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Do you EVER contact the other person who is cheating on your partner?


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JoeSmith357-1

Looking back through a failed relationship of mine which just ended.

 

The warning signs were there, the evidence was there, I was dumb and ignored it.

 

Thinking back about things I could have done differently...

 

Ultimately, it's your partner's decision about what course of action they will take, if they will change their behavior.

 

In my case, it was an emotional affair, that PROBABLY went physical, but I have no evidence it did.

 

I found out, addressed it fairly quickly. She said she would stop, I forgave and forgot, only to find out months later, she started back up. And left her.

 

I was thinking, would there be a circumstance where you would ever reach out to the other person to try to scare them off? Not outright physically threatening, but something like "I know, get lost" or more detailed, perhaps shaming this ****er into finding some other woman to get involved with?

 

Even before discussing it with your partner, or after?

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imperfectangel

No I'd leave like you do. He isn't forcing her to cheat she made he conscious decision to.

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No I'd leave like you do. He isn't forcing her to cheat she made he conscious decision to.

^^agree^^

 

I can understand why you would secretly want to do this though. Perhaps wanting some measure of control over a situation that you don't have control over.

 

I'm sorry you are hurting over this though, truly. I think it's best to leave it behind you now and focus on just you and moving forward. I know this is always easier said than done. But one step at a time.

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lemondrop21

Yeah, I don't think it will make much of a difference. If MM's wife had ever contacted me to tell me to stay away, I would have just thought, um, why don't you tell your cheating husband to stay away from me?? Unless I was stalking... Otherwise I think you can tell your spouse to stay away and it is their responsibility to do so.

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RecentChange

This was touched on in a discussion recently.

 

I think there is merrit to contacting the OM, or OW.

 

I cheated, and on D day my spouse sent the OM two texts:

 

"Does your wife know you are F'ing mine?"

 

Followed by

 

"I know you work at xyz"

 

I can tell you that was enough to scare the OM ****less.

 

He was married, and getting discovered was his biggest fear. I know those two texts were enough to scare him off for good. We have been NC ever since. (I occasionally see him in passing - he adverts his eyes)

 

And I contacted the OW when he had cheated years earlier. Just a basic, I don't know what lies he has told you, but never contact him again. She.... tried to argue a bit, but I broke her off with you arent worth my time or explanation. And that was basically the end of it.

 

There is something about defending your turf. I remember another poster saying that the WS will gain respect for you if you do. I do agree with that.

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ladydesigner
Yeah, I don't think it will make much of a difference. If MM's wife had ever contacted me to tell me to stay away, I would have just thought, um, why don't you tell your cheating husband to stay away from me?? Unless I was stalking... Otherwise I think you can tell your spouse to stay away and it is their responsibility to do so.

 

^ This

 

MOW in our situation actually said this to me, while my WH was telling me something different. :sick:

 

I think it's okay to reach out to them to let them know the cat's out of the bag, but other than that you have no control over what the AP does or your WS. I learned this one the hard way as they took their A underground for 2 more years. :sick:

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I called the other woman bc my H fell asleep on the phone. I called her names, than I called back & apologized. Her & I talked & she told me the things he was telling her but I never said stay away from my H bc i for hired if that's what you want, go to her. He ended right then & she tried to take me out for drinks but I just ignored her messages. Lol she also tried to date my cousin & when my cousin found out who she was he kicked her out of his house, which I never asked him to but he said no way he was gonna date someone that had sex with my H.

 

I don't think telling the OW anything is going to work bc they've been lied to just as much as the BS. Now you can try to get some info if you're mentally prepared to know she might smart off to you.

Edited by a LoveShack.org Moderator
language ~T
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I introduced myself to the xOW but in a very businesslike way to say, "Hi, I'm Mrs. XYZ. If you are going to be spending time around my kids I'd like to meet you first, and to be there the first time you meet them." That was it. It was greeted with a lengthy attack which gave me tonnes of insight into what my WH had said and should have been a warning of good times ahead lol. She contacted me countless times for the first year post d-day, but I didn't respond, not even with a f*ck you leave me/him/us alone.

 

I think if she had been in a relationship at the time I would have contacted her spouse before using the A as leverage to scare her away from my husband.

