New 'boyfriend' is married and has two children WWYD?

[MissNJE]

Hello,

I broke up nearly two months ago with my fiancée (He hid the fact that he was 280k in debt etc.) and although I thought it wouldnt happen so quickly I met somebody new a few weeks ago. Everything is great, however he never wants to meet me at the weekend as he says he is busy. But he told me yesterday that he is married with two children but they are separated and only live together for the children's sake. Just to explain: he has a flat in Central London and I assumed it was his 'bachelor' pad but at the weekend he lives with his family in Surrey.

I really like this guy but I am not sure if I should believe him. I wonder if I should ask him if I can speak to his wife. I feel slightly uncomfortable about the whole situation. If I was his wife I surely wouldn't want to spend the weekends with him while during the week he sleeps is with his new girlfriend.

WWYD?

Sorry for spelling but quickly tipping from iPad.

This man has been testing you out.

Probably because he is practised at this, he was waiting to see how long it would take you to wonder why he was unavailable at the weekends. He knows that most emotionally healthy women would have worked this out or would have made absolutely sure he was single before getting involved with him.

He therefore thinks your lack of curiosity is either naivety or not wanting to know, because you liked him so much. So he said nothing and got you hooked, knowing that you are so vulnerable that you'd find it hard to walk away once the truth was out - even after a few weeks.

This man has played you and should be dumped forthwith, obviously. A man who cared about you would have been honest right from the start.

But what you really need help with is to understand yourself and to work on those aspects of yourself that make you a magnet for unscrupulous and unethical men, who can spot their next victim a mile off.

Op, well done for taking the decision to break from from your fiancé, I think I remember your thread.
This chap is having you on. He has a crash pad in London and he has a family home outside. Not sure he needs a crash pad as many commute from Surrey, but clearly he has found a use for it. His wife has no idea, and I woud bet a lo of money it's a surprise to her he is only there for the dc. And are you going to wait 10-20 years for the dc to grow up, sitting alone in your flat whilst your friends have families, waiting for him to call? Or will he get bored with your nagging to leave her as you want a family and dump you for a younger model? He is being an arse even asking you to do that. If he gave a monkeys about you he wouldn't have slept with you and he would not spend time with you to allow you to find someone else. Please don't do that to yourself.

I also don't like the sound of your mates. A bf wouldn't say that imo. Have you known them long? Are they bf because of habit? Tbh, if they are all in settled relationships you need other single friends to go out with and do stuff with at weekends and holidays.

Could you expand your social circle by joining a club ( tennis?) or taking up Zumba or something? Or learning to skate or anything that takes you away from the places you go where these men I are- I suspect high end bars and clubs full of these types of men. You need the gastro pubs packed of singles in fulham or something ( I think you are in London?) Plus your own age and single fun status?

Text him, say you are busy and think when he has left his wife, sorted his divorce and had a year or freedom you might rethink.maybe. Unlikely, as he will be skint as she will have ( hopefully, the arse) all his money.

Your friend is studying psychology, not a soothsayer. She isn't your counsellor and has a lot of her own hang ups, do not rely on her judgement.

Get some proper counselling from some one with qualifications. Get out there and enjoy your life. Don't look for men or be desperate and you have far more chance of meeting a nice one.

Yes if his story was bona fide and he had nothing to hide, he would have mentioned it on the first date. He has waited til you were hooked and suddenly you have discovered you are some bloke with a wife and kids' mistress!

They say there are only seven original plots in stories...and...surprise surprise...there are only seven bullshit plots that married men use to explain their relationships with their wives:

• We never have sex - she is frigid/ugly/in labour/not as sexy as you
• I couldn't leave her...she's too ill (good one this cos it makes you sound available and caring at the same time)
• We stay together for sake of the children (again, nice guy really then!)
• My wife doesn't understand me
• We have an open relationship - she's fine with it
• It doesn't make sense financially to get divorced
• What wife? I'm single...honestly

Anyone entering a relationship with a married man should expect to hear one of these or a variant thereof.

I had a friend who had an affair with someone at work. He was "separated but still living in the marital home for the sake of the youngest child who was about to go to secondary school"

She even had a child by him, who he was actively involved in bringing up. I think her daughter was 12 before she finally accepted that she should stop waiting for him to leave his wife and make a commitment to her (and their daughter).

Run.

There is a name for this type of dysfunctional triangle, it is called the three legged stool, the OW are often codependant women who grew up with poor Father relationships if at all, at least OP you don't fit the OW profile of Spider Woman, now they are proper bitches.

Look don't take your friend's comment as something that a solid statement, everyone changes, it's just requires insight and the will to change.

You are very young and seem to have a view about what success in life looks like. If you spend time on these boards you know that people in relationships can be very unhappy that certainly isn't a 'success'. Also your earlier 20's are a very different time to your late 20's. I really believe that adult group up after 27 or so.

If your friends are 'successful' now it won't always be that way.That's the benefit of being older we have that experience.

I get that you are lonely - work on that..don't use a man to fulfill that need.

PS Well done on breaking up with Mr Big Debt, that was a very sensible decision.

I agree with Fell on this one and I think OP is getting a bit of a harsh time here (I know, I know, tough love and all that...)

To me the simplest thing to do is to 'have a break' in your relationship until he sorts his family situation out. See where that takes you.

Oh and I do agree it never hurts to work on your self esteem

I agree he is probably feeding you a line, his life is definately complex, do you need a man with all that baggage at your age?

