I'm of the school of thought that anyone involved in promoting or enabling an affair, including those who know but don't say anything, are doing harm to the marriage and doing harm to our communities (because marriage is a part of the foundations of our communities). Anytime an OP knowingly enters into an affair they carry a responsibility for any secondary effects that affair has on the marriage. In other words, even if the purpose of the affair was not to damage the marraige, the OP is responsible for those effects when they willing chose to enter into an affair. In addition, when an OP overtly tries to destroy the marraige, they have gone a step further and they carry more responsiblity for those premeditated actions. The OW's friend who runs the escort service is also doing the same, and they carry the same responsiblity, maybe even more because they are an "object" third party (or fourth). However, it's not surprising that someone who runs an escort service would have such a lapse of integrity.

This doesn't take away any responsiblity from the WS. They took vows and made promises to their family and friends, to their spouse and their family and friends regarding their intentions for this marriage. They not only have betrayed their spouse, but all those who witnessed and supported their marriage that day. They also violated the trust of those who were not present in person, but present through the vesting of authority in the person conducting the marraige, whether it was a judge or a minisiter. I beleive the WS even violates the trust of their children, because even though they are not present at the wedding, the pledges of marriage extend to any future offspring of that marriage.

There is plenty of blame to go around from the "works" of the affair. The OW and their friends deserve the part they have earned.

TomJ

Tom,

Don't think I have ever seen it written out so well.

Carol,

I hear ya girl. Been there, the anger and outrage is very real. Thought it might be helpful if I list some of the things that OW did to me.

* Called all hours of the day and night and would hang up when I picked up. Take in mind this continued through out their 9 month affair.

* Even after I got caller ID she persisted, but being smart enough to block her telephone # so that I would not know who it was. Get this, she was pissed and told H so when I got privacy manager. Unfortunately I was a bit slow and only got privacy manager within the last month of the affair.

* She would copy cat anything I did within the marriage, like taking H to dinner, or so on, that he shared with her so as to try and one up me.

* She signed me up for tuns of free magazine subscriptions. I think she thought this was funny.

* This one annoys me even still today. She had the audacity to speak with my son when she phoned to check up on H who had not showed up for work that day. H and son sound very much alike, she would not have been able to tell the difference. Still it urks the heck out of me.

* Her final blow and her downfall was the incriminating VM she left on H and my joint Cell Phone at the time. The greeting was in my voice, so she had to know I would get the msg.

* After D-day she tried a few munipulation tackticks that fell on deaf ears with my H. One being to threaten to get a restraining order against me, she feared I would harm her. Probably the only smart thought the woman had. LOL. Still it was all very annoying at the time.

The good news Carol, is other than her speaking to my son, I have let it all go. And really the only thing that bothers me about her speaking to my son, is I wonder what he thought about the call, if he thought anything at all. I dare not bring it up, for fear he never made the connection.

Ami

The worst thing for me about the OP's actions is looking back at how much I was
prepared to put up with, explain away or be considerate about. I always try to think
the best of everyone and be at least tolerant...well...

OW used to phone me (she was a 'friend', hahaha) and complain about the state of her
M and how angry she was at her H for his affair, and how she was never going to forgive
him, never, nothing he could ever do would 'make it up' to her and she was entitled to
do anything she liked to him now. I tried to get her to consider what SHE wanted out of
life going forward, and encouraged her to talk to her H about what was bothering her.

Silly me!!! What she was REALLY telling me was "I'm seeing YOUR H who is also MY H's best
friend because I'm ENTITLED to, AND ha ha, you are so stupid Coventrie because you don't
even know where your H is or what he is doing,but I DO!"

OW also used to phone me whenever she saw 'their' OW in the street or the mall and give me
great long speeches about 'why should she'avoid her, as SHE'D done nothing wrong, and more
about 'why' her life should be so difficult now when that OW had 'got away with it', etc, etc.
When this subject came up I talked to her about how much I admired her efforts to work on her
M when she was still trying to deal with so much anger, and that I knew it wasn't easy.

OW also used to tell my H that all MY behavior (as reported by H and interpreted by them both)
'meant' that I was just using him, only out for what I could get and having a good life at
his expense. Reading between the lines I think this was exactly what SHE was doing to her H
and would do with mine, given half a chance. It is the way she sees life, so it's the way she
expects everyone to see life.

