[badmemory]

A recent thread about signs missed got me wondering. My wife had a two year PA (13 month R so far). I'm curious about others who's spouse had a long term affair - 1 year or longer. Now that you look back.

1)What clear signs did you miss/ignore?

2)How did you catch them?

Mine:

1) - Facebooking and computer use early in the morning/late at night
- Frequent GNO
- Frequent and extended shopping trips on the weekend

2) - Saw texts on her cell phone - got trickle truth - removed head from arse, then recovered AP's deleted e-mails on her computer.

How stupid did I feel? Very. Funny how I trusted so completely and how things are now so different.

 

[indiecat]

1) He said she was just a 'friend'.
2)Phone bill

 

[BrokenHeartedBelle]

Signs that I missed/ignored included:
-working late two or three nights a week and working Saturdays
-suddenly receiving work texts very late
-sending me and our kids on vacation without him because of work
-staying up after I went to bed

He started his own business around the same time the A started, so it was easy for me to believe that he was working.

I got suspicious a few months before I caught him, then one day I had an overwhelming urge to check his work lap top. He had just called to tell me he was working late for the third Friday night in a row. I found a secret e-mail account with the user name "itscomplicated". He hadn't deleted his sent e-mails to the OW.

 

[Gabriel]

Password protection of phone. Frequently changing passwords.

 

[BrokenHeartedBelle]

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I started having dreams where he was cheating on me.

Maybe it was my subconscious screaming at me to get a clue...

 

[DavidWYoung]

She could not look me in the eye. She started to dress alot better for work. I had a gut feeling. She would giv me verbal barbs or just start a fight so she could go out alone.

 

[Chris989]

Staying out late was the main thing when she hadn't ever done so before. Changed her phone contract. I had a gut feeling too as I thought she had been obsessed with the OM for several years before the PA started.

I found out because she told me a little (that they had kissed) and I figured the rest out; gave up dragging it out of her after a few months but I know pretty much everything except: Why?

We might make it yet, but the divorce petition is arriving from the court any day so we might not too...

 

[the guy]

You know alot of it had to do with not giving a damb about my wife. If you don't care, then why bother looking..right.

I mean in my case it wasn't a LTA with one individual, but 13 years of adultorus behavior with different man, sure there was a few in rotation, but for the most part it was 1-6 week affairs with a bunch of ONS in between.

Her 1st one (13 years from '10) was some what of a confrontation/d-day but was swept under the rug. From then I just didn't care and went about by life. I guess I can best descrip it as friends with benifit rather then a marriage.

Any way almost 3 years ago I didn't like my life and started to make changes for my self. By this time my fWW was leaving in the middle of the night ( going to bed together, me waking up in the middle of the night with her gone, and waking up back together again) spending weekend away only to return Monday morning.

After 13 year of snowballing behavior from GNO coming home late to not coming home at all. It had got to a point were I didn't even care anymore,(I got to do what I wanted) never asked and just....went blank with the marriage.

3 years ago something just snapped and I finally confronted her. For some reason I deside to give a damb and look, hell in a way it was easy to find actually.

So in my case it wasn't so much missing signs, it was more like not caring about the signs....as long as I got what I wanted and did what I wanted she could have and did what ever she wanted.

 

[the guy]

I still can't figure out why I confronted her on that day!

And yes I feel stupid..not for seeing the signs, but ignoring them and not caring about the signs.

 

[Labcoat]

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I started having dreams where he was cheating on me.

Maybe it was my subconscious screaming at me to get a clue...

No no no no... my xWF had several dreams where I hadcheated on her. Why? Because it was clearly something that, was, on her mind, I guess. it sure as heck was not because of any thing i actually did.
Posted via Mobile Device

 

[WasDecimated]

Sex life dropped off noticeably
Passwords on phone and computer
Much more time on line...fakebook.
More GNOs...staying out later.
Less eye contact and holding hands...much less physical contact.
Less communication.
Staying up late on computer.
Dressing more provocative
More shopping-spending...clothes.
3 hour groceries shopping trips
Gasoline use and mileage went up
Generally disconnected from family.
New friends that I wasn't introduced to
Cell/text usage went up...way up.
New hair style and attention to makeup
Started exercising more.
Secretive about whereabouts during contact
She would become annoyed easily with me.
Household responsibilities dropped way off.
ecame more forgetful in general
A noticable distancing from her family.
Much more waxing...trimming...shaving....not for me.

....just off the top of my head

 

[Surprisesinlife]

New friends from work
Started manscaping
Grouchy on the weekends especially Sundays
Lost 95 pounds
Started dressing better

 

[RWB]

Phone was glued to her
F--kBook all night long
Sex vanished
Argued about everything, even where I put the trash can???
Email was protected
Shopping trips "alone"
Grooming her private areas, not for me to see

Busted by her FB at all hours of the night, my grown daughter noticed who was online with her and called me. Emails had all the proof I needed.

 

[NEVER HAPPEN 2 ME RIGHT?]

My wife's affair was "only" about 4 and a half months, but I am going to be a rebel and weigh in any way!

After the initial betrayal at a conference with the OM, she came home and seemed off. Distant, avoiding eye contact, etc.

Over the coming months though the list of red flags grew:

Lost weight, working out more etc
Buying new, sexy underwear
More new clothes, dressing a little sexier in general
More after hours work events, dinners, team social events etc
Increased alcohol consumption
Drastically increased level of sexual desire at home
Always seemed irritated with me and our kids, like it was all she could do to be in the same room at times. Constantly bickering and searching for a fight, over the smallest and dumbest things.

