Worried and let down

leggo

No reason to delete the messages if she has nothing to hide. It’s been established that she kept something from you, so yes in this case she does owe you an explanation, deleting evidence then is a cut and dry admission of guilt. Whatever she’s guilty of, you can’t even start to determine if it’s salvageable if she won’t tell you. If she won’t tell you, you can’t have trust. If you can’t have trust, the relationship is sadly done.

I get that you don’t want this to be true OP and that it would be so much easier to believe her and pretend it isn’t, but it’s happening. I’m sorry. It ****ing sucks and at Christmas too, there’s no way around how ****ty this is. There’s no easy way to deal with the emotions of it all, but decision-wise when you take stuff like her relationship with your child into account, you need to get out ahead of this now. You will recover in time and you’ll have time to recover, but you need to start thinking smart and selfishly for now.

ElizaBennett

I really think you have to have it out with her. You'll go mad otherwise. If I were you I'd tell her how bad it all looks from your angle and then I would put it back on her. How is she going to convince you there's nothing going on with this guy? Don't take excuses or her being fake offended that you doubt her. My partner saw an email on my phone from an old flame and confronted me. He was desperately worried. I immediately opened the mail and showed him so he could read it and see it was work related and innocent, and he could check for others. Because I hadn't cheated and hated that he was worried I might have. I don't have a pin on my phone and he can look at it whenever he wants, though he never does. That's what you do if you've nothing to hide. Any hurt I felt that he was suspicious of me was outweighed by the mental turmoil he was suffering at the thought. If she loves you she won't want you to suffer like you are.

Neyite

Confused dad wrote: »

Nope she doesn't. Her excuse is that she has his messages muted because she doesn't want to talk him and she said that she was just sending him one worded responses. That cant be verified because she deleted them all.

I want to believe her but it's just not making sense and I'm really creeped out by the whole thing.

A year or so ago I was contacted on FB by an ex from my hometown of over 20 years ago. It started off as a friend request, followed by a DM apology for being a sh!thead to me all those years ago, then a bit of chat about our respective kids then he asked me if I go to my home town often...I took a guess at where this might be going and stopped replying before he could suggest meeting for coffee or a drink. (dumbass forgot he tried exactly this before a couple of years after we broke up) I got some snarky responses, which only confirmed that he was sniffing around for something extra despite my FB showing me all coupled up. It was textbook NiceGuy behaviour. He got removed and deleted.

But I'm a cynical old boot and it's taken me this long to stop being 'nice' when rebuffing male overtures (I get the hang of it just when it starts to taper off ironically enough.) And I found I was not alone in that compulsion to turn down men nicely, no matter how pushy or awful they were. Lots of my friends have said similar.

So another theory might be that this guy was hitting on her, she's genuinely got no interest but also didn't know how to handle it. That maybe because he's known to you both she felt she had to be nice, that she couldn't tell him to f off and yer man was just persistent. Then when you saw her she panicked and deleted even though she's innocent.

Now she could very well be running rings around you cheating. But none of us knows for sure except her.

What I'd suggest is you sit down together and talk. If you've kids, send them out with granny or a play date so you can actually talk this through. Grab a cuppa for yourselves and present it it to her that if it was you doing this and messaging an older woman and deleting messages, what would she be thinking right now? She would be coming to the same fears you have. And ask her for total honesty, tell her that her evasiveness and deleting stuff looks really damaging for your relationship and truth is what's needed now -even if it's going to hurt, it needs to be shared. Ask her there and then if you can look at her phone -without her going to the loo with it for 15 mins to delete stuff off it. Get everything on the table all out in the open. You don't have to decide right away if something's a dealbreaker. You can take time to think things over. But you need her to be honest first. Without that you can't figure this out together.

TheBoyConor

You need to be able to talk to her about this.

It seems she is a master of disguise and has a great poker face. She was able to show a happy face and lead you to believe everything was just hunky dory while the whole time texting and possible meeting this fella for shenanigans.

