Your responses here reek of denial and absolute lack of introspection and responsibility.
“Cut him off’” means: No. More. Contact. Ever.
When I was young and stupid I did have a brief affair with a married guy. It was a dark and stupid period in my life. Yet you are talking about this being a normal and ok thing? It is not. Just fucking stop it.
I think you need to put the relationship in perspective, and you can’t do that as long as you’re in it, even a little bit.
So my advice is to cut off the relationship – in all its aspects – and give yourself some breathing room and time to think.
No judgments or nasty comments from me.
I know what cut it means to cut him off. Not contact him, nor accept any advances in any way he may make towards me.
I never said this was a normal or an okay thing. I may be in denial, but I do take responsibility for my actions of getting involved. Similar to you–this was during a dark period in my life as well. Right after my mother’s unexpected death. I may have been a bit more vulnerable for whatever rhyme or reason, but it was my choice. Obviously not the best way to cope, but unfortunately, I am in this mess that I’m looking to end.
I appreciate your advice, more importantly your not judging or providing any nasty comments.
I do need to remove myself entirely from this to think and move on appropriately. Having contact with him will hinder me from doing so.
OP, you ask why he would still be wanting to talk to you if you’re not sleeping with him.
Two possibilities:
he’s keeping his options open, stringing you along in case his marriage does end, and then will try to re-activate his relationship with you. In other words, you’re his back-up.
He wants to have someone he can talk to, while he’s potentially going through a bad period with his wife.
If it’s #1, he’s using you, plain and simple, and not in a nice way.
If it’s #2, he’s using you in a different way, as a talking crutch. Not as nasty as #1, but still not pleasant. You can’t really provide any support or objective advice to him, which may be what he needs.
Either way, he’s using you. Just cut it off, cold turkey.
He’s a lier, he’s a cheat, and he’ll shut you out emotionally if it suits him.
Contrary to what you said up-thread, he’s not a nice guy.
I don’t think you got what I said and I think from this response you are still rationalizing and minimizing. If you obviously/need/etc/realize you wouldn’t have felt the need to post this thread in the first place.
BTW when l said l was in a “dark place” when l had my brief stupid affair I meant I was in a dark place because of the affair. Not, as you just did, come up with a bullshit excuse for making a bad choice.
I am not without empathy here but you are clearly still waffling about, making excuses, looking for affirmation for your poor choices and trying to parse “Cut him off” into something more comfortable for you. You are not being honest or courageous or ethical. Maybe you and the weasel cheating husband deserve each other. Not that it will last long in the light of day instead of sneaking around.
It may be true, but:
Think of it this way: if a man lies to his wife, why could he not also lie to his girlfriend?
You’re both confused? Of course you’re confused. Illicit relationships may initiate with all kinds of clandestine slightly dangerous forbidden qualities. But the hard facts are though, that you never get a chance to be or give your best to the relationship, either one. Can’t reach out in need at any moment, can’t step up and give in ways that would cause difficulties. Timing becomes everything. And you’re both complicit in the destruction of a happy family, with young children possibly. You may get over that part, but it all weighs down. Feelings get stronger. People ‘know’ what they ‘should’ do, then go on doing otherwise. But as you’re just human beings that too confuses things.
There is a good reason for the disdain for adultery, such relationships create minefields of emotional crap for everyone involved. A woman is betrayed, another marriage crash and burns, children’s home is torn apart, every bodies standard of living drops substantially, and there could be bitter conflict and lasting acrimony. Because it was, in the moment, sexy and tempting to toy with an off limits man!
They say the best thing to do, when you find yourself in a hole, is to stop digging!
You can see the minefield, of that I’m certain. You cannot undo the damage you have contributed to this cluster f**k, but you can stop contributing. And the truth will always out, so this WILL come to light, too many cross connections for it not to, I suspect. You’ll have to suck it up, I’m afraid.
But right now? You need to step up! Maybe get back to behaviour you can be proud of.
Good Luck!
The best thing I can suggest for situations like this is reading “He’s Just Not That In To You.” It sounds cheesey, but it actually is a good book for getting some perspective on what is happening in a relationship.
I will say that now and then, for whatever reason an affair blossoms in to a healthy, loving relationship. But in your case, that boat has passed. It is gone. If that was going to be the end game, it would have happened a long time ago. So all that is left now is perhaps a handful of good times, surrounded by a heck of a lot of pain and an inevitable break up. The question now is not “if,” but “when.”
