WomanSavers.com Forum / MEN'S AREA / Man V. Woman?

I read a lot of women slamming men (as a group) and vice versa.  The cheating behavior of each has little to do with which sex you are and a lot more about an individual‘s emotional maturity.  Don‘t waste yourtime waiting for the cheater to mature.  It‘s a long process and most of these losers emotional development permanently stopped at 18.  The story below is old.  I wrote this last year to no one in particular, just to write what happened to me but I found it very relevent to some of these discussions.  (sorry for the length).

When I was a boy about 10 or 12 years old September used to be a bit of an emotional paradox for me.  September marked the end of summer which is always a sad time for young boys, but it also brought my birthday and dreams of gifts I wanted.  These are the foolish little feelings of a young boy.  Even though four of those lifetimes have passed by I still see those little memories with that tinge of sadness still lingering around the edges of my photographic memories.  Like so many things in life, feelings of sadness are relative and I now long to be that sad again.

Many years later in the spring of ’05 hope was abound.  I now found myself the proud father of a 4 year old girl who somehow knew she stole my heart at age one and owned it completely.  She was Daddy’s little girl and the very sight of her made my soul smile.  Tumbling along right behind her was my little buddy.  My 3 year old son was a bundle of life and love.  The two of them completed our family.  Life was falling into place.  The days were getting longer and warmer and I was feeling better than I had in years.  Admittedly the years of marriage before the children were often empty and directionless sprinkled with bouts of depression and arguments, but things seemed different now.  The two children were like two little suns shining whenever they were around and my wife appeared happier than I had seen her in years.  There was a glow about her.  She had lost most of the child bearing weight and so proud.  Maybe that’s what made her glow?  Maybe it was the children or a combination of the two?  Either way, one knows better than to look a gift horse in the mouth.  I just enjoyed my glowing family.  Naivety is a beautiful thing, while it lasts.

It was only 4 weeks until our wedding anniversary.  12 years.  Not one of the big round numbers like 10 or 20 but 12 is still a unique number garnering its own designation of a “dozen”.  After a dozen years I still felt as though we had 2 marriages.  The first was the 7 year meandering marriage without children and the latter was the one with the children, filled with direction and hope.  It was this one I wanted to celebrate.  Then the thought came to me.  Why not get married again to recognize our new marriage?  The idea rekindled feelings of love and warmth for my wife again.  The idea was quite simple; set up a surprise party at one of her family member’s house and surprise her with a renewed proposal of marriage and a renewing of our vows with the priest who married us.  I spoke with a couple of my sister-in-laws about the idea and they loved it.  The problem was time and logistics.

Life and work conspired to derail my ambitious plans and I would need to postpone my great idea, but this missed opportunity may have been for the best.  The middle of summer had come and my wife still exhibited some glowing spots, they were becoming interlaced with periods of resentment and anger without a tangible origin.  These episodes were like walking into a predator lying in wait.  The things she would say seemed a bit rehearsed and shoe horned into a conversation.  I wondered what was bringing this on, but as always I naively assumed she was just going through the difficulties of being a stay-at-home mother.  Prior to the arrival of our son she was a professional and enjoyed her adult oriented world, but she simultaneously seemed relieved to not have to work once our son arrived.  Maybe she was just feeling a bit trapped at home now?  I wondered.

A dinner at our next door neighbor’s Jack and Mary was planned for a weekday in the middle of July to celebrate Jack’s birthday.  The evening arrived with my wife unusually enthusiastic about having dinner with the neighbors.  While we were friends with our neighbors, it appeared my wife was becoming very good friends with Jack because he was a stay at home husband and I knew they talked frequently.  Oddly enough they had no children but Mary was very successful and happy to have a husband at home to cook and clean.  Jack and Mary enjoyed cooking and fine dining as much as I did.  He seemed particularly nervous that evening about the meal he was preparing, as though it might not measure up to my culinary skills.  I was flattered, but still not completely sure that was the entire reason for his behavior.

