Found an escort's number

[KatieZA23]

Hello all - i'm usually a lurker, but decided to finally post for all of your helpful opinions :)

I'm in a long-term relationship with a great deal of trust. I rarely question anything my partner does when we are apart, as I fully trust him. We are both highly independent, live separately and have our own lives.

Mixed in amongst his receipts, I found a phone number and girls' name scrawled on a piece of cash register receipt paper. So I googled it, and to my surprise, it came up with an escort's page here in my city.

The escort in question is a similar age to him (more similar than mine to him), and it doesn't go to a vague page of porn - the phone number leads to a particular escorts site (and links to her same page on a number of different prostitutation sites).

My question is: how would you go about bringing this up with my partner? Should I ask point blank, but i'm concerned he will simply deny.

He is in a sales job where he is constantly collecting phone numbers for people and calling them later to discuss business opportunities, so there is the chance it could be yet another one of those phone numbers. But I guess I figured that if she was interested in business opportunities unrelated to being a prostitute, she would have given him her real number, not one that goes directly to a answer machine.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Don't change the number to yours as he will have your number in his phone and if he rings you how do you know if he is ringing Roxanne or you?!

serene I think if you read other threads where the partner has been unfaithful they will say "Get an STI check" and I have seen plenty of threads where the poster has indeed caught an STI from their partner following the partner having sex with another woman.

It wasn't just because the woman in question is a sexworker.

And the stat comes from the condom packet!!!

Wow! Thank you all for all of your helpful posts - I really appreciate it. :)

I have a couple of updates now - let me know what you think now that we have more information. :)

1. I was able to go through his phone and said number is programmed, but with the notes "so and so, met at so and so coffee shop" - he keeps notes for all new "leads" he meets so when he invites them to business seminars later, he remembers who they are.

1. I went through his text history with this contact, and there are about 10 texts, all of which seem quite innocent. The first was "remember meeting me at the coffee shop, and you said you were interested in making money outside of your job" and then the next couple were invites to his upcoming business seminar. And then her saying "can't make it - working night shift" (ha - yes you ARE working a night shift), maybe the next one, etc. etc.

1. She referred to him as "thanks, man" and her to her as "no problem, bud". Those kind of salutations seem pretty innocent to me?

Other than than, there was nothing at all in his phone to show a relationship beyond that.

I think she may have worked at the coffee shop he went to, but not sure if she worked there or met him there.

My gut is sitting much easier now…thoughts?

Fair enough but someone DID say 'if he's been having unprotected sex with prostitutes you need an STI check,' - just saying its very unlikely to have been unprotected

I'm obviously not saying 'don't get an STI check!' :)

Seems pretty innocent to me to be fair with those texts.

Ok fair enough seren. I agree that "omg you'll definitely have HIV" is not accurate either.

It's unlikely to be the same person, but I "know" someone who used to work as an escort and set up her own coffee shop, doing occasional sexwork on the side. The shop was doing well but the council rerouted the roads and footfall was dropping, so she was looking for another income stream. Could be something similar?

Not sure she'd have given him her escort number, though.

What line of business is he in?

Multi-level marketing - similar pyramid structure to Amway, etc. Hence why he always needs to get people out to the information seminars and approaches everyone he meets!

All seems very innocent to me now, but hoping I'm not sugarcoating things.

However, wondering if I should still bring it up and tell him not to have any contact with her, being an escort and all, as with his business, if she signs up, they would be working very closely for the first month or so.

Why shouldn't he have contact with her if you believe you can trust him?
I said my history above - husband used prostitutes our entire relationship, turned out.
If my current boyfriend - who is a painter/decorator got a job painting a prostitute's bedroom, it wouldn't bother me in the slightest.
Prostitutes are not untrustworthy, men in relationships who use them are.

If you really feel you want to ask him not to work with her, then your gut is telling you something. Same way in told you something when you googled a phone number for a guy who has legitimate reason to randomly collect women's numbers.

As I said before, I know I am bringing baggage to this. But really have a think about your relationship and whether you have picked up on anything else.

If you're in a strong relationship it will weather you saying "so I saw that number and I googled it and it turned out she was a prostitute - why have you got it?"

He might say "god is she?! We've met for coffee twice, I guess she wants out as she's interested in signing up..."

Or he might say "no idea where that's from / some girl tried to chat me up and gave it to me, I should have chucked it / oh mate a conference said look after that for" etc etc

You give the minimum information, and see if it matches with what you know from the text messages.

And if he isn't supportive of explaining it to you, even if he is innocent, he's not a good life partner.

Parsley1234 - I guess we'll all have different opinions based on our personal experiences... but sometimes I think I'd rather my husband had wrecked our marriage and taken away our daughter's preference of married parents over a woman he actually felt something for. Any cheating is wrong, but I actually find it easier to understand temptation of someone else you fall for, than deciding it's OK to go and fuck a prostitute.
They're different, but equally bad I think.