In the meantime, there is some nice single guy out there who will treat you like a princess. He willr earrange his life for you, treat you like gold, and be grateful every day to have you. But he can’t meet you yet, because you are still wasting your life on your married friend. Every day you waste with Mr. Married is a day that your risk missing out on meeting a guy who is good for you, who will cherish you, and who you can build a real life with.
If you are smart, you will cut this off. Leave town if you have to. Erase his number, all his emails, every trace of him, and move on. But these things are hard, and you may be too caught up in the romance of the forbidden to do that. But in the end, that’s what is going to happen anyway. Might as well move the process along.
Most of this scenario is just the usual scrum of people thinking with their pussies and penises and trying to come to grips with the issues that causes, but this part (above) did give me pause. How would that ever some up as a topic of conversation? How would this info ever be offered up? Did he say he was (in general) a struggling pedophile or that he was specifically attracted to your married man’s kids. “Say Joe, those are good looking kids you have there…”
I know MM through my sister and her husband. Married man called my brother in law to let him know this as my sister’s kids were around his BIL. He is going around telling family and friends who have kids that his BIL was around just in case.
As much of a turd as he is, he wouldn’t go around and falsely accuse people of having sexual thoughts of his children.
It started with his BIL starting to not come around to family functions/gatherings. Married man called him and asked what was going on. BIL spilled his guts to him. So Married Man and the wife called her mom to let her know. She told them she’s known for the past few weeks.
He told Married Man that he has sexual attraction to his kids and described what he would do to them. His wife thinks with counseling her brother can have a relationship with their kids in the future. Married man says absolutely not.
With what Northern Piper said, and others-- nobody wants to think they are being used. Its a hard aspect to grasp, and nobody wants to admit that is what has been done to them. If he wants to emotionally shut me out at his convenience, I’ll do the same. I don’t think it’ll be a damn bit of difference to him.
Even Sven- I need to start the process asap. Its hard though taking the first step, but it needs to be done. I need the space and time away from him. Its not good for me, and he isn’t giving me anything for which I want to stay. There is no way we can have a friendship anytime soon, if at all. It would be the same reoccurring bullshit. So long as he’s in an unhappy marriage, he’ll consistently be in this rut. When I move on, he’ll just pray on another person. He better hope they don’t tell his wife. I wish it was as easy as packing up and moving. I have a career here, working on my Master’s, family to take care of, etc. Even then, he wouldn’t magically disappear as I’ll have a connection to him through my sister. I would then have to tell her as I wouldn’t attend any functions they may have with them being in attendance.
I do agree with a previous poster about this surviving if everything was in the light post divorce. That would be a long shot, and who knows by then if I would still have feelings for him. After all of this, its depressing and upsetting.
I don’t think he has any idea that I’m thinking of this… he probably thinks everything is sweet as sugar.
The usual take on pedophiles is that the urge is so innate they really can’t be effectively “cured”, but to unilaterally (as a pedophile) disclose this info. and then start saying out loud what you would do to your relatives kids if you got your mitts on them sounds even more disturbed. I would think anyone with these urges would normally keep their mouth shut and struggle. Compulsively blabbing all these dark desires sounds borderline psychotic. I’m with MM, no way he gets access to the kids regardless of therapy.
His BIL has issues, and has been known to have certain traits. MM doesn’t even want to see him, or be anywhere near him. MM wife thinks therapy will help him to keep the whole family together.
I’m not sure why he told MM; perhaps better to babble than to act on the urges… However, he told his mom weeks prior and she did nothing for the same reason-- keep it hush hush so the family stays together.
I did a lot of bad things, back in the day so I’m not here to
cast stones.
Rather I’m here to repeat some advice from a woman I had a brief affair with, in my previous marriage. She initially didn’t know I was married and when she found out, she told me she had been married before and had had affairs, then some guy asked her why.
So she said I needed to ask myself why, and not just the excuses, the real reasons because you can’t be happy when you are not honest with yourself in such an important area in your life.
I had some sort of noble sounding reasons I told myself at night to justify actions I wouldn’t want my partner to do to me. I won’t bore you with them, because they were BS, just as you know, or should know, that your married man is doing the same.
If you were married, would you want your husband doing this to you?
For me, it was an excruciating process to discover why I was looking for validation in forbidden arms. Sadly, I hurt many people in the process. I only hope that it doesn’t take as long for you to discover yourself.