Dinner was wonderful despite one course not turning out as well as Jack had wanted so he dumped it down the sink with a slightly childish display of frustration, but he recovered quickly and the evening moved on with good conversation, and even better wine.  It was time to retire to a cozy fire on the back patio for stories around a campfire.  The main fare now was stories of adolescence and swapping stories of our lives during the dating years.  The wine and stories flowed effortlessly and everyone seemed to be having one of those perfect evenings.  My wife needed to return home for a few minutes to let the babysitter go home and see that the children were sound asleep in their beds.  Moments after she left, Jack too needed to excuse himself to load up a new selection of music and whip up a batch of margaritas.  Mary and I chatted about everything and enjoyed talking.  We hardly noticed our spouses had both been gone for over 20 minutes until they both returned.  Their slightly prolonged absence was a bit odd and barely even worth the effort of making a mental note.

The Eleven O’clock hour was rapidly approaching and Mary, an admitted workaholic, needed to retire for the evening but insisted that the three of us stay and enjoy ourselves.  We all gladly accepted her advice and enjoyed the fire and storytelling.  We told stories for the better part of an hour when Jack decided that more music needed to be selected from his extensive digital video library.  Always the gentlemen Jack suggested that my wife choose some music, with his assistance of course.  I found myself alone at the campfire letting the warmth of the fire and alcohol flow over me. 

In the months preceding our evening at the neighbor’s I found myself getting odd, but not alarming, feelings about how friendly Jack and my wife appeared to be with each other.  That evening was no different until I was alone by the fire and those feelings were now accented with a little extra suspicion and alarm.  My rational mind wrote it off as just the protective instincts a man has about his wife.  Instincts passed down through millions of years of evolution, nothing more.  But the nagging feeling grew stronger as my mind started to play tricks.  I kept feeling that I should quietly walk into the room and see if something was amiss.  Then I thought to myself; “They are not in sight but they are less than forty feet away in the family room with the lights blazing, what am I possibly going to find?  If there is something going on between them, they are sure as hell not going to do anything 40 feet away while I am sitting right here!”.   So I just sat there a little while longer. 

Curiosity finally got the best of me and I decided to go walk in and “check up on them”.  I entered the house and was quietly walking down the twenty foot long hall to the entryway of the family room.  I could see a large screen TV with music selections being scrolled through and I could hear them talking but the music obscured their words.  Just a few more feet and they would be in sight just to the right of the entrance standing there selecting songs.  I stopped.  There was a bathroom door on my right.  I could just lean a little forward and to my left for a quick peek but I decided not to.  I didn’t want to enter the room and have to pretend I wasn’t checking up on them.  I decided to just go into the bathroom.  I closed the bathroom door and turned on the lights.  As soon as the lights came on I realized that this bathroom had another door that led into the family room.  I was very certain from the sounds of their voices where they were standing and that they would have their backs to this other door.  Maybe I should just crack the door open a little and take a quick peek so I could see for myself that they were just two good friends.  The music was loud enough that even if these door hinges were in desperate need of oil, I knew they would never hear it.  So I turned out the lights and slowly turned the knob, pushed the door open a few inches, and sure enough there they were just standing side by side with their backs to me.  Their bodies were very close together, and while they casually stood there discussing the different song choices he was squeezing my wife’s ass.  He was taking a full handful and trying to squeeze an entire cheek.  Then he would run his hand up and down between the two cheeks.  I continued watching the squeezing and rubbing for what seemed like an hour or two, all the while my wife gave no indication that he was even doing this.  She was acting as though this was as normal as waving hello to a neighbor.  From their posture and position in the room it was clear that they were prepared in the event that I came walking through the main entryway.  He could have easily stopped what he was doing and I never would have been able to see a thing.  My heart was now firmly lodged in my throat.  I became aware that I was beginning to breathe rapidly.  It felt like a tornado of emotions just touched down in my mind.  I couldn’t even distinguish one emotion from another, anger, disbelief, shock, betrayal, extreme violation all swirling around at once very quickly, very violently.  The skin on my face was hot.  I began to sweat and tremble slightly.  For reasons I don’t understand, I did not fly into a rage and confront them right there on the spot.  I quietly closed the door and tried to get my thoughts together.  I decided to quickly and quietly return to my chair at the fire before I was detected.  I sat down in my chair, my heart pounding in my chest, a lump in my throat so hard now that I could barely swallow.  My stomach had become a knot so tight I was becoming nauseous.

