19 Former "Side Chicks" Confessed Why They Got With Married Men, And My Jaw Is On The Floor At Some Of These
Let's face it: there isn't one-size-fits-all reason why people cheat on their significant others OR why people decide to pursue those in relationships.
A while back, Reddit user FinalEntertainment60 asked, "Women of Reddit who chose to be a 'side chick' to a taken man, why did you do it? How did it end?"
And the stories range from painfully petty to heartbreaking to jaw-on-the-floor shocking. Here are the best ones:
1."I met him my freshman year of high school, he was a senior. He became my closest guy friend, and I eventually lost my virginity to him at 19 years old. He was in the Air Force and stationed in a nearby state. I actually met two of his girlfriends when he brought them home to meet his parents. Every other visit home, he would spend the weekend with me but told his partner that he was visiting his parents. This went on for almost three years. I ended it when he hooked up with an acquaintance while he was in town and I was too sick to hang out."
"At the time, I had tricked myself into thinking that I was just so desirable that someone would be willing to cheat to be with me, but over 10 years later, I realized that I had massive insecurity issues and was easily manipulated. He served me all the red flags on a silver platter, and I was still devastated when he 'cheated' on me. He had a drinking problem and would push me to do things sexually that I wasn't quite ready for, and the whole time I would tell myself that I was so cool and sexy. I could chalk it up to naivete or blame being inexperienced in relationships, but I think, in reality, I was getting a kind of attention that I wasn't getting from anyone else."
2."To clarify, I am not trying to justify what I did and fully acknowledge it was wrong. I’m just trying to explain what factors led to the situation. I had just started a new job and, after a few months, ended up completely falling for my married boss. I knew it was wrong, and I tried to keep my distance, but we had a bunch of business trips together, which resulted in a lot of one-on-one time. Mentally, I was in a really dark place. I had a string of dates that didn’t go anywhere where I felt rejected and used. I gained 40lbs, and my self-esteem plummeted. Meanwhile, I had this super attractive, successful guy at work lifting me up, telling me I was smart and beautiful and that any guy who isn’t into me is an idiot. Anytime I was with him, I would finally feel alive again, and I felt like we just had magnetic chemistry. He also admitted to feeling the same way towards me."
"We tried not to do anything, but after a year of tension, we finally ended up hooking up. I knew he was married, and I knew it was wrong. I never met his wife, but I thought she must be a much better person than I was.
My colleagues had met her, and I knew she was beautiful, fit, and seemed really kind. I was at such a low point in my life that I would take the scraps just to be with him. It was a tumultuous relationship, and I tried to end it many times, but because we literally worked together in a tiny office, and I still had intense feelings for him, it would start back up.
I tried dating other people to take my mind off things, but I couldn’t because I was so in love with him. I felt trapped and would frequently cry in the office bathroom, knowing I needed to get out somehow. I ended up breaking it off with him, resigning, and taking a $70K pay cut just to get myself out of the situation ASAP.
Then COVID hit, and the new company scaled back their operations, and because I was a new employee, I was laid off. I then spent the next year in a super-deep depression but eventually managed to get myself out of it.
So, I honestly didn’t set out to have a relationship with a married man; I just kind of fell into it over time and made a series of poor decisions. The wife ended up finding out after I had already resigned, and I know she is the main victim here, and I feel terrible that I hurt someone innocent.
I have since landed back on my feet, gotten a new job, and am feeling far more confident in myself. Obviously, I stay far away from married men, and if the situation had happened now instead of at such a low point in my life, I would like to think I would make better decisions."
3."My ex cheated on me. We broke up, and then he cheated on his new girlfriend with me...I was honestly not looking to having him back, I guess I just wanted her to hurt as much as I was, 'cause she knew he was married and with a kid. I don't feel proud of that."
4."I did it because I had no self-respect or self-esteem and was desperate for validation. He was the only one giving it to me. I stopped because I started taking medication for my depression and generally grew as a person and gained some self-love. I truly did not even think about his girlfriend. My thought process was, 'If he does not care about her, why should I?'"
5."I fell hard two and a half years ago, I had the impression he was single because he gave me undying attention and wouldn’t sleep just to talk to me and open up. Once he started getting a little more distant, three months into our situationship, he told me that he had a partner of over a decade. The funny thing is, I actually didn’t believe he had a partner because nobody would tolerate their man talking to a risqué-cosplayer all day and night. However, after looking back, she was probably away on a business trip, or they were on a break, and maybe he thought he could try his hand at flirting with someone who gave him the attention he needed."
