(As told to Irewati Nag)
A rise in infidelity and extramarital affairs is the undeniable reality of the times we live in. There is research to back up the perception that both men and women today stray outside the sanctity of marriage in pursuit of emotional or sexual gratification, or both. When a married man is in a relationship with a married woman, what are odds of such an alliance becoming more than a clandestine affair? While roughly 50 per cent people cheat on their spouses, only half of such cases result in divorce.
In his book Blindsided By His Betrayal: Surviving the Shock of Your Husband’s Infidelity, author Dr Jan Halper says being involved with a married woman leads to marriage only 3 per cent of the time, and even then, the likelihood of divorce is as high as 75 per cent.
The statistics all point to one conclusion – even though extramarital affairs may be rampant, most people don’t want their paramour to take their spouse’s place. In rare cases that the two people do decide to break free from the shackles of their respective marriages, the chances of a happily ever after are slim. The likelihood on one of the partners in the affair backing out the agreement much higher.
Case in point: this story of a man in love with a married woman who won’t divorce her husband…
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Divorced My Wife Because I’m In A Relationship With A Married Woman
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Sometimes life throws situations that come with ‘danger alert’ blaring full stream. Despite this, we go ahead and take the plunge, hoping we’d survive. That’s exactly the curveball life threw at him and I couldn’t knock it out of the park. The warning signs were there all along, yet I jumped in a relationship with a married woman, which had no basis. I was continuously made felt unwanted and unimportant, only required for moral and financial support and nothing else. Now I feel as if I was just a necessary distraction in an otherwise non-eventful marriage of my girlfriend who belonged to a different nationality..
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She was successful and independent
I worked over a decade as a successful engineer in Malaysia. I met Chen at a business conference in Kuala Lumpur. We soon started talking and I realised she was quite successful for her age, an independent woman managing her two kids with some help from her aunt, while her husband lived in her home country in some town which I can’t even spell. She had been in KL for over 7 years and had risen the corporate ladder very soon, reaching the senior management level pretty early on. She made me believe that it was because of her hard work, but now I feel otherwise.
When I met her, although I was in awe of her, I was not attracted or in love. I was a married man then. However, I had compatibility issues with my wife; despite all my efforts, realised that my marriage was not going anywhere. My wife went back to India as she felt neglected and lonely in KL. I tried stopping my wife but in vain. I eventually gave in, sent her home.
Initially I felt hurt and lonely, but soon started enjoying my freedom.
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We kept the affair hidden at first
Eventually, I started talking more and more to Chen. We became close and before I knew it I was involved with a married woman. I started enjoying her company and wanted more out of our relationship. We started spending more time together, going on holidays and sneaking around the city. She told lies at home to cover her tracks, as she always had people visiting from back home who could have ratted her out to her husband. She wanted to hide me from her world. At that stage, even I wanted to hide her from my world. I was still married.
These trips with her were some of the most blissful moments of my life. Soon, my wife got to know about the affair. She smartly collected all the evidence she needed to get heavy alimony from me. To protect Chen from any legal trouble or social embarrassment, I parted with everything I had to stop my wife making our affair public. I convinced my wife for divorce by mutual consent, because I wanted to be free as soon as possible to make sure my dream to be with Chen comes true.
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I divorced my wife because of another woman, but…
I signed my divorce papers and ran to Chen, only to discover that even though I divorced my wife because of another woman, she was non-committal about separating from her husband. Whenever I spoke about our future, I never got a straight answer from her. I soon started realising I was in love with a married woman who won’t divorce her husband.
My father, who was upset over my divorce, had finally begun accepting my relationship with Chen. But he wanted me to go make things official. Even though it can be difficult for a middle-class Indian father to accept that his only son was in love with a woman of a different nationality who was a mother of two children from her earlier marriage, he came around.
But he wanted me to be absolutely sure that this relationship had a future and I hadn’t divorced my wife because of another woman in vain. I was confident of my future with Chen at the time of my divorce, but slowly that confidence began fading. She started visiting her husband, who had done nothing to support her or her children, more frequently. I never understood why. My father started suspecting her intentions and started building pressure on me to marry Chen.
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She says I demand too much
I waited patiently. Meanwhile, I discovered that my girlfriend is cheating on me as I saw some romantic messages sent to her by her boss, a colleague and former classmate who had moved to Malaysia along with her. She never gave me a straight answer when I confronted her.
I was only made to feel miserable for being suspicious. At one point, we were soul mates. Now, I’m someone she has to run away from because being with me is ‘stressful’, as I ask too many questions and I demand too much of her time.
I fell in love with her despite being married (I must confess that it was a loveless marriage). There was no need for me to divorce my wife. She was lived separately, anyway. The divorce came into play just because I wanted to be able to marry Chen. For that, I paid a heavy price.
None of it matters to her. Recently, she happily went on a family vacation with her husband and flashed all romantic photos on Facebook. She wants to hide me from her world, and at the same time, claims that I am her soulmate too.
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I’m left with nothing but a job
I may have been naive at the beginning of this relationship but cannot believe her claims anymore. I was raised in a traditional family, where the idea of monogamy is sacred. She made me feel that she shared this core value too. My love for her grew beyond my imagination, and being in love with a married woman who won’t divorce her partner has brought me only agony and misery. I am left penniless. All that I have to hold on to is a job. I hope God keeps me sane to survive this storm.
The man I loved had fooled two women before me, and yet I became the third