My wife!  Oh my god, that was my wife!  He has been violating my wife!  She has been doing who knows what with that bastard!  What do I do?  Think, think quickly.  Oh my god what do I do when they walk out here?  Oh no, here they come, what do I do?  They walked up happy and joking.  I stood up, fists clenched.  Twenty years earlier, a stupid bastard like this would have gotten beaten to pulp if he just said something to me that pissed me off, but strangely enough I had control over that adolescent urge now, even with 10 times the emotional charge surging through my body.  I just looked at my wife and said “We’re leaving; we have to go home, now.”  She protested and tried to get me to stay, but when I repeated myself in an intensely stern voice, I think she knew something was wrong.  Very wrong, and she relented.

The confrontation commenced immediately upon returning home.  I was feeling all the same emotions although now they were separating like an oil and vinegar salad dressing after a violent shaking.  She started with all the expected denials in spite of the evidence I presented her with.  She finally broke down and confessed that she did have an affair with him; however she lied about everything, only admitting to a few brief encounters that had just happened recently.  Over the next several hours the story changed and grew beyond proportions I could comprehend and in hindsight we had only scratched the surface of what she had done.

It took weeks for the entire truth to come out and only after she finally recognized that if our marriage had any chance of survival the absolute truth needed to be told no matter how embarrassing. 

She admitted that the affair had been going on since the year before.  She said that they had a few flirtatious conversations and kissed each other one evening, all occurring a few weeks before their relationship became sexual.  In complete disbelief how she could develop a romantic and then sexual relationship so quickly, she offered no explanation.  To see if she had any moral compass or had any remorse for violating our marriage and family I asked her to tell me about the first time they had sex and how she reacted.  I expected to hear that she had a few false starts before she could actually go through with taking all her clothes off for another man and have sex with him.  I also expected to hear that after their first sexual encounter she would show signs of remorse for what she had just done and that she avoided having sex with him for quite a while afterward.  Unfortunately I was dead wrong on both counts.  While I was away for a four day weekend hunting with my father she admitted that he invited her over while his wife was working and in less than a half hour they were naked having sex.  I then asked how long did it take for you to get over what you had done and start having sex again.  The answer: 2 days.  She had sex with him twice the very same weekend.  In the 17 years we were together (dating 5, married for 12) I can count on one hand the number of times we had sex twice in one long weekend.  She admitted to many things that she did to him or with him that she never did in our marriage.  Every one of which tore my heart out, and then stomped on it.  The pain was unbearable.  I had to ask hard questions because she never offered any information unless it was under direct questioning.   I had to listen to her tell me how they stopped at one of Jack’s friends boat to have sex but since she was on her period she gave him a blow job (to make sure she fulfilled his needs and desires).  I can count on one finger the number of times we have been together that my wife unselfishly fulfilled my needs while abstaining herself.  I had to listen to her tell me about the last time they had sex and I found out that he screwed my wife in my own house while I was sitting next to the campfire the night of his birthday!!!  Yes, that fateful evening when I was sitting at the next door neighbor’s fire talking to Mary and my wife was presumably “checking on the kids” while Jack was “inserting new music”; he was actually in my house screwing my wife in my half bath.  I had to listen to her tell me about the blow job she had promised him for his birthday, how she would leave our two children, both under the age of 5, home alone while she would go over to his house to screw his brains out. 

The details could go on for pages but they are just more of the same completely unbelievable acts.  Every detail I had to hear was like having a knife stabbed in my heart.  To know that she didn’t show acts of remorse was like twisting the knife.  To hear that all of her relationship with another married man was more important than our new little family was like pulling the knife out and using a rusty fork.  And all of this pain inflicted by a woman who always portrayed herself as the “good girl”, the good catholic girl who was never bashful about reminding me of her higher moral character.

