Do men ever regret their ‘midlife crisis’ affairs?

[stitchinguru]

Just that really - it’s such a common occurrence, I’d be interested in how it tends to pan out in the fullness of time.

Ex had affairs I think to feel superior, he resented that I was better educated and was the main earner.

I have no idea how he feels in his current situation he married one of the OW. However he is obsessed with me and wants to know everything about what I’m doing where I live who I’m with etc. It is most bizarre.

We recently moved and he asked the CSA for my new address, which they wouldn’t give him but told me he was asking. He also named his dc a name which I had chosen had our dc been a boy (he wrote to tell me about it ). In the meantime I’d found other names I preferred more, but it is odd.

He did used to tell me I’d be nothing without him and nobody would want ‘used goods’.

I don’t think he’s terribly happy, only because he spends so much time and energy trying to spy on me.

For context it’s been almost 11 years since I kicked him out!

I’m happy with my life and steadily growing family.
You will get there OP and realise how pathetic he is and how much easier and happier life without him is.

The OW was older than me by a couple of years and doesn't work (kids are teenagers). TBF it was a loveless relationship which I was glad to get out of but the way he went about it was disgusting (disappeared). Our DC hasn't spoken to him for 3 years. He lost all his friends and eventually his business that he had worked hard to build up.

I hope he bitterly regrets it.

What’s amazing is these exes are STILL lying to their wives and their new partners. The old “I don’t love my wife we are only together for the kids” versus the “I bitterly regret leaving, my new woman is a pain and stupid and I’m so unhappy, but I can’t leave”

Both of these are lies!!! And most of the time both of the women believe them.

My DH has one of these midlife crisis younger woman affairs. He never intended to hurt me or leave.

We stayed together, worked through it and it’s been an opportunity for me to ‘re-set’ the marriage and our roles. My life is so much better now.

had not has

@Astral please please write a book i will buy it!

Or just PM more of your thoughts to read while i am in the bath!

Some do, some don't - they're not a homogeneous group.

'Affairing down' (yawn) - OW are not all the same either. They can be older than the wife, kinder, more well balanced, better educated, more successful, more attractive etc etc

My exH was incapable of showing any regret at all for his long affair. Needless to say we split up but he came crawling back, begging and pleading, when I met my lovely now DH - like he didn't particularly want me until someone else did. Nice.

He was on his own for a bit, shagging around, but has ended up back with the now-divorced OW. He definitely affaired down (so I'm told!). Whether he feels any regret for what he did and whether he's actually happy these days is anyone's guess, but I doubt it. He has a colossal ego.

I however am very happy with my lovely DH and have no regrets.

Good luck OP. It's a truly truly terrible time for you, but these things have a way of working themselves out to how they should be in the end

Just read more of the thread. There are some dreadful generalisations about men on here.

SOME men definitely don't have a clue about what women do to keep life ticking smoothly along but some men do all or some of that stuff for their wives/families.

Is there something that makes the older man stand out to the younger woman? Him already being a father, just being older? Does that make them more attractive?

I mean I am a guy in my mid/late 30s, single, no kids, stable, good job, etc but struggle to find a woman similar to me and I see many women in their 20s and 30s going for the guy who is already married and has kids.

I agree with holdingonbarely, they can hardly say to their teenage children and ex wife "Sorry for breaking your heart, but I am sooo happy, she's amazing" so they do their 'woe is me' act. It's still self serving lies.

Richdeniro i know when i split up with a man who didn't want children, i developed the most intense crush i'd ever had on my happily-married-with-two-kids boss.

Luckily it was obvious what was happening (i left my partner and literally 12 hours later the crush hit me like a thunderbolt) and also luckily i'm pretty plain so not likely to catch anyone's eye, but there must be subtler versions of the same thing experienced by more attractive people. I have still never been with a man who actively wanted children and as far as i can tell from stalking Facebook, only one of my exes has a child. Dh went along with it when i got pregnant. When the longing for children is the strongest urge you have, and noone you meet seems to share it or even thonk it should ve s factor in your thinking, seeing a man who actually has children and apparently likes them is an aphrodisiac like no other.

