Did my wife cheat?

[vandemonium]

I will describe my problem then at the end ask 4 questions I genuinely want answers to.

 

A few years ago I went through a 2 week trauma that left me with PTSD. I’m talking 2 weeks of pure stress with multiple opportunities to get killed. Due to the PTSD I got very self-obsessed and neglected my marriage.

 

6 months after the event my wife of 7 years told me she wanted to fly to her old home state and attend a school reunion. I supported this and agreed to stay and look after our 6 year old and 18 month old kids. A week before the trip she changed plans and flights from leaving Saturday coming back Sunday to leaving Friday coming back Sunday. I dropped her to the airport,she flew interstate and 6 hours after leaving, rang me to say she had arrived.The caller ID said she was ringing from her mum’s place which is a 3 hour drive from the airport, so everything fitted.

 

The trouble started when I picked her up on Sunday. I asked her if the hire car arrangements had been trouble free and she said she hadn’t hired a car. She admitted that aspart of the weekend she had met an old boyfriend. He had picked her up at the airport and driven her to her old home town where the reunion was. She has talked about this ex before and their relationship had ended badly. He had mental health issues and when she had dumped him he had held her against her will, raped her and made her pregnant. She had escaped, got restraining orders against him and had an abortion. Sounds whacky but is absolutely true.

 

I was very upset with this news, not just because of the betrayal but because I had no idea she could be sneaky and deceptive. It was a complete betrayal of trust. I sulked for a day. I did get hold of her phone,recovered the call history and found the number of the old boyfriend. I rang him up and warned him off. The next day after the kids were in bed I started having it out with her. I asked her for details and discovered something about her that I didn’t know. She is hopeless at lying, she may as well have a flashing light that goes on when she does. For simplicity I will condense various conversations we had over about a month.

 

She said it was a pure coincidence that they were both in the airport city at the same time. She admitted to going out to a bar with him after the reunion on Saturday night but nothing had happened. She denied going to his hotel room. I asked about the Friday night and after some blustering it was obvious that she couldn’t conceal lies from me. She admitted she had dropped her gear at her mother’s then gone out with him for “a couple of beers”.I asked what time she got home and she said about 2AM. I pointed out that the call log on her phone showed her calling a taxi at 4.30 AM. I asked her why she had admitted to going out on the Saturday night but not the Friday. She replied, “I would have told you if you’d asked”. I asked her how she got home Saturday night she initially said she’d taken another taxi then, realising I had her phone log, changed that immediately to, “he gave me a lift”. That was obviously a lie. At this stage I had uncovered enough lies to know something serious had happened. I stopped asking questions simply because I knew that in my fragile mental state I knew I couldn’t handle the truth I thought I was about to find. I told her that as far as I was concerned our marriage was over.She cried and begged me not to leave. She said she hadn’t realised before the trip that what she was doing would destroy my trust but she did now.

 

Over the next few weeks I knew she was chatting with him online plus getting phone calls and emails from him. She would immediately delete her sent emails to him and received emails from him. I only saw 2 emails from him when I got on the computer before she got up in the morning, read them then marked them as unread. In one he said he had repressed his feelings for her because he knew she was married but now that “the barriers are down” he declared his love for her. Reading between the lines, for the next month and ahalf she plotted for them to move back to her old home town together with my kids. I gather it fell apart when he refused to leave his wife.

 

In amongst all this I found her one day researching anti-psychotic medications. When I asked why she said that during that trip she had seen some pills of his and was trying to research them. When I asked where she had seen them she said, “it must have been at mums”. When I pointed out this was an obvious lie, she said she’s seen them at his hotel when he was checking in and freshening up on the Friday night. This again was a lie but I didn’t challenge her as I still didn’t have the strength if I found a really bad truth. At one point I said what she had done was cheating but she flatly denied that and was apparently speaking honestly. That confused me but since then I think I have figured it out. I think her definition of cheating is intercourse. She didn’t have intercourse with him so in her mind she didn’t cheat. My definition of cheating is meeting and old boyfriend behind my back, going out with him and being in his hotel room.

