Advice for the OW

[babycow38]

I can only tell you about me and my husband and two beautiful daughter
We had a lovely llife, we did everything together. Does that make you stop and feel awful? You didn't give a crap about my children but I want to tell you about them
They love their life with Mum and Dad, they come home from school and feel happy, they do school work chat to mum and. Dad, they feel happy, secure, wanted. You come in their life? Other woman?? you hate the fact dad is in their life, you are jealous, dad distances himself to appease you , you have awfully messed up girls

She can blame the OW all she likes, it doesn't change the fact that you can't steal a person unless you kidnap them, and that if the husband walked it was because he chose to. We've ascertained that if he's willing to cheat, it's all in the shit even if there's no OW at all.

There's been a lot of talk about OW getting off scot free. In my experience, they don't. But boy, all these cheating MM who get to share and dilute their culpability with an evil scheming sexy woman....

I don't think anyone is saying it is 100 percent the fault of the ow are they ? ! As far as I can see no one is saying it is fine what the husband has done as the poor little diddums was seduced by that evil conniving little madam. That is ridiculous and as daft as saying that the ow is blameless in this sorry mess
I look at it this way. If someone you knew asked you to give them a lift home from the bank and you knew that they had gone to said bank to carry out a robbery would you do it ,? If you did you would be aiding and abetting them in the execution of a despicable act that was going to impact on other people in a negative way.
It is the same when you sleep with a married man . You know the fall.out is going to hurt innocent people and whether you like to admit it or not you are to blame as well.

Affairs are rarely black and white though. It’s very easy to follow the narrative that the affair is always about someone just seeking a shag on the side or being lured in by the attentions of an (often younger) woman.

it’s also very easy to follow the idea that the betrayed partner is always an innocent victim who was just going about their life unaware of what was about to happen or that their partner was seeking attention elsewhere or being distracted by the attention from an OW.

The reality is that while all affairs are wrong, there is often a back story which leads to someone pursuing an affair or ending up in one. Often it’s emotional before it becomes physical and while of course there are those out there who spout the line that “she doesn’t understand me,” or “the marriage was over years ago,” while there are people for who this is actually true (and whether people wish to admit it or not there are people for who this is true,) others with a less pure agenda will still be believed.

Equally there are differences between different OW’ and while of course being an OW is not a desirable position to want to hold, there is a difference between a woman who ends up being seduced by someone who they genuinely fall for, and one who actively seeks to destroy the life of someone else in their pursuit of what she wants.

In the latter situation this is generally not just reserved for snaring a married man but usually people like this stop at nothing to get what they want. If it wasn’t this particular married man it would be a different one, and while someone like that is not responsible for the breakdown of a marriage that doesn’t make them an innocent party as they are just unpleasant people all round.

But that doesn’t mean that everyone who has at some stage been an OW is permanently branded as scum. We’ve all likely done things in our lives which others would find irredeemable, but that’s not how reality works.

I don't think anyone is saying it is 100 percent the fault of the ow are they?

I don't know...in the OP, the husband has had an affair and yet the person being questioned about feeling guilty and thinking of the children is the OW. Looks pretty 100% to me.

And as for other posters, there's a lot of "well of course the MM is more to blame BUT OW is a slag, slut, harlot, this that, the other..." Pretty clear where the focus is.

Bank robberies are crimes, affairs are not. And as we've ascertained, a man who's willing to cheat doesn't even need an OW to have fucked it all up. Much like the bank robber who suddenly asks you to be a getaway driver has already robbed the fucking bank. Drive him or don't, he's already done the bad stuff whether you colluded or not.

Obviously it's shitty and dishonourable to be an OW but the focus should always be on the MM (or MW, as the case may be) who made a promise and is the only person responsible for it. Yet time and time again, this focus is shifted.

I don't know...in the OP, the husband has had an affair and yet the person being questioned about feeling guilty and thinking of the children is the OW. Looks pretty 100% to me.*

In the op the op said the ow was jealous of his children so has had to distance himself from them (less visits I guessing ) to appease her. ( avoid rows I'm guessing again though )

My exh married a lady with a child (she wasn't the ow )
So she was very supportive of our child and treated her very well.
I have always appreciated her for that.
Had my exh got involved with a childless woman it could have been quite different.

In the op the op said the ow was jealous of his children so has had to distance himself from them (less visits I guessing ) to appease her. ( avoid rows I'm guessing again though )

Which makes him an utter scuzzbag. Why is the OW being questioned when a man shirks his responsibility to his children? Why is she and not he being asked whether she feels guilty and whether she thought of the kids?

Nobody comes right out and says "OW, I am laying this 100% at your door, my husband is just a poor widdle man". That would sound crazy. But if you look at who people are questioning, and where they're more concerned about directing their invective, it becomes clear pretty quickly who they believe to be truly responsible.

I'm not diminishing people's hurt and pain in any way by asking them to blame the person who actually betrayed them and to stop this biblical process of holding women accountable when men act like total shits.

I’m not defending the OW but feel any anger should only be directed at one person, solely and squarely. The OW never made any commitments, promises and had no obligations. The anger belongs only with the person who broke the commitment which is the DH.

I’m not an OW, never have been but still believe 100% of the anger should be directed at the DH. No one had a gun at his head, no one kidnaped him and locked him in a basement. The OW is blameless in this regard, if the DH had his head turned its 100% on him.

