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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

Obsessed with his ex-wife

32 replies

welshieness · 22/08/2018 21:23

Backstory: Severly sexually abused by grandfather as a child. Emotionally abusive parents. Failed marriage. Eating disorder. Years of counselling later....

Today: I am in a very beautiful 8 year relationship (6 week marriage) and have a 9 month old baby with a man who truly loves me. I feel it. His wedding vows floored me.

Problem: I can't get over the marriage he had before me. They were together when we met. He left her for me. He had been unhappy for a long time. Leaving her the way he did though went against everything he believes is right and he struggled for almost 2 years and during this time his ex was ever present in our relationship. I handled it because of the guilt I felt about it and I knew he was just eaten up by guilt.

Eventually we sorted through things and made a beautiful life for ourselves but I cant move passed his other marriage. If he chooses songs I think they played together or TV shows or films or places or holidays I get cripplingly insecure and think his life was better then and how or why would he choose me. I can't quite believe he would want me he's so lovely. Annoying at times but he's a good man. I know how we started was dodgy but it's not WHO he is and he made a mistake. I can't shake feeling like a mistake.

We have a beautiful girl together and he couldn't be a better father. This is his first.

I'm driving myself insane obsessing. Counsellor says it's linked to my insecurities from my childhood. Hmm... am I just being a div?

Thanks... sorry for the essay Shock

OP posts:
OnlyFoolsnMothers · 22/08/2018 21:25

V sorry for your past.Flowers
Did you know he was married when you started a relationship?

Original poster
welshieness · 22/08/2018 21:31

I wish I could say I didn't.. but I did. Something I'm not at all proud of and wish I could change. I didn't have the greatest role models when it came to healthy decision making and the counselling has been within the safe confines of my now relationship

OP posts:
NadiaLeon · 22/08/2018 21:32

If yoy read other threads, you will see that most other posters think that once a cheat, always a cheat. Keep seeing the counsellor. This is your problem, not his. He seems sound.

Original poster
welshieness · 22/08/2018 21:33

I should add... we didn't actually get together properly until he had left her. Not that that's an excuse as we had feelings for each other before that.

OP posts:
Original poster
welshieness · 22/08/2018 21:34

Thank you. This IS TOTALLY my thing! He is sound. I don't buy into the once a cheat always a cheat. Not now anyway.

OP posts:
LettuceKissYa · 22/08/2018 21:36

I was married before

So was my DP

I still have moments about his ex-wife and mother of his children - he really loved her and I know they'd still be together today if she hadn't left

No help OP but it's not unheard of

OnlyFoolsnMothers · 22/08/2018 21:41

I don’t think once a cheat always a cheat but I do think given how you met you will always feel like this and maybe that’s your
come uppance.

SandyY2K · 22/08/2018 21:42

OWs and Ex wives are often obsessed with each other.

He had a life before you. He will have memories of it...but he left her for you. You won.

Continue with the therapy and look to the future not the past.

Moominfan · 22/08/2018 21:46

If he can do it to her he can do it to you. So yea can see why it's on your mind.

Hayles88 · 22/08/2018 21:51

but he left her for you. You won.

Grow up. No one wins in this situation. No OW/OM wins against the ex wife/husband They both lose as one gets horribly hurt and the other is stuck knowing they'll soon be replaced by the next thing that catches his eye.

SandyY2K · 23/08/2018 09:08

Grow up. No one wins in this situation.

You obviously missed my undertone. Nobody wins...affairs are devastating....but leaving the wife is what pretty much all OWs want. She's got that now hasn't she. She's won a cheater.

KMoKMo · 23/08/2018 09:21

I think your counsellor is right. I think whenever you found someone who truly loved you, irrespective of how you met and their past, you’d have felt you didn’t deserve it. The people you were meant to be able to trust and rely on the most abused you terribly and that will resonate throughout your life. Then the circumstances of how you met will also add to your insecurity.

Funicorn · 23/08/2018 09:30

This is the real life example of what happens when a man marries his mistress . You know that you can never really trust him .

DelBoysCrombieCoat · 23/08/2018 10:23

I don’t think you will get much sympathy on here op as you were the other woman.
Unfortunately in real life people do fall for other people and marriages break up, it happens.
Your DH sounds absolutely lovely and it sounds like you have both battled with demons about how you got together. You have been together a long time, recently married and a lovely new baby, op your DH clearly loves you but he does have a past which you can’t change. We all hear songs that bring back nostalgia of past partners but that’s just what it is nostalgia, it doesn’t affect feelings for your current partner. I would work on this with your councillor, it’s insecurities on your part which is understandable considering your past. Enjoy your life, it sounds lovely, his ex is in the now distant past, it’s history, you and your baby are his future.
For what it’s worth I cheated over 20 years ago in my first marriage because I was so very unhappy, I’ve never cheated since. I don’t believe once a cheat, always a cheat.

