Moving from being the OW to being his girlfriend...

[beingmyself]

I've got my flameproof suit on and will start by saying I know being in an affair is a selfish and cruel thing to do. I did it. He did it. We decided we wanted to be together so after having an affair for several months we both left our spouses. He has moved out and so has my h.
We are not living together though and are not intending to for a while. We are also still secret and will remain so for some time.

Is anyone who has been there brave enough to come and talk to me about the highs and lows of finally getting to be together? I knew it would continue to be a rollercoaster and would really appreciate anyone who's willing to talk about it with me to do so here or to PM me!

Thanks

op

Out of curiosity, how would it make you feel if your XH told you he'd been having an affair while you were together? Relieved? Upset? Justified?

There are a lot of people on here banging on about karma, once a cheater always a cheater, you deserve unhappiness etc. That's all rubbish. Every relationship is different and no one not in the situation can know what it's like or know what'll happen, they're just projecting.

But.. While relationships born out of affairs can last, the dynamic can change so greatly when you become public that it can cause things to fail.
Take your time and try to protect all the DCs involved.

Good luck

I know of two couples who divorced as the result of affairs.

My (from aeons ago)ex boyfriend's dad had an affair. He is married to the other woman and has been for 20 years. Entire extended family seem very happy and close.

My good friend's husband left her for the OW when my friend had a small baby. He has married the OW, they're very happy still 10 years on & my friend has remarried too. No animosity between them.

Well bant - funny you say that as my h actually gave me the "I love you but I'm not in love with you" so I had wondered if he'd been playing away but I don't think so... Having said that he is as much 'not the type' as me. Which just shows there is no type!

If he was playing away I would feel "why wasn't I good enough?" but I wouldn't feel bitte or angry. We don't work together. As long as whoever ends up with my STBX is good to the DCs that's all I can ask for and all I have a right in now we are separated...

Well, OP has an opportunity to build the new relationships. Whether continued lying is going to feature is up to her. But I can only see complications if STBX is unaware of the new life she is moving towards. The DC may not need to know the full details at this stage (it does depend so much on age), but getting everything out to STBX may cause short term pain, but gives an honest foundation to the next stage. And allows him to be a full participant, not a continuing dupe.

I think the key seems to be avoiding any unnecessary animosity with the partner you are breaking up with. No blame. Show kindness.

line - I have a very good friend who is a child pyschologist and have talked a lot to her about affect on children and her main advice (which is obvious really) is to maintain a good relationship with the other parent. So far that looks to be possible and yes I am worried if I tell h the truth that that will not be possible. Because he is in a good emotional place and wants to split too I genuinely don't think it would do any good to tell him.

You still don't get it do you? Tell your husband and tell your children too. You are deluding yourself you think it is helping, your lying. Or finish the affair. Sort out your separation. Then when you're divorced, if you still feel the same, then is the time to start a new romance. Stop hurting those you are morally responsible for.

beingmyself - be careful how you manage the telling him thing. On the one hand, I understand that you want to protect you H & the relationship between you to a certain extent - but on the other hand if he finds out later, then your relationship may be damaged very badly indeed - which as you rightly point out is not in the best interests of your children.

How likely is it that he would find out. Are there people who know you & your OM who also know your H? Have you told anyone at all in RL that you have been having an affair? Information will haemorrhage out, if there is any information out there.

As someone whose H left them for the OW, in an odd kind of a way, it was better to have it all out in one hit so to speak. It was ghastly, horrific & felt like essential organs were being removed from me - but at least it happened all at once & I didn't go through some fake leaving with talk of non-compatibility & then discover some time after the event that he'd been boffing someone else.

I agree that unless you have told no one else, these things do come out eventually. I was told things about my parents affairs as a 30 year old, by an aunt. (I asked her to be honest with me and she was) I then started asking other people questions and I found out a lot of things.

It's not nice to find out you've been lied to all your life. So unless you can guarantee your H and children will never find out the truth, you should tell them about when you started this new relationship. (Of course that depends on the DCs ages)

Sorry but it's ridiculous to ask adults to stop seeing their new partner until a divorce is finalised. The op is no longer with her dh. They are separated. There is no need for her to 'be single' either as a front, or as reality.

People break up and move on all the time. Given that op is already in the new relationship, there's no benefit in her pretending not to be now just to tick some 'correct marriage ending behaviour' boxes as randomly dictated by others.

If they were mutual friends while married (sorry I've only read the first 100 or so posts and not sure if this came out at some point) then when the OP and new man 'move in' together or come out publicly, there will always be suspicion that they were having an affair anyway. So they'll have to choose to lie to people 'oh no, we'd both been separately single for a while after mutually separating coincidentally at the same time'

or cut pretty much all ties with anyone from the past who knows their exes (friends, family etc) - and it will still get back to their exes. People will gossip, people will make (true) assumptions, and it could all just get worse.

OP while you don't want to hurt your ex, and your OM doesn't want to hurt his - it is incredibly highly probably that they'll come to that conclusion anyway, that you were both cheating.

I'm not going to say you should tell them the truth, that's down to you and your other half. But it will come out at some point, or you can potentially spend the rest of your lives lying to everyone - including your DC. Which will put it's own pressure on your relationship. And then it will still come out, years down the line. Some facebook photo, someone putting 2 and 2 together, someone just assuming that's what happened and telling people - it'll come out. And what you've got to think is, will it have been worth all the deception in the meantime to save your Ex a bit of justified anger, when that very deception could ruin what you could potentially have with the new man?

