Man's Mid Life Crisis From the OW's Side

[Joy5]

Two years and a bit on from the end of my marriage, i'm starting to wonder what its been like for the OW.

Is it really that much fun to be with a man who's destroyed his family, and his children's happiness? Have all the problems been worth the new relationship?

Will the new relationship even survive long term?

Would just be interested to hear the other side's point of view.

I wouldn't want to be an OW, now second wife though. I'd always feel a bit shifty as if I had to cover things up. Like how I met my husband and how long we'd been together. I wouldn't know whether to tell people the truth or always fudge the dates and that would make me feel uncomfortable. But then I have a very easily disturbed conscience.

I wonder how quickly you would get over self Charlene if your dh cheats on you.

I have to say your post reinforces the stereotype of the cold callous ow perfectly.

If you read the relationships board ever then you can see the horrendous results affairs have for the family left behind. Why couldn't you leave your dh before starting another relationship?

Bloody hell, Firekraken... where were your friends and family in all this? How could they let you slip off the edge like that?

I'm so sorry that you went through that. This thread really isn't about you, you weren't an OW, you were a vulnerable woman who was preyed upon and if ever the 'victim' tag was appropriate, it was for your circumstances. I hope you find peace eventually and can forget this monster.

One of my work colleges was the OW, she rationalised it by convincing herself that his ex never showed him any love, used him to get children and have a cushy life as a SAHM, and that as she is now only bothered about her children and doesn't want a new DP she clearly didn't want a husband and was using him.

It's ridiculous to listen to but she seems to genuinely believe it. Saying that she is quite naive and 17 years younger than him and his exw.

That's really kind lyingwitch. Thankyou.

I have a dysfunctional family. At the time they were no use at all. My parents blanked me. I'm not in contact with them anymore.

My best friend at the time I suppose didn't know what to do as he was her boss too. I think she felt she couldn't do anything in case she lost her job. It was all during the feral times at the BBC that we read about today re Saville etc.

The BBC was a cesspit then.

The same old sad crap has happened from time immemorial though: some OW are just used by married men a)for sex and b)to make their wives feel inadequate and want them back (at which point they try to negotiate a better deal form themselves - anything from more sex, to doing less childcare, to their wives agreeing they can go on two annual holidays with the boys each year)

Abusive men love those kind of games.

I would never have a relationship again now.

and not a day goes by when I don't mourn for my baby

The problem with affairs is that one person takes the unilateral decision to introduce another person into the marriage without the knowledge or consent of their spouse. The minute they do that, they are in the wrong.

It doesnt matter if he is in a sexless marriage, or she feel neglected because of his job. Doesnt matter. If you are unhappy you either face it head on and try to deal with it through counselling etc or you leave.

You dont treat your spouse like a fool and cheat.

Well said!

nocontactforevermore this is what is happening with me now, we only split 6 months ago. Despite finding texts from OW months before we split up. Apparently they were just friends, he just texted her to offload about how hard it was for him when I was going through cancer treatment. He even continued to deny it, when I saw his car outside her house late at night, he was just sleeping on the sofa!!!

He did finally admit they were together 2 months after we split up. Not sure that they will ever admit to the affair either, I suppose you are right that it gives them a story that they can live with, without the guilt. I'm sure eventually they believe there own lies. My dd is 12 so unfortunately she saw all the lies, and she has come to the conclusion that her dad is a liar and a cheat, who has replaced her for another woman and her family - ow has 3 kids one the same age as my dd.

I did ask the Ow when I spoke once to her on the phone, what sort of relationship they were going to have as it had be based on lies in the beginning and didn't she think he would lie to her, like he has to me. Her answer was that their relationship was different and that he would never lie to her as that wasn't the person he was with her - I made him act like that. Bless her I think she's deluded!!!

I think it can sometimes work.
My opinion is the ow/om is damn well welcome to the cheating spouse.

I think looking at it that way is therapeutic.
Who cares if they are happy or not.

Ex-DH and ex-BF had an affair and have been together for about 25 years . We only meet at family occasions but I do speak to them both now because life's too short !When we do meet up if he speaks to me for more than a few minutes she rushes to his side so I guess she still feels insecure. He is quite a bit older than her so she will be the one nursing the old man ! According to DC he is very grumpy with her already

Sand-I think a lot of ow are jealous of the ex, bizzarly enough.