The 'copycat' principle Ami mentioned was something I saw, too - whatever I did or had, OW
then had to do too, bigger and better and louder. I know it all speaks volumes about her
state of heart and mind - very insecure at the least - but the immediate effect was, and is,
a lot of damage to the people around her. She got a lot out of my tendency to always do my best for people, and she made full use of it. My H did, and does, too, which is something I have to work on for myself - I either have to stop being so tolerant, or accept / expect that I will be taken advantage of.

Yes, the copycat thing...that is why OW wanted a waterbed because she knew how much H missed ours

This time it is much harder to just forget about the OW like last time...much harder when they are manipulative and cruel!

Take Care...Carol~

Oh... for awhile I was the Queen of Hatred for OW... I wore the crown for that one. I wished her a horrible painful death. She was the last shred of A related crap that I had to clear from my mind. Oh..there not words for the anger I harbored.

And yet... as time passed, and I spent quite a bit of time reading on a site were "people like that" post and moan about the long nights without their "MM"

I came to see that I was HER OW. And the thing was, that my H filled her with lies about mental I was and how pathetic I was and what a bad wife I was and how miserable and incapable I was ...

and the whole while, she had to play second fiddle to a mental, pathetic, horrible, miserable wife. I had the holidays. I had the weekends. I had the birthdays. I had the home and the ring and the title. She had to hide in the shadows, take the crumbs, wait out the weekends and never call the house...

I laugh at how she must have hated that. I laugh at how she must have hated it when I found out and suddenly she saw H forced to choose and she was losing ground fast.

I love the fact that she arranged to meet me in a last ditch attempt to force a wedge in my marriage. Of course she expected to meet a drooling mental case with crooked teeth and weak grasp on reality. I wasn't working at the time, but I showed up in my corporate best backed up with enough experience in sales and pre-sales to manipulate her like a puppet. I bet she hated that. She had her own little dday sitting there across the table from me realizing that "the love of her life, who touched her heart like no other" had lied to her too.

I love that she let it slip that her then teenage sons didn't know H was married and she didn't want them to ever find out -- but then I got to tell her that her Ex-H knows because I contacted him to learn more about her. Fear and shame will someday come home to roost when Ex-H sooner or later spills this to her sons.

I love that this person who was low enough to get involved with a "MM", then low enough to temp him to leave his marriage, then low enough to try to come after me -- lost on all counts and eventually had to give up and plead no contest.

I love that after they broke up, she freaked out and became so desperate. I know how much I hated my own desperate acts in all of this, but I was fighting to save a marriage and she was fighting to save only a house of cards built on lies. That's gotta hurt.

In time, I came to laugh that my H even told all these lies -- because the truth wouldn't have been the kind of thing that makes a person like this throw her legs in the air as a tempting alternative.

The further down the path I went, the less she stayed in focus....but lots of people here will remember those angry days.

Many will tell you it's a waste of your time, but for me, it was just one more issue I had to deal with on my own time, in my own way, at my own pace until I could resolve it.

This hatred will pass in time and be replaced with something...pity, disgust, indifference, or maybe even gloating. I'm guessing that eventually, you'll get tired of carrying the burden and you will offload this one along the way with the rest of it.

Good Luck,
Susan

Let's face it.....the OW wanted what WE had....home, family, husband...what they viewed as a "good life/marriage"....

They didn't/couldn't have it, as they were...well...um....(insert expletives here)...

In the case of my H's OW....she was married, posing as a "single mother",cheating with some other guy at her work, not just my H, and twisting my H around her little finger all the time....telling him that I was no good for him, that she would be so good for him....he was everything she always wanted in a man (choke)...

SO.....anyway...

My H's OW did the same....only she used her friends to "get" to me.....I fell for that for awhile, but then realized just WHO was causing all the trouble.

Didn't matter....her "friends" were as bad as she was. Period.

I won't waste my time or effort on those little.....(insert expletives here)...

They WILL reap what they've sown....

And my H WILL reap what he's sown....after all, it was HIS decision....she may have provoked all HELL....but, ultimately, it was HIS decision to go down that path.

As a remosrseful spouse, he can reap a better harvest, but he still has a lot of weeds to contend with....I AM NOT PULLING THOSE WEEDS....he can do it himself!

Hugs, Carol....we all understand, Hun...We really do....Hang in there....

Cheri