is it me or are a lot of women NOT NOTICING their hs are having affairs on here atm

[PitysSake]

for eg the mate in the car thread

the golf text thread

WAKE UP!!

expat, not every woman who lives in that financial insecurity is a sap though. I badgered my x about the injustices as I saw them. He didn't listen. Well I left eventually. He's met somebody new! God help her.

I am angry. i don't think he is havng an actual affair, he is just insanely stupid and didn't realise how that "joke" reads.
im not yet decided on course of actio but it will be a rocky road either way im sure.

For me its the feeling of utter stupidity. the humiliation of telling the world how fantastically happy we are were, just for him to throw it in my face like that.

to feel so thick that i didn't realise sooner.

Its the shame rather than a fear of being alone imo.
but then again my judgement is rather skewed so ignore me

I wouldn't get judgy about it either. It's complicated. Men in very happy married relationships have affairs - so do women too.

I think too we're v. quick to think someone is having an affair on here. Sometimes people are more weird than that - there's every reason to suppose that the dh was just sitting in the car, enjoying an evening off, almost certainly flirting and behaving selfishly - but not having an affair.

Women always want men to behave EXACTLY like they do - imo - that's what they consider normal and satisfactory. And when they don't, which is inevitable, all hell breaks out.

Women get sad and jumpy if they think their partner fancies someone, or is being emotionally unfaithful. They think that is disrespectful - to even think it. I think that too, but I reckon most men don't.

Also marriage is hard isn't it. It's difficult to sustain such a long relationship over years and years and years.

I don't think your judgment is skewed at all. You are right. It feels like a betrayal.

Until it happens to you, you really can't comment on whether it's obvious or not can you? I suggest you wake up or butt out.

tiffany - that sounds bloody perfect! A man when you want one, not when you don't! Hurray!

orm, i have a close friend who has a relationship like tiffany's that's been going strong for 9 years!

they live in the same town and are 100% happy with the set up.

its obviously not bvious to the people involved here though is it. i deisgaree (gasp) with 110 times though adn think we make excuses for mens behaviour on this board too much - "maybe this maybe that" when he or she is either just being disloyal or shagging around.

Speaking as someone who went through this, after you have trusted someone for 10 years you do tend to look for an explanation rather than screaming AFFAIR at them as soon as things go a bit odd and wrong. AF is right, you do rationalise the behaviour as something it is not but that is like any kind of learned behaviour - if the train to work is late you don't think terrorists have blown it off the track, you think the signals are sticking, just like they have a hundred times before when there's been a bit of a problem.

Unfortunately, that's the downside of having trust in another person - you have faith in them and the fact that they won't see this as an opportunity to go behind your back and crap all over you as soon as someone indicates she'd give them the chance. My H used to trust me to go out for drinks with an ex every month or so - we work in the same field so can bore each other shitless with gossip while the other halves babysit and have a night off from our bitching. I extended the same to him, and it worked just fine for years until a bored, predatory bitch gave him the signals and the idiot reciprocated.

However, there are upsides - in my case, my H has gone from having delusions of superiority to knowing he's actually a worse person than me - which I have welcomed; it has made him a much better person to live with. And the choice was this - leave him and go back to dating people I have no idea about (see many threads on this board again for details of the psychos and general weirdos that this brings into your life), or realise I now know even the nasty bits of him (including the signs he's up to something) so have a stab at a new relationship based on this awareness, not romantic delusion. I'll keep you posted... but I am in no way afraid of going it alone, it just isn't always such an attractive option.

PS, what sort of strong advice would you give instead of the old hugs line?

Seriously, what can a woman do if her H is shagging someone? I've seen people post things like 'Put a stop to it now!"'

but surely it isn't something within the woman's control? It's like demanding someone love you, or be your friend. You can't make someone treat you nicely.

You can only protect yourself to a degree.

