He thinks I'm paranoid. Instincts tell me something's wrong. Is it?

[tande]

Been together with DH 20 yrs, married for 5 with 2 kids, DD 6, DS 3. DH became distant, moody and non communicative last year. I put this down to stress as there were lots of genuinely highly stressful things happening at work, family & financial. Then 2 things happened which freaked me out. Went for dinner with friends at Xmas and he seemed completely normal, chatty, joking. That was fine, but as soon as we left he snapped back into grumpy mode, shouted at me because I hadn't got the cash for the babysitter already. In January I invited myself along to a work drinks/dinner and he was really friendly and close with a girl he'd been working with a lot. When we walked from the pub to the restaurant, he walked ahead with her joking and chatting. They were so close as to be almost arm in arm. My instinct kicked in & red flags went up. When we got home I asked him what was going on. He said they were just friends. It made me realise how much he'd withdrawn from me but I hadn't really realised how bad it was.

So I sat him down & asked if he wanted to stay in the relationship. He said yes. We've been working on it and things are so much better. But there is still a lack of trust on my part as I don't understand why he withdrew if there was nothing else going on. He says he withdrew cos he wanted distance but he says there was no specific reason. Just I was being nasty to him. But I feel I was responding to him being critical & argumentative with me. We are intimate and close one minute, and then having a blazing row the next minute as I keep checking up on him. When first challenged, he said I was paranoid, delusional and i was jealous of her. I've been checking his email and texts and can't find any evidence (he knows I check). He's done everything I've asked of him, being more communicative, loving, coming home early, not being grumpy, being more involved with the children.

So now I feel like I should be happy but something still niggles. Here's just one weird example, we use the same passwords for everything but he has a different one for his phone. I asked why that number (it's a year) & he has no reason. He uses my year of birth for another pin number & said oh I can't use your birthday as I use that for something else.
If anyone can offer some perspective I'd be really grateful. I'm driving myself crazy.

It's niggling because you have plenty of valid supicions but no concrete explanation. People who blow hot and cold like that have often just stopped making the effort to be civil as they reevaluate their relationship. Could be due to an affair. Could be pressure at work. 'Distance' is conveniently vague. If he won't talk about it, that's not helping. I'd back off and give him some space for the time being.

tande here for the support and for any common sense that other MN'ers can offer. Yes to what CESometimes expressed so beautifully. I am giving mine some space and monitoring his behaviour. Though I don;t know what will be gained by it. All the best though my darling

I think it's probable that either a physical or an emotional affair was happening with this colleague and that explains all the behaviour you experienced. The pin number is probably related to her in some way. If there is something still going on and he still works with her, he will be using another means to communicate with her if he knows you check everything else.

I said on the other thread that if your husband had admitted that he was developing feelings for someone else and had come a bit close, that would be believable, whereas an outright denial is not. What I do know is that you haven't got the truth about what was happening around that time and it's possible that it's still going on and he's just covering his tracks a bit more carefully.

Trust your instincts on this. They didn't fail you before and they are unlikely to be failing you now.

Definitely trust your instincts.

Something happened and now that he knows you suspect he is cheating, he is covering his tracks carefully. Whether its still going on I need to know more about other things that are niggling you NOW - was the password thing recent?

The fact that he says you are nasty and paranoid is part of the cheater's script - they provoke you in behaving badly in order to justify their withdrawal from the relationship (e,g my wife doesn't understand me).

Check his car for a second mobile and I would do some intensive search of his internet history in case he has another email account, secret credit card account and check his deleted folders.

Its very difficult getting them to admit the truth - they will deny deny deny so your best bet is to do some snooping.

accusations that you are "nasty, paranoid and jealous"

withdrawal from you and finding fault to justify something he knows is wrong

he still works with her, and you have absolutely no evidence of contact any more even though he denied anything untoward and it was "just friendly"...erm, why hide it then and why then go complete cold turkey ?

it's right there, in the Cheaters Handbook, Chapter one

trust your instincts, there is evidence somewhere and deep-down you know it

Well what I find strange (among many things) is that he now seems to never speak to or see her. Altho that is specifically what I asked him to do. Luckily for me he's been working in another location so he can't chat to her & haven't seen any emails or texts. He says he feels awkward and embarrassed around her now after what I've said. He doesn't think anything inappropriate has happened. So maybe she was flirting with him & he didn't realise?

I checked his inbox & he's deleted ALL emails from her (there were normal work ones I'd seen so I know he's cleared it. That's a bit odd isn't it?

yes, it is

That's another red flag re emails. If these were innocent then these wouldn't have been deleted.

