Husband has stormed out because I found messages on his phone

[Welshie2]

My husband has been acting strange/secretive with his phone for a couple of weeks now so I took it on myself to look at his phone. Yes I know it’s morally dodgy but we have each others log ins and I looked at it whilst he was feeding DS dinner (it was charging upstairs).

There is a woman who is obviously a co-worker. I only had time to look at messages from the past two days. He was in the office today. He messaged her to say please walk past my desk again so I can look at your arse. She said she’d be back up in an hour and she will walk slowly this time. He then messaged again (after about an hour) to say that was the highlight of his afternoon to which she replied she knew her trousers would get attention today and sent a peach symbol. That was the last message.

I confronted him straight away and he stormed off and hasn’t come home yet. Said how dare I look at his phone. I have tried to call him and he just declined the call. He sent a text to say I’ve betrayed his trust and he can’t believe I did that instead of speaking to him.

Am I wrong to have done this, I think that if you know something is up then it’s within your right to investigate?

Mine doesn’t?

Agree, she sounds like a piece of work as well. Imagine a man starting those messages at work, he'd be hauled straight into HR. Very inappropriate. But yes, he should have shut it down and reported her for sexual harrassment. Men are so easily flattered and led by their dicks.

But it doesn’t change much if he’s deleted things or not. His story doesn’t add up. What’s missing is what’s been said or done in person which I think is not what he has said to you.

He says he can’t do that without it being suspicious and it would be career suicide/risk the roof over our heads.

Either he’s done a number on you, and your confidence is rock bottom or you’re just incredibly naive.

How can you trust him and be happy with him again? Hes not only cheated (that’s cheating in my eyes, doesn’t have to be physical) but he’s blamed you and shown no real empathy towards you. He doesn’t love you - if he did, he wouldn’t do this. He probably doesn’t love anyone except himself.

He didn’t care much about these potentially catastrophic outcomes when he was messaging her to walk past his desk so he could perv at her arse, was he?

I couldn’t look at him with respect again.

When you delete a message you’ve sent, you can also delete the ‘you deleted this message’ part. So they’ll be no evidence of it.

[...] I need time to decide what I want.

So the first thing to decide is if you really mean this, or are you bluffing him?
Are you seriously considering divorcing him?
Because that is the only decision to make here: divorce, or stay in the marriage (with or without marriage counselling). What other options are there?

No-one would blame you if you decided to stay in the marriage, even knowing what you know, because you have a young child. There are huge obstacles and penalties to splitting up: finances, practicalities, sharing DS, trying to go back to work with endless childcare issues, etc.

However, keep in the back of your mind that divorce is always an option in later years, even if you don't jump to it straight away.

I hate to say this but it's probably going to come out in the wash anyway. If he says nothing and she goes to his boss he is in shit

He's already risked his job by a sexually suggestive response. He should have thought about that before.

And this is just what's on his phone. He was stupid enough to send that to someone working under him. You don't know what's happened between them at work.

I don't believe she sent such a blatant message to him about the desk without a lot of encouragement from him.

I'd get full STI testing myself.

This is my point. He has risked your family’s livelihood for an ego boost.

The woman has the WhatsApp chat on her phone. She holds all of the cards.

Your DH needs to start looking for another job, and hope that he gets out before this blows up in his face. If he waits until after he’s fired for sending inappropriate sexual messages to a direct subordinate, his career is toast.

of course he's encouraging her. and of course he isn't going to tell you. He's just mortified you've seen his phone and know. he's either sleeping with her or intends to. Men always blame the other woman

But as you say, you want to keep the roof over your head so will just turn a blind eye. That's your choice but don't be naive as to think he isn't sleeping with her/going to.

This

Oh me he's put you in some position obviously he should of that beforehand.
I'm not buying the 'she made him do it's
That's just outright pathetic.

So he's gone from saying that he'd never stand a chance with someone so fit to saying that she fancies him so much that she's throwing herself at him?

It's all bollocks isn't it?

With the added joy that if she wants to she could take all this to HR.
Honestly, what a dick he is.

How convenient?

OP, your husband is already in a perilously position at work. He's her line Manager, and if she reports him to HR or a more senior Manager for sexual harassment, because she's pissed off she's been 'dumped', your husband will be in the shit up to his eyeballs.

She could very easily say that your husband made inappropriate in-person comments during a 1:1 meeting and asked her to message him. She hasn't worked at the company long, and felt intimidated by him, because he's older and her boss, so did what he asked.

Your husband is (I assume older) and her boss, so there's an immediate power imbalance. He'll be hauled over the coals and disciplined, which could lead to him losing his job.

She's also got a nice amount of blackmail material she could use, with your husband being her boss. A nice pay rise, insist he gives her money/gifts, for her silence.

Your husband wants to hope and bloody pray, that this woman keeps her mouth shut, and isn't at all bothered that he's dumped her ass. He also wants to hope she's not into extortion!

Take your time to decide OP.
You know your husband, we don’t.
You know whether what he is telling you is plausible and feels like the truth.

Sometimes mumsnet advice is the wakeup call people need, but sometimes posters smell blood, and won’t be satisfied until a marriage has been broken.

My suggestion would be to take your time, don’t be hasty, and remember that you know more about your own life and your husband than random online folk do.

I'm trying to be factual. Posters challenge me on basic facts because they are either unaware of them or believe they don't/shouldn't apply to them. I am simply pointing out that legislation exists. If you want to challenge me, challenge me with facts, not feelings.

He’s really hurt you. He was seriously offensive to you.

He gave his personal phone number to this young woman.

And now he’s saying it’ll put your home at risk if he decisively steps away? What a head-fuck. I’m so sorry, OP. I wouldn’t be accepting any ‘apologies’ either till he comes up with a serious plan.

Please stop. At this stage, derailing arguments are not helping the OP @Welshie2 in the slightest.

I can’t believe she sends messages like that if nothing is actually going on between them. I would be wary op they could be messaging/emailing through work also. I’m not sure I would be trusting dh version of this.

Ah OP im so sorry but I think there is literally 0 chance that a woman would send those messages to her boss with no previous history/ context. Unless she has had some kind of breakdown I think there must have been at least a flirtation building for some time (most likely something physical has happened.) You can definitely delete the 'this message has been deleted' notification on WhatsApp, plus they could easily have been messaging on by other means too and this is the first WhatsApp exchange.
Even if this woman is completely unhinged and has decided to risk her job and reputation to seduce your husband with no encouragement or previous flirtatious interaction, the only appropriate reaction would have been to immediately shut her down and seek HR advice. If this was me and I was deciding to belive his version of events, I would be telling him to get a new job and I would have to see evidence that he had ended this relationship.

I'd only message someone this who I was already having sex with!

He's completely fucked it for himself. He needs to ask for an internal transfer at the very least if that's available to him