AIBU to think that most relationships will end with an OVERLAP with a new relationship.

[morningpaper]

I don't get this thing on MN whereby married people are expected to end marriages before embarking on other relationships.

This idea of people (except you always mean 'woman' ) being "slappers" if they enter relationships with married people makes me think lots of you have very little understanding of how relationships work.

• To be blunt, I would be FAR more upset if DH left me for a lonely life as a single person in a bedsit than for a new relationship. I think the former is FAR more insulting. I have a close friend whose husband did this and it was MORTIFYING every time people said "Oh darlng, was there someone else?" and she had to say "No" (unspoken message: 'I am just too horrific to live with').

• People need support when they end relationships - and that support often comes from a new relationship.

• If people ended every marriage at the first sniff of new romance, or at the first feelings of dissatisfaction, then none of our relationships would last more than a year or two! It is often a new relationship that gives people the impetus to re-evaluate their lives.

• Most relationships become very "stale" after a certain amount of time - society tells us we must WORK at our relationships after the desire has gone, but WHY? Why not just accept that our partners or ourselves might be MORE happy in a new relationships - we have changed and grown, after all.

I have several friends in relationships with married people - and I expect a lot of you do, too, but they probably don't tell you because you are so HORRIFIED at the idea. Such relationships generally end in a lot of DESPAIR but they are part of life.

When you talk about "ending relationships before starting new ones" it sounds to me just like people who talk about not having sex before marriage - a great ideal (perhaps), but not realistic for 99% of people.

hmmmn
"real relationships"
Can't wait to tell DH that one of us has to have an affair just to make it 'real'.

Actually I rarely talk about it - it is private for dh and me and not relevant to our life today. However, I've mentioend it here as it was pertinent to the OP and might have helped others in similar circumstances. Things are not always black and white.

The important thing is that dh and I are happy now, his ex-w is married with a kid (I can't comment on how happily as I have never talked to her) and life goes on.

Dh did have a fling with someone between her and me. I suspect she blames her far more than me. As I say, the biggest arguments that dh and I had in the early days was me taking her "side".

morningpaper dear we all know you are lovely but how many of these damn threads along similar lines have you started recently. I am not logging in as often but I read the title now and think 'thats morningpaper' as its usually about how women are insecure and something or other about affairs overlaps. You are right some women are insecure but I am NOT and I would be hurt if my husband had an overlap. Its the way I was made.

things are never black and white when you know that what you have done is not morally correct, IMO.

maybe seeing my best friend ripped apart by an overlap, that her H had no intention of telling her about, has coloured my view though.

oh believe me I have seen enough adultery in my life to know that people make excuses for themselves, any excuse. Its always someone elses fault

prettybird "And I should add that I have no concerns about dh "wandering". We have been through tough times over the years, when at times it would have been easier to separate, but becasue we love each other, we don't want to and instead work at our marriage"
nasty and thoughtless - so I didn't love my H and didn't work at my marriage - funny how its always the OW who blames the wife - you know what - what goes around comes around, just deserts, and self righteous are a few words that spring to mind - you never know perhaps if you hadn't "been around" maybe your H would have worked harder at his previosu marriage but who know because you were waiting for what you wanted !!!!

I've started ONE thread and this one, which is a response to another name-calling one that I didn't want to give the dignity of bumping.

I know it's much EASIER to think this is about ME ('no romance in your life MP?' etc etc) because then you don't have to think about the argument. This is just the same as assuming that there are 'slappers' out there after your husbands. There are not. Life is complicated, and people are confused and fallible, and relationships overlap.

life is complicated and people are fallible, but in my eyes , it does not make affairs right or justifiable or ok or cute or charming or out of peoples control.

mp...i love your threads. they're always interesting.

I don't have to justify myself and after this I will parp. As I said in my first post, our relationship did overlap but was not the cause of the breakdown, in tthat they were already in the process of separating - and that only we know the truth of that.

I have never said that there was not blame on both sides. I don't know the detail of dh's first marriage but suspect that they just married too young and just grew apart. I do know that there was an issue with a very interfering MIL - which I beleive that his ex-wife has since agreed contributed to the breakdown.

Dh continued to go the marriage counsellor on his own even after they had separated to try to resolve his emotions.

Dh has learnt from his "mistakes" - as we all do through life.

We have both read things like "60 Minute Marriage", "60 minute father", "Men are from mars, Woemn from Venus" etc. One of the things from one of the "60 Minute" series that struck home to me was something about the 30 second rule - you have 30 seconds to decide if you want to take a step (eg start an affair/give in to temptation") that could irrevocably damage your relationship - and is really worth it? I've never actaully been tempted - although I find plenty of men attractive, and in different lives, differnt times... - but I've often remembered that advice.

Dh has on a number of occasions been off for a week (or more) at a time, with my encouragement. I knwo that he has been propostioned on at least one occasion. However, he has never acted on them, and I trust him.

(going back a bit) I don'#t engage in couple relationships at all at present and hardly ever did previously: but the ones I did engage in after I worked out what the whole business was about, were always open. Anyone I met (or will meet in the future) who wants a monogamous relationship with me will be told politely but firmly that it is not on offer and never will be. If such a person finds that hurtful and bad and wrong that is his (or indeed her) problem not mine.
Equally (and going a bit off the subject here) the cult of compulsory heterosexual monogamy is disastrous for people who are asexual or prefer celibacy, because they get fed the same bullshit (only a couple-relationship will make you a Proper Person, you will 'fall in love' etc etc), they often fall for it and end up in these wretched relationships where one partner wants sex at least sometimes and the other would prefer never to have it at all.

FInally: 'insecurity'. I don;t think that's the right word, but if the focus of your life is labelling someone My Partner and preventing that person ever having a sexual thought about anyone else, that's a pretty pathetic, pointless and miserable way to live.

i cant imagine an open relationship at all

Why do people always post "I pity you MP" - blimey, I've got the best family life I could possible conceive of, that I don't remotely deserve, that positively proves the lack of existence of any sort of karma - and yet I am pitied because I don't accept the idea (which was invented by Disney, I imagine) that you find "The One True Love" and never fall in love again???

I full expect to fall in love again! Perhaps on a regular basis. And I shall enjoy it as much as possible. (And no, that doesn't mean throwing my pants in the air.) I think there are lots of people in the average person's life that they might meet, and that might make good life partners. Some people will make better matches than others. But the idea of "The One" I find utterly incomprehensible.

mp...I agree with some of what you're saying. i'm sure there are 100's of men (or women) out there that could make me happy, but you have to stop somewhere. I can't have them all can I. I love food but I wouldn't pig out 24/7. plus, I have a duty to provide as stable a homelife for my children, falling in love every other month would not provide that stability.

absolutely lapin

i think the idea of the one goes back before disney... like to romeo and juliet?

so you expect to fall in love lots more times.. for what purpose, what gain, why?

why did you get married, MP, if you are so sure that the notion of romantic, monogamous love is not going to happen, and that your marriage is pretty much doomed? i really don;t get it

you obviously feel strongly about this issue, so why do something as traditional as marriage?

There's no purpose to it, I think it's just the way people are built

I went into my first marriage thinking THIS IS IT! TOGETHER FOREVER! but rapidly discovered I was wrong

So I started off with that viewpoint (don't all girls?) but I don't think it's true any more

So what if you DID fall in love with someone else? Would that mean your marriage was obviously to the 'wrong person'?

I got married because I promised Yorkiegirl that I would do the sensible thing for my children

arent we programmed to be in monogamous relationships though

so being in love with more than one sexual partner is sort of switched off

ie you have to not be in love any more to be available for a love interest