Have YOU had an affair?

[girlnextdoor]

Like a similar poster not long ago, I am astounded at the number of mums posting abut their partners' affairs.

Yet, there is always another side- they are having affairs with women- many of whom will be mums too.

I am interested to hear the OWs stories. Things are never as black and white as one side may think.

Sometimes affairs can stop a marriage falling apart- if it is discreet or if both partners are relaxed about it- certainly, the upper classes and French presidents openly have affairs and everyone seems to accept it.

This is NOT the thread to join in with if you are hurting from your DHs affair, or if you can only see one side, and can only contribute things like marriage vows, trust, etc etc- but as a general open-minded debate it would be good to hear some other sides to it.

i would but i dont think i honestly could

Have the decency to either sort out your current relationship or walk. End of.

I pretty much try to treat other people the way I would like to be treated - I would never do anything like this...it may be fun at the time but I would torment myself with it for the rest of my life.

Even if hubby and the OM wife never found out - I would know and I would not respect myself for it.

Have met loads of attractive men recently and do sort of like them/feel comfortable in their company. But I am far too busy trying to start a new job/take kids to school/do housework/keep H happy to really have the guts to embark on a scary/secretive thing which could get me into big trouble at the end of the day. I like taking risks, yes, but at home with my H I feel safe, so that is it.

I wouldn't have time these days - like Salla. And I think that it's quite a different matter when you have children. I did have a very brief fling many many years ago. I did everything I could to stop it happening including leaving my job. But it still did. No excuses.

"Their relationships would have ended anyway- there is a lot of sanctimony on this site and not a lot of imagination at times."

No. Isn't this always the excuse for people who have affairs? Toss out any old self-justification.

It's not a matter of staying in a miserable relationship. It's a matter of having the decency and respect to wait until you are seperated from your partner.

At the end of the day its down to a lack of maral fibre and a lack of respect for your partner.

But then there are many people out there who put their own happiness above all else and are quite happy to re-write history to excuse the pain they caused. Such people aren't necessarily bad I suppose but they are are generally weak, and lacking in morals.

"We are just glad we met each other and to be honest 'getting over it' is their problem and not ours."

What a shame you could not have done the decent thing and left your respective partners first before skipping off into your idyll of happiness tigersmum.

I can't help but wonder why you felt the need to comment that your respective spouses never got over it too.

affairs ooooh noooo, they sound like too much hassle, especially if he too is cheating on someone. And what do you get in the end - a broken marriage, forcing children to live apart from one parent they love, and a new partner with dubious morals who may do the same again to me in a few years time; and low self-esteem for having betrayed someone, which would possibly create a paranoia which would then damage the relationship with new partner. Sounds hell.
No thanks.

"There are many people out there who put their own happiness above everyone else's". I would add to that that a lot of people do not actually realise that they already are happy and that they have a lot of good things in their lives. All these good feelings sort of get covered under the everyday sturggles of mortgages, bills, kids etc. You sometimes need a catalyst of some sort to make you realize how lucky you actually already are and that just to wake up on a summers morning and know that you have some friends is good enough reason to be happy and enjoy life.

That's very true Salla !

I couldn't have an affair as I would feel like I were taking the piss out of my partner and would find the sort of man who would cheat really unattractive. TBH I'm too vain to sleep with someone else's husband, although did get off with a few friend's boyfriends through my late teens but that was more about needed to ensure everyone thought I was the most attractive!! Very sad and desperate behaviour which I swiftly grew out of when I had a little self esteem and self worth.

GND

I understand your wish to facilitate an open debate. TBH, I think it would help if you were able to dictate less overtly and steer more gently. You are at risk of stomping on peoples raw emotions and silencing people in pain. Everyone has a right to a voice, particularly on an open forum.

Anyway,

"...Would anyone even own up to understanding why their partner had an affair? It's never 100% one person's fault- maybe one person has let themselves go, become boring, self-absorbed, has no conversation at all to offer, and is frankly boring. These people never think they are to blame- it's always someone else's fault...."

I feel most of the reasons you've proffered are simplistic and in IME, exactly the type of thing a more naive OW is likely to grab onto. (?)

well cathartis- those reasons are not necessarily what i believe personally- they are there to fuel the debate- and despite your protests that I am stomping on raw emotions, plenty of MNs are willing to come here and say their bit.

How would you have put it?

I dont suppose I would have ever left my ex H if it was not for my affair with now DH as I was in an abusive loveless relationship with a partner who had total control. My children are better off and have been for the last 15 years without their dad as he was a bastard to them and me and having an affair was the best thing I did it gave me the confidence to get away and continue the wonderful relationship I had begun with DH.

i feel quite sad and bereft now.. i am single, lonely and have no man in sight, yet some of you on here have 2 on the go at once

GND, I've hardly protested as such. It appears that you seem or choose to be unaware of the depth of the issues you are wishing to debate. An open debate might lead to enlightenment. A censored debate may lead to false justification (?) for example but little else. IMO

With regard to your question? In answer...
I wouldn't have!