 

Since then our marriage has improved. We had more sex in the next 3 months than in the previous 3 years. I got over my PTSD and things are relatively normal. The problem is I place a lot of value in trust and I now don’ttrust her. I also have a big issue on the timing of this event. I was suicidal at the time and really needed a friend not a kick in the teeth. So here I am. I now have the strength to know the truth and am thinking about confronting her again. Things could go two ways. Either I find out there was more to it than just meeting and dancing, at which point our marriage is over, or I find out nothing really happened and I can trust her again. Frankly I’m terrified.

 

Here are the questions you can help me with.

 

Despite the answers I force out of her, do you think I already have enough information to say she cheated? Let’s presume she didn’t have intercourse with him. Would she lie if she had nothing to hide? The lies/deception I know she told are-

 

* Meeting him at the airport was a coincidence. he changed flights only days before the trip.

* Tried to conceal the fact she went out with him Friday night as well as Saturday, then lied about when she got home after the Friday night.

* Lied about how she got home Saturday night. Noway would he have driven her home after drinking all night, especially on themain party night of the week. I can’t think of any reason she would lie about this unless it was the fact that she didn’t actually go home.

* Lied about where saw his pills. Twice said she hadn’t gone to his hotel then said saw them briefly when checking him in on the Friday.

 

* Can I presume that the bits she tried to conceal or lie about are the bits she is ashamed of? In that case I am confused. She tried to conceal Friday night and lied about how she got home Saturday night.

* Should I bring it all up again? Ideally your answers to the above questions will put my mind at ease so I don’t have to risk my marriage.

 

Please, I am very genuine.

Edited July 22, 2015 by a LoveShack.org Moderator
Edited for readability

[nightmare01]

It doesn't sound good.

[Morro72]

She's a liar. Whether she had sex with the guy is almost beside the point.

[aliveagain]

[* Tried to conceal the fact she went out with him Friday night as well as Saturday, then lied about when she got home after the Friday night.

* Lied about how she got home Saturday night. Noway would he have driven her home after drinking all night, especially on themain party night of the week. I can’t think of any reason she would lie about this unless it was the fact that she didn’t actually go home.

* Lied about where saw his pills. Twice said she hadn’t gone to his hotel then said saw them briefly when checking him in on the Friday.

 

She called a cab at 4:30 a.m. are there many places open at that time of the morning where she was? Too many red flags and coincidences to believe nothing happened. They planned and spent a weekend together, you caught her. It is not your task to prove she cheated, you caught her in her lies, it's her task to prove to you she didn't spend the weekend in a hotel with him. Tell her you expect her to pass a polygraph test, see what her reaction is. I would get tested for STD's.

[66Charger]

Wait a second. She planned to leave you, take YOUR kids and move back with him? And it only fell apart because he wouldnt leave his wife? That means he was MARRIED. And she knew it! You are plan B.

 

Dont you realise she almost divorced you? And YOU were not part of that equation. The decision was HIS.

 

READ THAT AGAIN....slowly

 

You are asking the wrong questions to the wrong person. The only person who should be answering your questions us a divorce attorney.

 

This will happen again.

[Raena]

Too many lies and she's hiding something. It could be that nothing happened physically, but something obviously happened emotionally to where he felt the need to say that the barriers were down. What makes you think that she was plotting to move back home to be with him with your kids? Were you surmising or was there something else that you found that made you think that was her plan?

 

It seems to me like she planned to see him there that weekend, or maybe didn't plan it but met up with him anyway. Either way it seems highly likely that she stayed with him the one night she didn't call a cab. This doesn't mean anything happened between them, but it's enough doubt that I would say yes, something happened.

 

Do you need full and complete proof and admission of guilt from her to make you decision about what to do? The information you have is damning, but it's not absolute proof. Some people need the proof or an admission of guilt to call it quits, other's don't. Not sure where you stand on that.