How do you know he never speaks to her now?

Not talking about her and deleting all communications is a very bad sign.

Of course he was aware of the attraction between them. You noticed it straight away and so did others. Men are not stupid and are aware as you or I if they fancy someone and she fancies them back.

He's stopped mentioning her because he doesn't want a difficult conversation about her. He's deleted the e mails for the same reason. He doesn't want you re-reading them and seeing something in a fresh light.

You saw how close they were that night and yet now you're expected to believe it's gone from that to nothing. No explanation to her about the end of the friendship and no communication whatsoever.

I don't think so, do you?

Men are stupid. My DH never notices if someone is flirting with him. I'm taking the opposite view to most of the other posters as I think your DH could be telling the truth. Which means that he would be quite justified in being pissed off with you being paranoid if he had done what you asked (coming home early etc), not talking to her deleting her emails & even putting up with you checking up on him all the time AND was innocent in the first place. The fact is that when you saw them talking & chatting, he knew you were there & presumably would have been a bit more circumspect if he was having an affair?!

If the story was the other way round 'my DH thinks I'm having an affair, he's being incredibly controlling and keeps checking my phone, and just won't believe me.....' then I think the responses you'd get would be rather different.

Shelby, men are not "stupid" as a rule

what a horrible thing to say

The ones that are stupid or like to act stupid are always the most vulnerable.

Nor me.

ie I dont think it is that innocent either. Trust your instincts. They proved me right and I was made to feel paranoid too.

Trust your gut. If your gut says, it is happening. I argued with mine for far far too long and my gut was right and my rational brain was wrong.

There is a spy phone on ebay for £20. Put it, or a voice activated recorder in his car.

I also remember the deleted history, and the locked phone.

Look into his eyes (as they are looking at you). Are they dead, like a sharks?

Ok, the 'men are stupid' comment was a bit of a tongue in cheek response to the previous poster..... but in my experience they often don't notice things that seem obvious, such as a colleague flirting with them.

And FWIW I think accusing a man of being an adulterer is worse than calling him stupid, especially when I was referring to his naivety rather than his IQ!

calling men "stupid" excuses their behaviour

But the OP's DH was going thro a highly stressful time (her words) & became moody & withdrawn. When she pulled him up on this behaviour he tried to change and follow her requests. She's still on his case. So he's either an expert at deceiving her or there is no behaviour that needs 'excusing'. We don't know. The OP will only know if she keeps snooping until she finds something, if she doesn't find anything will she decide he's innocent or just convince herself that he's even better at keeping secrets than she thought? And in the mean time she could destroy her relationship permanently.

On a practical snooping note, if DH has an iPhone than you can download an app to track where it is, supposed to be for if it gets lost or stolen. You can also track other phones if you have the owners agreement - not sure how that one works but my sister keeps track of her DD that way.

Indeed AF.

I hope the explanation for this is innocent OP, but I would almost bet it isn't. :(

It makes me so angry when wayward men make their wives or partners out to be paranoid/controlling/mad. Don't doubt your instincts.

I hope you are ok, tande x

I really hope there is nothing to worry about, but once your gut instinct starts screaming at you it's almost impossible to stop the checking and searching for clues. I've been there , really tried to stop my paranoid behaviour but in the end after he had left blaming me, i found out i had been right all along!!!!. Please don't let your suspicions run away with you, be clever take your time and in the end if you are right you will find out . Good luck and i really feel for you , it is an absolutely hideous feeling x

Good luck from here too x

Thanks so much for all your comments, I haven't talked to anyone so it is good to hear your views. Thing is, I do believe it could all be innocent as another poster said. When he speaks to me I believe him - not because I want to but because he seems genuine. Then I go back to thinking but this happened, that happened & it doesn't add up? The deleting of all emails from her happened recently after I'd found out he'd lied about something completely different. He said oh you've been on my web mail (I hAdnt but he gave me the idea & about a week later I had a look). I said oh you've deleted all her email from your inbox & he said I've deleted all xx's emails too, clearing my inbox. But there were hardly any there (recently at least) as I've been checking. There were still some in his sent mail that were not exactly flirty, but not work either. Borderline i'd say. Except one where she'd sent link to very sexy music video with comment 'must see!!!''. He doesn't realise I saw this. He flatly denied they had ever emailed about anything non work related. But maybe he's worried if I see stuff I'll jump to conclusions & better just avoid it? I'm sure I can be REALLY annoying esp if he's innocent!