A Letter to Doris, the Mistress

For the women who’ve lived through the devastation of being betrayed not just by a man, but by the girl who helped him do it, this letter is for you.

Dear Doris,

I’m not writing this because I want anything from you.

Not closure. Not answers.

Not accountability you were never going to offer. You are a compulsive liar anyway.

I’m writing this because for a long time, women like you walked around untouched protected by the silence of the women whose lives you helped fracture.

So let me say the thing so many of us were pressured to swallow:

You knew he had a wife. You just didn’t care.

I need you to understand something clearly:

You didn’t “win” him. You are more than welcome to him and you and he knows that.

But you participated in the unravelling of a woman who trusted him, believed him, built a life beside him for 12 years.

You helped break something that was never yours to touch.

And I want you to know something else:

I actually don’t hate you. You aren’t worth the energy.

You weren’t the woman I loved. You weren’t the one I built a home with. You weren’t the one who made those promises to me.

But you were the woman who stood beside him as he dishonoured them.

And that is its own kind of cruelty.

The truth is, women like you always think you’re the exception.

You think being chosen in secret means being chosen in truth.

You think the lies he told you sound different from the lies he told me.

But let me offer you a truth now, you’ll eventually learn the hard way:

A man who betrays his partner with you will eventually betray you too.

Not out of punishment, but pattern.

Not because of karma, but character.

He didn’t cheat with you. He cheated on himself because he actually has no idea who he is.

No integrity,

No values,

No ability to be a safe place for anyone.

You were simply the hand he used to do the damage. A marvellous performance by the both of you. You fooled a lot of people.

And while you get to float around in whatever fantasy you built in your head, I am sure convinced that you are happy and you are special,  I was left to rebuild a life that you helped burn.

But here’s the twist you probably didn’t expect: I got stronger.

Not bitter. Not closed. Not small.

Stronger. Open. Bigger infact.

Because women like me don’t collapse.

We rise. We heal. We rebuild.

We learn exactly who we are in the moment we realise we deserved better than both of you.

So Doris,

my letter to you isn’t about anger. It’s about clarity.

You can have the version of him you got;  the secret version, the dishonest version, the escapist version, the one who needed to sneak around to feel powerful.

Because I’ll tell you something with absolute certainty:

The woman he lost is far more valuable than the woman he gained.

I walked away with my integrity intact. My conscience is clean. My future is open.

And a heart that knows now, more than ever, that real love is built with honour not stolen in shadows.

You didn’t take my life. You just freed me from a man who didn’t deserve the way I loved him.

And that, Doris, is the part of the story you’ll never be able to rewrite.

A woman who finally knows her worth.

So no, I don’t hate you. I thank you.

He is all yours.

Chez