What makes a woman happy to be the Mistress?

[RedishBlonde]

This link got me thinking - forum.psychlinks.ca/relationships/829-the-other-woman.html

I suppose I'm interested in the "professional mistresses" - The women who seek out and only have (the majority of their) relationships with married men.

My sister (on her own admission) seems to be attracted to unobtainable men, whether it is emotionally unavailable men or attached men.

She has recently been exploring and resolving some emotional issues that stem from her childhood and speaks of these men within the context of these issues.

Now, I'm not making excuses, I have no sympathy for a woman that willingly enters a relationship with a married or attached man but there has to be underlying psychological reasons behind their motivations.

I believe that all ow are fully aware they are being lied to, not just the predatory ones. I suspect they pretend to fall for the married mans lies because they don't like to admit they are happy with being used.

Tbh, I have often found the idea of an unobtainable man (attached man) appealing, although I've noticed only when I'm feeling low on self esteem and NEVER when I'm at a happy place in my life. I have never acted on this and wouldn't, mainly because I know it's a sign I'm not in the right place emotionally. I believe a happy, well adjusted woman wouldn't willingly enter herself into a complicated relationship.

What are your thoughts on the motivations of OW? Are you a mistress? if so, do you explore the reasons behind why you're happy to take second place?

RB - Our children were and are our priority, so we fitted stuff around them. I don't see that it makes it worse or better - it'd just a statement of fact; it is as it is.

I dont sit around and think well just because I never made him miss time with his DC I'm a better person than X who did that in the affair they had, or our affair was 'better' than others for that reason.

IF I was ever to have a relationship with a man who was already in a relationship (this is hypothetical as I have never been in that position) I cannot imagine that I would want to demonise the wife/long term girlfriend. Apart from anything, what would that say about my lover - that he had rubbish taste in women?? Why would I be interested in someone who had rubbish taste in women?

I suppose every case is different. IF my partner were to have a relationship outside of our relationship I would be ---- fascinated!! What would be so special about that person?? I think I would probably have to have grudging respect for her, because my partner is bloody choosy (he chose me after all!)

It is interesting how emotive this whole thing is. If you take the morality aspects out of it (difficult I know) then you can see that it amounts to people being attracted to different people at different times, sometimes several people at the same time.

Contraversial as this may be, I think that I would rather have a "cheating" (a rather silly over-emotive word in my opinion) partner than a partner that exhibited other, in my eyes even less desirable traits. For instance, I could tolerate infidelity (especially if discreet) over excessively controlling/excessively immature/ excessively lazy behaviour.

I'm not saying that I WOULD necessarily tolerate infidelity, all I am saying is that, in my opinion, there are probably worse things that happen in long term relationships - just take a look at all the other threads on here.

hatesponge - ok, in the context of this thread it sounded like a justification.

yup

booty call

sums it up, really

hs...you can't have it both ways

you were an afterhtought when he had an itch in his trousers...or you were an integral part of his life (thus taking time away from his family)

which is it ?

I am not expecting to pierce your denial, btw

Hi Strawberrymarks, you obviously dont know a lot about this. Its not just the cheating, its the lying and the nastyness that often go along with affiars that wear you down. Most men who are cheating distance their partners and can be very cruel to them as a way of justifying their behaviour. Believe me, its not nice if you are the partner being cheated on and you find your partner has started to be unkind and unpleasant to you and then further down the line you find out why. Also you get told serial lies and then called paranoid for questioning what is going on. Do you really want to live like that? I dont, hence I am now divorced and bringing up my kids alone

Because the are treated like sex goddesses, princesses and confidants in the time they have with the mm? Whether the adoration is deserved or not.

strawberrymarks - I can see what you're saying. My Ex was briefly unfaithful, but his other behaviours were to be honest much worse, much more damaging and harder to live with, for me, than that episode of infidelity.

dittany/AF - you think what you like. I know the reality. Trying to belittle or insult me or my views doesn't work. I went through too many years of that with my Ex for it ever to have any effect on me now.

do you really imagine it was just all about sex? or that sex was all that happened between us? now who's being naive?

TYhere are too many different scenarios to generalise. The spouse who loves their other half but still plays around. The one who is having a bad time at home and the spouse really is dreadful to them so they seek solace elsewhere. The one who is pretty much okay but falls in love elsewhere and leaves and remarries. Loads of different ones.

But I fundamentally disagree with anna that it's fine to look elsewhere when things are failing. Instead deal with the failing and then divorce and then have a break so the children adapt and then find someone else.

I don't agree though that the man is always worse to their wife and chidlren if involved elsewhere. If thing s were very bad sometimes he cheers up and is nicer to them all and even sexier at home. Nor do I think it's the worst thing you can do to anyone but it is grounds for divorce etc and it does risk infecting the wife too. They will usually be sleeping with both possibly without protection whatever they say.

"Its not just the cheating, its the lying and the nastyness that often go along with affiars that wear you down."

Yes, it's the manipulation, mind games and loss of trust in your own instincts that are the killer. A lot of men think all women want is to be told what they want to hear and they're happy "Of course I'm not being unfaithful" = Happy woman

-Even if the evidence is mind blowingly obvious.

"TYhere are too many different scenarios to generalise."

Yes, I agree.
hatesponge doesn't sound like a "professional mistress" as I put it, but it's still interesting to know what goes on in the mind of a woman seeing a mm, in general.