I lived with her 12 years watching her use the tools of manipulation her father used on his children.  She would try to dominate our marriage through guilt.  She would not only claim the moral high ground, she would build a moral mountain and surround it with a moat to prevent anyone from occupying her territory.  She would find every little fault and lather on huge amounts of disappointment to make me feel guilty thus cementing her place above me.  A skill she perfected from her father but unfortunately an emotionally immature skill that is now useless.  Having never matured to the point where she can truly care for anyone more than herself, the only tool she has to repair the damage she has caused is to let time do the work.  She just waits for time to heal the wounds.  She has done nothing on her own to find constructive proactive tasks to help those whom she has injured.   Even years after her affair when asked what she is doing to repair the damage and improve the marriage, she says she goes to church a lot more to help “fix herself first”.  As people mature they naturally begin caring more for others than themselves.  This transition is most rapid and recognizable in children but it continues throughout life (for most people).  It must be nice to be perpetually 16 years old.

The Middle.

Wow, what an amazing writer you are...I could almost feel the immense pain you must have felt.

By the sound of the end of it you two are still together, but you sound as if your still not happy...why are you still together?

You don‘t think thats doing damage?

I‘m sorry, but you really are not doing your children any good by having them live in a confusing and unhappy home.

Seperations are hard for children, but no less hard and no less damaging then having them live with two parents who can‘t stand each other.

The best you can do is seperate as amicably and undramatically as possible and let them adjust to that rather than living like you are now....

Yes, very nice writting skills.  Very well laid out. (no pun intended) LOL

You will have to continue your story now that I am intrigued.  I have questions that need answers.

Was there ever a confrontation with the neighbors??

Are you legally seperated?

Are you dating now?

Do you really think your little ones are that tuned out not to know something is not right?

Do your neighbors still live next door and are they still married?

What is really keeping you together in the same home?  Is it money issues or are you hoping your marriage will work itself out?  It can‘t really be for the children, I am not buying that at all. 

Take it from someone who lived in a home with parents who couldn‘t stand each other for 18 years...there world has already been chipped away at...

Dad, end this now for your childrens sake, be honest with them, or their little minds will make up a worse truth.

I‘m intuitive (a good thing) also sometimes insecure and paranoid (a very bad thing) because as a child I had to train myself to be that way...its not fair to have a five or six year old kid training themselves how to read peoples faces in order to guage whether there is an argument brewing. Its not fair to have a kid think its their fault that mum and dad don‘t like each other any more. I‘m in my mid-thirties and have had to spend thousands on therapy to get my head sorted out after a life-time of blaming myself for everyones problems and trying to ceaselessly fix everyone I‘ve ever been in a relationship with...ok, now I fix people for a living myself...my career in counselling is probably the one good thing that came out of my experiences...but I still wouldn‘t wish the pain I had to endure on any other child. Being the child of two people who‘s sole individual aim seemed to be emotionally torturing one another for years and years is far far worse than being the child of two happily divorced people.

Drew you are a racist pig!

You are lumping all women in to one catagory.

Do you know all women?   You woman bashing needs to stop. 

He knows what is best for his kids,  when he is ready to divorce the cheating hoor he will. 

Drew  I hope the sweetest woman in the world  sweeps you off your feet and makes you eat your words!

Even if someone hated al women, it wouldn‘t make them racist. Get it right sunny.

"You are lumping all women in to one catagory."

Oh and women never do that. But I don‘t even do that to all women, If you would check out the topic WIFE, you would see that I made for obvious exceptions. Particularly with regard to one level headed female poster.

"He knows what is best for his kids,  when he is ready to divorce the cheating hoor he will.  "

He needs to think about what is best for him because what is best for him will be best for the kids as he will be happy and willing to participate in their lives. Of course that can happen if he goes for divorce and fights for custody.

