Most agree that it’s important to trust your partner enough to maintain their individuality (and have friends of their own). But what happens when the friendship you tried to be supportive of winds up ruining your marriage, and you get replaced by the person you always had a strange gut feeling about?
Sadly, this woman found herself in the same situation last summer with her now ex-wife, and now, she’s stuck in the same tiny town with her ex and her ex’s affair partner.
“My relationship with my ex-wife has never been that great, even in the best of times. We simply weren’t meant to be together. But the way our divorce went down was a shock,” she stated.
For some background, she and her ex share two children, and in 2023, they relocated to her ex’s hometown for a couple of reasons.
First, the move allowed her ex’s parents to help out more with the kids, and it also gave them the opportunity to raise their children in a quiet and safe community.
Anyway, while there, they met a few different couples, who were all straight and had kids of their own. However, one specific female friend always gave her pause.
“One of the couples, if I didn’t know the woman was married to a guy, I would immediately think she’s a lesbian (rainbow flags, Subaru, short hair, etc.),” she recalled.
Despite that, her ex and that lady began hanging out a ton, and eventually, they even got matching tattoos. She admittedly found that strange, but she tried to be understanding of the fact that her ex wanted to have her own friends.
Spoiler alert: their “friendship” was more than just platonic. Back in May 2024, she saw texts between her ex and the lady that revealed she was getting cheated on. In the messages, the pair claimed to love each other and actually discussed secret plans to meet up.
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Then, by July, her ex finally expressed not wanting to remain married, and since she was already on the fence herself, she just accepted their split. Still, as they went through the divorce process, her ex said the “fling” with her friend was a “big mistake.” Moreover, her ex claimed she didn’t want to be in another relationship and planned to focus on their children.
She wasn’t totally sold on her ex’s words, though, and a few months later, her suspicions proved to be right. That’s because she found out the lady and her husband were also getting a divorce.
“Another [freaking] shock to my system. Questioning everything my ex said to me. But no signs of them together,” she noted.
Well, she and her ex officially finalized their divorce in February and figured out a co-parenting schedule. And more recently, she discovered from her daughter that her ex has started seeing the lady.
To make matters worse, they actually went on a three-night trip with her kids and the lady’s children. Apparently, the kids stayed in a hotel room with bunk beds, while her ex and the lady shared a bed.
After that, things between her ex and her ex’s affair partner seemed to get more serious, too. By May, she learned the lady had supposedly gotten surgery and began “staying” with her ex-wife during the recovery. Since then, the lady’s two kids have been given their own bedrooms in her old home.
“So basically, the lady is now living together in the house that my ex and I picked out, on a beautiful lake, with our beautiful west-facing sunsets and our pontoon boat at the end of the road with no traffic, parking in my old attached and heated garage, and spending more time with my kids than I do,” she revealed.
It kills her to think about them enjoying family meals, swimming in the lake together, and caring for her kids. She’s begun attending therapy and even quit drinking to try to cope. Nonetheless, the truth is that they live in a small town, and she’s dreading running into her ex’s affair partner around town.
“I do well sometimes for stretches of time. But since I have to stay connected with my ex because of our kids together, it’s like every time we do a kid exchange, I’m reminded of it all,” she vented.
According to her, if they didn’t share children, she would have just moved back to her own home state and started fresh. But obviously, that’s not the case, and today, she’s quite lonely in her tiny town and feels like there’s no hope of finding another local lesbian relationship anytime soon.
How would you feel about essentially getting “replaced” by your ex’s affair partner? Does it sound like she’s doing a good job coping, given the circumstances? What advice would you give her?
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By Katharina Buczek
Katharina Buczek graduated from Stony Brook University with a degree in Journalism and a minor in Digital Arts. Specializing in... More about Katharina Buczek
