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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Starting over after 25 years - Part deux

999 replies

Lily007 · 10/07/2018 10:42

Wow need to start a new thread.

The support I’ve had from all the posters has been amazing and very much appreciated and I hope will continue.

OP posts:
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6
tootstastic · 07/08/2018 07:44

He's definitely only embarrassing himself. Fool!

Have a good day at work Lily.

Rememory · 07/08/2018 07:45

Don't wish to derail Lily's thread but how on earth can you ever trust anyone? If it's as easy as saying I wasn't really that happy, after being told for years they are happy and you are the love of their lives? I think that's just a cop out for them. A convenient way of excusing their shitty actions. Or is it the case of if they did cheat then they can't have been happy? I think for some people it's opportunity and thinking they'll get away with it.

There have been times in my marriage where I haven't been happy but I would never have looked at someone else. Was I just not unhappy enough?

Bluntness100 · 07/08/2018 08:12

Of course some people just shag around and cheat and were perfectly happy.

Others were obviously once happy then became unhappy. There is no one answer, and just because you were once happy, or were happy for many years, doesn't mean that can't change. People and relationships change.

tootstastic · 07/08/2018 16:35

Who knows for sure what each cheater's motivation is, but two things are for sure; they are all selfish and they are all cowards. If they put their partners feelings just a tiny bit above their own, or had any balls at all, they would end their current relationship before embarking on the next.

Rememory · 07/08/2018 17:08

Agree toots

Bluntness100 · 07/08/2018 17:10

Agree, 😔

Wolf1826 · 07/08/2018 18:09

Ideally people would end one relationship before starting another yes, but unfortunately some people (women and men) are in dysfunctional relationships where it isn't as simple as that.

I'm not suggesting this applies to the OP, just that some people who cheat are abused, co-dependent or whatever.

They're not all selfish and cowards and putting their partner's feelings above their own has sometimes got them into, and kept them in, shit relationships in the first place.

Someone in that position could be reading this thread - they don't need to be told they are all selfish and they are all cowards.

Original poster
Lily007 · 07/08/2018 19:02

Rememory. I know exactly what you mean. If my XH was unhappy before January this year he deserves an Oscar for his performance.

OW knew when they met that he was married and still living with me. He used to go to her house at 7.30 am for a quick shag before work! She must be on pins every time he’s a bit late home, leaves early for work or doesn’t answer her calls. I never had any reason not to trust him but she knows he’s a liar and a cheat. Although by all accounts she’s had more than her fair share of fellas so maybe he’ll wonder what she’s up to when she goes out without him. They bloody deserve one another.

I’ll just sit back, watch and wait - oh and drag out the divorce/financial proceedings to piss them both off 😉.

OP posts:
Sunflowersforever · 07/08/2018 19:09

Loving the spirt from most women on here. So sad to have your trust betrayed and doubt about the past sprinkled all over your memories. So so so unfair.

Please don't let it stop you all having faith in others going forward.

Original poster
Lily007 · 07/08/2018 22:34

I’m watching “The Affair”. I’m on season 3 episode 8. The first wife has just been in a bar with the ‘affair partner 2nd wife’ and said “when a man stops feeling important in a marriage he moves on to someone who makes him feel important”. It’s so true.

All they want is their ego massaged.

Its so shallow and really sad 😔

OP posts:
tootstastic · 07/08/2018 23:11

Ok @Wolf1826, I'll concede that it's probably 'most' instead of 'all' cheaters are selfish cowards. Clearly, this may not apply when trying to escape an abusive relationship but, to be fair, we were talking about men suddenly cheating in a non-abusive, very long-term relationship without warning. However, I should not have generalised.

Lily, that is so true about the feeling important thing. Perhaps more prevalent in narcissists? I watched the first series of The Affair, must catch up on the rest.

Bluntness100 · 08/08/2018 08:56

To be fair, I think that can be said of both genders. We all want to feel important to our partners, and agree, when we start to feel unimportant to them, yes then there is a risk they will move on to somone else.

I'm not sure that's just men though. No one wants to feel unimportant to their partner.

