Hi! I'm new and regret having to meet you all in such a place. I've been reading a few posts for the last 2 or 3 days and they've been very helpful. Will someone please share with me what you did (as far as contacting the OP or not) when you found out about the A. I've been able to get the names, addresses and phone #s of the OW (at least the two I know about). Not only would I love for the boyfriend and H to know b/c they deserve to know, but they've all ruined my marriage/family (of course H being main one) and I don't want them to think I've just rolled over and taken it all without having some input in their lives (whether verbally or written; preferrably written...addressed to the men in their lives). For those who suggest I contact them, any suggestions on what to say?

I'll try to summarize my d-day:
I've been suspicious of his activities for a long time, but tried to trust anyway. About 6 weeks ago I confronted him with evidence and after denying it for hours, he finally confessed and said that was the only time he cheated on me. Well, I believe that where there's one rat, there are more. I began investigating and that very same day found out there was another one (this one has been long-term). His story is that she heavily pursued him and flirted until he obviously gave in.

Thanks in advance for your responses.

Married 9 years
3 young children
long-term OW (11 years younger than H)
so-called one-timer, but a R (1 yr. younger than H, 34)

Everyone advised me that the affair needs to be exposed so that it will stop. so telling the OW spouse/boyfriend is the way to go....once the secrets out they don't have the desire to do it as much....well at least the exciting part of the secret is blown and they feel a little stupid....when it is exposed be prepared for major anger from your spouse and the OW....there is no need to talk to the OW cause that will just cause you hurt anger and every other emotion in the book....my Husbands OW tried to get me to trust her and be all buddy buddy with her while things were still going on between them....oh anyway.....good luck....this is a sucky situation and it really is tough....i don't know if my marriage is going to make it out of this affair but I do know that I get some relief from talking with people here....

I contacted the OW because I felt like I need a little control over the situation. I felt so helpless. First, I should say that I found out about this A in such a way that I got all of her personal information. Good luck/bad luck, it's all horrible. I called her on her cell and left a message. No reply. About 2 weeks ago, I wrote her a letter and sent it to her home. WH came home really mad because of "what I'd done." Apparently, after reading the letter, she decided to not be involved with him anymore. Is there contact? Probably not. But it's given me a good idea about who might have been chasing who in this thing. How's it going to end? No idea. Is it better or worse? Well, at leasthe's home earlier at night. I'm unsure how much he wants to rebuilt this marriage or when his anger and withdrawal will burnout. Maybe he'll just try to shift into another relationship and keep thinking of me as the bad guy. I plan no further contact with OW.

Think through what information you have and how it can be deliverred. Be true to yourself, that's all I can say. Be honest, empathic and not angry. Good luck.

Hi,

I contacted the ow. i called her cell phone from my H so she thought it was him... When she answered i said hello this is so and so' wife.. She said i'm commuting to work and can't talk i said gee that's funny you spoke to my H ever day on your way to work now i expect you talk to me.. I told her to leave my H alone. she said i can't help it if he calls .. i said oh yes you can if you know what's good for you you will not accept his calls.. Then i said did you ever think of his children when you spoke to him.. Did you ever think of what you are doing to their lives.. i said don't get me wrong he's to blame also but you allowed for him to wrong his family.... Then i said just remember when you walk down the isle someday and say I do to your husband, just hope and pray their won't be a selfish, decietful little whore like you waiting to prey on your husband.. Then i said thank you have a nice day and hung up... I have to admit i may have been childish but oh did i feel good.. It helped me somewhat recover over her if that makes any sense... I just wanted her to know i know what's going on and i won't sit quietly... so if you think it would make you feel better than i say do it... it helped me. good luck

StillBlessed,

I'm sorry to hear about your situation. Hang in there...it can get better.

Don't worry about contacting the OW at this point. Call the husband and boyfriend instead.

Exposure has a way of fizzling affairs. Besides...those men have a right to make their own decisions about the relationships they are in. You have information that they need...share it with them.

Has your husband formally committed to no contact yet?

<small>[ December 14, 2004, 12:44 PM: Message edited by: AndrewA ]</small>

I found out about the OW on Thursday night. I found thru husband's secret other cell phone. I took her phone number, had it converted to her address and went over to her house Friday morning. She was there. I talked with her calmly for 40 minutes or so, and I felt much better after I did. It was clear that she was floored that my H was married and had a child. It was also clear that there was not love between them *yet*, so in my case it really helped me. Also because the A was stopped before it really got going, my H was only mad for a short period at me for doing this.

