After five years the man I love has left his wife for me. I'm proof being 'the other woman' CAN work out...

This month – after five years of our extramarital affair – my boyfriend will finally be divorced. Nathan (let's call him that) is going to court to dissolve his marriage of over 20 years and we can, at last, start out on our new, happy life together, with our hopes and dreams looking ahead to middle age, and beyond.

I'm writing this article because I want to show that being 'the other woman' can work out. Sometimes, married men do leave their wives. I'd like to show that 'mistresses' aren't always scheming harpies, men aren't always irredeemable b******s, and that nice people can have affairs. 

But I also want to acknowledge the inescapable fact that others get hurt in this situation. There's no doubt it would have been better if Nathan had been single when we met.

As you can see, this piece is written anonymously. Not because my partner and I are ashamed – we aren't – but because we don't want to expose or upset the 'innocent' parties, particularly Nathan's family. 

And yes, because there is a lingering stigma around the idea of people getting involved when one of them is married to someone else. But life is complicated – especially when you hit your 50s – and perhaps society should be more open-minded before leaping to judgment.

Nathan and I 'met' on a mutual friend's Facebook page in 2019. We were part of a political discussion and Nathan's answers were succinct and funny. Realising we were monopolising the chat, we decided to migrate it to our private Messenger channel, where we'd stop annoying everyone else.

In just a matter of hours, the messages flew thick and fast, opening out to our favourite books, films and the comedy we both liked. Nathan was in his 40s to my early 50s. He told me he lived in Edinburgh.

After 20 messages or so, he said: 'I'm going out now, to get fish and chips for my wife and daughter.'

I thought – ah.

In 2019, I was single, my marriage having broken up two years before. My children were at university; I was happy with my independence, and not particularly looking for romance. But there was no doubt my messages with Nathan were becoming cheeky to the point of flirty. It probably wasn't a good idea to continue down this track.

So I typed: 'You sound great: your wife and daughter are very lucky to have you.' We had a couple more funny exchanges, I shut down my computer for the night, and thought that was that.

But the next morning, there he was, asking about my evening, and telling me about a TV show he had just seen. I was fully aware we were now entering ambiguous territory. At this point, I could have made a clear choice. Not replied, blocked him, carried on with my day. You might think this is exactly what I should have done.

But I didn't. Our conversation was so free-flowing and so much fun, I wanted it to continue. He was clever. And this was hardly infidelity, was it? Discussing Stoicism, The Fast Show and the best music to listen to while cooking spaghetti? Besides, I was the single one – I was doing nothing wrong.

A few days later, Nathan asked for my number. I hesitated about giving it to him (but not for that long), and he rang me immediately. We started to have daily chats. Nathan's wife was working away in another town at that time, and he was able to speak freely. Predictably, the discourse started to become more personal.

I told Nathan about my divorce, the couple of car-crash-y dates I had been on and the 'dick pic' one of them had sent me. We laughed a lot. Eventually, he started to tell me about his marriage. He'd been with his wife, Maggie*, since university. But over the past 15 years, the intimacy had started to slip from their marriage, and he was feeling increasingly sad about that.

Nathan wasn't just talking about sex – though that was part of it. He told me that he and Maggie just didn't talk – except to discuss their daughter – that there was no emotional closeness. Nor were there any fiery arguments – just a state of comfortable misery. (How many marriages must exist in a state of comfortable misery?)

I guess it was that old 'my wife doesn't understand me' cliche. But it really did seem that Nathan's wife didn't even want to try and understand him – and, well, I did. There's no doubt we were starting to fall for one another.

After a few weeks of chat, Nathan told me he was coming to London to meet me. I told him there was no way he was coming to London to meet me. Five months later, I relented. We both knew what we were getting into at this point. I booked a hotel for him to stay in, but he didn't use it.

When I picked Nathan up from the airport, he was almost silent in the car on the drive to my house. OK, I thought, he doesn't fancy me (I totally fancied him) so we'll go and see that play I booked as platonic friends. I made Nathan a sandwich, he went upstairs and had a shower. Five minutes after that, Nathan pulled me onto his lap for a kiss. Five minutes after that we were in bed.

We stayed there for the rest of the weekend, with just a break for dinner and cocktails. We had sex, talked, told each other funny stories and declared how much we loved each other.

On Sunday night, we made plans to meet again as soon as humanly possible. There was no concern that having 'got what he wanted', Nathan would 'ghost' me –he called me twice before he even got back on the flight to Scotland.

Over dinner the night before, Nathan had told me he was going to leave his wife. I wanted him to tell her immediately: I'm an open person, I didn't like sneaking around, and this situation was basically one big lie. From everything Nathan said, his wife sounded like a very nice person. I wanted to do the right thing by her in every way – except for walking away, because I wanted to do the right thing by me more.

I had finally met my soulmate and wasn't going to give him up. I didn't want to 'meet someone else'. I loved him.

But Nathan wanted to wait before breaking the news – ideally, until his teenage daughter was through her A-levels. He also wanted to let Maggie down in as gentle and kind a way as possible. That left me at least two years of kicking my heels.

This feels like a good place to mention how I had been on the other end of this equation. Nine years earlier, towards the end of my own marriage, I discovered my husband had been having an affair when his girlfriend left me a voice message on our landline.

While the manner of the revelation was a shock, I'd suspected something had been going on for months. By this point our ten-year marriage was a mix of seething resentment and passive aggression (from him) and frantic distraction with my job and my children (me). Even so, hearing the news was brutal. I played the answerphone message just as I was coming in from Tesco.