Should add I did once go out with a married man for some time. I did NOT know he was married. Sounds strange but given our work patterns and shifts it was not at all obvious and he would have easily tricked his wife as it was pretty routine that we did not make it home for several days in our line of work. I lived close to work at the time, he lived a considerable distance so no reason why we would have ever gone to his. Turns out he also had kids. He only ended up telling me as a third party knew about his wife and gave him the ultimatum that either he had to tell me or they would tell me. It was over the second he told me - oddly he didn’t understand why, “but why does anything have to change”. So I never considered myself the OW given I never knew he was married.

I completely agree that he is a rubbish father and that he bears full and total responsibility for that. No blame to be laid at the door of the OW for that one .
And as the op was titled Advice for the Ow then of course it is aimed primarily at her . If it had been titled Advice for my Scumbag Husband no doubt it would read v differently.

My advice to my ex ow.

Get out at some point and find someone who treats you like you should be treated.
You may have thought you won the prize but in reality you did me such a massive favour that I now have the man and the life that I always wanted.....normal and drama free.

The OP isn't really advice though, though some subsequent posts are. A pity, I LIKE the idea of advice for the OW. But the OP isn't. It's just asking the questions that the OP should be asking her husband.

I also believe that if you choose to have an affair with a married man you don't get to choose how the wife thinks or feels about you if she finds out.

Lie down with dogs you get fleas.

"Then why aren't we hearing it? Why are you instead so much more passionate about defending your right to pour ire on OW?"

Because that's who op started a thread about.

Because you don't have to defend your right to criticise a cheating man on mn, he's fair game.

Because some of the posts defending ow on here are misguided, and I disagree with them.

Gloomy, that right there is the crux of it - OW do not need defending because they are NOT responsible for somebody else's marriage.

That you and others can't make that distinction is why this thread goes on and on.

OW/OM guilty of dickish/selfish behaviour - absolutely

Responsible for cheated-on spouse - not a jot, that's on cheating husband/cheating wife.

... and thanks Ayn, I appreciate your patient explanations - much more succinct (and kinder) than mine would have been.

I have just re-read the OP and it makes no sense.

You come in their life? Other woman?? you hate the fact dad is in their life, you are jealous, dad distances himself to appease you , you have awfully messed up girls

Your husband had an affair in 2013 and you have remained with him so how is the OW stopping him from seeing his children??

What a baffling post and looking at the subsequent responses, one that was made to incite anger from posters towards the ‘OW’

But should ex DH stay with you if he is unhappy and wants to be with someone else? That would be staying out of duty or pity. Would you want to be with him on that basis? He can’t help the way he feels. If he doesn’t look after his children properly he is a bad father but staying in a bad relationship can never be a positive thing. You’ll be better to move on and find someone who loves and deserves you.

"OW do not need defending because they are NOT responsible for somebody else's marriage."

Nobody's saying they're responsible for anyone else's marriage are they? Certainly not me.

I'm saying all sorts of other stuff but not that they're responsible for the mm's marriage.

Gloomy, this is what you said:
Because some of the posts defending ow on here are misguided...

I can't find a post on this thread, or any other actually, defending an OW(OM) yet here you state that they're doing it on this thread. Where?

I think there's almost a 'blindness' when it comes to affairs and the default is ALWAYS the OW. That's possibly because mostly women post here so there aren't many instances of OM but it seems very much that the affair partner is the target of most if not all of the anger.

In a way I understand it, but that doesn't make it right and you (generic) do that at your peril because it's easy to convince yourself of the narrative you'd prefer to be true and where does that leave you? With a cheat for a husband, a true snake-in-the-grass.

... and if you're NOT saying that they're responsible for MM's marriage, then what exactly is it that they are responsible for?

what exactly is it that they are responsible for?

Happily shagging someone they know is married.

So joint culpability then? Fair enough, just make sure that MM is tarnished with that also. Seems to always be missed off the 'credits' somehow.

Nobody's saying they're responsible for anyone else's marriage are they?

What? Every other post is saying that OW should hold joint responsibility at the very least. The OP itself is a series of questions that should be put to the man who shat all over his family, instead being directed at the OW. No "advice" in there at all. It's all invective and vitriol towards OW and barely any towards the men who actually had duties to shirk.

Obviously you can't force someone to blame the right person if they don't want to, but as LyingWitch says, deflect this way at your peril. And some of us, as sad as we are for your hurt and devastation, aren't prepared to perpetuate this crap whereby men act like shits and women are accountable.

I know I keep saying it but so many people don't seem to get it. We have established that if a man is willing and prepared to cheat on his wife, he's already fucked up and the marriage is already not ok. He doesn't even need to have found an OW; all that matters is that he was trying.

But should ex DH stay with you if he is unhappy and wants to be with someone else? That would be staying out of duty or pity. Would you want to be with him on that basis? He can’t help the way he feels

Seriously, what's the point of marriage at all in these circumstances? Instead of 'for better, for worse' we should be saying 'until one of us says we're unhappy, at which point both parties agree to move on and end it all immediately, never looking back'

A decent human being would definitely say no. I didn't. But as the OW I think the one I betrayed the most was my exH, not the unknowing BS. Of course I got all the "homewrecker" wrath... But the MM was as much as a homewrecker as I was... Buf most of the blame was always put on me. Like I'm so special that a happy MM would leave everything to be with me obviously not.... I had to leave my marriage as much as he needed to.

My advice to OW - You stupid mug, thank you for taking him off my hands. Don't ask for my advice when he fucks up your credit. Byeeeeee