Whilst I agree with you, If I was in a situation where I thought my DH was cheating, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to believe it until I had walked in on them at it. Must be a hard situation to come to terms with after having such trust in a person, easier to rationalise it than confront it the way it is IYSWIM?

I'm one of those women who thinks her DH wouldn't cheat, too much to loose etc etc, but I hardly ever see him, he's out of the country for 7 months ATM and when he is at 'home' he's at the opposite end of the country 5 days out of 7, lets face it he could be up to anything and I wouldn't have a bloody clue. I trust him, I have to, I'd end up a raving loon otherwise.

It is just you.

There is nothing new about this, nothing atm about all of this.

This has been happening since the dawn of time. Men cheat, women ignore the warning signals, pretend they don't know, try to rationalise everything, stick their heads in the sand, wail "but I ^luuuuuuve him" and then stay with the bastard.

It has been a regular feature of mumsnet since it started, and is a regular feature of our society (maybe all societies?)

and it's not just men either.

Only since being on MN have I realised how many women also cheat on their partners/husbands.

i am financially independent, lots of friends etc but i am sure in the unlikely event of dh straying i would cultivate a certain amount of denial rather than face the cold hard truth.

btw my dh is a nice man and all my male friends are v. lovely do i live in a parallel universe?

eleanora, no, I live in that universe too

so am really not qualified to comment on how other women may react in any given situation, so I do try to understand how utterly awful it must be

I do, however, have some examples to fall back on from another universe (before dh, when I was a different person )

is it another universe though? or do you live in the happy trusty universe until you suddenly find yourself in the other one?

Yes mesboogie that is exactly as it is - I lived in the happy trusty universe until I found myself in the other one.

It is worth remembering that any one is capable of having an affair and therefore we all stand a chance of being the betrayed. Nothing can protect you from the feelings that come with being betrayed including denial even when it is staring you in the face.

And to all those who say they would kick their DP/DH into touch if they strayed, you do not know what you would do until you are in those shoes ...... Nothing is black or white just loads of grey.

Yes, I think it's like that. And I think it must be really shocking, because suddenly you are staring down at a different potential future - you don't go RIGHT, THAT'S THAT, I can see clearly now the rain has gone.

It think it takes time. Whatever the outcome.

Lots of people are destroyed by affairs and the relationship finishes. Quite a few stick around to see if it works etc.

is all on a continuum innit. We only see a snap shot.

you can see all fo the obstacles in your way

Yeah. So it's natural to say 'oh no, I completely trust him' when you've just started a thread saying 'do YOU think this is odd?'

Those threads remind me of RL conversations. They're a testing ground. To see what it sounds like out loud. If it stands up etc, whether they are mad, whether anyone else thinks it is odd. They're like the first phase.

They're the one thing on Mn that do remind me of RL conversations.

its like the dark clouds that had you blind have gone?

I said a lot earlier in this thread, that none of us know what is around the corner, no matter how much we trust our partners and don't think him capable of throwing your relationship down the toilet

I don't always think it is purely about sex

it's about flattery, feeling you've still "got it", escapism, the excitement of something new... bla-de-bla

a new mum who feels like shit, is exhausted juggling all the balls, is feeling unloved herself...well, how the fuck can she compete with that ?

so, I say to anyone who smugly thinks it will never happen to them, think again

i don't think it is smug to think your dh is unlikely to stray, i think it is normal.

lol. I was holding a nice cup of nescafe in my hand though (not really, is proper coffee). Why did we all think that advert was so great - the coffee, the vw, the picnic blanket.

Yes, I agree AF. But mostly I get the not noticing on those threads - they're v. raw.

though one does sort of hope that in the end they DO notice.

The biggest problem my DH is having atm is how to forgive himself. He was a person who would never have an affair. He feels totally ashamed, embarrassed, repulsed etc by his behaviour and can't understand it himself even with the help of the therapist so I am even less likely to understand it.

As I said, any one is capable of an affair even those in very happy marriages.