I contacted the OW and it also gave me some satisfaction. She is a bartender at a certain restaurant where my husband would spend his lunch hours and spend time at her home on her day off. I waited outside for her to arrive for work one day and introduced myself. I told her that I wanted her to see that I was a 'real person' and that she just wasted 2 years of her life. The affair was exposed about a month before and my husband and I decided to put our marriage back together. She told me about all the good sex they had and the gifts he bought her. I just kept cool and told her that because of their affair that our sex was presently the best ever and we have been married 30 years and will continue to stay married and she is the loser. In regards to the gifts, my reply was: "Yes, my husband is very generous and buys me great gifts too!" She said that my husband told her that our relationship was over and my reply was: "Oh, is that what he told you!" "Well, guess what? I'm still here!" Next she said, "Does he know that you are here?" I told her "No, but he would not be surprised because he knows that I approach things head on!" She told me that she was going to call him and tell him and she quickly hurried into the restaurant and in the meantime, I called my husband and told him what happened. He laughed and said that he would ignore the phone call when it came in. He did call me and told me that she did ring his cell phone but he ignored the call and that he was having lunch at a restaurant she knew he frequented near his work. The waitress there, who is a friend of hers, told him that she was on the phone and he told the waitress to tell her what he told her before that their relationship is over and he wants no more contact with her. I know for a fact that everything is over because I have been checking all the locations (restaurant and her home) on a regular basis (which my husband knows I do) and he is always where he is suppose to be. Our marriage is so much better now after the affair because we realize what we almost lost. Don't get me wrong, it's been almost a year since discovery day and the memories are still very painful but we communicate everyday how much we love each other. It took an affair to wake us up. In regards to confronting the OW, she knows that she will have to deal with me, if she ever contacts him again and I like it that way.

Stillblessed, hi and welcome!

Contacting the ow can be very dangerous. It depends on what you would like to accomplish out of it. Exposing the affair and make it fully aware to your husband and her that you know about the two of them is very important.

But it does have its consequences. I called the ow because I wanted to know why. My husband met her at work. She was the HR assistant who handle the benefits. My youngest son was about to have major surgery on his skull and I had spoken to her several times. She knew what kind of hell I was going through during our conversations. but she made it very clear to every body in my husbands office that she wanted him. So when I finally called her to find answers to why, she basically got laughed at in my face. My husband was living in Texas and I couldn't come down there for many reasons until later. One was my son's surgery that my H. knew about before he accepted the position.
She was very cruel and wasn't sorry. She said that he needed someone and I wasn't there so she filled in. "Two people who needed each other at a bad time in their lives." And she said something's that I am not sure to this day is the truth or a lie. Who do I believe? Him or her? They are both liars.

So if you absolutely need to call ow, make sure you have a plan and stick to it. And be prepared. She might through you off as my H. slut did. But I did bust her a couple of times and it felt great. Be careful and try not to loose your composure. You have got to be on your best behavior. And if she gets you don't let her know it. No sarcasm!

As for the Rat! That is the one thing I said: Where there is a rat, there's got to be at least a thousand more hiding. Or if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, its got to be a duck!

Good luck and let us know the out come!

Ali~

Thanks so much to all of you. You're so helpful and so supportive. A big applause to those of you who approached the situation head on. I had to laugh at some of the approaches in disbelieve b/c I so much admire your courage and umph.

To answer some of your questions, I told my H on d-day (10/29/04) that all contact has to stop, but the thing is I just don't trust him (although he said it would stop). He sees the single one sometimes at work (this was the 8 mo. + A). I don't trust him one bit b/c when I confronted him about the married OW, he said it was only one time with her and that he'd never cheated on me b4 (but he didn't tell me about the other one). When asked if he would have to me if I hadn't found out, he said no. When I confronted him about the single OW (w/ live-in BF), he said that he probably would have continued w/ that A if I hadn't found out. That just proves even more that his W and kids are not his top priority. He said that my finding out and her telling him of her pregnancy (YEP! She's prego!) was a wake-up call to him. He claims that she's so sure that it's not his, but we all know that the only guarantee is abstinence. It still gets worse! Her conception dates back to when they slept together on OUR ANNIVERSARY!!! (Another story in itself as to how I found out about this. Obviously not thru his confession. In fact, when I approached him with rock solid evidence, he blatantly denied it. But I let him know that I knew the truth regardless of what he said or didn't say.)