Yes - although when we first met I didn't know he was married. I was insanely in love with him. He was older than me. I was flattered that an older, successful man was intersted in me. He was late 30s and I was early 20s.

We split up. I was wanting more than he could give. They got divorced and thankfully I wasn't cited in divorce. Their marriage had been a mess for sometime - she had chosen to take a job away from where they were living and if I remember rightly was also started seeing someone else. I honestly don't think that it was a marriage that was going to recover. What I regret is that I met him then and not sometime later. He was rebounding badly.

Wish some men would post- you must be out there!

If your relationshop was abusive tigersmum then that puts a different slant on things and I would like to apologise

I was in similar situation, except my partner cheated on me in a really humiliating and hurtful way.

Anyway, I'm genuinely sorry for being so judgmental.

I am a wife and had a string of affairs in a 8mth period many years ago. I was out for the physical aspect not emotional side.

It started when I was pregnant (not the affairs) I found I went from low sex drive to insanely high, DH found it difficult to keep at my pace and appeared to reject me.. at the same time once the baby was born I found my sex drive was still insane, during the day I felt deeply depressed which I was in denial about yet I was hungry for physical closeness so I sought out men, one was married for a once off, the rest were single.

I hated the fact I was a liar, cheat so told my DH sooner rather than later about my evenings out, he was deeply hurt, yet he turned around and forgave me and said he felt he could understand why I did what I did. The fact I was prepared for him to leave me and rightly slag me off he said was simply not me and asked that I see the Dr.

Not long after though it did lead to us exploring new roads never trod down before.. interesting times, but now truly left in the past but not with regret.

The period of affairs led to a more open channel of communication between us, to the point I can honestly say dh does trust me and for his handling of it all I will always be grateful for, he could have easily walked away or left, but he didn't he worked with me to get us back to being us.

I did have an affair at the end of a previous relationship - in retrospect, the affair was not only sexual, but about me finding myself again. The relationship I was in was particularly intense, and I had become increasingly unhappy with my partners behaviour and the emotional effect he had on me. I needed to become my own person again.

I met my DH 6 months later, and 13 years on, I cannot remotely imagine wanting anyone other than him. We have a much more balanced, less dependant relationship with each other.

On Diva T.v at the moment Orpha is on and the show is about this. Thought I would post and see if anyone was interested. Only just started watching it. Very sad.

buzzing bee have been where you are.

I am a long term clinical depressive with manic features. Around 3 months ago immediately after weaning ds2 went into a manic phase the major features of which were complete lack of concentration, extreme sociability (!) and obsession with sex.

I am ashamed to say that I very nearly slept with the husband of a woman I actually know and like. He is a horrendous philanderer and I knew this- today I just can't understand my own behaviour and I am disgusted by it in retrospect. I had known him for 5 years and merely thought he was a twat. My husband knows all about this as he had noticed I was behaving really strangely and manically and started checking up. He has forgiven me now but it was hard. I don't think that if he had judged me to be 'sane' when I did it, he would be being so forgiving, although I think he would always want to try again for the sake of the kids.

My reason for posting this is to try to add another element to the 'moral fibre' arguments. I feel appalling guilt and even horror at what I nearly did but the psychiatrist has told me that unusual sexual behaviour and lack of 'conscience' is a common feature of mania. I am not for one moment saying that all affairs/flings can be excused as blips in brain chemistry but I do think that we need to think about the role of mental illness and/or emotional trauma in them. I dont' feel it is quite enough to say 'fine leave if you are not happy and if you don't you are basically evil' because there are other factors involved in low impulse control of the type I descended into.

I have only been able to get free of my sexual obsessions and longing for new partners since changing to new medication 3 weeks ago. My husband says I am like a different person and he is glad although he misses the sex

Im a namechanger and i had sex in a hotel on saturday night with a guy now he has cold feet and im angry for being so bloody stupid and starting to have feelings for him. i hate myself at the minute. My husband knows about it tooim so pissedoff at the minute i dunno whats going on in my head.

My husband and I had affairs with each other (short lasting a few weeks only, we knew rapidly we wanted to be together) and left our spouses to be together.
Yes we could have both left our spouses, lived alone for a bit then lived together but life seemed too short. Sometimes you just realise you have married the wrong person. Neither of us are religious so we don't believe we'll burn in hell for it, our exspouses are now with new people and happier than when they were with us as their new partners love them.
I can't contemplate having an affair currently, I am too happy. I do think affairs for most people can be the result of an unhappy marriage rather than the cause of it.

I had an affair when I was married to ex-h. No children involved, just adults being foolish.

I really regret the hurt that I caused, to loads of people, not just ex-h, but looking back I often think that I was desperate to end the relationship but didn't feel that I could say "I don't want to be with you any more, I don't love you" so I let him find out about the affair as a cowardly way of ending it.

We are all happy now thankfully but it was a really awful time.
I would absolutely never ever do it again.