I'm finally FREE

[BaileyB]

8 minutes ago, LostinLove2 said:

then asked me to please deny it.

In other words, he chose to protect his marriage. He asked you to lie for him, because he wanted to stay in his marriage. You, were expendable. He would deny your relationship, because keeping his marriage was his priority. 

Edited July 14, 2021 by BaileyB

[Wiseman2]

Don't take the fall for this creep. Be honest.

[elaine567]

People in affairs always seem to think the wife knows, some believe she knows and is actually condoning it. They justify continuing as the wife "obviously"  knows everything and is not bothered... BUT when the proverbial hits the fan on DDay they find out she didn't have a clue...  
THEY know they are having an affair and so assume the wife is party to the whole thing, when she is often innocently going about her own business, blindly trusting her husband who she "knows" would NEVER have an affair...  
Her utter devastation on finding out, can hit men very hard, they had no idea she cared so much...so reconciliation is then the name of the game....

[mark clemson]

On 7/13/2021 at 3:14 PM, LostinLove2 said:

We’ve been together for 3.5 years. We’ve been bickering a lot lately or maybe it’s just me bickering. I’m ready for things to move forward. I’m ready for it to just be us. All he keeps saying is “be patient” and our future is dependent on “my patience.” Im running out of patience.

How exactly does that make sense? If you push too hard he feels betrayed and ...  drops the relationship? So stays with his wife.

He is hoping she will file? Really? On what basis exactly? Is he actively trying to annoy her to that point or ??

Like @Prudence V I'm not one who's automatically negative on affairs no matter what. But the above doesn't add up for me. You push too hard and he doesn't do what you want. Meanwhile... he doesn't do what you want.  Hmm.

On 7/13/2021 at 3:14 PM, LostinLove2 said:

I’m not sure how much more of this I can take. I love him. I really do. I just feel like if it hasn’t happened after 3.5 years, it’s never going to. I’m not stuck in the sunken cost fallacy, I just truly don’t know what to do.

You SURE about that?

Seems to me that some spine, timelines/deadlines, and willingness to walk away are in order here. Maybe just the latter. There doesn't seem to be anything in what you write that makes it sound like he'll ever actually leave. 3.5 years of your life seems like "enough" if what you really want is a full relationship.

Edited July 14, 2021 by mark clemson

[stillafool]

44 minutes ago, elaine567 said:

Her utter devastation on finding out, can hit men very hard, they had no idea she cared so much...so reconciliation is then the name of the game....

And at that point they would rather see the OW in tears than their wife.

[Luna66star]

Another point.  How would you really be able to trust a man who has deceived his wife for 3 yrs?  He would do it with you when things get rough.  This is how he deals with rough patches. Cheating.

He is in no way your prince charming! 

 

[Poppy47]

21 hours ago, elaine567 said:

Because you saw potential in him that the other guys didn't have.
I believe MM appeal to women as they have had the rough edges knocked off them by living with a women and being a father..
They often know how to talk to women and some of them were players and guys who were successful with women in their previous lives. 
They say and do all the right things to get an OW on board. 
They are often)seen as a catch, and any woman struggling to find the single version, may opt for the married one.
The hope being, to wow him so much, he will leave his wife.

I agree Elaine. They have lived many years with a wife and know what to say and how to please.  Happy wife, happy life. I believe they are used to manipulating a woman to suit their own needs in real life

Poppy.

 

 

[mark clemson]

Think this might be useful for you too.

17 hours ago, mark clemson said:

... there is a concept in sales "getting to No" - which means recognizing (preferably quickly) that the customer genuinely isn't interested in buying [and therefore ending your efforts to sell to them].

Applied to relationships, I think this means recognizing as quickly as reasonably possible, while giving things a chance, that this isn't the person for you/isn't what you want and then kindly but firmly ending things so as to give both of you "time back" in your lives to find something that IS what you want. Can be easier said than done if you really like the person and/or emotions are clouding your judgement.

 

[poppyfields]

On 7/14/2021 at 6:38 PM, LostinLove2 said:

What’s sad to me is that I was perfectly happy being single. I pushed potential mates away because I was independent and living life. He came along and threw a wrench in my happiness. I’m a shell of a person who is accepting breadcrumbs. Why? I’m smarter than

Hmm, think about this ^.  You pushed single "available" mates away, but a married very "unavailable" man you cling to and can't walk away from.

Have you ever wondered if he were to leave his family and become available, you would even want him anymore?

