did your marriage begin life as an affair?

[thinkingandsad]

Yes of course I have changed my name for this.

That's it really. Were you married to someone else when you met your current partner and were they married too?

Has it worked out and would you do it again?

How did you go through the process of getting together and breaking up your families?

i have now read this whole thread and i am glad a lot of posters who started their relationships through infidelity have gone on to have lasting, happy relationships. because quite honestly i am sick of hearing negative doom mongering about how these things never work from all the dumped, bitter ex wives. hmm

Ouch - someone is rather defensive, aren't they? Okay, your bloke left (after lying to the mother of his child - you can't deny that), so clearly he is happy with you and that's fine -not having a go at all.

But what Happywoman is saying is that in the MAJORITY of cases, the men don't really want to carry through with it and when push comes to shove go running home. Yours is an unusual situation in lasting - tons of statistics say so I am afraid. Once the hormone rush of feeling all teenage like has gone (and that's something you can never sustain in a long term relationship), they are back to square one, which is why people serial cheat unless they become aware this is the case.

Fact is, no matter what you have, if something is laid out on a plate some people will consider taking it - just like finding a purse in the loo at a nightclub with a £50 note in it and no details of the owner. Do you hand it in or pocket it if you think you can get away with it, (even if you are a millionaire)?

Kate, interesting that you see the same sentence I applauded as being a sign of mummee being defensive.

The point of this thread, I think , is that there is a general perception out there about affairs never working out in the long term and the OP wants to hear from those for whom it did work out.

It is such a sensitive topic and so many people are hurt by affairs that those who have an affair with a happy ending don't usually go shouting from the rooftops about their success. I think it is good to hear from those who do.
Are there any published statistics on this? I am genuinely curious.

My friends I described above are amongst the happiest in love couple I know and are certainly not back to square one.

I think the £50 note analogy is unhelpful.

Pinching the purse is NEVER ok. People are not owned and therefor cannot be stolen.

My friend who had the affair was not "laid out on a plate" no matter how much the ex wife wishes to think of her in that way.

I've been in love with someone else for nearly a year. my DH is abusive and I have tried to leave him, but it will, i think boil down to me grabbing a bag and running in the end as he is very clever and controlling. Not having affair, but OM makes me happy, takes time to listen etc. it's difficult.

changequick1 do you have children with your abusive DH?

It's definitely interesting and I am in no way having a go at those for whom it has worked.

Some stats from Mira Kirschenbaum etc - only works out in between 3 and 14 percent of cases according to surveys: tinyurl.com/yh4czrl

Think you might have got the analogy wrong - the cheater is the purse stealer, not the purse. All I was saying was that faced with temptation in front of you, people make bad choices... no matter what they already have.

Started as an affair.

Me in an 8 year live in relationship and him 13 years married.

After a month I left and rented a small home.

A few week's later he left and moved in with me.

Now together 9 years, married 7.

Both a lot wiser.

yes nula have kids, lots.

timberwolf, are you very happy together still?

Technically yes

"quite honestly i am sick of hearing negative doom mongering about how these things never work from all the dumped, bitter ex wives"

nasty bitchy heartless selfish self absorbed defensive comment - but then those are all the attributes who developed a "pure and simple love" for a married man

Changequick1,if he is abusive you can't hang around, especially if you have lots of kids.

This is with or without OM in the picture.
SO easy for me to say, though

Are you miserable or coping?

Yes - we both say we love each other more every anniversary.

I don't want to die and leave him and he doesn't want to die and leave me.

But we know that's the end story.

Unless we go together.

timberwolf are you also fivegomad?

Macdoodle I am guessing you have some history ?

or five was that in response to the original question?

No.

I am many people but not fivegomad.

oh I have history many threads on here - in the past !!
In fact the OW now has XH - and is more than welcome to his sorry arse - he only went back to her when I finally dumped him - Im not bitter or dumped, and comments from thats nasty mummeee creature, just prove the point of how utterly self absorbed with a lack of human empathy, OW are!

but macdoodle you can no more generalise about exwives than about otherwomen.

Just because someone has an affair with a MM does not immediately make them self absorbed without human empathy.

Just because someone is an exwife does not make them bitter. Mummee specifically referred to the vocal doom mongering exwiveswho are bitter - not to say all exwives are like that.( I know a couple )

Also you should not make personal attacks on other contributors . You don't know whether anyone here is a "nasty creature" or not

In Macdoodle's defence, I think Mummee, you really need to review your posting style. A few weeks ago, you posted that "no-one has an affair if they are happy at home" which, as many people will tell you on here, is far from the complex truth of many affairs.

Then this statement, which took my breath away: "Sorry, while i am not suggesting that a couple cannot save their relationship after an affair, i am very sure that the majority of men who do are NOT happy, whether they leave for OW or stay with the wife."

How in God's name do you know that men who leave or stay are not happy?