Wolf1826 · 08/08/2018 09:55

No, no one male or female wants to feel unimportant to their partner. It's not just men. Women might be conditioned to tolerate it more though - which doesn't make it right.

tootstastic · 08/08/2018 10:34

Totally agree this can happen with both men and women. Just that we were talking about men doing it in Lily's and Flame's relationships,

Original poster
Lily007 · 08/08/2018 10:38

Yes I agree but if anyone does feel unimportant the right thing to do is speak to your partner, not embark on an affair.

Let me be clear, my XH can never claim I made him feel unimportant, he was well aware I loved him to pieces and he was my best friend.

Since he left, his behaviour (detailed on FB and IG) is becoming increasingly bizarre. He’s become a laughing stock amongst his friends who no longer have anything to do with him.

It seems now he has no support other than OW, he was always a very sociable person so to have no real social circle will, eventually, have an impact on the relationship!

Oh well, you reap what you sow 😬.

OP posts:
tootstastic · 09/08/2018 08:41

He must be regretting thinking the grass might be greener Lily. His new life doesn't sound much fun, does it?

Wolf1826 · 09/08/2018 09:48

“when a man stops feeling important in a marriage he moves on to someone who makes him feel important”. It’s so true.

All they want is their ego massaged.

You brought it up OP

AcrossthePond55 · 09/08/2018 14:05

As I see it, it's not my job to 'make my DH feel important'. That's his job. Just as it's my job to care for my own self esteem. It IS our job to love and support each other and not to tear each other down or do things to hurt each other. There's a difference between loving and supporting someone who thinks well of themselves because they know they are worthy and having to stroke someone's ego or continually validate everything they do until they 'feel important'. Or worse yet, having to stroke the ego of someone who is using 'not feeling important' to manipulate their family or get away with bad behaviour. The 'don't feel important' is an excuse, and a poor one at that.

And Lily is absolutely right. If a person feels they aren't getting what they would like from their marriage, the right thing to do is talk to their spouse. You never solve a problem in a marriage by going outside the marriage. Or if one feels that the marriage is irretrievable broken on their side, the right thing to do is to leave before you cheat, when the marriage can still be ended with a modicum of dignity and as little pain to the other spouse as possible. My cousin told me that although it would have hurt to just hear her ex say "I don't love you anymore" that would have been less painful than hearing it after she discovered he'd been having an affair.

Original poster
Lily007 · 09/08/2018 17:50

Thanks for that Acrossthepond

Wolf1826 are you a man per chance? 🤔.

OP posts:
Calidream · 09/08/2018 18:16

Wolf Lily was quoting from the tv series The Affair

Wolf1826 · 09/08/2018 18:24

@Calidream I think you'll find that the OP quoted “when a man stops feeling important in a marriage he moves on to someone who makes him feel important”. from The Affair.

Then she said that It’s so true. All they want is their ego massaged.

And no OP, I'm not a man.

Bluntness100 · 09/08/2018 18:54

I think there is a semantics issue here.

Everyone wants to feel important to their partner. No one wants to feel they don't matter to their partner. No one.

And of course ideally if a relationship is breaking down or broken down the right thing to do is speak to your spouse, but that's not the way it works in thr real world many times. Everyone knows it is wrong but that's the way many do it.

You see it on here all the time. Someone posts and says my husband says he doesn't love me anymore and is leaving. The responses of "find the other woman, she will be there" are immediate and voluminous.

What is it they say, men don't leave unless they have someplace to go.

beeefcake · 09/08/2018 20:59

@Wolf1826 if you want to debate the reasons various people cheat could you start another thread on the topic?

We are discussing Lily's situation here which is a typical MLC case.

She's understandably quite upset so if she unintentionally makes a generalisation then perhaps let it go?

Original poster
Lily007 · 09/08/2018 23:22

Thanks everyone.

Wolf1826 I know this “cheating business” isn’t a one size fits all situation, I’m only talking about my situation.

I don’t think cheating is acceptable under any circumstances. If you’re not happy leave, none of this keeping your foot in both camps nonsense.

OP posts:
Bluntness100 · 10/08/2018 07:33

Morning Lilly?

How's you today? Anything planned for the weekend?

And I don't think anyone disagrees with you, maybe all that's being said is there are many reasons that doesn't happen, that it's often quite complex.