What I'm suggesting is a big part of the appeal for you may be the fact that he IS married and unavailable.

Even tho you claim to hate it and complain, the situation actually suits you perfectly due to your emotional unavailability. 

All of this is happening on a subconscious level. 

Something to consider? 

 

Edited July 17, 2021 by poppyfields

[NYAG]

3 hours ago, poppyfields said:

Hmm, think about this ^.  You pushed single "available" mates away, but a married very "unavailable" man you cling to and can't walk away from.

Have you ever wondered if he were to leave his family and become available, you would even want him anymore?

What I'm suggesting is a big part of the appeal for you may be the fact that he IS married and unavailable.

Even tho you claim to hate it and complain, the situation actually suits you perfectly due to your emotional unavailability. 

All of this is happening on a subconscious level. 

Something to consider? 

 

Fear of commitment. If you date a married guy you know it is finite. They will never be yours, you will never have to be theirs and if you want to remain independent but still have someone in your life that's one way to do it. If you date a single guy you might be with them forever! I completely get this as someone who is doing it and dissecting it as I go.

[LostinLove2]

Last night I ended it and blocked him everywhere. I guess this is the beginning of NC. I feel a sigh of relief, but I also feel incredibly broken and upset. My heart hurts so much. 

[BaileyB]

5 minutes ago, LostinLove2 said:

Last night I ended it and blocked him everywhere. I guess this is the beginning of NC. I feel a sigh of relief, but I also feel incredibly broken and upset. My heart hurts so much. 

Hugs. I’m sure it hurts, but you made a good decision. 

[Myabee]

On 7/13/2021 at 6:14 PM, LostinLove2 said:

We’ve been together for 3.5 years. We’ve been bickering a lot lately or maybe it’s just me bickering. I’m ready for things to move forward. I’m ready for it to just be us. All he keeps saying is “be patient” and our future is dependent on “my patience.” Im running out of patience. 

Last night we had a text fight about him not wanting to meet my family. He said he’s just not ready yet. For me, if they aren’t important to meet, then I’m not important enough to him. He got all annoyed and said we need a 2 week break. 

I’m not sure how much more of this I can take. I love him. I really do. I just feel like if it hasn’t happened after 3.5 years, it’s never going to. I’m not stuck in the sunken cost fallacy, I just truly don’t know what to do. 

I know it’s easy for an outsider to say, “he’s feeding you a line. Just leave. They are all the same. Read the forums. Textbook case” but we’ve been through so much in these 3.5 years. I haven’t made it easy on him and he could’ve easily found someone else, but he hasn’t. You can’t say it’s too comfortable for him not to either. I don’t like being the other woman and it constantly weighs on my mind. My feelings of staying vs leaving flip flop all the time. He knows I waiver, yet he’s still here. 

I’m just so lost. 

I'm sorry. 3 1/2 years is a long time in for still such indecision? What is holding him back? 

[Myabee]

10 hours ago, NYAG said:

Fear of commitment. If you date a married guy you know it is finite. They will never be yours, you will never have to be theirs and if you want to remain independent but still have someone in your life that's one way to do it. If you date a single guy you might be with them forever! I completely get this as someone who is doing it and dissecting it as I go.

Fear of commitment defiantly sounds appropriate. 

[BaileyB]

11 minutes ago, Myabee said:

What is holding him back? 

He’s married to another woman.

The writing is on the wall when you ask him to progress the relationship and meet your family and he asks for a two week break. Too much, he never had any intention of leaving his wife and/or forming a legitimate relationship with OP. With that knowledge, three and a half years is a long time to waste in a dead end relationship. 

[Camper]

On 7/14/2021 at 5:59 PM, elaine567 said:

People in affairs always seem to think the wife knows, some believe she knows and is actually condoning it. They justify continuing as the wife "obviously"  knows everything and is not bothered... BUT when the proverbial hits the fan on DDay they find out she didn't have a clue...  
THEY know they are having an affair and so assume the wife is party to the whole thing, when she is often innocently going about her own business, blindly trusting her husband who she "knows" would NEVER have an affair...  
Her utter devastation on finding out, can hit men very hard, they had no idea she cared so much...so reconciliation is then the name of the game....

This is exactly what my H's former OW thought. She was convinced that I knew about the A long before D-Day, but waited months for a "vulnerable" moment to confront him. I learned later that the FOW's own father carried on with an OW for years while still married to her mother. FOW could not understand why I would not agree to a similar arrangement. SMH.

