When Margaret Josephs married Jan Josephs in 1994, she thought their relationship would last forever. She even helped raise his three children from another marriage. “I was madly in love,” she tells Nicki Swift. “I could still say marrying my first husband was one of the top five best moments in my entire life … I cry if I watch the wedding video. I adore and love my ex-husband very much.” So what happened? Enter: Joe Benigno.
Margaret met Benigno when he was a contractor who worked on the couple’s home. At the time, her marriage was fizzling out and she felt an undeniable spark. Thus began the pair’s fated love affair — but if Margaret could’ve done it over again, she probably would’ve done it differently. “It does hurt a lot of people,” she says. “I mean, obviously there’s always collateral damage. But yeah, I think I would’ve just left sooner and been more upfront about things. No one ever thinks what’s going to happen happens. Life is a whirlwind, and you and you can’t change the progression of it.”
At the end of the day, she still stands by her decision to end the marriage. “Hurting him and hurting my family was very upsetting to me,” she says, “but ultimately, if you as a person are not happy, you can’t make anybody else happy around you.”
You can catch Margaret Josephs on her weekly podcast, “Caviar Dreams, Tuna Fish Budget.“
