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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

Mistake with older man coming back to bite me

455 replies

Yecats1990 · 05/05/2020 15:25

5 years ago I made a mistake with a man I worked with. I was 25 and single but he was 45 and in a relationship with a woman the same age as him (they weren't married and they both had kids but none together).
Anyway it wasn't my finest hour, he was training me in work and I found him sexy and exciting and honestly I just enjoyed the attention from an older more experienced guy. We would flirt at work and then progressed to texting, then we started to have phone sex and sent sexual videos and photos to each other, nothing ever became physical though and it wasn't an emotional affair either as we rarely spoke about anything other than sex. We had a token attempt to meet up a few times for sex but never went through with it I think we both knew the relationship was just fantasy we used for masturbation and nothing more. The whole thing lasted about 2 years.
Eventually I left the job and moved to another area and the whole thing just fizzled out (prob slightly more on my part than his)
I met a new man, got married and am now 38 wks pregnant with our first baby. My husband knows nothing about that awful decision I made back then.

Anyway the problem is 10 mins ago i received a WhatsApp message from a number I don't know with a sexual photo of me that I had sent to this man (no face in the photo but I know it was me) and a text followed which says

"Why the fuck were you sending naked photos to my partner you dirty c##t"

Then quickly followed by a "you're welcome to him f##king slut".

And now my phone keeps ringing from a private number. Im not answering obvs.

Anyway now she will know at least my first name from my WhatsApp profile and I have a profile picture up so she can search for me on Facebook.
We live at opposite ends of the country so I don't think I will run into her even after lockdown but im terrified about her getting further information about me and contacting my husband just wks before our baby arrives.

Should I tell my husband about it now and explain? Should I interact with this woman and try to explain to her? Or should I just ignore it and hope it goes away??

I was a selfish idiot back then and really regret what I did long before this woman ever contacted me. I know I deserve little sympathy here but just want opinions on what I should do

OP posts:
Original poster
Yecats1990 · 05/05/2020 16:11

Ffs she just me messages on LinkedIn (I blocked her on fb, insta, WhatsApp but forgot about bloody linkedIn)

OP posts:
greyspottedgoose · 05/05/2020 16:11

Tell your husband, he will know there's something on your mind and you two are a team so let him support you, you haven't cheated on him he has no reason to be angry with you

Ughmaybenot · 05/05/2020 16:11

To clarify, not that I think you need to speak to her, or you owe her an explanation, but I personally feel like washing your hands of any responsibility for the hurt caused is completely wrong. You knew about her.
Given the circumstances, and the tone of her messages, I don’t blame you for not wanting to speak to her.

AlternativePerspective · 05/05/2020 16:11

And TBH if my partner of three years told me that they’d had a two year sexting affair with a married man I would very probably end the relationship.

So I would only tell your DH if you’re prepared to lose him over it. Otherwise keep it to yourself. You say that’s not the person you are now, if you tell him now he will always wonder...

Bluetrews25 · 05/05/2020 16:12

Just answer the bloody phone or this will never stop.

listsandbudgets · 05/05/2020 16:13

DH a few years before I met you had a relationship with an older man. Now I'm getting harassing messages from his partner and shes being quite abusive. I'm bit worried she will try contacting you as shes being so nasty so hist wanted to let you know"

no need to apologise to your dh youd not even met him at that stage. Hopefully he will be supportive.

No need to communicate with her delete and block.

You're heavily pregnant in the midst if a pandemic you dont need the stress that responding to her is likely to bring

Menora · 05/05/2020 16:14

I don’t think she’s going to let go very lightly at all. I think now you are going to tell your DH about it and lock down absolutely everything, you don’t know how far she will go as she is very angry

Me personally would prepare to answer the phone one time to see if I could make it stop by talking to her. Telling her you were a moron might placate her but it could make it worse. But if it doesn’t stop you might need to contact the police

Standrewsschool · 05/05/2020 16:14

“ I never told him before now because I was embarrassed and ashamed of my actions and we generally don't speak all that much about past relationships”

Perhaps this is how you should introduce the conversation. Explain that, as far you were concerned, it was all in the past, and you didn’t expect it to resurface again.

Be upfront and show him the calls. Honesty will be the best policy. Hiding them will make him think something is going on.

Everyone makes mistakes, and everyone has a past.

GreenGlassVase · 05/05/2020 16:15

Goodness, block her number. Iphones can do that easily.

Sort your LinkedIn out quickly, block her, you don’t want her contacting everyone you’ve ever worked with.

Check Twitter and Instagram too, she’s obviously on a mission

EmmaGrundyForPM · 05/05/2020 16:16

If I were you I would tell my husband. I would probably also answer the phone just once, explain. that this happened several years ago and that it is her partner she should be shouting at, not you. Then explain that if she contnudes to contact you, you will contact the police.

Good luck with your pregnancy

Carrie7469 · 05/05/2020 16:16

I’m sure you can block calls from withheld nunvers

Cherrysoup · 05/05/2020 16:17

Don’t answer any messages.

I have blocked her number but she's calling on private number and I don't have a way to block that on my phone.
You do, just put Do not disturb on except for people you still need to contact. Just ignore. I would take away Facebook just for now.

TriarFuck · 05/05/2020 16:18

Leaving aside the silliness of sending naked photos to anyone, ever - I think you wiped the slate clean when your dealings with the older man fizzled out, OP.

I have been in two long-term relationships (one still on-going), with two men who had very much more adventurous pasts than I had. I know that much, but I don't know any of the details, and don't want to know them. So long as my partner is faithful, kind, respectful etc in the context of our relationship, anything that happened before that is not my business (any more than my more limited experiences are their business).