It was like having the rug pulled away from under me – as I dropped my shopping bags on the floor and the tins rolled away, I felt a free-falling panic wash over me. I knew my life was about to change for ever. My ex denied the affair, ended it at some point, and we carried on in a damaging cohabiting stalemate for five years, until our eventual separation and divorce.

Nine years on, I could honestly say my husband had done me a favour, freeing me up to find love again. But of course I felt bad for Maggie – the situation was hardly 'sisterly' and I didn't want any woman to go through what I'd been through. But I never felt guilty, exactly. Can you feel guilty about someone you've never met?

The following couple of years were not always easy. We got through the pandemic with phone calls and Zooms. After Covid, Nathan and I saw each other a few times a month. I made the odd trip to Scotland, but mostly he came down to me.

Nathan spent the pandemic locked down in Edinburgh with his wife and daughter. It may sound odd, but I wasn't jealous during those weeks and months. Every day, Nathan told me how this enforced proximity made him even more certain of his decision.

The only thing that rankled was that Nathan and Maggie still shared a bed. Nathan promised me that they hadn't had sex for years, that his wife slept curled up in a ball at the other side of the bed, her elbows sticking out in a 'don't you dare touch me' kind of a way. He told me it had been that way for ages. Was it true? Who knows. But it suited me to choose to believe him.

At times, I felt like Whitney Houston in that song, Saving All My Love For You: 'a few stolen moments is all that we share/ you've got your family, and they need you there'. It was difficult spending Christmas without Nathan, knowing he was opening presents with someone else. Bank holidays were particularly lonely, sitting at home while couples and families were out enjoying the sun.

There are unsurprisingly few self-help books on how to manage as 'the other woman', no support groups. If you are worried about your partner, there is nowhere to turn. These days, I have his best friend's phone number, but last year Nathan had an operation and there was no way of checking up on him.

He could have died, and I'd have been none the wiser.

Almost from the first day, I told my friends about Nathan. Reactions were mixed. One of my female friends was wildly jealous – she'd had an affair herself a few years earlier, had never left her husband, regretted it, and urged me to go for it.

Most of my confidantes – predictably – were worried for me, concerned that I'd be getting myself into the stereotyped position of the mistress whose man kept her hanging on for years.

One man was blunt. 'They never leave,' he said (which perhaps said more about him, than anything else).

To begin with, the relationship felt asymmetrical – Nathan met my family and friends quite a while before I met his. My closest two friends met Nathan on his second trip to London; he met the wider circle over a few months. When they saw us together, all their misgivings vanished. Everyone agreed I was much happier than I'd been with my ex, that we were so obviously 'made' for one another.

His friends soon came to the same conclusion. On my second visit to Scotland, we had a drink with Nathan's oldest mate, Max. He was initially a little reserved, but it didn't take him long to warm up.

Max had been in the same university year as Maggie and Nathan and had been a guest at their wedding. But while he was fond of Maggie, he had seen the chill seep into their marriage in real time. He told me he was relieved to see Nathan smiling again.

Unlike me, Nathan didn't have groups of friends, more like one-on-one relationships. So I met the rest of them one at a time, over the following months and years. There were no issues with 'loyalty' as they didn't actually have a mutual friendship group., including Maggie. She was, and is, very introverted, preferring the company of books and puzzles – so no one even had to take sides.

To this date, only one female acquaintance of mine has remained judgmental – but that is because her own sister was cheated on, and hurt deeply. This, I understand.

At times, that two-year wait was difficult. While Nathan and I spoke several times a day and saw each other as often as we could, I was occasionally stretched to the limits of my patience and understanding. Every so often, I would download dating apps, be so horrified by what I saw there, that I decided that if it didn't work out with Nathan, being single again was fine by me.

Nathan and I rarely argued, though I remember once ­furiously shouting: 'Who do you think you are, Henry VIII?' when I got sick of being an eternal wife-in-waiting.

His break-up happened in stages. First, Nathan moved back to work in his home city of Manchester where he had kept on his first flat. Then, when Nathan's daughter finished her exams, he gently told Maggie that their marriage was over. He didn't tell her about me for a few good months after that, but I'd be astonished if she hadn't guessed.

Naturally she was devastated. But while the inevitable upheaval shook her in the same way it had for me, I understand there was also a weary resignation they hadn't been making each other happy for quite a while. Maybe she too will now have the chance to meet a man more suited to her.

Maggie and Nathan remain on good terms, and, when his daughter is back from university, he stays at her house – but sleeps in the spare room, rather than on the sofa these days. I'd be lying if I said this never bothered me - what if they fall into bed for a sentimental last bout of passion?

But he assures me neither of them have ever been tempted, and he would rather save money on a hotel. Mostly, I have made peace with this. I'm not going to start laying down the law and being a nag: I trust him.

While Nathan is still based (for now) in Manchester, we have spent much of the past two years together.

The toughest part was probably meeting his daughter - understandably, she was initially wary, and not warm. I think she was mostly relieved I wasn't some 27 year-old starlet. We now have a tentative relationship that is improving all the time. She's met my children and we have spent a short holiday together.

As for Nathan and I? We are happy. While our relationship has been an open secret for quite a while, the fact of his divorce ­rubber-stamps it.

We've talked about getting married, but there's no rush, really. We are proof that an affair can blossom into the real thing. Why settle for 'comfortable misery' when every day can be full of laughter and joy?

• Names and details have been changed
• Caroline Lowe is a pseudonym