Hey folks. So this isn't a thread that's asking for advice- but I've just always been curious on getting other perspectives on this from ENM folks.

The context:

When I first moved to my current area, I was also just starting to date as an out polyam person for the first time. I had some safe acquaintances in the area from the polyam community but no friends who felt close enough (and disentangled from other important life spheres) for me to comfortably talk about my dating life. So I got on a friending app and met up with this other autistic gal.

During maybe our second hangout, I had just been through another frustrating dating app experience and really needed someone to talk to about it, and decided "fuck it, if I'm going to really be friends with people, I want them to know I date this way" and disclosed to her that I was polyamorous. She then disclosed to me that actually, she had just started cheating on her husband of many years, because according to her, he had been doing the same thing behind her back for most of their marriage, was generally abusive in all non-physical ways, and it was a situation where she didn't really have the means to leave, for reasons that were fully out of her control.

I also didn't feel inclined to walk away from that potential friendship after the initial reveal because I needed a friend, generally liked her company even though I disagreed with her actions, and saw that she seemed to need a friend too. I also think some part of me thought that I had a chance at encouraging her to pick a safer path, which I'll admit comes from a complicated place that has been discussed in my therapy sessions many times before.

Over the course of that friendship there were moments of friction between us where I was basically trying to nudge her towards the idea of encouraging the relationship to become openly non-monogamous, or leaving the marriage for her own well-being, but every form of this brought up emotional safety concerns about how the husband would react, and whether or not it would even matter because he was reportedly the kind of person who would lie to couples therapists rather than put in real work on their issues.

We continued being friends for a while, but it eventually came to a conclusive end for reasons that, as far as I am currently aware, had nothing to do with our conflicting views on non-monogamy.

But I was never really sure where I stood on the matter of how she conducted herself. It sounded like she was being ethical towards everyone she dated by disclosing her marriage status and situation, it's just that she was keeping her husband in the dark about all of it. For a while I told myself that her behavior and the consequences of that were her business, but I would of course be there for her if she was in an unsafe situation and needed to get out. The idea of willingly engaging in cheating is so distant from who I am that it was really hard for me to see the situation from her shoes, especially given the specific reasons she felt stuck (the details of which I am withholding because even now, I kind of worry that talking about this will lead to her being identified and put into unsafe circumstances).

So my questions to you all (and again I am not asking for advice, this situation is very much concluded):

What do you generally think of this situation? Would you have done the same in my shoes, and/or in her shoes?
Was I an asshole for feeling like she still shouldn't have been engaging in cheating?