A couple who met two decades ago through pro-cheating dating site Ashley Madison have revealed they have no regrets at all and feel their marriage is as happy as can be.
In 2004, Michael Oshust and Stephania Meyer of Nova Scotia were married to other people, but neither of their marriages was going well, they said. Business Insider.
Michael, 55, was in the middle of a divorce from his wife, whom he had been with for six and a half years.
For her part, Stephania, 52, had been with her now ex-husband for 11 years and had two daughters with him, but was desperately unhappy and leaning towards divorce.
In 2004, Michael Oshust, 55, and Stephania Meyer, 52, were married to other people, but neither of their marriages were going well.
Since Michael was in the middle of a divorce and Stephania’s separation from her husband was imminent, the two separately decided to sign up for Ashley Madison.
In fact, Estefanía and her ex had implicitly agreed to postpone the separation until after the following Christmas to give their daughters one last holiday together as a family.
At the same time, Ashley Madison was stepping up its marketing efforts and would soon gain widespread notoriety for its slogan: “Life is short. Have an adventure.”
“I heard numerous radio ads for Ashley Madison and it piqued my curiosity because I was missing companionship in my marriage,” Stephania told DailyMail.com in 2019, on the occasion of their 15th anniversary.
The service’s blatant promotion of infidelity even led to its ads being banned in Singapore in 2013 for its “flagrant disregard for our family values and public morality.”
Still, it gave Michael, then an IT project manager, a discreet option to start dating other people while his divorce was still in place.
As for Stephania, who was a stay-at-home mother at the time, she said she had initially signed up out of curiosity and not with the express intention of finding a partner for an adventure.
In any case, the couple, both living in Ontario at the time, met through Ashley Madison and began chatting.
Michael described to BI that they both “yearned” for deeper connection and “intellectual conversations.”
After six weeks of texting, the two met for the first time in real life at a coffee shop… and the rest is history.
Stephania and Michael married in 2007 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, with two friends present.
Stephania recalled that most of her messages were asking for nudes, but only Michael had asked her how she was.
They were also united by a shared affinity for rock music.
“I was intrigued, so I sent him a little note,” Stephania told the outlet. “And then we kept texting each other. We had a lot to talk about.”
It got to the point where I would take the kids to school every day and rush home to get online just to chat with Michael.
Over time, she began to develop real feelings for her new online boyfriend.
“I was scared because I’m not a cheater,” she admitted, adding, “I just felt very different. Natural, even.”
Six weeks after exchanging their first messages, the duo met in person at a coffee shop in October 2004.
“I opened the door and gave her a sweet kiss. It was the best feeling I’d ever had in my life at that moment,” Michael recalled to BI.
After moving from Ontario to Nova Scotia in the years following their wedding, the two opened and currently run a house painting business.
From then on they began to see each other more and more frequently, but kept everything secret.
However, it took only a month after their first in-person meeting for Stephania’s husband to discover Michael’s emails and realize what was going on.
From there, he threw her out of the house.
After her divorce was finalized, Stephania recalled that her ex admitted that he knew something was up because she had started to shine and take better care of herself.
It wasn’t long before Stephania and Michael moved in together, somewhere close to their two daughters, who were then five and seven years old.
Although Stephania did her best to be a constant presence in her daughters’ lives, she was devastated when they eventually cut off contact with her, even blocking her “on everything.”
And he became something of an outcast among his family and some friends.
But she and Michael were undeterred and tied the knot in 2007 in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, with two friends in attendance.
Eventually, they both moved to Nova Scotia and now co-own a house painting business.
Two decades after their first meeting, Stephania reflects on their relationship: “I wouldn’t change it for anything in the world.”
