit on the side, as long as he continued to be kind, but remained committed to his children and family life generally, but I think that this view is relatively unusual.

I would also agree that in France they have a more laid-back attitude towards sex generally and that may well extend towards fidelity. However in less developed countries I would imagine that the lover is pretty much reserved for the male. There is certainly a much higher tolerance for men to be unfaithful than women which really annoys me. I have already told my partner I will take on a lover if he starts to be an arse, and he knows that I mean it!!

Tad - I would love to have been a fly on the wall when you told him that! lol

no fear of you being walked over i can tell you that

Deb

Have to say that when I posted on here about being the OW a few weeks ago I was overwhelmed by the supportive posts and messages I got. At the time I deeply regretted what I had done and it took a while to come to terms with it. Now I don't actually feel that guilty. It wasn't a physical affair, was an online thing but I know that if the opportunity had presented itself I would have been tempted to take it further.
The thing is nobody actually knows what they will do when this kind of thing happens. For years I have been in an unhappy marriage because frankly I thought that was just what my life was. I didn't know that somebody would tell me I was funny and pretty. Didn't know I was those things after years of being told I wasn't funny and was just ok looking. I would have always said people who did this kind of thing were wrong, immoral, low. But now I know differently!
So to all of you who have no regrets,I understand. I don't feel that way ... in my heart I know I was wrong. But I understand how these things happen now, it's a bit like not understanding motherhood until you actually have a baby!

Being French myself I would say that people might stay together because the general idea is that the dcs will always be better of with two parents. Here the emphasis is on what it is teaching the dcs. So people there will divorce if they can not cope with it anymore.

I remember in class on counselling being taught that incouples both persons are responsible of the situation inc with DV. I was shocked that comment. But now understand that even if you are victim you need to allow it (past perhaps the very first time). I believe it is true for affairs too. When you at the whole relationship there is often some problems there in the first place. It doesn't mean there is no responsabity for the one who has an affair but that being black and white does not help.

OMG its great that you are starting to feel better about yourself - and not so great that you have been told that you werent that attractive or amusing. I think sometimes its a case of being your own best friend. Thats what I have found anyway.

edwardoreric i think your story is another example of affairs actually making people take stock. The same thing happened to me with my first husbands affair but what it did for me was highlight how unhappy we both were being married to each other.

Its strange this link as its really the first one of its kind I have come across on MN - not that I have looked very hard if im honest but its the first time on this forum that a group of women have come on here to say what its like on the other side of an affair, its bad points and its good.

anyone else agree?

I agree deb, I think people have been afraid of being 'told off' before and this thread has allowed /encouraged more open,less coformist opinions to be exprssed.

expressed, even!

Absolutely Aislingorla which is exactly what a forum is for, being able to speak freely. Did you see the other thread where someone was asking where WWIFN was? it seems to have disappeared as has WWIFN.

Can I also ask, apologies now if I should know the answer to this question, but why are some of the posts deleted my mumsnet, my own included by the way? Not sure what was said that was offensive etc?

I think that marriage is the most difficult committment as its non-stop 24-7 and sometimes things that should be discussed just arent or cant be for various reasons. People grow apart and sometimes just cant get back on track, hence the looking outside of their relationship.

I woudl agree SGG with what you said about monogamy and in fact feel it wholly applies to ex husband. I dont think he will ever settle down with one woman and remain faithful to her, in fact I wonder how often he cheated before we were married to be honest

We've just recieved a MN email about the deleting of posts on this very thread, did you get it deb?
A new one in support of When (and veryy,very 'cross' with anyone who disagreed with them) has been removed also.

"Absolutely Aislingorla which is exactly what a forum is for, being able to speak freely"

Not about the character assasination of a poster who has only ever tried to help. Honestly the way some of you have behaved on this thread is vile.

If you don't like the fact that MNHQ has deleted your posts (Thank Fuck they have) then maybe you shouldn't post here anymore?

GOOD MANNERS AND DECENCY DICTATE THAT YOU DID NOT NEED GO ON THAT THREAD TO DISAGREE WITH THE PEOPLE ON IT, YOU ALREADY HAD YOUR OWN SPACE TO DO THAT HERE!

Honestly don't know why I have to keep explaining that to you . You deserved and were quite rightly told where to go aislingorla.

Shirley, I think the email was telling us we can post on all threads and express our opinions just not to personalise it. They also recoginise that some posters dominate the Relationship threads.