Something on the side?

Peter Robinson’s Wife Was Having an Affair

Politicians are renowned for dipping their wicks into anyone who goes weak at the knees in the presence of power and influence. But sometimes, its their long suffering other halves who fall prey to temptation while their partners are voting and shouting and fiddling their expenses. And, as ever with affairs, tragedy can follow.

Northern Ireland’s first minister Peter Robinson has quite a lot of shit going down. If IRA splinter groups aren’t trying to foment revolution and Sinn Fein bring him down then it transpires that he’s spent the last year dealing with the fallout from his wife’s “inappropriate relationship” with what Irish newspapers are calling “a much younger man.”

So far, so ordinary, but this week’s tale has a sadder bent than most. The first that Robinson knew of the affair was when he found his wife during an attempt to take her own life.

The emotional consequences of an affair can be deep and long lasting for either party. If you’re thinking of cheating then be warned that things can spiral out of control in directions you never imagined. You might think you’re getting a little shag on the side, but before you know it you can end up in way over your head before you know it. Even if it doesn’t spark any feelings in you, the other person can fall for you and make your life more complicated than you’re prepared for.

And if all that gets too much, you might find you’re prepared to go to almost any lengths to find an escape route – from murder to suicide.

On the other hand, you could feel cool about the whole thing. If you’re planning to have an affair, then think very carefully and make sure that not only you know what you’re doing, but the other party is on the level too.

Rachel Uchitel to come clean about Tiger Woods’ affair

"I'm a quiet person who likes reading and have never shagged Tiger Woods". Riiiiight.

I promise this will be the last Tiger Woods update for awhile unless something really juicy hits the news. If you’ve been following the tale, we heard the other day that one of the women named as Tiger Woods’ lover was denying the story, claiming that she was a quiet person who liked dogs and baking. Or something.

Anyway, Rachel Utimel (for it is she) is holding a press conference today where she is expected to basically admit that she was a lying little minx when she said that.

We’ve got mixed feelings about all of this. Tiger Woods has undoubtedly contributed to the sheer size of this story with his sphinx-like silence on his personal life down the years. We can’t think of a single person of his profile and public presence about whom we know less. He broke down racial barriers in golf and made the whole sport sexy. Or sexier, anyway.

By being so closed, he only served to fuel speculation as soon as the merest chink of innuendo was attached to his name. To put it another way, no-one would have cared if say Joey Barton was in another fight. It’s what we expect. Had Woods adopted a less saintly and aloof manner in his early days, then maybe we’d all just be shrugging right now.

He was also stupid. Few people manage to get away with affairs. Fewer still when one of the parties is famous. Even if love and jealousy doesn’t lead to betrayal, tabloid cheque books and the lure of the chatshow sofa tends to smoke out one party eventually. According to reports, he was so indiscreet as to even use his regular phone to take her calls, which ultimately aroused his wife’s suspicions when she saw his dialled numbers and voicemails.

Well duh, Tiger, you could afford another phone!

Confessions of a Cheating Husband

We’ve had a look at women’s motivations for cheating and concluded that they might be very different to those that drive a man to play away from home. Thanks to our anonymous submitter John (not his real name) we can have a closer look at what drove one man to stray from his wife of 15 years in search of an illicit encounter.

*** WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS EXPLICIT MATERIAL ***

Many thanks to ‘John’ for his submission. If you’d like to add your own story, drop us an email. Anything you tell us will be treated with the utmost discretion.

John’s Story

Looking back I wasn’t even looking to have an affair when it happened. I was really content at home in ******** with my wife Janet and a young son. Like a lot of blokes I always liked to look at other women when I was out or in the office but I never thought anything of it.

Then one day I got bullied into signing up for Facebook because everyone else was doing it. I thought it would be a bit weird doing it and didn’t know what to expect and it was pretty boring at first once you’d played the vampire game (remember that?) Anyway  I joined a group about my favourite team – the mighty ******** United. It was the first time I’d ever really used a ‘forum’ type thing because I’m perhaps a bit old for that kind of thing but I really got into it.