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ladydesigner
I introduced myself to the xOW but in a very businesslike way to say, "Hi, I'm Mrs. XYZ. If you are going to be spending time around my kids I'd like to meet you first, and to be there the first time you meet them." That was it. It was greeted with a lengthy attack which gave me tonnes of insight into what my WH had said and should have been a warning of good times ahead lol. She contacted me countless times for the first year post d-day, but I didn't respond, not even with a f*ck you leave me/him/us alone.

 

I think if she had been in a relationship at the time I would have contacted her spouse before using the A as leverage to scare her away from my husband.

 

Oh definitely if the AP is married and has a significant other. Be sure to tell them. Nothing like the fantasy bubble popping.

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JoeSmith357-1

In my case, the OM was not married and had no SO. I'm not going to bring this into his work, that's dumb. None of their business. Wouldn't consider that.

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RecentChange

It wasn't so much that he was going to contact the other man's work - it was more "I know where to find you" idle threat.

 

I suppose none of that would have worked if it was an EA, and not a purely physical affair.

 

My Mr's messages were enough to make the other man steer clear. I didn't have to do anything but not contact him - which made it easier not contact him!

 

If the other man found out from me that I had a D day - I think it would have been easier for him to ignore that and attempt to still contact me.

 

Knowing that there was a pissed BS, ready to blow the roof off of his world made him back away, quickly and permanently.

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Absolutely not!

 

I've been cheated on once (that I know of). I sort of knew who it was she was doing it with too.

 

I really didn't care who it was. The guy has no responsibility to me. She did, and I held her completely responsible.

 

She was dumped, real quick. She cried, wouldn't return my stuff, tried everything. Still tried contacting me over social media a couple of years ago...

 

Doesn't matter. She'd done. And I've done a heck of a lot better than her on an average Wednesday :laugh:

 

Sort yourself out, man. Women are not worth fighting over.

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1. I Think this might be a bit gender specific.

 

2. It can work if there is some leverage in your position.

 

I let her know I knew through a third party. The difference in social position frightened her. I wouldn't have done it otherwise.

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The question would be, are you going to try and scare off every man who is interested in having an A with your partner, or are you going to look at the real problem- your partner.

You cannot control other people's actions, however, you can discuss issues in your R some of which maybe you were unaware of, and encourage and support your partner in addressing any personal issues that affect their ability to be faithful, or of course you also have the choice to end the R.

Warning off the AP doesn't solve the problem...not long term.

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Lady Hamilton

My AP's wife got in touch with me. At first it was for information, then it was to scare me off. The first was met with silence and the second met with "yeah, ok, whatever" initially and then when it kept escalating, a "if you want to keep rattling my door, be ready for me to rattle on yours." Not my finest moment, but I was pretty much over the threats and had very little to lose.

 

Somewhere in there his BW or his MIL called my family to tell them what I was doing. Since my mother has a trolling level of expert, that did not go as well as she'd hoped.

 

The one thing she never did was tell my husband... Which was actually fairly smart. I think she knew once he knew, the marriage would end and the ability to maintain the relationship would be easier and my AP's desire to leave her and stay gone would increase.

 

When my husband at the time found out, confronted me, I confessed, we did our brief R and then finally split, his parting words were actually along the lines that he hoped I'd be happy wherever I ended up and he wasn't surprised I was having the affair with my AP. We were well suited, he was a good guy, etc etc.

 

When my AP's wife found that out and heard we were separating and divorcing, she just lost it. Then she tried to reach out to him over who knows what, but got a "it's not my problem, I don't like you, do not call me again" response. My ex never reached out to my AP, nor did I expect him to.

 

So the whole telling, not telling, scare off or to not scare off... It's a mixed bag.

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i never reached out to my xH's AP - we were acquaintances, we knew of each other so there was no need for formal introduction. i never saw a point in contacting the AP or AP's family - my xH's AP's live-in boyfriend contacted me though. at first, i empathized because we were both BSs and both hurt. he tried to turn me against the xH in terms of using our child against him, also tried to convince me that the OW was mentally ill and will abuse our child, contacted my xH's mother & father and our daughter's kindergarten teacher to express his "concerns" -- took him about a year & three restraining orders to finally back off.

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I personally wouldn't give the other person the satisfaction of talking to them at all, but they would start experiencing some unpleasant happenings from a distance.

