Why would anyone become the OW?

[StillAgainstTheWind]

I am mystified as to why any woman would knowingly become the OW.

My friend's marriage was destroyed by her DH's affair last year. Why would any woman choose to sleep with a married man especially one with children?

Statiscally I imagine those affairs that end in a happy, faithful marriage between the affair partners are a tiny minority.

Getting a shag from a single bloke isn't fucking difficult. If a woman is just after sex there's plenty of options other than a married man.

And if it's the soulmates bullshit, well it takes a lot of fucking steps to get to the point of feeling that way.

The reality for most is, I would guess, a snatched hour or two of furtive fucking. Lots of time waiting around for a call or text. Being let down at the last minute.

Why would anyone settle for so little? You hear of women who wait years for the man to leave and he never does. Their whole life on hold waiting for an event that doesn't happen.

How is it justified by OW morally. The man is the one who made the vows I guess?

My friend's husband was a knob anyway and was thinking with his dick. But he didn't make the OW any promises and months later I can't see the appeal for her.

I have jut come out of a terrible situation where I was the OW and I am now pregnant. I didn't know I was the OW for a while and he lied and said they just lived together as couldn't afford to sell the house, he lied about everything- fake name etc. When I found out I stayed with him for a while (3 months), his wife found out and now he wants to be with me but I'm not prepare to go there. I don't want to be with a lying cheater at all.
I am deeply hurt and so is his poor wife, on top of that we both have children so his kids with her are hurt because he's left and my kids are hurt because we've split and on top of that I'm having a baby alone.
No good can come of the situation as far as I can tell, I'm deeply ashamed of my part in the situation and I would never knowingly get involved with a married man.

Jillyarmeen thank you, wishing you all the very best too . It is totally awful isn't it? I will never recover from this fully, unfortunately.

It is also very clear from latter posts that the grass isn't always greener.

Somebody asked upthread if any of the OW on here ever apologised for what they have done. From my point of view as a cheated on wife, I think that could possibly have made a difference if we had had a different OW who hadn't been trying to destroy my marriage for years. I accept that these things do happen, that people fall in love, that all marriages aren't perfect and that sometimes a new partner is better suited. I do think how you treat the person left behind makes a huge difference, that you show some respect and apologise for the utter destruction you've caused. What you don't do is lay the blame at the wife's door, abuse her in the foulest manner, cause untold emotional damage to the children involved and generally behave like utter arseholes because you've been caught out. Hold your hands up, be truthful and apologise. Just my opinion....

I am so sorry you were treated that way FormidableMrsC. Nobody especially the poor wife deserves tht treatment in this situation. I'm my case I did have contact from his wife and I was nothing but apologetic, it seems he is a very good lie to both myself and her. I think it take a unique type of home wrecker that can be the OW and have no remorse for the primary family. I am wracked with regret and guilt about his wife and children, but like I said I didn't know initially that I was the OW and I was already in love etc when I found out and did t feel I could leave him. In retrospect I should have left him then and there.
I would never put myself in a situation like this again an if I even had the smaller doubt in a relationship I would go with my gut feeling and not just put it down to stress/ work/ family problems etc like I allowed him to when we got together.
I now have a beautiful child to look forward to and while I hate him for what he has done to me, I have such a wonderful gift of life that I can't regret ever meeting him. I do however feel remorseful for the pain it most certainly has caused others.

I haven't read all of the comments, sorry, but here is what I think.

I think in certain circumstances, a man and woman can be forced together with opportunity (working together closely) and probably that attracrion creeps up on them without any origional intent to steal anyone's husband.

To be very honest, I would really hate to be in that position if I ever fell in love with someone who was already married - but I would hope I would not be able to actually do anything about it.

I do think there is a certain breed of person though, who just genuinely does not give a fuck about anyone else. They seriously just don't. They can compartmentalise and tell themselves whatever the heck they like and they might fancy the thrill and excitement or just see something they want and go after it.

They are genuine scum, and I think (sadly) as I get older the world is made up of at leats 50% of those sorts of people.

I used to have a friend who had been single for a while. We were late twenties.
I remember her saying one day that she used to think a man was out of bounds if he was in a relationship. But she had changed her mind, and now basically thought anyone is fair game. If his relationship is that good he won't be interested. If not, then why shouldn't they get together.

I was very shocked, this was a complete turn around form the woman I knew, I think it came from being fed up of being single, but also because her previous boyfriend had gone of with an OW, and she felt why should she play by the rules when other women don't.

Interestingly enough though, she never has actually been the OW and we are now 20 years older.

I fell for MM but never did anything about it despite him making it clear that he was unhappily married and on the verge of divorce. The reason I never did anything was because I thought he was a lovely guy and going through emotional turmoil at home and didn't want to add to that by causing him to deceive his wife. He did eventually leave his wife but by that point we were living in different countries. Reading through some of the happy ever after posts on here I wonder if I did the right thing but I'll never know. In fact in a tiny corner of my heart I still hope that our moment might come.

kekikako
I think I would be like you. If I fell for someone who was married, then I wouldn't act on it, I would say, go and sort your marriage out, and come and find me when you are free.

My STBxh had an affair with colleague. I know 100% that he was to blame it I really do think if the ow had just backed off when she found out he had young kids and left him alone for just one minute instead of chasing him etc etc he would have stayed in my marriage. Would I have wanted him by then is another question and the answer is no.