My research also seems to suggest that in these cases, although the OW may be younger, men tend to ‘affair down’ - i.e take up with someone generally less attractive, intelligent, talented etc etc.

I know some people are plainer than others, less intelligent etc but this isn't a nice way to talk about other humans.

Having an affair is a shitty thing to do but everyone has their own strengths and talents. If someone is more overweight or shorter than you, say, you aren't a better person than her. It's monumentally shit if your husband had an affair but I hate reading stuff like this. Society is so shallow and if you aren't an attractive woman, you get told that in a million ways.

People are worth more than their looks.

I recently found out that my ex has cheated on the girl who he cheated on me with. Not very mature but it did make me smile even though its years down the line.

The ow ex married is ugly to the bone as well as less clever, less educated, less talented and a thoroughly vase human being. It wasn’t the affair that makes me say that either. I don’t want him.

It’s the fact that she wrote to court during the children’s hearing and declared that I was fifty percent responsible for the physical, mental and financial abuse ex perpetrated.

And ‘trade down’ is a mild thing to say compared to psi and anguish ow/om have been complicit in causing a completely innocent party.

Base not vase
Pain not psi

MaryJenson How is your life better? How have you managed to forgive him pursuing/sleeping with someone else?

I think my H has regretted it hugely , mainly because I think he knows in his heart that although still together I do struggle to feel 100% the same regardless of how sorry he is. The problem isn’t what he is doing now, it’s the fact that he had it in him to do something stupid years ago that I found out much later and yet I know100% that he has always loved me . I actually do envy those women who can be so laissez faire And just think ‘twat’ and carry on and still feel 100% ok. Maybe some women just find it much easier to think twat and carry on regardless or leave straight away rather than a kind of middle ground .

Mine regretted it. When he was sad and lonely and no one would speak to him (his words)

So he regretted it when it effected him negatively, that's not real remorse for the person he hurt, you

I know two female friends who had affairs. Both regretted it, both say they don't feel that they were in their right minds, both still with original DH who took them back, one for 20 yes, one for 7. Both say they have never ever felt remotely tempted to do it again.

People only regret it if it turns out shit. Otherwise they wouldn’t have done it in the first place.
Which means they aren’t very insightful people

Corroboree
My life in many ways is better because my 20 year marriage was effectively razed to the ground. The love and many happy memories remained within the foundations so we built a new marriage. Patching up the old one was not an option for me. This took counselling and time. Our relationship is different now and my life especially, is very different.

You can’t forgive the unforgivable but with time you can accept it. You need reasons not blame, reasons, to enable you to both understand why and minimise the risk of it happening again.

Ultimately, I wanted to be with this man I loved and he wanted to be with me so we both worked hard to make that happen.

A man who is chucked out following an affair will probably go on to reshape his life and is likely to be happy. He will be 'single' in effect and able to have sex with whoever he wants often with younger women who aren't really looking for anything serious and (probably) at the same time still keep the benefit of his prior family relationship - children and grandchildren.
This may apply in some cases, but not in the case of my ex. He wasn't single at first, he was with the OW, and like someone else said, she wanted children. After a few years he discovered she was seeing other men and they broke up, so he is single, but he is not actually that keen on the bachelor life (afraid of being alone) so I doubt he's enjoying that either.

He came to me after a couple of years, presumably when the cracks were starting to show with OW, and apologised for having broken up the family. Never apologised for treating us all like shit, though, which was kind of the main issue.

I haven't asked if he regrets the affair in retrospect. I'd imagine he is just sorry the OW broke up with him, and otherwise loved the kick he got out of it.

When I worked as airline crew it was rife.
Pilots... crew... all at it.
Accepted part of the job.. blokes and girls.

My ex regrets getting caught I think. He's never apologised for the havoc he's wreaked on our family and it's all about him.