That you were / are the other woman

[Willyouadmit]

I admit I was. I read a lot of threads on here and posters always justify with I was not the other woman. My DH and I have been together 10 years. When I met him he didn't initially (for about a month) tell me he was married with children. The day he told me everything I was angry and upset. I told him he had to make his decision immediately.

Agree it needs to move to relationships.

She owes nothing to possible existing partners. He is the one breaking promises.
There are two types of affairs. The type when the man is after sex and companionship but has no intention of leaving the marriage. It's an 'extra'. He will only leave when caught and chucked out. Few get caught because they are very careful. The other is a man who is unhappy and looking for an exit. He will leave as soon as the affair is established.

I agree with all of this.

I disagree it should be moved to relationships when there are many women who have been cheated on and heartbroken. It'd be unhelpful then for them to have to read about OW.

I think more men leave when they have a secure new relationship to go to than moving out with the prospect of being single

My dh’s answer to that one would be that if he was choosing between living alone and battling to see his kids and living in a broken relationship but getting to live with his kids every day then he might as well stay put. I think at that point he had no hope or intention of meeting someone else at all. It happened when he least expected it, and suddenly a 3rd option presented itself. Battle to see your kids, but at least have a loving and meaningful relationship at the same time.

Yes some men are just total shits and walk out on relationships without a thought. Some are downright selfish. But some are good men stuck in horrible situations with no idea how to get out and they end up making bad choices. But that doesn’t make them bad people. Life is rarely black and white.

Font why would your dh want 50/50 when he worked away?

Battle to see your kids, but at least have a loving and meaningful relationship at the same time.
Prove my point, a completely selfish decision to benefit him and him only because I doubt his decision made it easier for his kids to know that it was ok to leave them when he had someone else to go and have fun with? What an excuse to appease his conscience!

I don't think that affairs always end up for the worse, I think it many cases it end up for the best, but I strongly believe that in each and every cases, the decision was purely a totally self-centred and selfish one. These people are remain selfish, it works when what they fight for through their selfishness is shared. The moment it diverge, they create chaos because they will always fight for what is best of makes them feel better. That's what many cheaters cheat or lie again one way of the other, they are selfish people.

As a social scientist I believe that if the default setting for child contact at the end of a marriage was assumed to be 50/50 (and only changeable for welfare concerns with court intervention) then more unhappily married men would be prepared to end the marriage before having an affair

font perhaps as a social scientist you should consider facts. Half of all separated dads have regular contact. Unless every one of these has a bitter xw stopping contact (frequently a justification used where dad cba to pursue the legal route) the reality is that men don’t want 50:50. A good proportion don’t even want to see their children weekends and holidays.

The assumption of 50:50 on relationship break up would probably mean they were even less likely to leave as they woud suddenly have to do more parenting

IME as a PP pointed out, 50:50 is frequently simply a mechanism for “no maintenance”

*have NO regular contact that should say

People make point that they were not the ow to avoid having others writing "you made your bed etc" comments.
As for the rest of your post no doubt its the greatest love story ever but most people here are just trying to cope with the fallout day to day

I’m the OW. I have told only a couple of close friends. I know people would not be impressed. It is shameful and I hate being the OW but I love him too much to walk away. I’m not going to try to justify it on here although I easily could. I feel constant guilt and shame.

As a social scientist I believe that if the default setting for child contact at the end of a marriage was assumed to be 50/50 (and only changeable for welfare concerns with court intervention) then more unhappily married men would be prepared to end the marriage before having an affair
Don't get the logic of this at all. How does having an affair and creating a new household with that person make it better for a man who wants to leave his wife to have contact with his children than moving out on their own. By all logic, new relationship demand a lot of attention, so inevitably, the man not only will see less of his children by leaving the household, but by also having to put effort into the new relationship.

Do OW truly believe the rubbish the spurt out that they only stayed with the EW so that they could see the children more? Are OW really that gullible?

At least you're honest Leedsgirlfriend. You're just being selfish and thinking of you, that's the shameful part. In the end, it's you or them and it's easy to think that them would probably not be that happy anyway even if you gave up your own happiness, so you might as well be super happy and continue. Your OH will have the same thought process.

