My old flame

[IThinkImMad]

Recently an old boyfriend got back in touch with me through Facebook. I'll go straight to the back story. He was my first sexual partner. I was 19 when we met. We were together for about two years. At the time he was a student and a heavy drinker. He was lovely when he was sober. He's a great talker and very charming. He often told me he loved me. He was really unreliable and eventually I saw sense and broke up with him. He tried to get back in touch with me a few times in the following year but I suppose he gave up eventually when I didn't respond.

I met my now DH the following year and we have been married for 16 years. We have 2 young children. DH is a lovely man and a great dad.

Our sex life has never been anything but mediocre and has diminished a lot in recent years. We might have sex once a week but sometimes not for weeks on end. I haven't had an orgasm through sex for years. It's partly because I'm on antidepressants (I had PND and then other things going on) which have effected my libido and partly because I don't really get turned on by DH anymore.

I think I still love him although I am finding him more and more irritating recently. We are generally happy enough and don't row much. My family thinks that we are the perfect couple. But there is just no oomph left between us. Sometimes I feel like I'm living with my irritating but loveable brother. But in our almost 20 years together, I have never even looked at another man.

So the old boyfriend got back in touch. We chatted on and off for a few weeks and caught up on one another's lives. He is divorced with 2 children. He lives in London. Our online chats got more and more frequent and we started flirting. He told me he regretted his behaviour at the time we were together and that 'I was the one that got away'. We also spoke on the phone and honestly some of our conversations made my stomach flip (in a good way!). We spoke about meeting up and also about sleeping together. We eventually arranged to meet up a couple of months ago but I chickened out and cancelled.

Last week I was visiting London for a few days and we arranged to meet up again. I ended up back at his flat and we slept together. I managed to see him twice more before I had to leave. It was lovely to see him again and my God, he's a fantastic kisser. I haven't had a snogging session like it since I first met DH.

We have said we will try to see other again but we live so far apart that realistically it won't be for months and months. There is absolutely no chance of it ever developing into something more. But I can't stop thinking about him. I think I could actually fall in love with him this time.

I know cheating is wrong and that my DH would be devastated if he found out. I also know that I'm putting our family at risk.

There is no way I would ever leave my husband. I'm not really happy but my life is very comfortable. I know I am being an absolute bitch. I didn't know I had it in me to be so deceitful. It's not a nice thing to realise about yourself.

I don't want to tell anyone IRL but I need to talk or I might blurt it out to someone. So come and talk to me. Tell me I'm a terrible person. Ask me questions. Don't be too horrible but talk to me.

I hope to God your DHdoes not find out and you have the chance to try to repair your marriage.

I think your former bf sees you as 'the one that got away' and it has nagged at him. Getting you to sleep with him made HIM feel good.

You sound so bored with your comfortable, secure 'perfect' life but if it were swept away I suspect you would be devastated. As other people have suggested, it's time you gave your loyal and loving DH a chance. Time you booked that weekend away I think. And please OP, tell me you used a condom?

Yes we used a condom. I deleted all messages on FB as I went along and I'm not actually friends with him on FB. Once I've told him that it's over, I'll block him so he can't message me. I've also deleted any calls or messages from him on my phone. No one IRL knows so there is no way for DH to find out except through the ex himself.

To answer the question, why did I start the thread? I don't want to tell anyone IRL but I need to talk about it so I thought MN would be a good place to get it out. The level of vitriol from some posters has surprised me. I can't believe anyone would feel that strongly about the wrongdoings of a stranger on the internet. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised really, it is MN after all!

However there have been some really good useful posts that have made me think. Acrossthepond55, how did you get to be so wise? I wish I knew you in real life. You're right, he is a good, decent man and I realise there would be no shortage of women to fill my shoes.

I won't tell DH. I don't think there is any point in hurting him. But we do need to talk which can be difficult to get him to do. He's a bit stressed at work at the moment so it's not an ideal time. We are going on holiday next week so maybe I'll get a chance when we are away.

You were surprised by the vitriol of some posters? Why? I'm just surprised that you haven't had more, because quite frankly I find it the highest level of insensitivity to gloat about your tawdry affair on a forum that has so many people who are desperately trying to recover from being utterly betrayed and heartbroken by their other halves. You seem like a selfish, selfish woman and you do not deserve your husband.

Your attitude is quite breath-taking.

The level of vitriol from some posters has surprised me.

What? On a relationships board??

She didn't gloat. She asked for help.

Since when was MN only a place for women who had been left or whose partners were unfaithful?

To call someone 'low life' for 1 slip up says more about the posters than the OP.

Thank god none of you want to be counsellors for a living- you'd not even get beyond the first selection interview.

If the Relationships forum is only for 'victims' then it should say that. I thought it was to offer support and so forth to anyone who needed it. silly old me.

It is lowlife behaviour to do what this woman has done. if I had done it, i would accept the epithet with good grace

I have exhibited some low life behaviours in my life, and i have taken full responsibility for them

Yup, OP. I had a feeling you wouldn't be telling your husband. Wouldn't want to ruin your "comfortable" lifestyle, would we ? The poor sap has no idea of the battle he is fighting. Shockingly selfish behaviour from you.