We are still married as four years later he has refused to divorce. As he is playing a significant amount into the house pot I've not pushed it as financially I will be worse off. She is now pregnant and he still hasn't seen a solicitor. I think that says a lot about his commitment to her and if I was her I would do some reading on MN about red flags!!!! As she is quite young I'm waiting for her parents to bump into me - I will tell them exactly what I think. Wrong I know but she had no morals for me.

MrsC IME apologies made no difference cos I tried and the apology was not well received.

This thread is quite laughable. The Op has asked why women become the OW. Surely the only people who can legitimately answer that question is the OW. Yet I have just read a bunch of cheated on exes pour scorn on the few genuine answers from OW. Fair enough you might think you know why, and probably some of your answers will be spot on for some cases. But like someone else said upthread, there is no one straight rather than a myriad of reasons specific to the circumstances surrounding any particular affair. This thread reads like an excuse for (possibly justified) bitter exes to have a dig at OW.

Itisbetternow why on earth would you want to tell her parents what you think?

Harrassed - exactly.

Harrassed agree entirely. Some pages ago I talked about my experiences as the OW- and said that my reasons were basically a) young and stupid b) loved him to the point of absolute madness. Immediately mine and other responses from people with experience as OW were shouted down with "you must have no self esteem/ have been after his money/ be an exceptionally lonely and sad human/ had an abusive childhood". None of these are the case for me- it was bad judgement, naïveté and being manipulated by an absolute sociopath. I'm not in some way lacking as a human. I absolutely understand wives of men who cheat being fucking furious and wanting to think terribly of the OW but unfortunately there's no one size fits all answer.

Ditto for me, happy childhood, parents married 35yrs, don't have low self esteem. Just fell MADLY in love.

Felt guilty to begin with but less so as I found out more about his then wife. I could see why he didn't want to be with her but didn't want to leave because of his DCs.

I know what he told me was true because I am now friends with a lot of people who knew her.

There's no "one size fits all". Some OW are actually nice people - who did a bad thing....

My MM also demonised the wife but with the benefit of age and hindsight I don't think that any of it was true. He was deeply misogynistic which I think is often a trait in adulterers, and he just didn't like or respect women much other than as sexual beings. And he utterly believed sex was some kind of witchcraft used against men by women.

He was a real legend

I feel deeply sorry for his wife who went on to have him back.

Demonising the wife...that old chestnut. My husband did this, the things he and OW told people to justify their affair were utterly shocking, including that I had abused my own daughter and he had stayed to "protect her", that I had severe mental health issues, that I was "cold", "emotionless", "unable to show love"...oh it went on and on. Absolutely none of it was even remotely true as he well knew. All it did was give OW a tool to send me the most vile abuse via e-mail, words that I literally can't read again to this day. I have, however, made sure that the world and his bloody wife have seen them because it really did show them both up for what they were. Even the police were shocked (there has been a lot of police involvement unfortunately). Yet it appears they all do this. How about, instead, holding your hands up and admitting what you've done? That was not an option apparently...but setting out to destroy mine and my kids lives was. I have seen this happen over and over again and I will never get my head round it.

TheformidableMrsC....I'm sorry to hear of your situation, it sounds shit.

However I don't think it's either logical or fair to say 'they all do this'.

I've never done anything like that and never would. When I was the OW I would never have considered it my place at all to say anything about his DW, let alone do any of the actions you experienced.

Stumblymonkey, I perhaps didn't make myself clear. I meant that the husbands all do this..in terms of demonising the wife. I literally haven't come across a case yet where that hasn't happened and indeed where the allegations made were even remotely true. I just find it so weird, disrespectful and vile to behave like that. If you're a cheating shit, you're a cheating shit, far better to own up to it IMO.

Formidable I think it's because they're cowards. Because only a coward would think that the best way of dealing with your unhappiness in your marriage was via an affair. So they then make it someone else's fault that they're acted like scumbags because they're too cowardly to take responsibility for their awfulness.

That and the fact that they're liars by definition.

Sorry formidable...perhaps my misunderstanding.

Definitely disgusting behaviour.

My MM doesn't demonise his wife. He says she is a great mum and wife, clever, pretty, fab cook, etc. but she doesn't give him enough love and affection.

strawberry apologies if I've missed an explanation up thread but are you currently Someone's OW? If so please take my advice and run for the hills. He will break your heart.

Too late. I have been for three years!

I don't see myself in these posts. I'm not vindictive, my self esteem used to be shockingly low but now isn't too bad. It's a situation I never wanted to be in but it kind of works for me. I feel excruciating guilt on a daily basis, I'm certainly not escaping that.

I expect his wife would have a different story strawberryshortcake.

I expect she would say that she loves him but he's been a bit emotionally distant lately, and she has no idea why.

If he wants more love and affection in his marriage he needs to start by showering her with love and affection, no? Can't see how fucking someone else is going to sort that problem out.

Unless he's talking utter shit.

I feel excruciating guilt on a daily basis.

So stop being an OW then.

It isn't rocket science...

Fuck me Strawberry...sorry you believe that shit. It is shit. What he means is that he's such a precious pussycat, he's not the centre of attention ALL THE FUCKING TIME. My ex actually said that I didn't "greet him nicely enough when he came through the door" while run ragged by an ASD toddler.

This is actually quite funny and makes me feel so much better...they all come out with the same shit.

You are utterly utterly deluded and I hope you get what you deserve. That poor woman, being all "pretty, a great cook, great mum, all round decent human being" deserves being shat on by the bloke you are shagging. Fucking disgusting.