A few weeks ago, you were also claiming that absolutely nothing happened between you and your DP before he left his wife. Today however, you reveal that: "the "affair bit" (ie him seeing me behind her back) of our relationship lasted barely a month before he left her." You seem to be in denial that just because you didn't have sex, you weren't involved in a relationship with your DP. I imagine that's why his ex-wife is so bitter - and also his daughter.

I'm also very suspicious about men who claim their exes are bitter harridans with no redeeming qualities - but I do think some women are so competitive that they believe all this nonsense and think that they are somehow "better" than the ex-wives. Mummee, you seem to show no compassion for a woman whose marriage broke up - instead in some peculiar way you blame her for this. In reality, marriages are never this simple or one-sided - I don't imagine he was a paragon of virtue either and in the end, he took the coward's way out and ensured he had another woman to go to before he left.

Like others (and Amy, who was brave enough to be truthful about this) I think that many marriages are actually pretty good - that is until someone comes along and offers an alternative. At other times - and often because of life crises like deaths in the family or a newborn - marriages go through a rough patch. I do think that third parties who capitalise on that situation have some guilt to bear. People who offer affairs to a married person who is going through a crisis are actually delivering a death knell to the marriage.

I have a general philosophy on life that has served me pretty well up to now. Anything that has been gained on the back of another's pain is not worth having. I have also noticed throughout my life that people who don't follow this rule tend to suffer their own pain somewhere down the line....

Interesting post,whenwillIfeelnormal.
I don't think it matters whether anything really "happens" till people officially leave their spouse.

It is a huge leap to leave a marriage, no matter whether it is abusive, loveless, or just humdrum.

I agree many marriages may SEEM pretty good till lover comes long but how much of that is down to familiarity/habit?

"I agree many marriages may SEEM pretty good till lover comes long but how much of that is down to familiarity/habit?"

But that's the point - how can the feelings in a ten or 20 year relationship compete with something new? Nature makes sure that you produce a rush of hormones etc in a new relationship and the same happens when attracted to someone outside your marriage who lets you know they are also interested. New untried things are by their nature more intriguing than what you know inside out (I sometimes suspect that if couples get on with each other really well and share everything this is why such a situation is particularly dangerous - the lure of the unknown) - doesn't matter how good the original relationship is - hence why people give in and act on them.

As katemum says, after a while these hormones die away, which is typically when the person having the affair realises the grass isn't greener and comes home - they aren't seeing the OW or OM through hormone haze anymore but as they really are (and often find them very lacking).

I'm not going to get drawn into this, mumeee may not believe it, and she certainly seems to have an axe to grind, if anyone seems bitter it is her, she has what she wanted so why does she seem to need to continually blame the ex wife??....

FWIW, I am long past my XH affair, he may not have been happy but neither was I, I didnt go off and line up some replacement to sooth my tortured brow while lying and cheating!
Mumeee if it makes you feel better to blame all XW's as bitter, and that only a month of lying and cheating and skulking makes you feel better go for it, if it makes you feel better that the pathetic man you are with who was so terribly unhappy in his loveless marriage was happy to stay there until something else came along

I am happily past my XH , as are all the other XW's I know, its the OW who has the man who seems troubled and bitter, and why would they not, they have a man who is proven to be a liar and cheat, who has shown that when he is unhappy, he will happily lie and cheat until he gets what he wants, a nice catch indeed!

I am happy and moved on, I suggest mumee you do the same!

"I agree many marriages may SEEM pretty good till lover comes long but how much of that is down to familiarity/habit?"

Well isn't that the point of marriage? You cannot stay in love for ever and ever - that feeling will fade. What remains will be affection, companionship and yes, familiarity and habit.

Oh abedelia just said that

Bit harsh macdoodle. I don't think you should judge someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes. A relative me mine left his wife for ow and ow seems fine. Don't condone it but I can't judge either. Xw is v bitter, and her xh is now completely different and much happier.
Nula, no quite miserable a lot of the time. For years I didn't realise why either. It's been tough. Don't condone affairs, but also never knew I could feel like this. So . . .

Me and DH were both married when we started seeing each other. We've now been together for 15 years. Of course leaving one relationship for another is selfish - by definition. Sometimes you meet someone and you think: "Shit, I would be happier with them; maybe happier for the next 60 years." That causes an enormous amount of dissonance, particularly when there is sex thrown in: it's a powerful mix. Yes yes yes, it's selfish. And you pay an ENORMOUS price - basically you will be dropped by most of your friends and you will have to start again. People who you were close to for your entire life will turn their backs on you. You will hurt an enormous number of people. There is a deep pit of despair and hurt facing anyone in this situation. And you might not be happy for the rest of your life. You might be happy for a few months. You might sleep with his brother when you're drunk at New Year. You might die in a road traffic accident next week. You might find that you get on really well and learn a huge amount of lessons from the whole thing. Or maybe not. There is no way of knowing where you will be in six months or sixty years. Who knows? There ARE no rules, there IS no karma. Life is messy and humans are feckless and fallible.