Is anyone else still in disbelief that another woman is living your life?

[autumnmarshmallows]

Usual scenario. Husband of 22 years had an affair and got OW pregnant within three months of being with her (we already had adult children).
Both of them are bastards in my opinion but even 5 years on, I still have days when I can't wrap my head around this other woman living the life that was originally mine. She seems to want for nothing and doesn't work (small kid at home half the time), drives a brand new car, goes on holidays and is a bitch towards our adult kids.
I'd never want to be with him again but it does occasionally piss me right off . I'm wondering if this feeling with ever dissipate?

You sound like a paranoid other woman who's trying to convince herself he won't do It again

I imagine you’re still feeling like this as you haven’t found happiness in your own life yet. How are things going for you and could you do anything to improve things?

I suppose I’m living the life my partner’s former long term partner had with him. I’m looking like a pampered princess, but the reality is of course different.

Do not covet her lot in life. They are probably rowing about having another child and he is looking at not being able to retire before his mid-70s as he tries to fund it all. She'll have to go back to work in the end no doubt.

I think the new young wives have the rougher deal in these set ups to be honest. You get the young version and don't have to deal with any complicating second family issues - I would say she is welcome to have the twilight grumpy limp dicked years.

Op what 30 something really wants to partner up with and have a kid with a 50s man who's nearly old enough to be her Dad, seriously though.

She couldn't get better.

She couldn't get a man around her own age. She had to settle for a washed up much older man who's already had his kids, a marriage a life.

You didn't - you got an age appropriate, young man to have your family with etc. She's got someone else's middle aged, used up, leavings. You had the best of him, she gets the rest of him.
I hope you got a fair deal in the divorce.

She also got the type of man who'll cheat and fuck over his long-term wife and the mother of his kids for a bit of young ass.

Also the type who doesnt care how cringe it must be for his adult kids to see him get with a young woman and have a kid in his 50s ...and he doesn't even see them or try to keep a good relationship going with them and lets her disrupt it; he's spineless, has no loyalty, lacks integrity.

It sounds like if they ever broke up, you two would never get back together (and rightly so on your part) so all you can do is enjoy your life and build up the best life you can.

Wow. How judgemental.
I found out my ex was sleeping with someone else exactly 3 weeks after finding out I was pregnant with our dd. So definitely not the OW.
But I can still agree that the belief that "marrying the mistress creates a vacancy" is far from universal.
I know of plenty of men who have cheated and gone on to have long-lasting stable relationships. Not all, but more than pps seem to think.

I agree wholeheartedly with @MrsHedgewitch
The new wife is not living OP's life. The OP has the choice to live a fulfilling and new life. I'm not dismissing the unjustifiable and devastating hurt caused by her exh, but there is truly only one path to happiness and its not through anger.

Well my father eventually did the same to wife no 2. Took him over 2.5 decades (or probably more accurately, took him over 2.5 decades to be caught). So in my experience it's not just a "comfort blanket". Actually I think the idea that these men generally change or that "they'd never do that to me" is a comfort blanket in itself.

Nice little pre-dig at the end to anyone who dares to have a different opinion to you btw 😂

He's the one who ultimately decided to leave you, I can get why you're coveting her life and resent her, but he did this. No matter how much attention she gave him and whatever else he still chose her and to leave you; he isn't a man you want to wistfully imagine a perfect future with, he sounds awful. I get it though, it's easier to blame a random woman than the man you loved for many years. I hope you find happiness, I fear until you do they will take up too much of your headspace.

These barbs at this poster aren’t ok. They speak the truth. Exit affairs. New relationships are often successful. Trying to say oh he will cheat on her too is silly. He might do. But he overwhelmingly may not. Much depends on the state of his marriage before he chose to end it.

amd it appears he ended it very quickly after meeting this woman, pregnancies can be managed, he chose to end his marriage he choose to be with her, there is no evidence he’s a serial cheat. Was it wrong yes, but trying to pretend he will defo cheat on her, that he’s unhappy really doesn’t stack up

it’s sad for the op, yes. Devastating her marriage ended like this, but that’s where it ends. She should be encouraged to move on.

and I’m happily married not an ow by the way.

she is welcome to have the twilight grumpy limp dicked years.