I feel almost 100% sure that I don't want this marriage anymore. If he admits that he wouldn't have told me about those A's if I hadn't found out, who knows what else he hasn't told me that I haven't found out about. Either now or possibly in the future. He said on d-day that he wants the marriage to work and that he'll do anything, but his actions aren't backing up his words. He's been better with accountability, but says that'll get old. What then? I won't always believe what he says about his whereabouts anyway b/c he's proven that he's not always where he says he is. I don't want to live the rest of my life playing detective. The last cell phone bill doesn't show those #s after the period when he said the contact stopped, but there's always a way to hide what you want to keep secret. Calls can be made to and from different #s. Who knows? There's so much more to it, but I don't want to take up too much more space. Oh yeah, I never used to open his bills, but on d-day, I opend all that I got my hands on, therefore discovering the 8-mo A thru the cell ph. bill. Since then he's told me "angrily" that I need to stop opening his mail or he'll put a block on it. You'd think that in his position, especially saying he wants our marriage to work, that he'd be doing ALL that he can to erase suspicion rather than raising it by not being open with every aspect of his life and basically telling me to stay out of his biz. I discovered yesterday that he requested that his cell ph. bill be mailed to a P.O. box (I don't know where it is and don't care). He's apparently unaware that I have other ways of accessing the bill. HeHeHe!!!

I contacted the OW just to bring closure to this entire situation. My husband had told me that he wanted us to be together, but he was still friends with the OW. Well, the night that I confronted the OW, he told me that he would be working late at a work event that night so I took the opportunity to see the OW and confront her concerning the affair. Unfortunately, my husband had lied to me again. Instead, his vehicle was at her home. I confronted the both of them via phone and basically had a conversation with the OW. Found out that he had been lying to her and me.

I'm glad that she and I did talk, but in the same respect she has fallen deeply in love with my husband and truly believes that he is her soulmate and will do anything to keep him. I can keep going, but please if you choose to confront the OW, please write everything down you want to know from her. Just ask questions and don't offer anything to her about you, your husband, and your family and most off all don't go emotional.

Jolu:

"childish"?

Are you kidding? You did just fine! You acted as a responsible adult married woman who is willing to fight for her marriage.

Jolu, I said almost that same very thing. And my husbands slut said to me after I said the family etc.; "Sounds like a personal problem!" Unbelievable that these people have absolutely no conscience what so ever! How can a person be born without a guilty conscience? <img border="0" title="" alt="[Mad]" src="images/icons/mad.gif" />

Ali~

<small>[ December 11, 2004, 09:42 PM: Message edited by: Ali88 ]</small>

Still Blessed,

If you do meet OW keep in mind that some of what she says may be a lie. One of the most difficult things for me to do is analyze their affair to try and determine if what she said was true or if what he said is true. It at times, has been torturous.

Btw, I didn't contact her the first two times, she contacted me. I did contact her the last time to verify that he was still in contact with her. She knew way to much about what had been happening with us and our children not to have been in contact.

Some need to have contact for closure. In some ways, I wish I could have talked to her again before she died just to see if she had remorse, but I really doubt that she did.

Best of luck,
Cathy

I am a FWW, just for the record.

After my DDay, I asked my H if he wanted to talk to the FOM, and he said he neither wanted nor needed to. He said at the time that if I initiated NC, then that was good enough for him. He said that he was not interested in hearing anything from a man who would lie and cheat. Ironic, since his wife had been lying and cheating as well. But my point is that neither of us felt like anything positive (or truthful) would come out of the two of them having any contact. I left it as his ultimate decision to make though.