You cannot discount the possibility that she has been texting and meeting random fellas for years on end. The only difference is that this time she has been caught out.

Quickpip

If your partner is telling the truth, which she very well may be. She will have no issue with you confronting the guy sending her these unwarranted messages.
Pick up the phone and ask him why he's messaging her or better still confront him on his next delivery, the cheeky get.

qwerty13

qwerty13 wrote: »

I wasn’t criticising you - I got the impression that she was ordering takeaways v frequently when you weren’t there, while you were working. That’s why I was asking. It seemed odd - especially now that you know she’s contacting the delivery guy

I just want to reply to my own post, with something that hadn’t occurred to me until now. I don’t know if you do online delivery orders or not, but if you do, the name & phone number they have is generally the person who orders / pays / has their card linked to the order. Who does the ordering in your house?

Of course this guy could have added her on FB anyway, but if you do the ordering / paying, would the name / number not be in your name? As in how would he even know her name (and certainly not her surname, to google / FB search for her).

I don’t know where you live, I guess if it is a small town that doesn’t apply. Just throwing it out there as something to think about.

qwerty13

Quickpip wrote: »

If your partner is telling the truth, which she very well may be. She will have no issue with you confronting the guy sending her these unwarranted messages.
Pick up the phone and ask him why he's messaging her or better still confront him on his next delivery, the cheeky get.

I can’t see that will do any good. Yer man will probably just make light of it whether that’s the truth or not. If she’s lying, she’ll have warned him to make light of it. And if they are carrying on together, they will just become more covert and use another medium to communicate.

It really does come down to having a very open and honest talk about it in my opinion. Covert ops on the OP’s part aren’t really going to reassure him. The only outcome I can see from the OP snooping is that he still has suspicions but doesn’t really know what’s going on (ie he’s in limbo), or else he finds evidence and dumps her.

Quickpip

qwerty13 wrote: »

I can’t see that will do any good. Yer man will probably just make light of it whether that’s the truth or not. If she’s lying, she’ll have warned him to make light of it. And if they are carrying on together, they will just become more covert and use another medium to communicate.

It really does come down to having a very open and honest talk about it in my opinion. Covert ops on the OP’s part aren’t really going to reassure him. The only outcome I can see from the OP snooping is that he still has suspicions but doesn’t really know what’s going on (ie he’s in limbo), or else he finds evidence and dumps her.

You've made some very good points there.
But i'd definitely still confront him. A quick call to his workplace or land on his door to ask him to stop bothering your partner. He can deny it all he wants but you've seen the evidence and tell him so.

TheAnalyst_

She's already met this guy and had sex. I know you don't want that to be true but please don't delude yourself.

leggo

Quickpip wrote: »

You've made some very good points there.
But i'd definitely still confront him. A quick call to his workplace or land on his door to ask him to stop bothering your partner. He can deny it all he wants but you've seen the evidence and tell him so.

Nope. Most likely course of events here is he either denies it or just laughs. Either way OP looks like a nutcase and airs his dirty laundry/trust issues (albeit valid) in public. Probably looks like a bit of a dope too since there’s clearly more to this or his gf wouldn’t have deleted everything. This solves nothing and is just drama for the sake of it.

Caranica

TheAnalyst_ wrote: »

She's already met this guy and had sex. I know you don't want that to be true but please don't delude yourself.

Wow, that's a stretch! The OP asked for help, speculation like that is dangerous. There could be nothing to this other than flirting. Going straight to the nuclear button over that would be foolish.

TheBoyConor

Dump her. She probably has been always cheating.

shafty100

TheBoyConor wrote: »

Dump her. She probably has been always cheating.

Another option is text her on a different number and see how she responds, good luck

Confused dad

leggo wrote: »

Nope. Most likely course of events here is he either denies it or just laughs. Either way OP looks like a nutcase and airs his dirty laundry/trust issues (albeit valid) in public. Probably looks like a bit of a dope too since there’s clearly more to this or his gf wouldn’t have deleted everything. This solves nothing and is just drama for the sake of it.