Kennycalmit · 23/08/2018 11:22

Cheating isn’t always black and white. I wouldn’t really call him a cheat though considering nothing happened, as you say. He simply met somebody else

Sometimes people get married and a few years later one person becomes unhappy and realises they’ll be happier with somebody else. Would you really insist that person remains in that unhappy marriage? It isn’t fair on them, and it isn’t fair on the unsuspecting partner. They deserve someone who loves only them

I wouldn’t want my partner to remain with me if he wanted someone else. I wouldn’t want to be the second choice. I wouldn’t wish to be laying next to him at night while he’s wanting to lay next to someone else.

How lucky we are to live in a society where we can walk away from unhappy marriages instead of being shunned for divorces or even worse, killed for adultery.

“Once a cheater always a cheater” isn’t true.
Yes it’s possible he’ll do to you what he did to her. But it’s also possible he won’t.

Moominfan · 23/08/2018 11:24

Sounds lovely? I can think of nicer attributes than a cheat. Those insecurities are well founded. Reap what you sow

FairylightsTentsAndBunting · 23/08/2018 11:28

This is the real life example of what happens when a man marries his mistress . You know that you can never really trust him .

Completely agree. I know that my exh's ow worries about me. I can tell when she is in the room if he and I speak on the phone due to nature of the conversation and hos tone of voice.

The reality is, he makes my skin crawl and i'd never be interested in him again.

It's been 6 years now but she clearly doesn't have peace.

Shame... Wink

FairylightsTentsAndBunting · 23/08/2018 11:31

Sometimes people get married and a few years later one person becomes unhappy and realises they’ll be happier with somebody else. Would you really insist that person remains in that unhappy marriage? It isn’t fair on them, and it isn’t fair on the unsuspecting partner. They deserve someone who loves only them

This is essentially what my husband did. Neither of us were happy but neither of us wanted to be the one who ended the marriage.

He wasn't a 'cheat', he just met someone and fell in love. I would stake everyone's life on him never having done it before and never doing it again.

FairylightsTentsAndBunting · 23/08/2018 11:31

But I still judge her for going with a married man! Have some self respect and tell them to leave the relationship first.

hellsbellsmelons · 23/08/2018 11:34

I think you sabotaging yourself, subconsciously.
After your upbringing, you don't think you deserve happiness.
So you will obsess until you sabotage it.
But you are having counselling.
This is absolutely right.
You get one shot at this life.
You've found some happiness.
You deserve happiness in your life.
Don't deny yourself it.
You are allowed to make the most of this one shot.
Don't throw it away.
Work through it all with your counsellor.

Aw12345 · 23/08/2018 11:36

^This is the real life example of what happens when a man marries his mistress . You know that you can never really trust him.^

Sadly I do also completely agree with this. When he got with his first wife he was head over heals for her ... He loved her. That's why he married her. The truth is he may do it again.

StarsMoonSun · 23/08/2018 11:45

I dare say his wedding vows 'floored' his ex wife too with whatever crap gushy words he came out with.

He didn't stick to them then though.

Original poster
welshieness · 23/08/2018 12:25

Thanks everyone for all your comments. Some very helpful. I think the indignance I felt in the pit of my stomach at the ones suggesting he will cheat on me shows my true feelings about what I actually know in my heart to be true. He won't cheat again. He may leave me if I continue but cheat no. So thank you for making me realise my true feelings. I totally understand why you think badly of both him and I... I would have been the same years ago. I truly believe though that none of us are without sin and I try not to judge anyone too harshly these days.

I need to work on these feelings (which I had in my previous marriage but he never had an ex wife for me to focus on). If you all met him you'd know why I know he'd never cheat on me and my question wasn't really wondering if he would it was more wondering why I don't feel good enough for him or indeed anyone.

Some of you hit a nerve and I thank you for that.

I hope love finds you all x

OP posts:
motortroll · 23/08/2018 12:44

It takes time. It's difficult whatever the circumstances of the ex. Mine was complicated by a child in the mix but I also did the thinking that what he said was related to her. Eg when we went shopping he used to pick out things for me that I thought she'd wear....15 years later and ive realised he's just got no taste 😂

I had a period of poor mental health early in our relationship and a lot of it was related to his past relationship.

It just takes a lot of time. Keep working through it and be open with him....tell him you find it hard but you love and trust him.

I still have a few hang ups. I will never visit a place he loves as they got married there and we've never talked about previous sexual partners as I fear she's his only one...I definitely don't need to know that!!

MooseTheDog · 23/08/2018 12:54

My DP has only ever slept with his exW

He was a broken man when she left him. I'm his only relationship since. She's been engaged for years and as far as I know, is extremely happy

He won't have children with me - he's a good bit older - thankfully I have a DC already from my own former marriage

I have no feelings for my exH

My DP adores me. But it's still hard. I know he loved that woman with all his heart and he fought for her; she cheated and left

It grates on me that he had DC with her and won't with me. Petty, I know. Great children all the same but it still stings a little

Maybe I'll always be a little insecure - who knows?

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