Stillblessed the decision to contact ow or not is one I would think long and hard about. Although things may turn out well, there's the chance that it wont. For I choose to confront the other woman. I had questions and I damn sure was about to get answers. What I found when I talked to her was initially I was able to converse and have a civil conversation but then I'd think about the A, hell the simple fact that there was one and go off basically. One thing I ill advise you of should you contact the ow is prepare yourself emotionally. I'm sure like many of us you have question but make sure you're actually ready for those answers. Just the nature of the subject is hard to deal with and hearing the answers from the horses mouth at time was extremely painful. For me the pain of total disclosure was less painful then the possible continual decit and feeling of being left in the dark. As for the ow's bf and h I would tell the for the simple fact that if someone knew about my h A I would have wanted them to inform me. I would want to know or tell not to be mean, malicious or anything of that nature but simply so I(or other BS) could make some informed decisions on our own, knowing fullwell whenever we made those decisons they were based on the full deck of knowledge. Overall for me confronting the other woman helped. I had questions and I got answers. If their were things I questioned I would cross reference the info w/ my H. And to this day she hasn't lied about anything and I appreciate it.

FYI...My intentions for confronting the OW is not to have them answers any questions. I plan to say what I have to say about them and the whole situation and hang up without giving them a chance to even get a word in. They and my H are liars so I don't want to hear anything they have to say. The married one even had the nerve to say that it was childish of me to want her to call (us) because my H asked her to call (on d-day) to confirm the dates. Of course she never called to talk to me, but only to him on his cell. What does she think is so mature about having A's and not being woman enough to call me?! No reaction of anyone betrayed to that degree is childish. I'm not quite sure how to contact the H and BF. I'm heavily leaning toward a bday/xmas greeting card for the single one and her BF and a xmas card for the married one. I just don't want to mail it and risk OW intercepting it and the men still be in the dark. Any suggestions? I know where they both live.

Still Blessed,

Why not just call the BFs or husbands? That way, you don't have to worry about the possibility of an interception.

StillBlessed,

If you decide to contact OW, be prepared for anything.

In my case, OW wanted to talk to me to 'apologize' ... yeah right! ... I agreed. We met and while I was waiting for an apology that never came ... she wanted to let me know that she didn't care what he had told her, she was going to fight for him until the day she died.

I was not prepared for that. It got me into a more depresive state <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" />

Then, later (about 3 months later) she sent me a text message on why xH was spending all this time with me and DD. I sent her another message and she called to my cell phone saying that she didn't wanted any hatred between us. I called her back. She said again that she could not loose him ... she acted like she was the BS and I was OW ...

Then about a week later, she left me a letter saying that everything that was happening was my fault ... that I was the one making things difficult, that I was using my daughter as my personal toy. That I was playing games. Four pages.
I wrote her back ... Four pages, double sided ... I wrote everything I felt ... it felt good. And at that point, after I wrote that letter, I didn't care about xH's reactions or her reaction. I made my peace with the letter. My closure/end letter for OW.

Was it worth it? No. Not talking to her. Not writing the letter. I should had wrote the letter without sending it. I know that I was honest in my reactions and responses but I just gave the OW the power of playing with my emotions and feelings. It gave her the power that she could hurt me more than xH. And she did.

It is your decision but please think if in the long term it would be good or bad for you ... not if it would be good or bad for OW or WH, but for you ... think about you first and how this will affect your feelings ...
It hurts and you want to hurt them as much as they have hurt you ... but it might be the case that by contacting her, you will be the one hurt.

Again SB,

Think really carefully what you are about to do! I am confused though. Is she seeing your husband and another guy? And she is also married? Boy that sounds like the the slut my husband was screwing! Hey, it could be? I know for a fact she is still cheating on her clueless husband. And that leads me to that. I told the sluts H. and he didn't get it. He didn't believe me. He thought I was acting out of spite.

Call the other men in her life and say it like it is. With her? You will never be able to inflict the pain that she caused you. I wish that slut could feel for five minutes what I was going through. By the way, this month marks the anniversary of the two. but again beware. She knows your husband is married. You think that she is going to care? Probably not! Just like when I called. She laughed in my face.

Good luck!

Ali~


Oh Mily,

Holy cow! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" /> How creepy for you to deal with that psycho women! I am glad you got out of a bad situation. Good for you. I hope you can recover peacefully. I know it is painful.

<small>[ December 14, 2004, 07:15 PM: Message edited by: Ali88 ]</small>

Clarification:
2 different OW (that I know of)
1 is M with 3 kids
1 is single, 1 child & 1 on the way (both could be my H...who knows. I want pat. test at least on unborn one), live-in BF
The single OW is the long-term EA & PA
The M OW was supposedly a 1.5 week EA and a
1-time PA

I hope that clears up that soap opera.