I think it's a bit unfair to label me a nutcase and a dope, because I sought some advice through this forum?

Many thanks to everyone who has responded with advice so far.

Bigmac1euro

Confused dad wrote: »

I think it's a bit unfair to label me a nutcase and a dope, because I sought some advice through this forum?

Many thanks to everyone who has responded with advice so far.

That was definitely harsh so I’d disregard that comment if I was you, that poster is the only dope here I reckon.

I would keep an eye on her phone, tbh while it’s not ideal you need to wait until you have a good chance with her phone.

Check
WhatsApp
Telegram
Fb messenger
Normal messages
Instagram messages.

If there’s any messing going on you’ll find something in one of those apps.
Sometimes you need to snoop. I can’t see her telling the truth tbh.

Also is it her you have the daughter with ?
This is obviously quite important for the child.

Millionaire only not

Confused dad wrote: »

Hi Folks,
Sorry in advance, but this is a long one!

I'm just feeling so worried, hurt and let down this evening after a pretty horrible discovery last night.

So My Partner, with whom I thought I was rock solid has been texting a much older married man, in secret and has lied about it to my face.

I made the discovery last night. We had been for a family day out with my daughter on Sunday and she had taken some lovely pics on her phone. She sent them to me last night through FB messenger so I could choose which ones to get printed today. When I went to look through them on my phone, my battery died. So, I asked her if I could look at them on her phone and she said no probs. She went out to the kitchen to make a cuppa. So, I went into her fb messenger to the message she sent me, and I saw a message there from a local delivery guy (who calls to our home quite often with takeaways etc). No big deal, until I noticed this particular conversation was on MUTE. I could see the first line of the message and it read like a message between two close friends. I said nothing and went to look at the photos.

About an hour later, I went to make another cuppa, and when I came into the room, my partner quickly stopped what she was doing on the phone and dropped it onto the sofa. I'm not proud of this, but when she was next out of the room, I went in and looked again (far from my finest hour). I was really surprised to see that message thread had been deleted. However, When the phone was in my hand, another message came through. It was a reply to whatever she had said to him before.

Basically, she has been texting this guy, with the conversation on mute, and deleting the messages. I confronted her about it. She denied that she had been texting him at all. I asked her to open her phone and she did so reluctantly, and low and behold there was yet another message. She then went on to say that she has it on mute because she doesn't really want to talk to him, and that she never responds to him. However, the message she had just received was clearly a reply to whatever she had asked him in the last message she sent and deleted. She then went on to tell me that she hasn't done anything wrong. I asked her if he was pestering her, and if she doesn't want to talk to him, why she responds to him and she couldn't answer me.

I asked her why she lied about having secret text conversations with a married man. Why was it on mute? Why delete them? She just got really flustered and gave me some garbled excuse about always deleting her messages, despite having a full inbox.

Then, the sucker punch came. She let it slip, that last week he asked her to meet up with her. She says she just "forgot" to tell me and that she didn't meet up with him and ignored the message.

This is so out of character for her. We have always had 100% trust. Never lied to each other. Always tell each other exactly how we feel. Now I'm really worried that something is going on. I feel guilty for snooping in her phone the second time, but at the same time, I fell vindicated as she has been texting this man in secret. I'm so worried, as I love her to bits, and she has a great bond with my daughter also.

To make matters even more concerning, at our annual theatre wrap party last weekend, we had both agreed to go home early as we were so worn out from our annual pantomime. However at the last minute she decided to stay on and said she would ring me in an hour to come and get her. So, I left around 10.30pm. Three and a half hours later, no phone call. She went completely off the grid. I called a few times to see if she needed a lift or if she wanted to stay on at the party. She eventually landed home at 4am. Again, completely out of character. She would always check in with me, and vice versa to let each other know we are ok etc.