Like many, I don't blame the OW because it's very different to feel a sense of responsibility towards someone you don't know and care for. The husband however has some responsibility within his marriage, and has cared/love their wife enough to want to commit to them for life at some point.

Having an affair is just the easy selfish way but few men will admit that yes, they just took the coward way because living with the shame clouds the new found happiness so they come up with excuses after excuses to justify their actions.

My ex H walked out and moved in with the OW without spending anytime on his own. He did not want 50:50 access. In fact I had to push to get him to have the kids every other Saturday night. The OW was 20 years younger than him.....why would she want two under 5s living 50% of the time with them.....that would have burst the loved up bubble very quickly.

Yet my ExH is a good generous dad. He just didn’t want the daily grind of kids. That was left to me to step up. Just as well I didn’t have a fancy man to shack up with.

Newsofas I’ve had that done to me as well. I’ve brought up my kids alone. It was very tough at first.

Just to throw this in but I think that there are a lot of ow that don’t actually know they are the ow. I know that my ex was with his now partner 8 months before we split. He stupidly left a camera behind with picture proof. I don’t however think she realises this. From brief conversations I’ve had with her I’m pretty sure he told he we were split already and he was living with me still for financial reasons. I don’t think I will ever know for sure but she seems a decent person and that’s the impression I get from talking to her.

Just to throw this in but I think that there are a lot of ow that don’t actually know they are the ow
Or more often chose to believe the stereotypical excuses as your EH gave to his girlfriend because it either suits them to believe it or because they are so in love, the blindness is making them believe anything.

My mother was the ow, split up a new family, who became my step brother was only 6 weeks old when my mother and his dad started the affair. My brother was 2 and I was 4. We were all very young children whose lives were altered forever because of some excitement they wanted.

They were together for 12 years, in those years he had countless affairs and fathered another 2 children (not with my mother). My mother also continued to be a cheat.

It's also had a lasting effect on our lives now as adults. It took us all a long time to gain trust in relationships and with a childhood filled with affairs, the constant insecurity that someone else may come a long and add to whipping our lives away again. Also none of us have any respect for the parents that had the affairs, but cherish the parents who didn't and didn't abandon us.

Good for you if it lasts but in my experience the saying 'a leopard never changes it's spots' is accurate.

Im not sure why so much anger is aimed at the OW and never have been. My ex husband cheated but it was him not her that did that and tbh it was a symptom of a lot of other issues in the relationship. The anger should be aimed at the person doing the cheating as they betrayed the trust not the other party.

I don’t think it’s anger per se. It’s disrespect, it’s contempt, it’s pity, a wry smile and a vague consideration - “what makes you think you are so special he won’t treat you just as terribly...?”

It’s not anger. It is pity, contempt, sorry that ones ExH had such poor morals and values and backbone. Sadness that two people put themselves 100% first before children, honesty and actually treating people with respect.

I don't see it like that and find the above so over the top and dramatic.

As a single parent to two happy, healthy, funny children who are doing well at school, I don't see a relationship outside of The Marriage as equating to some sort of child abuse.

My x was abusive and I escaped rather than left so I don't think that a marriage is like oxygen in the same way so many others do.

The script on mumsnet in PARTICULAR is so extreme in that a marriage must be respected supported, nurtured etc.. ONly the two people in it can do that.

So often women take back their husbands and continue to label the other woman ''scum'' and the worst of the worst which makes me roll my eyes. It's ludicrous. I'm sure it hurts. But calling OW ''the worst of the worst'' and the other drama that you read on here is not women's finest hour in my opinion.

And no. I have not been an OW. I would never enter in to a relationship knowing that I would be devastated and feel grief, loss, loneliness and unhappiness if it ended though.

Rather than always telling single women they're too choosy, I think single women need to advise married women to get stronger.

My view on my EX - is mine and mine alone now that my mother has passed away. I do not discuss my feelings with regard to what he did so no one can ever say I dissed him to the DCs and my conscience is clear.

The OW, who is now the Ex OW, was a family friend with DCs of her own. They are both as culpable in my mind -they destroyed families, friendships and so much more. Her behaviour towards are DCS was emotionally and verbally abusive an the crap said about me was just pure lies.

My anger lay with my Ex for his actions, my loathing for her is on what she did next.