 

If you still have his number, you could call him directly and ask him what happened... that you need the truth. You could tell her to take a lie detector test like others suggested or you could just go with your gut. What is your gut telling you?

[Arieswoman]

vandemonium,

what does it matter if your wife actually physically cheated or not?

 

She disrespected you and your marriage. She made plans with an ex b/f

 

for the next month and ahalf she plotted for them to move back to her old home town together with my kids.

 

including taking your kids with her.

 

I have emphasised the above ^^ because you need to realise that this woman was plotting to take your kids away without your knowledge or consent.

 

You are not risking your marriage, she risked your marriage by meeting up with an ex under dodgy circumstances and then lying about it.

 

And she did all this at a time when you needed her most as you had health problems.

 

(You say you had PTSD ,

 

A few years ago I went through a 2 week trauma that left me with PTSD. I’m talking 2 weeks of pure stress with multiple opportunities to get killed.

 

I was suicidal at the time and really needed a friend not a kick in the teeth.

 

So I presume you are/were in the military? - If so your wife is an absolute disgrace as a military wife)

 

This is one of the shabbiest examples of behaviour I have read on here for a while.

I think you need to think carefully about why you would want to stay with someone you can't trust and who blatantly disrespects you?

 

I'm sorry x

[drifter777]

She saw your reaction and threat to end the marriage when you busted her with the first set of lies. Now, without solid evidence, she will never admit to you that she screwed him. She's prepared now - you helped her practice. Real fear makes good liars out of cheaters.

 

Look, adults go to a hotel room to have sex. She went to his hotel room. You connect the dots.

[SSJROMANCE]

I would say without a doubt she cheated on you. She is trying to tell u enough information without giving you the absolute truth. It's starts with the cover up then little by little truth here and truth there. If u keep pressing you will find the truth. In fact maybe there wasn't a reunion at all. Maybe it was all about him.

 

One day my wife gets a call. It's from the husband of a friend who lives out of state. He asked to speak with his wife. She said I don't know what u are talking about she isn't here. The husband goes oh she said she was going out of town to spend the weekend with you. Obviously he felt something was up and was checking her whereabouts. Turns out she spent the weekend with a guy she met and made up this story. They were divorced shortly after.

 

I feel for you. She is definitely hiding something. You have the right to know the truth and don't let anyone on this site tell you otherwise. Good luck.

[Friskyone4u]

If you do not consider spending the night in a hotel with another man for ANY reason cheating I guess she did not cheat.

 

If you want to get out of denial and try to get the truth, you might want to show her some real consequences. If you sweep this under the rug, you can be sure it will happen again.

 

Married women simply do not defy their husbands twice and spend nights alone in hotel rooms with other men and any other conversation you are having with her is ludicrous and a somescreen.

 

Why don't you tell her she will be taking a polygraph, and watch her either become angry you do not "trust" her or turn as white as Casper The Ghost.

 

The only question here is what are you going to do about what she did, so I suggest you start asking the right questions

[Buckeye2]

She admitted that aspart of the weekend she had met an old boyfriend. He had picked her up at the airport and driven her to her old home town where the reunion was. She has talked about this ex before and their relationship had ended badly. He had mental health issues and when she had dumped him he had held her against her will, raped her and made her pregnant. She had escaped, got restraining orders against him and had an abortion.

 

She had her rapist pick her up at the airport?

 

Sounds whacky but is absolutely true.

 

Are you sure about that?

 

Since then our marriage has improved. We had more sex in the next 3 months than in the previous 3 years.

 

"Hysterical bonding" Look it up.

[italianjob]

One shot post. Weird Story. Insisting it's genuine...

Have my doubts, but, if this story is real:

 

- Not only it's quite obvious she cheated, she was also planning to leave you and take your children with her (and bring them to live with a man with mental health problems and a rapist!). You should see an attorney as soon as possible and put all your ducks in a row. This is a red alert situation also for your children well being.