One person kept cropping up in my conversations though. Clare. She was always really funny and her humour really seemed on my level. Sometimes we’d have a conversation thread to ourselves and we developed loads of injokes. Without realising it I was spending quite a lot of time logging on at work to talk to her specifically. One day she asked if I had MSN so we swapped addresses.

I think that’s when I started to realise how attracted I was to her. I’d only seen her tiny little profile picture on Facebook but it didn’t seem to matter because we got on so well. We started chatting more on MSN than Facebook pretty much every day. And then in the night when our respective husband and wife had gone to bed.

The Cybersex

One night I was talking to her when somehow we ended up having ‘cyber sex‘. It took me totally by surprise. One minute  we were joking, the next we were describing what we’d do to each other. I was sat on my laptop until 2 in the morning telling her how I’d like to use my fingers and tongue on her body. It was so intense.

Pretty soon we were having cybersex almost everyday. As soon as my wife was in bed I would log on hoping she was there and masturbate while we talked – sometimes for hours. I felt like I could be honest with Clare in a way I could never be with my wife.

After about 6 months I was going on a works night out in N*********. By chance Clare was going to a conference there at the same time.

I knew then that we’d go further than just cybersex.

The Meeting

I was terrified of meeting Clare. I didn’t know how it would work out. So I sat in the hotel bar beforehand and got good and drunk. Eventually, she arrived a bit late and flustered and we just started talking. We made chit chat for a while before I got the nerve up to ask her if she wanted to go up to my room for a drink. It makes me laugh now that I even said that!

We more or less fell through the door in each other’s arms, kissing and touching. I literally tore her shirt off and threw her back on the bed. We’d talked about what we’d do so much that it was amazing to actually do it. I kissed her all over her skin from her calves over her thighs and when I finally got to lick her pussy it was incredible. We talked about what she tasted like all the time and to finally put my tongue there was the biggest adrenalin rush ever. Then she gave me a really sexy slow blowjob.

We had sex for what seemed like hours until we were sweaty and breathless and fell asleep in each other’s arms. We both knew how wrong and how risky it was but somehow that made it all the better. I’ve never had better sex.

The Fallout

I’ve hardly spoken to Clare since that time. I don’t know whether us actually doing it took away some of the excitement and mystery out of our relationship or whether one of us was embarassed afterwards. We still send the odd email to each other and are friendly but the spark has gone it seems. I do sort of regret it really. Noone but me and Clare knows this every happened but I do love my wife and know I’ve let her down so badly.

South Korean Adultery Laws: Harsh

From the perspective of Adultery Towers here in the Decadent West^™, South Korea’s laws on sexual behaviour look pretty batshit. Even the locals have started to get antsy about laws which included a bizarre crime of  ”making false promises of marriage in order to engage in sexual relations with women.”

Hell. It’s a wonder anyone’s been getting laid over there if they can’t pull the old “let’s get married… now drop your knickers” trick so beloved of lotharios the world over.

Anyway, the country’s supreme court have decided that the law “infantilised” women and in a landmark ruling struck down the law – brought as a test case after two recent examples where 2 year prison terms were handed down.

“The government should refrain from interfering in men’s sexual activities of tempting women in an unharmful manner”

Noted the court, sagely.

Despite that, adultery remains on the statute book in South Korea as a crime. Attempts to have this particular activity decriminalised were dismissed last year, and anyone shagging around on the side can look forward to two years in chokey if they get caught. Even if they don’t murder their lover.

Love Cheat Martin Forshaw Jailed for Murder

Another one to strike of the dating list

We’ve seen over recent weeks how having an affair can be dangerous to the person having the affair, as well as their spouses and lovers. Yet another tale reaches us today of a copper who murdered his fiancee 5 days before their wedding in order to hide his cheating lifestyle.

Unusually, in the adultery stories we cover, Forshaw took his secret cheating life very seriously – and genuinely seemed to not know where his future lie. In fact, so long and serious was his affair that his lover had a 5 year old child by him

Something inside him snapped as his wedding day approached and he decided the best way to settle the issue was a quick game of eeny-meeny-miny-mo then down to the toolshed for a murder weapon.