Now I'm thinking, did she leave the party and go and meet this guy maybe? Or am I putting 2 and 2 together and getting 5? I was looking at photos from the party posted online. She's not in any of them, except the ones taken when I was still there, the photo's I'm in. Any photo's taken after that, she's not in them.

Some advice would be greatly appreciated on how to approach this issue. I don't want to come across as controlling or anything by checking up on her, but I just knew in my gut something wasn't right about this and I was right. She told me herself that she sees nothing wrong with texting this guy. I also have my little girl to think of. She looks up to her so much and has a real close bond. :(:(

Sounds like she’s banging him alright .
Women are deadly , myself and friend have had experience of them, some of which were not proud of.
given right circumstances there worse than any man !

Millionaire only not

Anywhere around the 40 mark married a few years there cards are marked ! Spending money on themselves clothes tan make up , the tell tale signs are there ur just have been ignoring them !

Anyone can slip of the boat it’s up to u wether u want to save them or will they just fall in again once they’ve a taste of hot steamy sex and all that goes with it !

U can be sure she’s meeting up while ur at work too ! There meeting twice a week at least, leave her alone and pretend Uve forgotten about it .
Buy a tracker put it on the car great job if u want her back see is she telling the truth!
Lay money she’s playing away , half the women are playing away if truth be known !

By the way the trust is gone and it never comes back I know - my motto 2 can play that game !

Kidchameleon

leggo wrote: »

Nope. Most likely course of events here is he either denies it or just laughs. Either way OP looks like a nutcase and airs his dirty laundry/trust issues (albeit valid) in public. Probably looks like a bit of a dope too since there’s clearly more to this or his gf wouldn’t have deleted everything. This solves nothing and is just drama for the sake of it.

Confused dad wrote: »

I think it's a bit unfair to label me a nutcase and a dope, because I sought some advice through this forum?

Many thanks to everyone who has responded with advice so far.

In fairness, I don't think leggo was calling anyone a nutcase. Leggo was implying you would look like a nutcase if you took the suggested course of action. I dont think you are reading the context of leggo's post properly.

LegacyUser

Knew someone in same boat . Put the lads name she was banging onto his number on her contacts . Deleted his own number also
He caught her because she text him about the husband sniffing around etc and of course the husband actually got the text

Confused dad

Kidchameleon wrote: »

In fairness, I don't think leggo was calling anyone a nutcase. Leggo was implying you would look like a nutcase if you took the suggested course of action. I dont think you are reading the context of leggo's post properly.

Apologies if I took leggo's post out of context

Princess Calla

Kidchameleon wrote: »

In fairness, I don't think leggo was calling anyone a nutcase. Leggo was implying you would look like a nutcase if you took the suggested course of action. I dont think you are reading the context of leggo's post properly.

I was just about to say the same!

There's a few regular posters on this forum who consistently offer good advice leggo is one of them.

I've never read a post where they attack anyone, even if disagreeing he's 100% respectful!

Confused dad

Princess Calla wrote: »

I was just about to say the same!

There's a few regular posters on this forum who consistently offer good advice leggo is one of them.

I've never read a post where they attack anyone, even if disagreeing he's 100% respectful!

Apologies leggo!

dartboardio

Millionaire only not wrote: »

Anywhere around the 40 mark married a few years there cards are marked ! Spending money on themselves clothes tan make up , the tell tale signs are there ur just have been ignoring them !

Anyone can slip of the boat it’s up to u wether u want to save them or will they just fall in again once they’ve a taste of hot steamy sex and all that goes with it !

U can be sure she’s meeting up while ur at work too ! There meeting twice a week at least, leave her alone and pretend Uve forgotten about it .
Buy a tracker put it on the car great job if u want her back see is she telling the truth!
Lay money she’s playing away , half the women are playing away if truth be known !

By the way the trust is gone and it never comes back I know - my motto 2 can play that game !

You sound like a delight....