"Drew  I hope the sweetest woman in the world  sweeps you off your feet and makes you eat your words!"

Sorry but I have a policy. No women in my life until millions more women change their attitudes and until statutes change regarding divorce, alimony, attempts to get money back after you‘ve proven kids aren‘t yours, etc. I have resisted female advances because quite frankly, most of them are poison. Especially the young ones my age. Sometimes I wish I was in my fifties so that years ago I would have had a better chance of meeting a smarter, decent, non slutty women.

I can hear it now. "Drew, you‘re just paranoid about women cheating on you. What about trust? Who cares what the laws are?"

Okay fine let‘s turn the tables. Let‘s make rape legal. If you complain I‘ll just say, "You‘re just paranoid about men. What about trust? Who cares what the laws are? How can you build a relationship without trust, eh?"

See how ****ing ignorant that response of yours would be? Good.

"Why did you even bother posting?"

Why bother answering to me ?

"Drew  I hope the sweetest woman in the world  sweeps you off your feet and makes you eat your words!"

Sweeps off his feet ? Only if she knows kung fu, Ha, ha...

Even if someone hated al women, it wouldn‘t make them racist. Get it right sunny.

Why wouldn‘t it be?  I believe you should research this a little more before you try and correct me.  Woman are of the female race.

Racism is the belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race.

"You are lumping all women in to one catagory."

The correct thing to say would be some women will do you wrong.

Oh and women never do that. But I don‘t even do that to all women, If you would check out the topic WIFE, you would see that I made for obvious exceptions. Particularly with regard to one level headed female poster.

Hey drew ole buddy, this isn‘t WIFE  get your threads straight.

I happen to believe there are wonderful men out there, you are dealing with women that have been very hurt by a man.

"He knows what is best for his kids,  when he is ready to divorce the cheating hoor he will.  "

He needs to think about what is best for him because what is best for him will be best for the kids as he will be happy and willing to participate in their lives. Of course that can happen if he goes for divorce and fights for custody.

Drew again  he knows what is right for him,  not everybody ups and leaves the first day they find out,  he will know when his time is right.  Just because he doesn‘t do it the way you would doesn‘t make it wrong.

"Drew  I hope the sweetest woman in the world  sweeps you off your feet and makes you eat your words!"

Sorry but I have a policy. No women in my life until millions more women change their attitudes and until statutes change regarding divorce, alimony, attempts to get money back after you‘ve proven kids aren‘t yours, etc. I have resisted female advances because quite frankly, most of them are poison. Especially the young ones my age. Sometimes I wish I was in my fifties so that years ago I would have had a better chance of meeting a smarter, decent, non slutty women.

Well Drew I do agree with you  women mature and get set in their ways as they get older,  they also don‘t and wont put up with **** like they did when they are younger.  But you are selling yourself short because some women have morals and aren‘t cheaters.

I can hear it now. "Drew, you‘re just paranoid about women cheating on you. What about trust? Who cares what the laws are?"

The laws??  Please Drew,  I don‘t know where you live but here it is 50/50.  9 out of 10 parents have joint custody and they take both of the income and figure if there is any child support at all.

Okay fine let‘s turn the tables. Let‘s make rape legal. If you complain I‘ll just say, "You‘re just paranoid about men. What about trust? Who cares what the laws are? How can you build a relationship without trust, eh?"

Rape is a violation of a person,  and is illegal.  apples and oranges dear Drew.    I don‘t not date because I am afraid of somebody raping me.  If I did then yes I would be paranoid about men.  You need to be aware of the situation you are in and always let somebody know who you are going out with and what your plans are.  male or female there are sickos out there that just want to hurt you.  That comment really didn‘t make since Drew.
See how ****ing ignorant that response of yours would be? Good.

See Drew  your response is very ignorant,  you are missing out on life  because of the chance you may get hurt.  Drew do you not drive a car because there is a chance you could get in to a wreck.  Do you not fly because there is a chance you will get killed??

Because I wanted to point out your stupidity to you.

It worked look at your response.