Trying to hide the crime, he staged a horrific attack on her with the intention of passing it off as a motoring accident. When he arrived at the planned scene of the “accident” he discovered that she was still alive and finished the job with a further rain of hammer blows.

As the judge pointed out:

“You may have been panicking but you were also cowardly.  Instead of doing what you should have done and calling the emergency services when she was still alive, you put her in the car. Then, seeing her so injured you finished her off.”

People say that divorce is bad, but seriously compared to a life sentence for murder it’s a walk in the park. So next time you’re thinking about cheating, maybe keep the phone number of a solicitor somewhere closer to hand than a potential murder weapon.

Edward Erin: Adulterer and All-round Evil Man

Don't date this man either

It’s been quite the week for cheaters at the evil end of the scale already. Yesterday we reported on the case of Lucasz Reszpondek who killed the woman he’d been having an affair with in order to make sure his wife didn’t find out.

Today, the medical profession is reeling from the news that Edward Erin – a consultant at a central London hospital – was cheating on his wife. Nothing too out of the ordinary there.

But then his lover fell pregnant. Terrified of the fallout, he set about the issue as any normal man would: he spoke honestly to his wife about what happened and promised his lover that he would stand by her for emotional and financial support as far as his circumstances would allow.

Just joking: he tried to feed her poison to induce an abortion.

Hell.

Bizarrely, his wife has announced that she is prepared to “stand by her man”, even as he faces 6 years in chokey. This despite Judge Richard Hone’s accurate description of him:

“You are a flawed character. One part of you is a doctor caring for his patients. But your other part is self-centred, vainglorious and irresponsible. The three affairs … illustrate how you exploited your senior position as a consultant respiratory physician to lure women into sexual relations. Your property wealth, tailored wardrobe, high lifestyle, illicit weekends and expensive trinkets dazzled those whom you designed to seduce. You are clever, but also devious and dishonest. You inhabited a fantasy world.”

As in so many cases, Erin is now free to spend a lifetime to reflect that a few exciting shags on the side can cost way more than the price of a cheap hotel room and a couple of drinks. The silver lining to this cloud is that he failed in his attempts to kill his unborn son, and Ernie is now a healthy two year old. Let’s hope he doesn’t grow up like his dad.

Lukasz Reszpondek: Adulterer, Murderer

Do not date this man

As Neil Sedaka sagely noted, breaking up is hard to do.

That’s true of almost any relationship, but particularly hard if the person you want to break up with is ‘unofficial’. If you’re married and cheating, what do you do when if and when you want to end that side of your affairs?

It’s a toughie. They might be understanding, but if you’ve been nice to them and shown them love and affection they’ve failed to get elswhere, they might take umbrage when you start trotting out the “I’ve decided I need time to make my marriage work” cliches. Before you know it, they’ve gone Glenn Close on your ass and family pets are fetching up in the pressure cooker.

Lukasz Reszpondek, a Polish dairy worker living in London faced just that problem when some chick he was boning on the side started to get all uppity and threatening to tell his wife when he tried to break things of.

Reszpondek’s response was as time-honoured as it was stupid. He murdered her.

We don’t know what kind of dipshit is so scared of divorce that he goes and kills in an attempt to avoid it. Nor can we understand the thought processes of someone who thinks that murder is the way to get yourself out of a sticky hole. But there’s a lesson here for any would-be adulterer or bit-on-the-side. You might think you’re going into it with your eyes wide open, but you can never tell how things will work out…

Ronnie Wood Divorces After Affair (you guessed it!)

Happier times for the rock legend and his wife

I don’t what you expect if you marry a Rolling Stone. Well, if you marry one now, you can probably look forward to wild weekends of woodland walks, or sharing a packet of Werthers Originals whilst complaining about the volume on the Antiques Roadshow.

You know how old the Stones are? Jokes about them being old are old!

