One of my friends, who's already had a really hard, hard year (I think we're running neck and neck for the title of Excrement Blowback Queen) just posted about her husband asking for a separation after confessing he'd fallen for someone else. She and her husband have had a rough row to hoe throughout their marriage, but in so many ways, they've been best friends, too. Now he's fallen in love (he thinks) with someone who's a very much like his wife, just ten years younger—the old mid-life crisis cliche, and one of the most stupid.
When things like this happen, there's plenty of blame to go around without pointing specific fingers. He's certainly got a good chunk of the blame to carry around, because cheating on your wife is just not done, no matter what it's been like at home. Divorce is too easy for that to be an excuse anymore. That said, it usually takes two to get things to that point. But the person I really blame is the girlfriend. (Let me add the proviso that there is no way the girlfriend, who is a reporter, could not have known he was married. There's just not, whether he was wearing a ring or not, no matter what he admitted. He's come into some publicity recently and it's pretty hard to be ignorant of the fact that he's got a wife.)
So WTF was this bimbo (and I use the term intentionally) thinking? What made her think it was okay to poach another woman's husband, just because he happened to away from home without her?
I speak from some experience here; for some reason, married men seem to find me attractive, and I've turned away more than one of them. Early on, I realized that married men are a vale of tears for single women. If they're already chasing someone other than their wife, they'll chase someone other than you, too, and they'll probably never leave their wives. I also learned, along the way, that no matter how hard the lightning strikes, how hot the chemistry burns, you'll get over it, and if you're still in the middle of the deception when it does, what you'll be left with is a train wreck, strewn with bodies.
I did fall very hard for one of the married guys, and while I still have wistful thoughts occasionally, I'm not sorry I kept my distance. It ended badly enough without losing the respect of our mutual friends. The thing is, you can say no. You can, in fact, keep saying no as much as you have to until you can leave, or throw them out. And if you have any self-respect, or respect for other people, that's what you do.
After she got done sobbing, my friend called up the girlfriend and snarled at her to keep her hands off her husband, which apparently scared the girlfriend silly. Then she called her back and suggested a conversation. The girlfriend, spineless, sneaking, poacher that she is, has not returned the phone calls. Out of guilt, I would suggest, as well as fear.
One of the things that saddens me about this kind of situation is that women don't seem to have gotten over the idea that we need a man at any cost, even at the cost of another woman's misery. This is the ultimate divide and conquer tactic, to my mind. If women continue to think we are nothing without a man, even someone else's man, then the lure of being a trophy wife is going to keep us at each others throats. Sisters, will ya stop thinking with your gonads? Men do enough of that without us adding to the problem. Have a little respect, for each other, if not for yourself. Go play with someone your own age. Preferably single.
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