 

[LostinLove2]

7 hours ago, BaileyB said:

7 hours ago, BaileyB said:

Hugs. I’m sure it hurts, but you made a good decision. 

Should I reach out and tell his wife? I’m seriously asking. I think she has a right to know what I’ve done. 

[Wiseman2]

4 minutes ago, LostinLove2 said:

Should I reach out and tell his wife? I’m seriously asking. I think she has a right to know what I’ve done. 

What he's done.

She does need to know but it's a toss up what your motives are whether it's simply leveling the field or something else.

Obviously he should do his own dirty work, but it's doubtful a snake like this would do so unless he got caught.

[LostinLove2]

2 minutes ago, Wiseman2 said:

What he's done.

She does need to know but it's a toss up what your motives are whether it's simply leveling the field or something else.

Obviously he should do his own dirty work, but it's doubtful a snake like this would do so unless he got caught.

I was trying to word it carefully. My “motive” is awareness. I’m not doing it so she gets mad a leaves him. I’m considering it as I think she has the right to know. 3.5 years is a long time. I think it’s only fair that she has the full picture to make her own decisions about her future. 

[LostinLove2]

1 hour ago, Camper said:

This is exactly what my H's former OW thought. She was convinced that I knew about the A long before D-Day, but waited months for a "vulnerable" moment to confront him. I learned later that the FOW's own father carried on with an OW for years while still married to her mother. FOW could not understand why I would not agree to a similar arrangement. SMH.

 

Should I tell her about the last 3.5 years? Would you have wanted to know? Part of me feels she has the right to know and the other part of me feels like it’s their marriage and I don’t need to interfere anymore than I already have. It’s not to be vindictive or spiteful. It’s just like I feel it’s the right thing to do. I don’t know. 

[Wiseman2]

4 minutes ago, LostinLove2 said:

I think it’s only fair that she has the full picture to make her own decisions about her future. 

Well yes. However she could turn things on you, as if you 'seduced' her husband.

Also be aware to save his butt, he may describe you as some Fatal Attraction case who wouldn't leave him alone and it's all made up. 

So if you do decide to reveal his dark side to her, stay very unemotional and be very specific about dates, times, places, facts, etc. so it sinks in.

[LostinLove2]

1 minute ago, Wiseman2 said:

Also be aware to save his butt, he may describe you as some Fatal Attraction case who wouldn't leave him alone and it's all made up. 

Of course I would expect him to save his own butt. I have plenty of proof showing that it is most certainly not made up and I’m am not the one “harassing” him. I think I’d rather just sit her down (if she even would) and just start from the beginning. I just don’t know if it’s my place to tell her. 

[BaileyB]

13 minutes ago, LostinLove2 said:

I was trying to word it carefully. My “motive” is awareness. I’m not doing it so she gets mad a leaves him. I’m considering it as I think she has the right to know. 3.5 years is a long time. I think it’s only fair that she has the full picture to make her own decisions about her future. 

I struggle with this question because for the past three and a half years, you had no problem with his behavior… Last week you were dreaming of a future and you had invited the man to meet your family, this week you intend to share information that could end his marriage. 

Perhaps, you have good intentions, but I struggle with these posts because if you had good intentions or empathy for his wife, you wouldn’t have been sleeping with her husband for the past three and a half years. Of course, she has a right to know the man with whom she has called her husband and built a life. But, you have to know that you have very little credibility here. 

[LostinLove2]

1 hour ago, BaileyB said:

 But, you have to know that you have very little credibility here. 

You are right. You are 100% right. It’s devastating to me how this A went from one extreme to another in a week. I see the true writing on the wall. 

I do have sympathy for his wife, despite my actions for the last 3.5 years. It would be impossible not to. Even with having the best intentions by telling her, maybe I just fade off into the distance and let them live their lives. 

[BaileyB]

It’s not that I don’t believe that she should not know the truth. If I was married to a man that was cheating on me, I would personally want to know.

I’m just saying, you need to be very clear about your intentions when sharing this information. You ended it yesterday. I would kindly suggest that you should give this decision a little more time and contemplation, to be sure that you are doing it for the right reasons and you are prepared to deal with the consequence. There are many stories on this board of wives who have behaved very inappropriately toward their husband’s affair partner (and vice versa). This is not a decision to be made impulsively, when you are deeply hurting from the end of a relationship. Clear your mind, let your emotions settle, and then think about this again. That is my advice.