Anyway, Jo Wood married Ronnie at the height of the Stones’ fame. And in those days they cut a rather  different dash. Drugs. Drink. Women. Violence – even murder – followed the Stones wherever they went. They were the high priests of the rock ‘n’ roll myth. At the centre of it in the seventies was the quasi love-affair between Ronnie Wood and Keef. Both louche outsiders with a taste for decadent behaviour on the road. Perhaps surprisingly, Ronnie was happily married for all that time.

So it’s kind of sad to learn that Ronnie and Jo are calling it quits. Of all the Stones, he seemed the most grounded – with none of the nose-tweaking self mythology that surrounded the others. He genuinely was just one of the lads.

Anyway, after all those years of hellraising, it’s awful to see that he’s finally been caught dipping his wick where he shouldn’t and wound up in court. The divorce leaves Jo a cool £6.5 million better off, but really – can you put a price on being married to a Rolling Stone?

Australian Man Stumps up £55,000 Compensation… to his Lover???

Australia has just been turned into viper’s nest for people looking for a quick extramarital shag. Under their Family Act, common-law spouses and long-term lovers are accorded similar rights to those enjoyed by wives and husbands.

In this case, the woman was his secret lover for 22 years – during which time he took her around the world on “business trips” and even attended posh dinner functions alongside him. How the other half live, eh? When it came to finally dumping her, she demanded compensation – a move that must have startled him somewhat. Originally he acceded to her unusual request, but then backed out, at which point she took him to court.

Finding in her favour, the judge ordered the man to pay her 55 grand – in recognition of the support and love she had shown to him over many years.

We think it’s an interesting development in relationship law, and probably not one without merit. This woman had happiness with this guy for decades – and he certainly gave her something of a lifestyle to which she had become accustomed.

And then he thinks he can just chuck her like its a teenage school romance? Affairs like this come with responsibility – not just your own personal emotional responsibility, but a duty towards the person who is who is your confidante, lover. In a way, he got off lightly. We’ve all seen Fatal Attraction, right?

Is Marriage Dead on its Feet?

A happy couple and friends. Until the inevitable death of their marriage and the lingering life of solitude that will follow. Possibly.

Everyone’s getting divorced these days. Well, you might get that impression from screaming headlines about family breakup and celebrity adultery. Tawdry details of breakups and cheating are flung in our face every day.

It’s worth pausing to remember however, that if 40% of marriages end in divorce, then 60% don’t. Not only that, but people are still getting married in huge numbers – despite the cost and strain it can place on a relationship. So clearly, the institution appeals to a lot of us and is worth fighting for in the majority of cases.

Marriage is a long commitment. Going by the book – it’s till death. Of course, our  more relaxed attitude to the reading of the marriage vows means that few people perhaps take that as seriously today. It might still be a big commitment, but for many married couples, it wouldn’t be the end of the world if the marriage were to end sometime before its participants were pushing up the daisies on boot hill.

Against this backdrop of changing attitudes to marriage, it is still clear that adultery – cheating – is still a huge ’sin’ in most people’s eyes. We might be prepared to contemplate that our marriage isn’t forever, but none of us wants it to founder on the rocks of our partner getting their jollies elsewhere.

There are two schools of thought as to why we look so dimly on adultery. One line of thought is that it is a hangover from an era in which sex itself – let alone infidelity – was something of which we should be ashamed. Against the careful skirting around the issue that characterised the issue of sex in Victorian and Edwardian times, “marriage” was often nothing more than a codeword for “sex”. Consequently, we’ve never address the fact that ’sex’ can be an entirely separate thing from love – and needn’t carry any great emotional weight.

On the other hand, many people argue that monogamy itself is actually an unnatural state of affairs. Our genetic predisposition is to ensure our DNA gets passed successfully along. Therefore, it is in our interest to spread our seed among as many potential partners as possible. We look around and see that in almost every other species in nature, monogamy is an aberration – not a given.

I’m sure that anyone who’s ever been cheated on will have had that thought up front and centre in their mind when they found out!

Anyway, marriage is – for whatever reason – still a big part of our cultural heritage. From the lowest to the highest, it sets the standard for commitment and regardless of the failings of individuals and partnerships, it looks likely to stay with us for a long time to come.