I quoted the parts above, because you still aren’t getting it yet. This has absolutely nothing to do with him anymore. Make it about you and getting what you deserve, like even says.
Damn, that’s cold.
Tremblay, the sooner you finish with him, the sooner you’ll be over him and emotionally available for someone else. Maybe he’ll be single this time.
I think it’s possible to back away slowly. It’s hard to quit smoking cold-turkey. It’s sometimes better to just start limiting contact and move towards no contact.
It’s worked for me in the past with my one and only affair. I’m not proud of it, but I’m still friends with her today (I’m separated and she’s in a full-time relationship) and after 13 years we actually are friends and still communicate.
You don’t need to break off all contact: just back away slowly. You can still be friends at an adult level.
Nah, it’s not as if s/he suggested using the claw end.
Context: one of the reasons I got divorced was my ex decided to lean on another woman (actually a teenager, when he was 47, awesome) for ‘emotional support.’ She ended up cleaning out our bank account, and I got well shut of him in the divorce.
:smack: Really? You started off as friendly acquaintances discussing platonic chitchat topics, and then became friends and then lovers, and you honestly have no clue how continuing to have platonic chit chat discussions might lead to you two having sex in the future. Really? You’re not that dumb.
I guess it’s entirely possible you’re that deluded, though. People can blind themselves to all sorts of obvious things that they don’t want to believe. My own husband is a very smart man, but he was honestly and utterly flabbergasted that I seriously considered the possibility he might be fucking one of his female friends. I mean, sure, they spent a lot of time having secret conversations about her unhappy marriage (and apparently her messy affair, which he hid from me), and she felt free to just walk into our house like she lived here, and they made all sorts of plans to do things that I only found out about when I happened to overhear one of them updating the other, and she stopped publicly complaining about the lack of sex in her marriage about the same time our sex life took a serious nose dive, and he couldn’t bear for there to be any mention of any of her flaws or foibles at the same time I apparently had nothing but flaws and foibles. But he honestly didn’t see how any of those obvious, textbook signs of an affair might raise any eyebrows, at least not while he was in the middle of it. He’s gained some perspective with some time and distance and can admit that a lot of that stuff was kind of fucked up and inappropriate, but at the time he honestly could not see any possible connection between the situation and my concerns.
Fortunately, you have a touch more perspective than that. You’re at least standing there staring around thinking, “Damn, this is a lot of trees. And there’s a lot more over there. This is almost like a forest,” rather than “Forest? What forest? What kind of idiot thinks there could be a forest in the middle of all these damn trees?” But you’re never really going to see the size and scope of the forest until you get some distance between it and you. As fucked-up as you think this situation is, it’s a lot more fucked up than that. When he’s fully out of your life and mind and heart, you’ll look back at this and be all :eek::smack::(.
Ditch him. Ditch him now. Yeah, he’s going through a hard time right now, and things may get harder down the road if they do divorce. But that’s not your problem. He’s a big boy and he has other people to lean on. He will manage just fine without you there to discuss sports and running and work with him. There is nothing good for anyone that will ever come out of you continuing to have contact with this guy, unless you count the ego boost he gets from knowing you’re still on the hook.
Literally nothing good for anybody. Nothing good for you–you won’t truly be available to get into a decent relationship if you’re still hung up on this guy, and your sister finding out about this is likely to cause serious friction between you. Nothing good for him–he’s not going to shit or get off the pot re: his marriage if he’s got you waiting in the wings to soothe and flatter and fuck him the second he opens the “oh poor me” door again. Nothing good for his wife–she’ll have a husband who shit or get off the pot and when it eventually comes out who his piece on the side is, it’s liable to implode her friendship with your sister. Nothing good for his kids–they’ll live in the Mommy-and-Daddy-ought-to-get-divorced-but-won’t limbo for that much longer. Nothing good for your sister–the longer you drag this out with this guy, the more likely it becomes that your role in all this will come out, and she’ll have to choose between a friend close enough that they discuss things like a pedophile brother, and her own sister.
If you won’t cut ties with him for your own sake, do it for everyone else who’s going to get hit by the shrapnel when this mess explodes.
even sven’s advice is spot on. Read it carefully and then read it again. It’s time to move on. By the way, no judging from me either. None whatsoever.
You know, I once spoke on the phone with the woman my husband messed with. After I told him to leave, he moved in with her. I called beause I needed to speak to him about the divorce arrangements. She answered, and I called her a slut. She had the nerve to be offended and indignant.
Guess what I think you are.