 

If they were in a relationship or married, I'd make sure their partner knew everything.

 

There's a marriage website that advocates men definetly contact the OM (if they want to save the marriage) and telling him to stay away from his wife. The message being that you are prepared to fight for your marriage.

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RecentChange
1. I Think this might be a bit gender specific.

 

2. It can work if there is some leverage in your position.

.

 

I agree with this - I am all for equality, but I think a man saying stay the hell away from my wife is somehow more effective then what often ends up a fight between women.

 

And leverage, like I said my OM was a MM, he had a lot to lose. If he was single, maybe he would have ignored the threats.

 

Lastly, it's all useless unless the WS sincerely wants to reconcile and is committed to NC with the OM.

 

I am sayin' for my situation, my spouse standing his ground did show he was ready to fight for it (actually he wanted to face him in person, but I convinced him that a confrontation would probably result in police being called, and this ending up even worse for everyone involved), and it made sticking to no contact easier for me now that the other man was too scared to dare contact me.

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No, I stopped getting involved in other people's dysfunctional behavior quite a few years ago. Of course, when I was younger, I likely would have gotten arrested, not for calling them, but for beating the daylights out of anyone who was messing with my husband (had I ever actually wanted to have a husband).

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RecoveringSlowly

Mine was kind of funny.

 

LD EA. After dday I was worried about saving my marriage, I didn't care to much about her. My husband seemed to wake up when I caught him and immediately went NC to work on the marriage. The OW literally went nuts. She started calling me over and over, trying to convince me that if I really loved him I would want him to be happy, and he needed more than one relationship to be happy. The same crap.

 

She started calling my friends, and I had enough. I called a left a fairly nasty message to leave me alone. An older woman called back, her MIL, to say that I scared her granddaughter. I apologized, and before I knew what happened. Started crying and the whole thing just came out. She was a very kind woman and spent twenty minutes comforting me.

 

Then, unsurprisingly, the OW was getting a divorce. She continued to attempt to contact both of us until I filed a harassment complaint with the police. That was the end of that.

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Friskyone4u

Joe

You did the right thing. Don't section me guess yourself . Sure there are cases of where contacting the OM or physical confronting worked, but NOT wise is the majority of cases.

 

The problem was your wife not the OM . Too many BH want to give all this super natural credit to OM as predator , seducer , or other super natural abilities , when in fact it is just denial of the truth .

 

There could be no EA or PA without the active participation of your WW.

 

Asking OM to leave her alone is humiliating and can be worse if genie a real ass and taunts you

 

Hang in there

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  • 3 weeks later...

I knew who he was. I did not contact him. I did not care at that point. My wife got mad at me, saying i wasn't fighting to keep her. I simply told her that she was not worth fighting for based on what she had done, and i would have a divorce filed within the next couple weeks.

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EverySunset

Shoooooooooot.

 

Yeah, I contacted some, not others. The second DD that is. Found out he was on sites. Got on there myself and texted a few. He told everyone I was an ex wife (eye roll. I did become that after, though) and I found out he lied to a lot of women. Holy smokes a lot of women. Me included of course.

 

I wanted to see the scope of what I was dealing with. Once I knew, I left. I'm not a glutton for punishment, I just needed facts. Expose? Nah. Everyone knew except me. (Seriously messed up, that lol) I just got my head straight and moved on.

 

Did I want to, the first time? Yeah! But I did everything wrong. I wanted to make her hurt like I did, juvenile or not. But then I realized she was just a jerk. My (now ex) husband was the one who really wronged me. So I left him to her. Funny how she moved on and left him behind too.

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All I'll add to this is be careful with the big stuff act bc you might get more than you bargained for. If you go down that road, at least be sure you mean what you say and you can back it up, bc a bluff can go about as wrong as anything can go wrong if you're really not the hard ass you're pretending to be. :-/

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Personally, if my xMM's wife had contacted me, it probably would have ''scared me off''. It's not that I would have been actually scared, I was a single woman, there's nothing she could have done to me, but it would have burst the ''bubble'' and I would want to stay away from the drama.

 

However, scaring me off would not have changed the fact that the affair did happen, she would have simply prevented it from continuing. I'm also guessing that one would probably want the affair to be ended by cheating partner, for the right reasons.

 

I guess it's all a matter of what you can live with and what you can forgive.

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