Very good point, Cabrinha. I suppose if I trust him, then there shouldn't be any concern with him conducting business with a prostitute. It always seems to me that men aren't as bright as we are, and don't see themselves being manipulated. And if she saw a way of making more money, could easily coax him into something. And an attractive girl promising full discretion and all kinds of wild and kinky promises could be fairly appealing to a long-term relationship tied man.

Seems like I should make it known that I know this person is a prostitute and based on that, would prefer he not do business with her on principle.

Pyramid selling? That sounds more dodgy to me than these escort issue tbh...

Also 'I remember meeting you and you wanted to make money outside your work'... And she's an escort?!

Sorry I still think it sounds dodgy and he sounds a bit slimy.... Think you should still ask/confront him. Work or not - texting an escort isn't on.

But that sounds like you judge her for being a prostitute more than you judge him for being someone who wouldn't turn down secret sex for a price.

Think of it this way: if a great looking bloke offered to fuck you in secret for £160 (I pick the rate my ex seemed to pay!) what would you do? I bet you'd say no. At least because of your boyfriend, if not because the idea was also horrid.
Isn't that what you want, what you deserve, from a partner?

And please, I'm afraid I despair at the "men are easily manipulated" and "coaxing" comments.

Because it isn't the poor man's fault, is it? Just like all the people that blame the OW. No, men are not codex and manipulated into using prostitutes or having affairs. They CHOOSE to do it.

If your opinion of him is so low, you shouldn't be with him. Choose better.

£160? I'd try and haggle

Katie - many escorts aren't, you know, shagging people all the time We sometimes get to know and like people outside of our 'work.'

He could try to haggle, but I expect most would want a lot more than that to bother with him Trevor
I'm well rid! :)

Seren it did sound from the OP (which was a bit obscure) like this woman was using her professional name. Stage name? Whatever - ykwim!
I think if she just wanted to get to know him, she'd have written Jane, not Sexy Peachy Bum. Or whatever it was!!

But I'm with you. If my boyfriend was friends with a prostitute, I wouldn't care, even with the baggage that was my marriage. I don't direct any of my mistrust towards the women my husband booked. Because I know that I could be friends with a male prostitute and not cheat. It's perfectly possible, so it's what I expect from my partner.

I was being a little facetious of course but it was the idea that escorts are nymphomaniacs constantly on the lookout for men to sleep with ...

The reality is this. Escorts 'advertise' through cards, websites, ads in papers like the Daily Sport and so on. I never worked independently - only through an agency - but I have never in my life heard of escorts hanging round hotel bars or coffee shops! Think about it - in one hotel bar you may meet one man prepared to pay for sex but its more likely you'd get thrown out or arrested for soliciting. Meanwhile, in a comfortable home you can just sit back and wait for bookings. No brainer, as the ad says.

Imagine you're a nurse: do you hang round hospitals in your leisure time? Pilots - do you spend all your time at the airport? Even if you love your job you need a break from it. Escorts are escorts for a myriad of reasons but being desperate for sex isn't generally one of them, honestly.

The Internet is the place a man would be looking for for an escort whether through an independent website or an agency: I worked for the latter. How can you tell - well the awful truth is you can't but it is unusual for an escort to be sending chatty texts to a 'client'

It sounds as if he's been texting a woman who happens to be an escort which isn't quite the same thing as texting an escort. If that makes sense!

Daily Sport.... Pyramid selling seminar.... It's all so classy!

Well, I'll give you the Sport but I have NO idea what a pyramid thingy is!

I agree that he may be texting a woman not in her professional capacity - but I'm dubious, given the name.

But I think it's far more telling that OP's gut made this stand out. Like she says - he gets plenty of numbers. If you yourself don't personally have issues with trust, then your senses are tingling for a reason. He may not have slept with this prostitute. But something isn't right, and it pays to listen to your instincts, I think.

OP says she think he could be manipulated and coaxed into sleeping with this prostitute. That's doesn't square with saying there is trust in a relationship.

This scrap of paper may be meaningless, but so etching about your relationship isn't right at the moment.

Pretty much up (or should day down) there with drug dealers and loan sharks... Prey on three basic weaknesses on people who want to get rick quick; naivety, laziness and greed.

Have met sooooo many (usually desperate and/or very thick) people who have been ripped off by pyramid. A bloke in a sharp suit (who may or may not like escorts) swaps biz cards to everyone they meets to go to a 'seminar' where it's a get-rich-quick con.

Huge sweeping statement (sorry OP!!!) but pyramid selling is dodgy as fook.

BUT - hope there's nothing to it OP. But if you're googling phone numbers you've found in your blokes stuff id say there's some pretty serious trust stuff going on.
Plus him trying to recruit 'everyone he meets' for his sales? He sounds a bit cheesy (again sorry to judge) x

Just thinking about the number OP could it be that he got the number in a strip club-not unthinkable that the women in question could do both jobs and that would explain the other cheesy name...

I agree with Hellsbells

Except for the piece of paper which looks like it hasn't been re looked at. There is nothing to suggest he is cheating. You say you trust him. Then trust him!! Ask him about it. I bet you can gauge what's or isn't going on by his reply/behaviour.