Think about it, do it by letter, whatever. You won't be financially penalised because it was an affair, rather than irreconcilable differences, that caused the divorce.

It's probably best for you to be honest in the long run.

I agree it'll come out eventually.

I think the most hurtful thing for children sometimes can be to find out from someone else. Or to slowly work it out for themselves. And then to have it minimised by the responsible parent, or feel too emotionally afraid to ask about it.

There are a lot of threads on this Board testifying to this.

Agree with all the posters saying be honest OP.

I found out my ex had been having an emotional/physical affair when I told him I was pregnant. I'd had suspicions previously and he'd followed 'the script' (if only I'd known about it then!) by calling me insecure, jealous, irrational etc.
He picked fights with me, was hyper critical and basically admitted later that he was too cowardly to finish things
Meanwhile I was making excuses for his crappy behaviour and trying to be the 'perfect partner'...

He's now living with OW and although I hope it works out for them (all the pain and upheaval has to be worth something)

The lies were worse for me. Being made a fool of. The humiliation.
It's completly battered my self esteem and I'm now on ADs and in therapy.

Telling the truth won't be easy, but long term it will be better for all concerned.

As an aside, my dad had an affair with my mum's best friend. The fallout was immense - she had kids the same age and gender as me and my siblings. He moved in with them. They are still happily together 40-odd years later but none of us kids is married, 2 of us are estranged from the other parent of our kids, one is a commitment-phobe and another is in a marriage to someone that treats them like rubbish a lot of the time... Coincidence?

I'm not suggesting that my parents wouldn't have split, but the lies, deceit and hurt have stayed with me, and I think affected my ability to meet a decent partner.
Hopefully something I'll resolve in therapy.

Be honest OP, there will be fallout, but not nearly as bad as it could be if you're not.

I hope things work out for you.

Just don't lend him money!!!!!!

My OW became my ex, became my GF, then became my DW

It was discovered and that was difficult.
Living together was cool as is marriage.

We sorted out finance carefully; worked out likely issues (why was she OW etc.)

Still married, never strayed again, nor think likely to. So don't worry all that much about trusting him

Children can put a strain on things.

Bogeyface, of course you have the right to post what you want. For clarification, I was talking about my relationship. Nobody else can know what that was like as they weren't in it. Ditto yours and everybody else's. I'm sorry that your husband kept on lying and didn't take the chances offered.

I don't to come across as a supporter of affairs; I've said many times that I am not, yet I can't ignore the pain of the people involved in them, I just can't and I have my reasons for that. My friend is a shadow of herself and it makes me very sad.

At least OP's relationship has been ended - as has other man's. Both parties are free to move on and the lies have stopped. I don't know what the benefits are of telling of an affair; what's to be gained by that? People end relationships all the time and I think they have the right to privacy of the reasons, even to former partners. Once relationships have ended, there's nothing really left to say and further disclosures can just cause immense pain when there was no need for them.

I think if OP and her partner can decide on a strategy with their former partners, to introduce the children at some point, they can move forward with their own relationship. I can understand the 'secrecy' for now; it would be the same if either of them had met somebody new, not necessarily the other man/woman.

The OW in my marriage was the OW in someone else's marriage, a couple of years prior. It appears she has a penchant for other people's husbands (OW in 2 marriages that then broke down, by the age of 29) but then gets bored of them when reality kicks in a couple of years down the line, and moves onto someone else's husband. I suspect the thrill and excitement of the affair, and the feeling of 'success' at 'winning' someone else's husband is far more of a motivation than actual love.

So basically, all 3 of them are the sort of person who will cheat on their spouse, and because there is a child from the first marriage, they are all inextricably linked for life, and I really think they deserve each other.

So, OP, as you and your new partner are both the sort of people who will cheat on their spouse / leave for someone else, I think you deserve each other too. Lucky escape for your exes.

P.S. I was convinced it was all my fault as whassisface just said he thought we had marital problems (6 months after our wedding, 12 months after he started his affair). To find out the truth off OW's H, who found out by accident, was actually a relief as I thought we had a great relationship and was tearing myself to pieces. So man up, stop being so fucking selfish and tell your poor partners the truth so they can actually understand and try and move on, they deserve that much at least.

Not telling exW and exH is a good thing. Why make things more complicated?

Don't expect it to be plain sailing at the outset. As others have said, you will both be grieving your marriage. Also you'll both need to get to know each other all over again. Real life is just so different to affair life.

Take it so so slowly, don't put pressure on it having to work out. Just enjoy being BF and GF for a while. And enjoy the rest of your life together

Why are some people having such a go at the OP? I thought that was what you were supposed to do! leave your spouse rather than having an affair! they have left, no what they do is up to them, IMO telling all and sundry will just cause upset and hurt.

I can completely understand the need for keeping things secret. Why throw another relationship into the childrens lives? let them get over the split first, then introduce it gradually.

Good luck OP.

Is NOT your ex's OW lol

But they DID have an affair I'mnot then left and didnt have the decency to tell their respective OH's why. I am sure that the wife and the husband left behind will be going around in circles wondering what they did wrong that made their spouses leave. Being honest about why the marriage is over is the only decent thing to do.

And is your user name indicative of the fact that you have personal experience of this FinallyMrsFC?

Or maybe it just took a while for him to propose

I don't see the point in telling X's, it just makes for a whole load more grief. The marriages are over, no need to pick the scab. Why open it all up again?

If one partner doesn't want the marriage to be over, no matter what they are told, it won't be enough. In the end it doesn't matter who's 'fault' it is, it's over. Move on.