I would ignore this woman, perhaps change your phone number, and say nothing to your husband. Perhaps just give social media a bit of a miss for a while (or tighten up the security settings? I don't use social media, so don't know how it works, so apologies if this is crap advice).

FudgeBrownie2019 · 05/05/2020 16:18

I think I'd block, delete and leave her to burn herself out; you can't answer her questions, you can't give her any kind of resolution, she wants to just vent at you (justifiably) so leave her be.

I do think I'd speak to DH about it. You have a past, it's not pretty, most people were dicks at one point or another and being open about yours (so long as he's unlikely to do the kind of guy who uses it against you) seems the best option. That way if she was unkind enough to try and involve him he can block, delete and walk away rather than getting embroiled.

TwistyHair · 05/05/2020 16:18

Sounds really stressful for you. I’d tell my husband because otherwise he might find out another way. You don’t want her having any power over you seeing as she has the images.

Original poster
Yecats1990 · 05/05/2020 16:18

@AternativePerspective you are actually pretty on the money, I have been very vocal about trust and not cheating and have always said that I never cheated on a partner (which is true) but completely omitted the fact I was the "other woman" for almost 2 years so now il look like a royal arsehole which I deserve. I have told him before that i made mistakes with men when i was younger but never had the balls to tell him the extent of the mistakes I made.
The photos themselves are just of a younger slimmer body than mine no face or recognisable tattoos I doubt he'd recognise me from them but I think I have to bite the bullet and fess up just because I'm stressing about it and he is gonna know something is wrong.

OP posts:
SleepingStandingUp · 05/05/2020 16:19

I'd just answer the call. Get husband cheated on her with you, you knew, she's just kind out and possibly has no idea what happened. Answer the call and put it on speaker phone a d on the side so if she's screams at you it's less of an assault on your ears. If she's just screaming abuse cancel it but perhaps she just needs answers. At least this might stop it before baby comes

clumsyduck · 05/05/2020 16:20

I do feel bad for you but let’s just remember from this woman’s point of view this has just happened now to her and of course she is angry . Hopefully she is angry at her OH too rather than just you !

I’d hate to have it hanging over me I’d text back saying along the lines it was years ago nothing more happened and also point out the revenge porn / police part others have said so the photos don’t go any further . Then I’d delete all social media for a while so she doesn’t look you up on it all and maybe change phone number

Tell dh for some real life support not because you should feel bad to him - he wasn’t on the scene then

StirCrazy2020 · 05/05/2020 16:20

What exactly is she going to do? Making the pictures public is against the law. Telling people you know what you did? Well that would be embarrassing but you can simply say it was in the past, it didn't go very far and yes it was stupid. Trolling your comments and inboxes? You could start to report her to the website owners but mostly she'll be making herself look deranged. She's exploding because there is nothing she CAN do really. Send the older man a text telling him to sort it out and explain to your husband if nothing else to get some support.

"It was in the past, it was mostly flirting, no we didn't have sex and yes it was stupid but take it up with your partner not me."

rosiepony · 05/05/2020 16:20

Answer the phone and go mental citing harassment and revenge porn.

Honestly, scare the fuck out of the bitch.

pipnchops · 05/05/2020 16:21

Block her number. My DH is my best friend and I would probably tell him and ask him advice rather than hide it as he'll probably notice something is up and secrets aren't good in a relationship. It was more the man's fault as he was in a relationship and you were single at the time. It wasn't your finest hour but we all make silly decisions.

Lifeaback · 05/05/2020 16:22

We’ve all made mistakes and it was a long time ago. I for one am certainly glad smartphones weren’t a thing in my twenties....

If you don’t want to speak to her then block her and make sure all of your social media is set to the highest privacy settings. I think though if it was me I would probably want to speak to her to reassure her that it was a long time ago and nothing happened because she probably doesn’t believe what her husband has told her. Of course, this doesn’t excuse his behaviour but I know that if I was in her shoes I would want to know the full story before deciding how to proceed.

With regards to telling your husband, I would probably want to tell mine if it was a situation causing me anxiety as I know he would help to reassure me and certainly wouldn’t judge me for something that had happened so long ago and prior to our relationship. It has nothing to do with your relationship so don’t feel it’s something you ‘have’ to tell him about, only tell him if you think talking to him about it will help you.

As others have said though, if she is persistent she might find your husband and tell him. In which case I think I would rather he heard it first from me so it didn’t come as a surprise and he knew I was being honest about what had happened

RJnomore1 · 05/05/2020 16:23

This will be controversial no doubt but actually you’ve done nothing wrong, you were single, you sexted someone who turned out to be a dick, I think you should tell your partner and I’d expect mine to support me unless of course you’ve led him to believe he’s the only man you’ve ever been intimate with?

And no don’t talk to her, block on everything, he’s the one that cheated on her he deaks with.

I think if you were proposing doing it now I’d give different advice but ffs the ship has sailed, and it does not sound like you’re in a rush to repeat it.

MadameMeursault · 05/05/2020 16:23

Why are you embarrassed and ashamed? You weren’t in a relationship, you weren’t cheating on anyone. No-one has any right to judge you. It’s not a mistake, it’s just something you did in your past. I would answer the phone and tell the woman what happened. It’s her OH at fault not you. Oh and I’d tell your DH too in case she causes trouble, even though what you did before you met him is none of his concern. Then just block her and move on.

Rainbowshine · 05/05/2020 16:23

If it’s from a private number how do you know it’s her calling?