As to contact - yeah right 6 ONs in the first year, 3ONs in the second and aload of rhetoric to friends etc on my withholding contact and not allowing blending!!! I was on my knees at the time with so much shit - a day of no childcare would have been wonderful

I would never enter in to a relationship knowing that I would be devastated and feel grief, loss, loneliness and unhappiness if it ended though.
The moment you trust someone fully, you put yourself at risk of the above. In only way to safeguard yourself from it is to never commit yourself fully to your relationship. It can work sometimes when the other person feels the same, but most of the time, it ends up badly because one will always expect a bit more or a bit less commitment than the other.

I think the worse part of an affair, what really really hurts are the lies and betrayal. When you start to have suspicions, but the cheater turns it around to make you feel even smaller by telling you that you are mad, paranoid, that your insecurities is making you unlovable etc... I've never been cheated on and never cheated on anyone, but I've seen how manipulative cheaters are. Their selfishness puts their own self preservation way before everyone else.

I agree that an affair per se doesn't have to destroy children, however, the selfishness that is often associated with cheating means that often, children are treated very similarly to the wife, as a second citizen, way after their own selfish needs.

So often women take back their husbands and continue to label the other woman ''scum'' and the worst of the worst which makes me roll my eyes. It's ludicrous. I'm sure it hurts. But calling OW ''the worst of the worst'' and the other drama that you read on here is not women's finest hour in my opinion

This assumes the OW is ‘innocent’ and does nothing at all. Unfortunately, if you read posts on here - and certainly in my experience - the OW is far from some kind of bystander who takes a back seat. Way too many OW demand lifestyle, supporting men who clear out savings accounts and who don’t pay maintenance for children. They refuse to have children in their home, or ha e the children call her ‘mummy’ 2 weeks after the split. They enjoy watching the wife disintegrate before their eyes and start on the ‘well, if she can’t cope, we will have the children’ court route. They attend school events and boast about ‘their girl’ who has to be coaxed out on stage by the teacher who mopped up the tears. They are frequently verbally abusive, insisting on turning up at hand overs. Children have to hear about their ‘fucking mother’ and other slurs. They insert themselves in friendship groups causing further distress and upset.

These women owe it to themselves to have some self respect and they owe to the ex to be fair and they owe it to the children to be decent. I don‘t know of any OW who has ever managed that.

I was cheated on, by my ExH, someone I blindly trusted. The personal devastation I still feel some 4 years after finding everything out is still very real and very raw. Yes he cheated, it was his choice and his responsibility. He lied. Time and time again. To me, to our DC's. He spent rare time when he could actually have been doing one of the school runs with one of his OW. He spent money that is our DC's future and security on the OW. All of this was his choice. But there was a woman on the other side accepting and welcoming it all.

My only saving grace is that somehow I was able to separate my hurt and pain from his relationship with our DC's. They have never been told, never will be told and as such they pass back and forth amicably between us and are thriving (well as much as children in this situation can thrive). I tell people he is a great father (he is) and he is someone to co-parent with (he is). BUT, nothing will ever take away the true pain and betrayal. The true dialogue says (in my mind), a good father would never have done this to his children. But I push that to one side, for their sakes. Their lives don't deserve to be further ripped to shreds.

The affairs and OW laid my life to waste. The old me is gone. Bit by bit I have had to rebuild my life. And I have done and I have a good life. But the open, pure trust I had? That's gone forever. His betrayal has changed me forever. Our DC's still miss the other parent when they're not with one of us. Our lives have been destroyed. For what?

So OP, to answer your post. Please, you and other 'OW', please just, for the love of god, close your mouths and take some responsibility for the part you all had to play in destroying peoples lives and homes. If you are the OW, keep it to yourself and deal with the guilt and shame yourselves. Because you should have guilt and shame. The heartbreak of being lied to and cheated on is soul destroying. 4 years on, I still break down when alone in floods of tears, asking myself why and cry myself to sleep.

So next time you want to post on this. Please move it to another thread, maybe relationships? And be more aware of the pain you have caused and through threads like this continue to cause.
A lot of us on here are step mums because our other halves cheated. And our lives have never been the same again.

Very well said @TooSassy - and it sounds like your back story is VERY similar to mine. Sending you all the good vibes. I'm eight years on and it does get easier - albeit very slowly. 💐