 

She has talked about this ex before and their relationship had ended badly. He had mental health issues and when she had dumped him he had held her against her will, raped her and made her pregnant. She had escaped, got restraining orders against him and had an abortion. Sounds whacky but is absolutely true..

 

- Here, either this is far from "absolutely true", but is just a story she fed you to cover something else, or your wife has really really really serious issues herself.

 

Rape victims usually don't go back for more, not even after several years...

[jen1447]

* Can I presume that the bits she tried to conceal or lie about are the bits she is ashamed of? In that case I am confused. She tried to conceal Friday night and lied about how she got home Saturday night.

Probably not. Ppl tend to carpet bomb lies when they're not sure what they'll be covering up.

* Should I bring it all up again? Ideally your answers to the above questions will put my mind at ease so I don’t have to risk my marriage.

 

Sounds like you don't want to bring it up and want to just have a stable marriage. Avoiding the questions or the truth won't give you that, unfortunately.

[sandylee1]

She slept with him and to believe she didn't or that she didn't engage in any other sexual relations is quite simply denial or hoping for the best.

 

You don't plan to move state with your kids just like that. You are the fall back guy and somehow you've missed that part and are focused on whether she slept with him.

 

Do you know if she really loves you?

How can you trust her after she plotted to move with your kids?

 

Now she's probably just the OW for her Ex. I suggest you find his wife and tell her everything.

 

Get std tested yourself.

 

Who plans to life happily ever after with the guy who raped her?

I think the affair has been going on for longer than you think.

Consider a paternity test for your kids, especially the youngest .

Did she even book a rental car?

She never saw the meds on check in, you know that.

 

The only reason to lie, is that she had a lot to hide.

 

If you want the full truth, ask for a full timeline of how they reconnected, with nothing left out. You tell her that anything else you find out will mean divorce , so she better be honest now.

 

Your fear of the truth has left you ignoring the obvious. I'm not saying it's impossible to go to a guy's hotel room and not have sex, because I've done it myself. I met a guy went to his room, but I didn't sleep with him. We did make out , but the big difference is that I wasn't married.

[bubbaganoosh]

Take her for a polygraph. Right now all your doing is hiding from the truth and it will not get better.

 

You can't live like this and the only thing that will happen is that it will play on your mind to the point where you can function. Not worth it.

 

Get everything out on the table and at least you can make a reasonable call for your life. If not you'll never heal.

[wizer]

You'll never be sure about the truth, you can't force it out of her.

 

All you can do is prove further lies.

 

You can't trust her, you'll never be able to trust her.

 

Can you really live like this?

[spanz1]

insufficient details to really comment.

 

 

But it sounds like this "rape" story was b.s. She got pregnant, and needed an excuse why it happened, and made up that story.

 

 

Sounds like she is having doubts about the marriage. Maybe because you "ignored her", maybe she just never really loved you and needed a husband in a hurry and married the first bloke who asked her.

 

 

Did she cheat? well it certainly looks like she did. She did all the clandestine stuff and lied about it. they might have just played cards all night long and reminisced about old times, or they might have gotten physical. She will not tell you. You MIGHT get it out of her by scheduling a polygraph and hoping for the parking lot confession.

 

 

You probably need to work on communicating more with her. assure her that she can tell you anything, and demand straight answers. Say she can tell you anything and you will not get mad, but if she says something this time and you later find it is not true you will divorce her immediately. then talk about what happened. be really soothing and understanding. If she says she screwed this guy, THEN you can dump her cheating azz by the side of the road.

 

 

I am hoping for the best for you!

[happyman64]

 

Over the next few weeks I knew she was chatting with him online plus getting phone calls and emails from him. She would immediately delete her sent emails to him and received emails from him. I only saw 2 emails from him when I got on the computer before she got up in the morning, read them then marked them as unread. In one he said he had repressed his feelings for her because he knew she was married but now that “the barriers are down” he declared his love for her. Reading between the lines, for the next month and ahalf she plotted for them to move back to her old home town together with my kids. I gather it fell apart when he refused to leave his wife.