Half the women are 'playing away' I'd love to see these imaginary statistics.

matthewmurdock

I'm frustrated just reading this thread. Couldn't be any more obvious that she is cheating. I want to grab you and shake you to get you to snap out of it.

Hiding texts, ridiculously flimsy excuses, and the Christmas party thing is like a cheating slam dunk. No doubt in my mind from what you have described that she is cheating on you.

Also the classic trickle-truth is one of the biggest signs. The amount of lies she was caught in, in such a short amount of time was insane and you still seem to be unable to see what's going on.

• Denied that she had been texting him at all. Lie.
• On mute because she doesn't want to talk to him and never responds to him. Lie.
• Always deletes messages. Lie.
• He asked her to meet with him and she just "forgot" to tell you. Lie.

Just wait until she tells you that she met with him to ask him to stop. And then the next piece of trickle truth will be that they kissed once and that's all that happened.

The advice to keep track of her phone is completely worthless. She made a mistake once and almost got caught, she won't let that happen again. The phone is useless to you now.

Now I'm thinking, did she leave the party and go and meet this guy maybe? Or am I putting 2 and 2 together and getting 5?

My intuition read this and said, that is exactly what has happened. It's incredible how your gut can sense these situations and you instinctively know that something isn't right. That is there to help you. Trust it.

If you confront her I can guarantee you'll be gaslighted to high heavens - "how could you not trust me" or "if there's no trust then I don't know if there's a point in being together". Basically putting you on the back foot and making you the wrong-doer when it's her. At this point I think it's unlikely that she confesses and instead gaslights you as paranoid/possessive/controlling.

Neyite wrote: »

What I'd suggest is you sit down together and talk. If you've kids, send them out with granny or a play date so you can actually talk this through. Grab a cuppa for yourselves and present it it to her that if it was you doing this and messaging an older woman and deleting messages, what would she be thinking right now? She would be coming to the same fears you have. And ask her for total honesty, tell her that her evasiveness and deleting stuff looks really damaging for your relationship and truth is what's needed now -even if it's going to hurt, it needs to be shared. Ask her there and then if you can look at her phone -without her going to the loo with it for 15 mins to delete stuff off it. Get everything on the table all out in the open. You don't have to decide right away if something's a dealbreaker. You can take time to think things over. But you need her to be honest first. Without that you can't figure this out together.

OP, I think this is absolutely atrocious advice. The phone is now a dead end as I (and a few other posters) have already established. Asking for or expecting honesty from someone who has lied at every possible opportunity so far. What's the definition of insanity again? Although maybe if you take the calm, doormat-esque approach to the conversation she will lie and reassure you instead of gaslight you.

coffee_cake

Neyite wrote: »

But I'm a cynical old boot and it's taken me this long to stop being 'nice' when rebuffing male overtures (I get the hang of it just when it starts to taper off ironically enough.) And I found I was not alone in that compulsion to turn down men nicely, no matter how pushy or awful they were. Lots of my friends have said similar.

So another theory might be that this guy was hitting on her, she's genuinely got no interest but also didn't know how to handle it. That maybe because he's known to you both she felt she had to be nice, that she couldn't tell him to f off and yer man was just persistent. Then when you saw her she panicked and deleted even though she's innocent.

Now she could very well be running rings around you cheating. But none of us knows for sure except her.

was thinking this as well to be honest. especially if she was at the party the whole time it turns out.
hiding it because she's trying to politely turn him down and doesn't want it to turn into 'a thing'. which it has at this stage so you might as well talk to her again as has been suggested

Millionaire only not

There cheating because women especially the ones that mind them looks wise are putting it out there !
Look there going to be propositioned wether u like it or not and 90% of the time they won’t!
But if there’s issues at home , or the partner is not minding himself etc , this is new lease of life! Maybe one last fling etc
They usually only do it for the excitement!