A lot of people come on Relationships because they have been cheated on, so they get to pour the vitriol they feel about their cheating partners onto people who write that they are having affairs.

It probably makes them feel momentarily better.

I haven't been cheated on in the last 25 years, so cut that out

Nor have I, but if I had cheated in my DH and felt the need to post about it on a forum like this I certainly wouldn't be smugly be telling people about how fantastic the sex was, leaving my husband as a footnote.

I don't know about wise Ithink, but I'm old enough to have seen a whole lot of life and the devastation caused by the things we do to the ones we love. And I've been very lucky in that I've learned from my mistakes AND the mistakes of others.

Yes, there's been a lot of vitriol. IMO, there is nothing worse than being cheated on except physical abuse and those two run pretty neck and neck in my book.

BUT, ladies, now that we've given Ithink our opinions, I think we should step back a second and see what she does with them. Personally, I'm of the 'cast the first stone' mentality. I've never been unfaithful to my DH, but I've hurt him at times in other ways so I'm no innocent. I agree with Pinkfrocks, if Ithink has seen the error of her ways and truly realizes that she has fucked up royally & intends to make amends (by her actions) to her DH, then I'll support her. I don't think she posted to brag or to blow smoke up any of our skirts. Nor do I think she was looking for 'congratulations'.

The ball is in her court. She'll either live up to her marriage vows or she will not. The rewards for rebuilding her marriage or the punishment for its destruction are all on her shoulders. Not a burden I'd want to have on mine.

Ineedabiggerboat, I haven't gloated or boasted about what I did. This is an Internet forum, people can pretty much post what they want, but I don't think I've been unreasonable to post about my marriage and affair on a Relationship forum.

As I've already said, I don't want to tell anyone in real life but I want to hear people's opinions and get a perspective from another point of view.

Of course you are perfectly entitled to your opinion of me, but I don't think I've done anything wrong by posting on this forum.

I'm out. I should never have posted to begin with as I usually try to let these "I'm having an affair oh poor me what should I do" threads pass me by, but the way you have been SO self absorbed just cut through me in a way that others haven't done before. I never said people who've had affairs shouldn't post here but I also don't think that showing an inkling of sensitivity and awareness of what many other posters here are going through would have gone amiss, that's all.
I truly hope you will be able to make amends to your husband and children and live up to the standards other, nicer MN-ers think you're capable of.

She didn't gloat.

"my God, he's a fantastic kisser. I haven't had a snogging session like it since I first met DH."

"my DH would be devastated if he found out... There is no way I would ever leave my husband... my life is very comfortable"

She asked for help

"I don't want to tell anyone IRL but I need to talk or I might blurt it out to someone. So come and talk to me"

I'm not sure where she asks for help.

Is "only" the internet and yet people care.
They come and spend their time sharing their experiences and emotions.

OP - you will do what you have to do, the lesson is that anyone who would have found out about your affair could make comments like those on here, in your presence and behind your back.

It hurts - but you can't control how others feel. Better to get that reaction in the virtual world than in real one.

Just wanted to add a different perspective. Both my parents had affairs when I was young (and then again when I was a teenager actually) and I don't hate either of them.

I understand that my parents have emotional and sexual needs not related to me and was never badly affected by it. Obviously it would have been better if they hadn't. But neither were happy in the relationship and I don't hold it against them.

do you think you might have felt differently if the affairs were only on one side, and the other partner was completely unaware of it, strawberry ?

My stbx is having an affair and our teenage children are going through hell trying to understand it all.

I would urge you to look at what you have and what you are throwing away. Is it really worth destroying lives for? I am sure that anyone can rekindle what they once had in their marriage if their heart is in it. It doesn't seem to me that there is anything that is not solvable?

I know cheating is wrong and that my DH would be devastated if he found out. I also know that I'm putting our family at risk.

Having this knowledge and then being comprehensively dismissive of it is very cold hearted, and as others have said, self-absorbed. It is my guess that others will be equally dismissive of your distress when the poop hits the fan.

Children hating parents It's a shame that some posters can't see beyond their own experiences and understand that their reactions are unique to them.

My late MIL had an affair for over 30 years. DH and his brother were aware of it as teens when it began. They never stopped loving her and helping her when she became infirm, and when she died not long ago as an old lady- with the OM still on the scene - the family bore no malice.

I also have several close friends whose parents- either one or both- had affairs and again they didn't judge or take sides.

Yes, people respond differently - so don't give the OP such a black and white reaction. It's your reaction - it doesn't always apply to all families.

it's a rather large risk to take though, isn't it ?

just for a grubby fumble ?

My DPs ex had affairs in the past which he stayed with her after. He didn't find out at the time, but after they were over.

However in the end it was too much for him to 'get over' and the result was a very long drawn out acrimonious split.

Please don't think OP that just because your DH doesn't find out now that he won't in the future.

OH and like you in the end it came out that it was the 'very confortable' lifestyle that she wanted to preserve rather than because she wanted to be with her then DP.

sorry- but where did the words 'grubby fumble' appear?

When I wrote them.