 

This is cheating. Does your wife know you have read these emails and know their plans?

 

 

Have you ever googled Stockholm syndrome?

 

 

Your wife needs a good psychologist.

 

 

She also needs to be shown consequences for her bad decisions.

 

 

Did you call the OMW and expose the affair?

[Noirek]

IF your wife was raped...

 

SHE needs serious help for meeting back up with him not in a coffee, safe place to clear the air but in a drinking and "good times" way.

 

as to your question. Yes, she cheated. You don't have to be physical with someone to cheat or even get sexy. What they did looks like building a dating relationship... while she is with you. That is cheating.

[turnera]

You guys need to be in therapy. To work on your marriage and to find out for her why she could hook up again with a man who raped her.

[RightThere]

You are in the process of getting what is called "trickle truth".

 

You need to assume that everything she is telling you about it is a lie to cover her tracks.

 

I would definitely NOT assume they didn't have sex. If a bar closes at 2:00 AM and she calls a cab at 4:30 AM, there was definitely something going on.

 

This was not spur of the moment. She's probably been communicating with him for a while and him professing his love is usually the result of a long and strong emotional affair, likely capped off with a physical affair.

 

100% what is going on is inappropriate. Your two weeks of PTSD is not what caused her to say "Well this has been a rough two weeks. Let's see what my ex who raped me is up to".

 

You are in deep trouble my friend. This relationship is in grave danger and you need to get (1) The whole truth and (2) some serious counselling.

[Artie Lang]

trust your gut, my friend.

[loveboid]

I think she's desperately trying to leave you and is trying to shack up with the closest guy who'll have her.

[vandemonium]

[FONT=Times New Roman][sIZE=3][/sIZE][/FONT]I will describe my problem then at the end ask 4 questions Igenuinely want answers to.

A few years ago I went through a 2 week trauma that left mewith PTSD. I’m talking 2 weeks of pure stress with multiple opportunities toget killed. Due to the PTSD I got very self-obsessed and neglected my marriage.

 

6 months after the event my wife of 7 years told me shewanted to fly to her old home state and attend a school reunion. I supportedthis and agreed to stay and look after our 6 year old and 18 month old kids. Aweek before the trip she changed plans and flights from leaving Saturday comingback Sunday to leaving Friday coming back Sunday. I dropped her to the airport,she flew interstate and 6 hours after leaving, rang me to say she had arrived.The caller ID said she was ringing from her mum’s place which is a 3 hour drivefrom the airport, so everything fitted.

 

The trouble startedwhen I picked her up on Sunday. I asked her if the hire car arrangements hadbeen trouble free and she said she hadn’t hired a car. She admitted that aspart of the weekend she had met an old boyfriend. He had picked her up at theairport and driven her to her old home town where the reunion was. She hastalked about this ex before and their relationship had ended badly. He hadmental health issues and when she had dumped him he had held her against herwill, raped her and made her pregnant. She had escaped, got restraining ordersagainst him and had an abortion. Sounds whacky but is absolutely true.

 

I was very upset with this news, not just because of thebetrayal but because I had no idea she could be sneaky and deceptive. It was acomplete betrayal of trust. I sulked for a day. I did get hold of her phone,recovered the call history and found the number of the old boyfriend. I ranghim up and warned him off. The next day after the kids were in bed I started havingit out with her. I asked her for details and discovered something about herthat I didn’t know. She is hopeless at lying, she may as well have a flashinglight that goes on when she does. For simplicity I will condense variousconversations we had over about a month.