Dittany - We didnt have sex at all for the first 6 months. Thereafter, we did, but probably 50% of the times we saw each other - the rest we would have a meal, or coffee, even go shopping, or simply chat, depending on the time of day, and how much time we had. We also spoke for at least an hour every day on the way to/from work.

He never just pitched up at midnight with his trousers round his ankles however much that might fit in better with everyone's image of an affair.....

For a lot of spouses tehre is much more betrayal in no sex but emotionally close to someone else than he or she had quick sex at the office party with someone they otherwise spent no time with. It's sad when someone would rather spend time talking to someone else than their other half but it must happen to loads of people.

A lot of adultery is just opportunity too - so don't work away from each otehr or accept to be parked in the country whilst someone works in town and has a flat there etc Common sense stuff. Some people of course will always cheat. Others only if they get the chance and others again only if they find they feel they've fallen in love with someone else.

Thankfully most people instead terminate a relationship have a decent break and then look for someone else.

The professional mistress bit... the one I know who is apparently according to her lover content with it, says she gets the best of all worlds - him once a week and lots of calls etc each day but none of the hassle of washing clothes etc and she never wanted children so that isn't an issue. I wouldn't like it at all but suits some.

On the whole, although knowing that your dh has been physically intimate with another is difficult (especially if they are either rejecting you at the same time, or having what you think is loving sex, or indeed crap sex for that matter), it is losing your emotional intimacy to the OW/OM that really devastates.

I suspect that until you have lived through it it really is very difficult to understand how much loving and living with a cheater really screws you up. Not just at the time, but for many years afterward, and also how it totally pollutes all that you thought was good, because it can easily wipe out all your happy memories as you evaluate them and find them false.

I don't really blame my DH's other woman. I know she was unhappy and had low self esteem, and I know that he can be totally focused and intense in quite an overwhelming way. I know they got carried into a sort of parallel fantasy world, where no one else really mattered (or perhaps truly existed). But even if I only held her 10% responsible, then that's 10% of a huge amount of hurt and harm to many people for many years (including almost certainly herself). IMO it would have been perfectly possible, and not that difficult to cause no harm to anyone.

I love the way OW justify shagging a married man by slagging them off completely, usually from (untrue) information gleaned from the married man to justify his cheating on his wife. Never fails to amuse me.

Whats wrong with people? Why can't the married man just tell wife he has met someone else, sooo, goodbye? Rather than creeping about behind EVERYONE'S back? If my ExH had done this I would have had a LOT more respect for him. Make a choice IMMEDIATELY, no ifs, buts or keeping your options open, selfish wankers. Just go.

Why can't the OW say "actually, I don't want to be with you until you are single and not still dipping in and out of your wife". Because I can tell the deluded OW out there now - their married man is still having a full blown sexual relationship with their wife - no matter WHAT they tell you otherwise! Have a bit of dignity ladies.

Serious question for any OW (past or present!) Do/did you truly believe every single word that came out of your married mans mouth?

I am going to nail my colours to the mast here and say hatesponge I just don't believe what you are telling us on this thread. I think you are adapting the information to suit people's questions and if you review your posts, they are a mass of contradictions.

So I will just go on what you say you feel now. It astonishes me that neither you nor your friends and acquaintances give thought to whether your actions might upset another and that you feel no sense of regret for contributing to another family's pain.

And no, you were not being unselfish leaving the relationship - just the reverse. You have already said that you could see the writing on the wall and got out to stop further damage to yourself. This was not some noble sacrifice to stop further pain to others.

'But I fundamentally disagree with anna that it's fine to look elsewhere when things are failing. Instead deal with the failing and then divorce and then have a break so the children adapt and then find someone else.'

Exactly! It's the decent, respectful, adult thing to do - to your other half, to your kids and to yourself.

I find people who can't leave a relationship without having another one going weak and insecure.

A divorce or legal seperation in Ireland if both parties are not in agreement is difficult and very costly. Firstly you must get a solicitor then argue through a court with barristers.

Where there's a will there's a way though, MCDL.

WWIFN - please explain where I've contradicted myself. I've reread my post and can't see that I've said anything different throughout. And what I've said is, FWIW, the truth. I accept it may not fit into the usual pattern of slutty/evil/naive OW and nasty MM, but surely that only illustrates that not all affairs, all OW and all MMs can be so easily categorised?

And I never said the writing was on the wall. I said I never wanted to be the OW forever. I also said it was not easy, and I couldnt put my life on hold for years waiting. That was entirely my decision, I stepped away from it. but ok, thats apparently as selfish as continuing the affair.

Frankly I dont care what popular opinion of me is on this thread. But just so I feel I've given a fair account of my actions, and what went on, I never asked him to leave his family. Not once, even though I wanted more than anything for us to build a life together. I never told him he would have to choose between me and them. I never suggested or offered that he could live with me if he ever left. Why? because i wanted any decision he made to be his own, made in his own time, not influenced by me and what i wanted.

I can see that that could cause difficulties, and I know that the Irish legal system is not disposed towards divorce. However the legal system has nothing to do with being honest with a partner who you no longer love/want to be with? Presumably people can move out of the marital home regardless as to the legalities too. I'm guessing that this might have more to do with the "who gets what" aspects of ending relationships? Of course most endings of relationships are messy, painful and often protracted, so there are no easy answers. It is my opinion and experience however that the worst possible way to end any relationship is through the lies and deceit that are the natural corollary to any affair.