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The Temptation of Stealing a Gem of a Man from a Married Woman

Liz Sinclair
5 min readJan 30, 2025

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Photo by DANNY G on Unsplash

I once knew a man who was the full package on a dating app. Educated, financially secure, homeowner with a vacation property, great job, physically active, tall, handsome, and fit. He drove a nice truck and a cool motorcycle, enjoyed the finer things, had a healthy sex life, and traveled extensively. He was also soft-spoken, a moderate drinker, had no addictions and, to boot, was a non-violent, liberal, feminist, and engaged dad to three great teens.

I’ve also met other men through dating apps. Jobless, anti-vaxxers, living with parents, toxic exes, angry and hurt, troubled relationships with kids, heavy drinkers, commitment-phobes, relationship novices, set in their ways, avoidant, needy, cynical about women, poor conversationalists, low-effort, lonely, and sad.

The first guy? A diamond in the rough. Truly. And I knew him well. You see, he was my husband. The one another woman snatched away.

Can you blame her? Well, yes, for breaking up my marriage. But for seeing him as the cream of the crop compared to the sea of losers? Not really.

She scooped him up after swiping right on him on a dating app — and let’s lay the blame at his feet too, he ran to her willingly — and now I’m in the dating pool where she’d once been.

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Liz Sinclair
Liz Sinclair

Written by Liz Sinclair

Ordinary, middle-aged, university-educated, working mother of three in a long-term loving marriage. Oh, and also non-monogamous. Ohhhh, and now also divorced.

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