And sure tis grand if no one is caught

Kidchameleon

Neyite wrote: »

So another theory might be that this guy was hitting on her, she's genuinely got no interest but also didn't know how to handle it. That maybe because he's known to you both she felt she had to be nice, that she couldn't tell him to f off and yer man was just persistent. Then when you saw her she panicked and deleted even though she's innocent.

I highly doubt it. Her actions are those of someone who knows what they are up to is wrong.

leggo

Kidchameleon wrote: »

I highly doubt it. Her actions are those of someone who knows what they are up to is wrong.

Yeah like there’s a part of me that can see a reality where maybe OP is more jealous than he lets on and things aren’t 100% perfect, so she’s hiding it to avoid it becoming a thing, but that potential theory dies once she deletes the texts. At that stage you just show the damn texts to prove you did nothing wrong. Even if you’re opposed to showing partners your phone, you don’t delete the messages. And any other potential reality/explanation on that side of the fence leads her right back to dumpsville (eg she’s not cheating but likes the drama so wants OP to think she’s cheating, or is ‘testing him’, and so on). I don’t see any potential answer that ties everything together and where they just go back to normal.

You’re totally within your rights not to answer OP, but have you done anything with this since or are you guys carrying on as normal?

wiggle16

Millionaire only not wrote: »

There cheating because women especially the ones that mind them looks wise are putting it out there !
Look there going to be propositioned wether u like it or not and 90% of the time they won’t!
But if there’s issues at home , or the partner is not minding himself etc , this is new lease of life! Maybe one last fling etc
They usually only do it for the excitement!

And sure tis grand if no one is caught

mod:

This kind of sexist generalisation isn't helpful and is of no use to the OP. Unless you have constructive advice for the OP, don't post.

ShaShaBear

Op, first off some of the more recent replies in here regarding women and cheating are downright horrific. Please don't use them to make a decision, regardless of what your partner is or isn't guilty of.

At this point, it sounds like the late start to middle of emotional cheating. Attacking, approaching, confronting or calling the "other man" is not an option if you want to handle this like a mature adult. Firstly, because you have no right to accuse him of harassing your partner when you don't know if that's truly what he is doing. Secondly because, once he has full consent, he can do what he likes. It's up to your partner to put the foot down and any grown woman will be well aware that continuing to message a man who has declared an unrequited interest is counter-productive.

I would safely say what started as harmless messages has quickly grown into light and possibly heavy flirtation and your partner is getting a massive ego boost while thinking it's a safe play as both of them are "taken". But the thing is, these kinds of text-based relationships can easily get out of hand as you can disguise tone, think about responses and say things you would generally never say face-to-face. They're fantasy and fabricated. It can be very easy to progress to a real affair, which usually goes belly-up fast when one or both parties realize that they were drawn in hook, line and sinker with rose-guilded words.

She is definitely displaying clear signs of covering up an affair of some degree. People who are cheating will only admit to what they're caught doing/saying. Nothing more. And the lie increases every time more is found out.
"I'm not messaging him."
"I'm not messaging him back. He's on mute so I don't get his messages."
"I only send back one-word responses to be polite."
"He's asked to meet me but I said no." (this is a GREAT indication that the rest is lies, because it's highly unlikely your married delivery driver is asking your partner to meet him in private on the basis of one-word replies)
"We bumped into each other."
"We went for coffee, he put me on the spot."
"It was only one kiss, it meant nothing."
"I made a mistake, I regret it."

This is coming from a woman who did all of the above with an ex-partner. Not one bit proud, but I can see all the signs and remember them all and what they led to.

Your ONLY option is to sit down and tell your wife that she IS lying to you. You know she is lying, but you can't understand why. She has broken your trust and her deleting the evidence isn't even giving you the option to determine if the relationship is salvageable and she needs to explain herself because you do not believe the current set of excuses that has increased exponentially to encompass all that you've caught her at so far. And then make a firm and fast decision on what she tells you. Either leave, or stay and forget about it. There's no in-between.