"He never left after I confessed my feelings, said I was confused by his bachelor-esque behavior, and said I was sorry for devoting my attention to him. He said he was sorry he couldn’t give me a relationship. That was the point that made me feel like I couldn’t leave because he WOULD NOT LET ME GO. I even told him to let me go once during an argument. I didn’t ask about his wife, and I didn’t want to. But someday, I’ll be ready to leave him high and dry. A lot of the more loving things he does to me bug me and make me latch on more... and it’s my fault for being unstable, younger than him, and far away that I can’t be his main focus 100% of the time.
Right after I learned he had a partner and that they were monogamous, I swallowed my pride and told myself I was just a talk-every-waking-moment-and-share-your-entire-life pseudo-girlfriend and that their love might fizzle out after 13 years together. We’re still the closest friends, and I’m trying to go the longest I can to just ghost him because I can’t break this, but I can disappear. My brain says they won’t stay together, and if I brute force this friendship or lose feelings, I might have a shot at happiness with him, but my soul says they will die hand in hand, and I will self-sabotage our entire friendship one day, and that will be that. Then, I can move on to someone who is single and who actually loves me.
As of now, I’m ignoring his 23 texts (yes, 23) and will just continue on as far as I can."
6."I am not proud of being the other woman. At all. Not the slightest. But when I was 18-23, I thought I was the baddest b*tch on the planet. He would spend every other weekend with me, and the one week a month he traveled for work, he was actually coming to me. I was with him for his bachelor party trip, I was with him the day after their wedding. I thought he was the only person who would love me, and she was just more presentable, so of course, he had to marry her. I listened to every bullsh*t line he fed me."
"Until my 23rd birthday and he was with me, instead of her nursing graduation. I heard the voicemail she left him, and to this day, almost 13 years later, I can still hear her crying. I knew at that moment it could not continue, and I ended it. It really was like a light got switched on, and I knew I was making horrible mistakes. Now? Single. In therapy. Have only dated women since then and realized my worth."
7."I was a piece of crap. Insecure, jealous, I had no hobbies, I was bitter and vindictive. I was in college, messing around with a married man who was 10 years older than me. He left his first marriage and literally married a different woman, and I was still gobbling up his d*ck like it was the best thing ever, and I thought he would wake up and choose me. It was mediocre at best, and he was a crap person too. I feel bad... mostly for myself. I was a young woman who didn't respect herself and allowed men to disrespect me and their wives. Not really much more to say than that."
8."I didn't know [I was the side chick] for two years. When I confronted him about making plans on Facebook to move in with another woman and accused him of having another woman, he told me that, technically, I was the other woman, but she was willing to let me move in with them. We broke up, and he moved in with her a few months later. A year after we broke up, he called me complaining that she wasn't financially responsible and wasn't able to run a house like me. He asked me to move to Florida with him. I laughed at him and said he should have thought about that before telling me I was the other woman."
9."I was 19, he was 39 and my manager. Now that I have grown up and I see things from an outside perspective, I feel completely disgusted about the whole situation, and I feel very bad for her because she never knew. I believe they got married in the end. Sorry, there's not much to say. I just need it to take it out of my chest."
10."He told me he left her. He didn't. So I chose to out him to her every chance I got. For example, he'd send me letters apologizing or begging us to stay together, so I'd mail them to her workplace so she could see what a loser she was. Welp... he died at age 35; she got a $950,000 insurance payout, and I was left salty and bitter. Lol."
11."Honestly? Desire. The thought of being desired so much that he was willing to sacrifice his living situation and long-term relationship was disorienting. It felt like a drug I couldn't get enough of. The heart-pounding adrenalin of watching him debate in real time if he was going to cheat and then feeling him look at me and decide he didn't want to but HAD to. It was a drug. And I think that's the best metaphor because drugs are dangerous. And they ruin people's lives."
12."I thought I was being a safe haven for someone who really had a bad situation. I didn't try to save him as much as just let him be him because his wife allegedly stifled family fun. I offered an alternative instead. I didn't give him advice or anything; I just stuck by his side. It was such a dumb outlook."
13."I've done it with two different guys. I had horribly low self-esteem and somehow thought I was 'better' than my girlfriends. I was trying to be the 'cool girl' so much. It's funny because I didn't want to be in a relationship with these guys as they were cheaters, but I liked the attention. The sex wasn't even that good! In the end, I got sick of being someone's naughty little secret and having to lie and pretend all the time. Years later, I went to therapy and wouldn't dream of doing it now if I was single. I've been in a relationship for 2.5 years."
14."I always thought we were just work friends. I knew he was married, and he always mentioned his wife with a smile, so I never thought about him in that way (and for a long time, I wasn't attracted to him at all). However, we started spending lots of time together due to work, and somehow, we found in each other what we were missing in our SOs through long and interesting conversations. We ended up confessing our feelings to each other but said that nothing could happen as we were both taken. However, I guess hormones took over, and we started getting physical."
