Dad cheating?

LegacyUser

I'm sorry if this is long but I've been keeping this to myself for 2 weeks and i have to get it all out:

I think my father may be having another affair, and possibly with a man this time! I am going absolutely insane thinking about it and what i should do, so I'd like to explain and would greatly appreciate any help or advice on the situation and what i should do/not do about it.

My mum and dad split up when i was 9 because my dad had been having an affair. Although it was hard, as the years went by i totally forgave him because he was much happier with his new woman and i believed things worked out better for our family in the long run. But our family has had a lot of problems, and many of them between myself and my mother so i ended up coming to live with my dad and his new girlfriend about 3 years ago. they have helped me a lot and we've all grown quite close, they have been mine and my sisters rock through hard times.

My dad and step mum got married last year and my dad had some reservations leading up to the event because he thought it might change their relatonship. but they went through with it and i believed everything was fine until recently.

I was sending a text from my dads phone about two weeks ago and went into his sent messages to see if they message was delivered. but underneath the message i had sent was a message to a man that seemed a little out of place to me. so i scrolled through the rest of his sent messages and came up with quite a few to the same person. At first they seemed fine, just stuff like 'thats fine, am on my way now, see you in 5' kind of thing. and since my dad meets with a lot of business clients when he's away i didnt think much of it. but then there was ones like 'I'm sorry, coming over now. be good and go easy on me please' and 'im in town tonight, will you meet me? would really like to see you again'. now at first I was a little worried but assumed i was overeacting because the messages really didnt imply anything. But then i had my fears somewhat justified. A texts had been sent to this man at half 4 one morning when my dad was down the country supposedly on business saying 'Am very drunk now, would really like to see you, would you meet me? i am staying at ...' i checked his call logs and he had also called the same number a few minutes after that text was sent. And this has really got me worried. I checked his recieved texts but there was nothing from this man anywhere in his inbox, which makes me suspect he was deleting them?

Now i know it was totally wrong of me to snoop, i had no right, but i honestly didnt set out to do it and i wasnt expecting to see anything in his sent messages to alarm me. When i saw the slightly odd text to the man at first, i scrolled on more looking for reassurance that i was overeacting than looking to find anything else. But now i wish more than anything in my life that i knew nothing about it and had never even used his phone!

Also the reason why i suspect it might actually be a man and not just a woman that he's hiding in his phone under a mans name is that in a few of the texts he uses the mans name. im assuming since he didnt delete the texts in his sent items that he didnt realise they were being saved and didnt think anyone would see them so why use a fake name when texting someone if its not actually their name?

I'm sorry if i didnt explain the situation very well but my head is all over the place about it. And the reason i am so worried about these few texts is that this is how he got away with it when he was secretly seeing my step mum. he would be gone down the country on supposed business trips when he was actually going to see her, and my older sister found a text on his phone from her around that time as well. To make matters worse he has been going away more and more frequently on 'business trips' lately, and is even now gone to London for a few days on business, even though I have never known his business to take him over there before! I know it sounds like I am reading way too much into his every move but i am just so alert to any signs that my suspicions might be right.

What I'd really like advice on is does it sound like i have a right to be worried or does it sond like I am just waaaaay too paranoid? Even though I have no actual proof that anything is happening, is it enough to confront him on a heavy suspicion? I dont want to expose him to the family, god knows we have been through far too much pain already, but i want it to stop, however big or little 'it' may be. Although i do think that if i did confront him he may actually try to kill me, i simply cannot just forget this information, knowing that i might be able to stop him from ripping our family apart again.

So basically I'd like to know if you think I'm reading too much into something innocent or if if i should be worried? I havent been able to get someone else's outlook on the situation since the situation is too huge and I'm afraid of the implications of telling anyone! Therfore I'm worried i may have blown things out of proportion in my head. Any advice is greatly appreciated and sorry about the long post.

zzxx

Hi

This is not a nice situation to be in at all. If he is having an affair it may not be with a man. He might have saved a womans number under a mans name as it would look less suspicious if they called/texted.

I can't really help you but it's bad enough to think your Dad is having an affair without thinking he's gay as well..

Best of luck

star-pants

You said some of the texts were normal but you kept looking?
As someone said it could be a lady under a mans name too.

At the end of the day it's his business and it's not really your place to get involved (as horrible as it might be). If you really want to get involved, ask him, but you'll have to admit going through his phone and potentially being wrong.

LegacyUser

OP, Your Dad's sex life is not really something you should be concerning yourself with... whatever he's up to.

Cleopatra12

you poor pet. That is a terrible thing to find (even tho you should not have been snooping).

My guess is, if they are inappropriate texts indicating an affair, the 'mans' name is probably really a woman and its saved under a mans name so as not to arouse suspicion.

AMK

You sound so upset.

I know you said you continued looking through his phone looking more for reassurance than anything else but would you have done that if you weren't pre-disposed to be suspicious of him anyhow? And low and behold, you found a heap of stuff to link together and now you're worried sick in case he is having an affair.

Of course it is possible you are right. However, it is also possible you aren't. It sounds as if most of these texts were not suspicious in nature and fear and anxiety may have lead you to put two and two together and get five. And would your father make his phone available to other family members if he was having an affair. A text message could be intercepted at any time. He'd hardly take that chance.

I don't think you should tell anybody about this. There is two much balance between both possibilities. And at the end of the day, this is a matter between your father and your step-mom. I am sure that after the troubles between your parents it must be hell to think this family could be heading for trouble as well. But imagine the damage if you did something about this and you were totally off target.

You are over-estimating your influence in this situation. You can't control or direct other people's behaviour. Ever. You cannot prevent your father ripping the family apart if that is what he is going to do. All you can do is not contribute to the situation yourself and try and think the best of those you love.