 

She said it was a pure coincidence that they were both inthe airport city at the same time. She admitted to going out to a bar with himafter the reunion on Saturday night but nothing had happened. She denied goingto his hotel room. I asked about the Friday night and after some blustering itwas obvious that she couldn’t conceal lies from me. She admitted she haddropped her gear at her mother’s then gone out with him for “a couple ofbeers”. I asked what time she got home and she said about 2AM. I pointed outthat the call log on her phone showed her calling a taxi at 4.30AM. I asked herwhy she had admitted to going out on the Saturday night but not the Friday. Shereplied, “I would have told you of you’d asked”. I asked her how she got homeSaturday night She initially said she’d taken another taxi then, realising Ihad her phone log, changed that immediately to, “he gave me a lift”. That wasobviously a lie. At this stage I had uncovered enough lies to know somethingserious had happened. I stopped asking questions simply because I knew that inmy fragile mental state I knew I couldn’t handle the truth I thought I wasabout to find. I told her that as far as I was concerned our marriage was over.She cried and begged me not to leave. She said she hadn’t realised before thetrip that what she was doing would destroy my trust but she did now.

 

Over the next few weeks I knew she was chatting with him online plus getting phone calls and emails from him. She would immediately deleteher sent emails to him and received emails from him. I only saw 2 emails fromhim when I got on the computer before she got up in the morning, read them thenmarked them as unread. In one he said he had repressed his feelings for herbecause he knew she was married but now that “the barriers are down” hedeclared his love for her. Reading between the lines, for the next month and ahalf she plotted for them to move back to her old home town together with mykids. I gather it fell apart when he refused to leave his wife.

 

In amongst all this I found her one day researchinganti-psychotic medications. When I asked why she said that during that trip shehad seen some pills of his and was trying to research them. When I asked whereshe had seen then she said, “it must have been at mums”. When I pointed outthis was an obvious lie, she said she’s seen them at his hotel when he waschecking in and freshening up on the Friday night. This again was a lie but Ididn’t challenge her as I still didn’t have the strength if I found a reallybad truth. At one point I said what she had done was cheating but she flatlydenied that and was apparently speaking honestly. That confused me but since thenI think I have figured it out. I think her definition of cheating isintercourse. She didn’t have intercourse with him so in her mind she didn’tcheat. My definition of cheating is meeting and old boyfriend behind my back,going out with him and being in his hotel room.

 

Since then our marriage has improved. We had more sex in thenext 3 months than in the previous 3 years. I got over my PTSD and things arerelatively normal. The problem is I place a lot of value in trust and I nowdon’t trust her. I also have a big issue on the timing of this event. I wassuicidal at the time and really needed a friend not a kick in the teeth. Sohere I am. I now have the strength to know the truth and am thinking aboutconfronting her again. Things could go two ways. Either I find out there wasmore to it than just meeting and dancing, at which point our marriage is over,or I find out nothing really happened and I can trust her again. Frankly I’mterrified.

 

Here are the questions you can help me with.

Question 1. Despite the answers I force out of her, do youthink I already have enough information to say she cheated? Let’s presume shedidn’t have intercourse with him.

Question 2. Would she lie if she had nothing to hide? Thelies or deception I know she told are-

• Meeting him at the airport was a coincidence.She changed flights only days before the trip.
  
• Tried to conceal the fact she went out with himFriday night as well as Saturday, then lied about when she got home after theFriday night.
  
• Lied about how she got home Saturday night. Noway would he have driven her home after drinking all night, especially on themain party night of the week. I can’t think of any reason she would lie aboutthis unless it was the fact that she didn’t actually go home.
  
• Lied about where saw his pills. Twice said shehadn’t gone to his hotel then said saw them briefly when checking him in on theFriday.
  

Question 3. Can I presume that the bits she tried to concealor lie about are the bits she is ashamed of? In that case I am confused. Shetried to conceal Friday night and lied about how she got home Saturday night.

Question 4. Should I bring it all up again? Ideally youranswers to the above questions will put my mind at ease so I don’t have to riskmy marriage.

Please, I am very genuine.

[FONT=Times New Roman][sIZE=3][/sIZE][/FONT]

[NopeNah]

Odds are she did. To what extent,who knows? The lies tell the truth and once the trust is gone,it's a loooong road back. Plus the fact that she remained in contact with him after what he "did", who even knows if that's what really happened?