Lol

Sgelk probably he glad he's limp dicked ... Not many 30/40 something women want to have sex with 60 something and onwards men. There aren't many George Clooney around.

I wouldn't see it like this. She is with a deceitful man, she can never trust him. No way would i want a husband capable of doing this. No cars make up for that.

Jackienory,very clear your moral compass and what you've been up to, scary isn't it knowing that he can move on and arrogantly believing it won't happen to you? You're younger,prettier,gave him something he needed the wife, was a bitch,right?
Here's a little fact, 2nd marriages are more likely to end in divorce due to adultery, if the first marriage ended because of one partners adultery,also more likely to end in divorce full stop.
Enjoy.

Sure, they just get better at.keeping the affair a secret or go the whole hog and save money using prostitutes also less likely to get caught cheats don't stop because they convinced someone to take on the housekeeper role. They all carry on.

Defensive much? Tell us you were the OW without telling us you were the OW why don't you.

I work with people having babies and of all the many older men with grown up kids who are with new younger women having babies I have encountered, only one seemed truly delighted. He was much older with a son of about 40. The others seemed to have too good a recall of how much hard work children are and how their lovely life's were going to change.

What bizarre misogyny to accuse a poster of being an OW just because she has a different opinion from yours.

I think this feeling goes away as you build your own happiness. The unfairness is still there but it seems to matter less when you are happy in your own life.

Another reason for op to be glad she's not his current partner; op had her kids with this specimen when they were both young ... This woman has a young child with a nearly 60 yr old man, not a good position to be in.

(But then she probably only had them to secure her visa status as much as she could anyway).

I sympathise op, but you must try to move on as you’re giving them both power to affect your life that they shouldn’t have.

She isn’t living your life, she’s living hers. It may turn out to be shit in time, or it may not. At the moment it sounds like she has it easy and this may well be true. You need to work on improving your own life, irrespective of what they’re doing. If she treats your kids like shit then I would speak to their father about it. If he doesn’t care or do anything about it, he may well find they cut him off and who would blame them!

It's not misogyny. It's an assumption, which may be right or wrong, based on the fact that that particular poster seems to have quite unpleasant (and actually misogynistic) views about first wives and their bitterness, prosecco habits and apparently their communication style as well.

@autumnmarshmallows sometimes I look at the ex's girlfriend and think, yes she is living the life I should have, but I wouldn't want it with him 🤷‍♀️

Why can't you challenge the views without resorting to accusations?

He's clearly cowardly and selfish and mal adjusted and irresponsible. Shown by his affair on his long-term wife & mother of his kids, his leaving for his young (visa seeking?) affair partner, knocking her up quickly etc

How is it surprising that he's not bothering his arse to maintain a relationship with his young adult kids?

He's selfish. She probably doesn't want him maintaining a good relationship with his young adult kids ... Because that's attention, time and potential resources away from her and her child.

That's potential inheritance sent their way instead of entirely grabbed by her and her child.

That's the bottom line. She wants him estranged from his kids. She doesn't want him eg feeling obliged to help them financially... A natural result of him having a good relationship with them. She wants any bonds that might lead to resources of his going to them, broken. She wants her name and her kid's name on any will of his, noone else's.

He ... Goes along with that, for a quiet life.
He doesn't care. He's too foolish and low integrity to think about it or care or do the right thing and treat his kids equally.

How you stuck such a limp lettuce and selfish idiot for so long, op, I don't know.

Time is a great healer, OP. My first husband had a delightful OW, who was deliriously keen to eject me from my life, and ex-DH was quite happy about it. Once DH and I had properly separated, their relationship was no longer 'forbidden fruit' and it all fizzled out very quickly. It was a truly awful time in my life, but I feel nothing about the whole episode now, its just a piece of history and the pain has gone.

I have a lovely new DH, I certainly wouldn't want my first husband back!

Most men of that age wouldn’t jump for joy at parenting again. She isn’t living your life she set you free. It’s how you look at it. I choose not to look. I know I’m better off without my ex. I feel sorry for the woman he is with now. Concentrate on you.