My exs ow gives me looks that could kill unfortunately I don' help her as last time I fell into uncontrollable fits of laughter.

Charlene, it is not about people falling in love with someone else. People fall out of love with their spouses, they meet other people. That happens. It's how you deal with it that determines whether you fit the callous and selfish stereotype or not.

A relationship that ends because it has run its course is a lot less damaging than one that implodes because one half of it has acted with zero integrity and treated them like a fool for weeks/months/years.

I was an OW briefly last year. Both of us are married with children and didn't have any intimacy or passion with our spouses. Of course we both knew that before our relationship started. I thought what I had was 'good enough' and not unusual after 17 years together.

I don't know his situation now I've not seen him for nearly four months and we have had no contact for two months I full expect never to hear from him or see him ever again. We broke contact because we couldn't try to fix our marriages whilst we were in touch with each other. I wasn't in love with him but I loved how he made me feel. I was under no illusions that we were just seeing the best of each other without all the domestic cr*p of real life.

Neither of us were in the relationship to leave our marriages. What we did was wrong and I never intend to tell my DH even if he and I end up apart because I do care deeply for him. I know it's hard for partners to believe when they find out about an affair but people do mad out of character things when in the grip of an infatuation. An affair doesn't necessarily mean that the person having the affair wants out of their primary relationship or that they are inherently a 'bad person'. Good people do bad things sometimes - it's what they do about it after that matters.

I think more of my affair partner because he's trying to fix his marriage. I know he feels very bad about what we did. He is a good man despite how he has behaved. His wife will probably never know about the affair. I think many or even most affairs remain undiscovered but that is just a personal opinion.

Some sweeping statements about the ow on here. Speaking as an ow, i'm afraid there is no 'one size fits all' template. I'm just a 'normal' person who made some seriously bad decisions. I'm not jealous, vengeful or vindictive, though I will give you selfish and entitled.

At the time of my affair with a MM, my dad had just died, and while I wouldn't ever want to bandy that around as any kind of excuse for my behaviour, it was something of a self destructive escape from the reality of what was going on in my life. If I am brutally honest, at the affairs peak, I never gave the wife or the dc involved a moments thought. They didn't feel 'real' to me. It is only since the affair ended that I think about them and feel terrible.

Dizzy you were not the other women you were abused.

yy PinkFlamingo

talksomesense... I can totally understand that MM would have offered a distraction for you, from your pain and there is absolutely no 'template' of a person, OW, MM or anybody.

I know a woman who had an OM who she left her H for and who she is now living with and has a DC with. I often wonder how they can be happy, but I saw them before Christmas and they have both invented this story (fantasy) that they both seem fully signed up to. Eg, the ExH was an abusive person, was cheating on her anyway (he wasn't) that the OM actually rescued her from that situation.

I watched the whole thing happen and that's not what happened. It left a lot of heartbreak and pain, but the woman and the OM have weaved themselves a whole story about it which they repeat daily and to everyone around them, in which they are the heroes.

I was the OW, sort of in the sense that we didn't have a long affair - he left his partner a couple of weeks after things happened between us. I would never, ever have expected to be an OW and certainly didn't set out to be. I think it's simplistic to say there's a 'type'.

We had been friends for a few years. He was in a relationship but didn't have kids. It was clear they weren't happy - he was pretty awful about her behind her back. In retrospect I don't know how I could be attracted to someone who behaved like this towards his partner, but I had a thing about him for years. I didn't pursue him, I tried to ignore my feelings for him and had relationships with other people. Then one might we got drunk and he told me he loved me. We ended up in bed.

Once he'd left his partner it was a complete car crash. I felt terrible guilt about his ex. Mutual friends blamed me completely, as though I'd deliberately lured him and he was just a poor, helpless bloke and he did nothing to discourage that view - he obviously enjoyed being blameless. He was emotionally and verbally abusive and basically treated me like trash. He also turned out to be a very heavy user of porn and the sex started becoming porny and a bit creepy. I stuck it out for 6 months then walked. Utter, utter disaster ending in misery for all 3 of us.