Go out, join a club, get some girlfriends and stop looking for a man - you are 22 if you live till 85-90 thats a bloody long time to be with the same man

I didnt settle down until my 30s and my mum told my best friend (unhelpfully) that I was "desperate to meet someone" she couldnt have been more wrong - being on my own had its downs but also its ups - I was keen to meet the right person, there were a hell of a lot of men I rejected along the way for one reason or another.

OP - dump him, he might be telling you the truth, but if he is, then it means he's a bit of an emotional fuckwit - they are already running two houses and he's not there in the week, so if he really is staying 'for the children' it really means "even though we've separated our finances, I'm not there in the week, we've done the emotional separation as a couple, but are just too scared to tell the children and our families the decisions we as two adults have taken."

So the best case senario - he's emotionally a bit of a child and you will always be second place to him saving face amongst his friends and family.

More likely, this "we are only staying for the children" would be news to his wife who just thinks she's married to a man who has to stay in London during the week for work, but comes home every weekend and they are very much still together.

If it was me, I'd say you need a few months alone completely, turn down invites for dates, don't just start looking for another long term relationship because that's what you think you need now, what you need is to get over your last boyfriend.

If you continue with this man you will still be jealous of your friends successful relationships because yours will be going nowhere.

Seeing a man who goes home to wifey every weekend will end in tears for you.

"the whole wife and children thing is putting me off a little bit".........

A LITTLE BIT?!?!? Are you for real????!!!!!!!

One day you'll be on a relationship with children....you better hope your man is more decent than this one and that he doesn't meet a woman like you.

Do you really need advice to see what is going on???

Please do the decent thing and walk (no, make that run) away.

OP - is your friend who anaylsed you the same age? 22, you said she studied psycology, not working in it? I would hazard a guess she's that most dangerous thing, someone who's studied a bit and thinks they now know it all!

You can not look at someone at your age (or younger if it wasn't recent she said that) and know how they will do career wise or romantically. Some of the people who seemed the most 'together' romantically when we graduated are now divorced, those who'd had a succession of doomed romances and dating traumas through uni, are in their 30s and happily settled.

BTW - as a bit of anecdotal evidence - I met my (now) dh when I was 31.

That was the year that I finally stopped looking for and being worried about the lack of a boyfriend.

I had broken up with a serious boyfriend the year before and was then worried about whether I'd ever have a serious boyfriend .

Interestingly, once I stopped worrying and started being comfortable with being on my own and having fun with friends, I then had about three "expressions of interest" within a period of about a month - none of them that I was interested in following up on I was having too much fun

It was a few months later that I met (now) dh and got to know him as a friend first, before he became my boyfriend :)

I like him, but the whole wife and children thing is putting me off a little bit.

Are you having a laugh? Seriously...are you?

OP, I was in a similar situation to you when I was 18, it doesn't end well. I'm 26 now and I still struggle with what I did to that shitbags wife and children. It's left me paranoid and although I am now married with two children, having a fling with a married man really fucks you up.

There's nice men out there but take time to find who you are. And to love YOURSELF. When you do that, you will find it easier to find someone who truly loves you, not someone who wants a cheap and quick fuck. You're worth more than that.

Gees, when I was 22 I'd have run a mile from any man who had two kids, much less was married.

OP, please, please give yourself some space and start having an affair with yourself! You're worth more than tossers.

He's not seperated. He's still married in every sense of the word. Or has that been pointed out to you now?

Sorry - guilt of heinous sin of not reading whole thread.

If he is married in any context ( ie: a happy marriage or a unhappy one) - he is someone else's husband, not your 'boyfriend'. That makes you not his 'girlfriend' but at best his 'mistress' or 'other woman'.
If that description sits comfortably with you and all the implications, baggage and stress that goes with it only you know.

If you want to be in a relationship with a man who is open and honest with you from the word go- he isn't it.' I'm married with 2 kids ' should of been clear up front. Ego made him think he would make you fall for him a bit, then when he told you, the lies / deceit ( towards his family)would matter as little to you as they do him.

He's kidding himself as well as you, if he didn't realise that was a big omission. His poor wife won't have a clue how he describes their relationship to others either.

I would run , run, run before I allowed myself to be undervalued by myself and your 'boyfriend' .....

Expatinscotland has a point, have an affair with yourself, love yourself, enjoy your company, go out of your way to do nice things for you.

Incidentally, if all your mates are also in their early 20s and all think that because they've got a boyfriend now their relationship life is now sorted forever, I've got news for them.

he has a flat which he uses but at the weekend he is in surrey? they are together for the sake of the children? it doesn't make scenes to me i would run a mile to be honest. also staying together for the children is not healthy at all. but i think they are still together and he uses his flat for other woman so he isn't lonely in the week then at the weekend goes to his family who think he is perfect and probably tells his wife how much he has missed her and loves her and takes her presents.

you will probably not be able to talk to the wife. "oh you don't want to do that." "she is busy tonight." "she doesn't answer her phone after a certain time." "lets go out or do something else" you get the idea. why would they be together for the sake of the children when he has a flat? maybe his wife doesn't know about the flat.

I hate to be defined by having a man in my life. I love independence. I have never understood Velcro couples, and i do have a good friend like that. I remember being frustrated that being in a couple seemed to just stop her from still being her, on her own. If i was constantly with someone all the time it would send me mad, i like breathing space. Hopefully you can sort out nights out with your friends and they can spend time with you, days out etc

Enjoy your freedom now. Take up new interests and meet new people. Do not go rushing headlong into another disaster. He is with his wife and family at the weekends, make no mistake. And she probably knows nothing about you.