Caught the occasional undeleted text to OM, but never a smoking gun. Finally found an email exchange that spelled things out in more detail and gave me the ammo needed for full confrontation.

Always amazes me that I didn't put all the red flags together better until d-Day. I mean come on man!!!! I think that on a certain level, I knew something was going on for at least the last 2 months or so. But just couldn't accept that my wife would do that. I mean not MY wife, right??? Denial is an incredibly powerful emotion.

 

[slater]

3 yr LTA-
I confronted w/o evidence 6 months in. I was an idiot- didn't know how to confirm. Kept getting gaslighted- in MC as well.

In my case- they travelled for work together about once/month although went several 6-8 month patches w/o seeing each other. Almost impossible to catch. used IM on blackberry - erased after each IM

signs-
no sex
on phone all the time
caught a few email that were suspicious (used code)
boob job
changed the way she dressed.
all the classic signs.

I can tell you- my WW was a high moral person before all this. We were active in our church, she taught sunday school. None of that matters I know now. At the time, it made it hard to believe the signs.

Caught her;
VAR in her car. took 2 days. This website. If only I had found this place 3 years earlier

 

[iheartlife]

phone surgically attached to hand
phone passworded
very emotionally distant, constantly picking fights over small things
no sex

the scary thing for me is that this happened 2x, 3 years apart. The first time I knew we were in a super bad place and I had begged him for months to tell me the truth (he vehemently denied he was in an affair).

I was just naive, I didn't know anything about the magnetic draw of affairs, it never occurred to me he was right back in the thick of things

but unfortunately I found out both times by pure luck
--first time, secret email account open on our home computer
--second time, he texted me thinking I was her.

The fact that he could hide it so incredibly well is still disturbing. So no, I don't really feel like a fool in that sense.

 

[mahike]

Phone would go to the bathroom with her.
More concern about grooming
I did not check the phone bills but text messaging went way up
less sex and contact with me
did not care about the house

The grooming should have been the big tip off but I was just blind

 

[naga75]

1) as per everyone else:
phone surgically attached to person at all times
phone in bathroom for morning shower
missing blocks of time during day (she is SAHM)
waxing often
picking fights over the most trivial of things (come to find out when she and OM would have a fight she would come home and take it out on ME wtf how phucked up is that)
no kissing or hand holding
more "prep time" before leaving house
she wouldnt kiss me goodbye in the morning before leaving for the "gym" (most of their encounters were in the morning before/after/when she was supposed to be at the gym). this one REALLY stuck out for me. i questioned myself about it a lot waaay before i knew anything. moral: listen to your gut.
locked computer.
locked phone.
different email password/resistant to giving me password.
cell usage was through the roof. as one person posted, i never checked.
i did last week and checked one of the months before they went to "text free" app and saw that she had 2,000 texts to/from him in one month. TWO THOUSAND. in the same month, i had 450 or so to/from her. that really made me trigger, and as a matter of fact i want to put my fist through this computer screen thinking about it.
i wonder why i never thought to look at cell phone usage history online.
OH YEAH, because i trusted my wife. thats why.
other than that, pretty much wanting to be anywhere except with me.

2) i was informed by one of my family members, who's friend was a friend of OM.
of course i didnt get the truth. "one time" then "seven times" then "we stopped last july" blah blah blah.
three months into our FIRST false R i had a gut feeling and actually WENT with it, hacked iphone backup and found deleted texts from last november detailing meetings and some sick sh!t lemme tell ya nothing you want to read your wife sending another man i promise.
then two months into our SECOND false R i had a gut feeling (which, you guessed it, i NEVER ignore anyomore), looked through her email (she had given me password) and happened across one from yahoo telling her her password had changed on ANOTHER account (whoops bet she thought she had deleted it). so i tried signing into that account, no dice. so i reset her password, sent the new one to her everyday email address i had the password for, and LO AND FKN BEHOLD there was all two months of their correspondence.
at that point, i blew my fkn top. though, luckily, i didnt make any choice that sent me to jail for a long time, or make POSOM's kids into orphans. but i was reeeeeeeeeal close.
i wish i had handled it a bit differently, becuase it would have been a better memory. just changing the password and not saying anything and watching things unfold like that, as she slowly grasped the truth. but subtlety has never suited me.
ah well.
im going to go hit something now.

 

[badmemory]

I still can't figure out why I confronted her on that day!

And yes I feel stupid..not for seeing the signs, but ignoring them and not caring about the signs.

The Guy, I hear ya. In my case, I was often happy to have her out of the house or on her computer so I could be left in peace and do my own thing at home. But I always thought that she was socializing with her girlfriends. Never gave it a thought, until she started spending too many weekend nights out late. Even then, I didn't suspect that she was cheating; just disrespecting me as a husband.

And I would never have suspected she would cheat with her best friend's husband. She was so close to this friend I was more shocked about that than her cheating on me.

Quite a life lesson.

 

[remorseful strayer]

A recent thread about signs missed got me wondering. My wife had a two year PA (13 month R so far). I'm curious about others who's spouse had a long term affair - 1 year or longer. Now that you look back.

1)What clear signs did you miss/ignore?

2)How did you catch them?

After being caught the first time, seeing a prostitute regularly, I became incredibly stealthy.

The second affair went on for years, because I was careful to do none of the things mentioned here.

I acted completely normal and attentive to my wife. She thought we were in a good reconciliation. She even commented that i treated her better than pre prostituted days.

She only found out because she was told.

Sadly the fact that she reconciled the first time made me feel as if she would not leave me if a second time did come to light.

She did leave though. She was devastated by my straying, and I am devastated about loosing her over shallow relations with other women.