"I remember feeling extremely guilty after every kiss but also excited, like I am finally alive. I ended it after I went to his apartment and saw pictures of his wife. That's when I finally realized that she was a real person, not just someone from his stories, and I was just disgusted by myself.
He still tried to contact me, and we met one time after that, but then one interesting thing happened — I found out my SO was cheating. The pain and heartbreak I experienced when I found out (and I am still heartbroken) is something that can not be described. I would have never imagined the pain to be so strong.
I immediately cut all ties with the married man, told him to never contact me again, and to focus on his marriage and his wife. It still haunts me that if she found out, she would be crushed just like I was crushed. I would never want to give that pain to anyone, and the thought that I may have caused that intense life-changing pain to his wife is just disturbing. I still have nightmares of what I have done. I probably will regret that all my life."
15."I chose it because I wanted him. His marriage was already dead in the water. He cheated on his wife with me (he kissed me), and the following day, I told him we shouldn’t pursue this and that I would take the secret to my grave if that was what he wanted. He split up from his wife, moved out, and asked me on a date two weeks later. We’ve been married for ten years and have two children."
16."We met one of the first days of college, in line to the students' office. I was with some friends, and he stood behind us with his. The chemistry was instant. We became friends, but the underlying tension was constantly there. I knew he had a girlfriend, we both knew we can't act on it. After several months we were so exhausted by pretend-friendship that we gave up. But he didn't want to end things with his girlfriend 'abruptly' as he said she 'was a great person and didn't want to hurt her.' I guess he was OK with hurting me..."
"We spent over six months hiding like kids before he broke up with her — sitting beside each other in classes but not showing affection, me going to his place for sleepovers, not together in his car but by bus so no one would see us, etc. Then he made me hide for almost a year, explaining that he 'didn't want her to think he just replaced her.' I was 19 and stupid, I thought this meant he was a good person. When, in fact, he was just selfish and didn't care about me nor her."
17."He was probably the person I should have ended up with. We've been in a 'situationship' for 16 years. I am divorced (for unrelated reasons), and he is married. We talk every day...and not just about the naughty stuff....we talk about work and kids and our favorite sports teams."
18."I was hurting and stupid and selfish and if I’m being honest, a little competitive. I thought we fell in love, I never felt anything like what I felt with him. I justified it to myself as us being a better match for each other. I met the girlfriend in social settings sometimes, and she was kind of terrible to him (not that this justifies our decisions in the slightest), which made me feel like I was 'saving' him. He swore up and down that he didn’t have romantic feelings for her, that she was basically his roommate, and he would leave as soon as he could."
"When your self-esteem is low enough when you hate yourself enough, you feel like scraps are all you deserve. That’s how I felt. A weird mix of 'I deserve this, I deserve something good for once' and 'I don’t deserve to be truly happy.' And then a year passed. And another. And another. And another. Four years in I realized I couldn’t beg for scraps anymore. I ended things and started therapy and tried to address what made me such a broken person that I would inflict so much hurt on someone else AND on myself. I feel so much shame about my decision to be that selfish."
19.And finally, "It took me longer to fall for him than it took him to fall for me. I wasn't entirely aware of his situation when I finally confessed to him, and I only did so when I was sure that there was no way out of my feelings for him. Only, by the time I did, he revealed to me that he'd gotten into a relationship in an attempt to get over his feelings for me but that he'd still like to see where a romance would take the two of us."
"So, we continued that way — him complaining to me about her all the time and telling me how much better than her I was. Yet, he was making no effort to leave her despite me begging him in fits of panic and hysteria to do so. She 'offered him security,' and he did not think I could do the same because I had rejected him at first and supposedly deserved what was happening. He was everything, and I loved him like a dog, so to me, it felt like I had no choice: I either lost him or accepted this situation. I'll confess that I resented her. he painted such an ugly picture of her, and yet, somehow, she was still more worthy of having him than me. I managed to delude myself into accepting the situation after a while. I thought that if I lost him, I'd lose everything, so I had to hang on to him no matter the cost.
He broke up with her after a while, and things were perfect for exactly a month. Then, he slowly reverted to the way he had treated me before, and really, very little had changed. I realized that the emotional abuse wasn't just a by-product of him being in a relationship, but it was somehow an implication of being with him. It was absolutely crushing at first, but after a while, I managed to convince myself to leave him. I hated myself for a long time for doing it, but then I stopped. I think he got back to her after I left. I hope he's happy. I know I am, now."
Responses have been edited for length/clarity.
So, have you ever been the "other woman"? Tell us your motives for why you did it, and how it all turned out. Or, if you prefer to stay anonymous, you can submit a response using this form here.
