I'm a married 40-something straight woman who has been having an affair for about nine months with a 40-something straight man who is also in a LTR. (Obviously, we are both douchebags, but that train has already left the station. If it matters, the affair saved my sanity and my marriage, and I think it saved his too—but I'll shut up with the self-justifying crap and get to my question.) The sex has been incredible—according to him, I was his best lover ever—and I also really liked him. He's smart and funny and interesting, and has been discreet and trustworthy.

About a month ago I sent him an email—the first in a couple of weeks—and got an immediate hostile reply along the lines of, "I wish you wouldn't contact me like this. I'm in an important meeting." We've had no contact since.

I know that as a grownup, if I have something to say to another grownup—something like, "Hey, I get that you want to end it, but let's thank each other for the orgasms and part on a positive note"—I should just say it. I think we can risk that much mutual affection and respect. But it seems like he wants respect for his constraints in the form of never being contacted again.

My question: Does a person in an adulterous relationship have a right to a respectful dumping? Or is, "Fuck off and I'm blaming you for the fact that I was checking my email during a meeting" the best one can expect?

I'm going to add some photos to get your attention. Not because I think you'll like them (they're of me), but because I hope you'll agree that a 40-something straight man whose LTR puts out three times a year—at most!—should feel some warmth and gratitude for having had a crack at what is depicted.

So Long And Thanks For All The Orgasms

My response after the jump...

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People should be polite as a general rule, SLATFATO, but an adulterer with something to lose—and by definition an adulterer has something to lose back at home—should err on the side of politeness. Because the second-to-last thing an adulterer needs is a pissed off ex-adulteree sending angry emails to what he has to lose. (The last thing an adulter needs? A sexually transmitted infection.)

So the short answer to your question is "yes"—yes, you were owed a respectful dumping. No question. But before we brand your ex-lover an impolite motherfucker and I tell you that you're well rid of him, SLATFATO, I have a followup question: That email you sent him at work? Did it, like your recent email to me, include a giant, four-color picture of your ass?

I was sitting on an airplane when I opened your email and the person sitting next to me got an eyeful of ass. If your ex-lover was in a meeting when a dirty email arrived—perhaps we should start calling them "Weimails," in honor of Anthony Weiner—and he opened it figuring you wouldn't be so indiscreet as to send an inappropriate email to his work address and his coworkers and/or superiors saw your ass flash onto his computer screen just as the person sitting next to me on the airplane today saw your ass flash onto my computer screen... well, then your ex-lover's anger might be justified. And as your email didn't demonstrate the kind of discretion and good judgement that an adulterer looks for in an adulteree, he might have been likewise justified in calling the whole thing off.

He still should've let dumped you politely—pissing off your adulteree is a bad idea even if the adulteree is at fault—but you may have been dumped with cause.