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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Anonymous message

179 replies

LittleNickola · 17/07/2017 22:20

I received an anonymous text at 11pm last night, which seems to have been sent from an app (I don't think it's possible to send a reply). It tells me a date, and says that my husband slept with someone in a hotel that night while he was away from home. I've checked the date (which was 3 years ago!!) and he was indeed away that night.
I feel sick. I've always felt that he's untrustworthy and he has form for sending inappropriate flirty messages to colleagues that I've discovered, but I've never had hard evidence of actual cheating.
I need advice on what to do next... would you trust this message?! Could it be malicious? Why tell me after 3 years?? And how can I get my husband to tell the truth. He'll simply deny it if I show him....

OP posts:
LoveDeathPrizes · 18/07/2017 11:36

Thanks Mickey. My guess is that it's the colleague. There were a group of them. He was privy to their secret. I wonder how long he's been holding that over you DH.

Chops2016 · 18/07/2017 11:44

What an awful situation. I genuinely have no idea what I'd do in your shoes. Like you said I'd also be reluctant to "show my hand". If he is guilty, once he knows he's rumbled he will delete any potential evidence that might exist so you only get one shot.

Do you have any mutual friends from his work you could fish for info with?

If you use Facebook perhaps you could post something alluding to the text, encouraging them to contact you again and allow you to reply? It would be tricky to word it in such a way that DH doesn't get suspicious, but also make it obvious it's meant for the sender of they see it. Maybe something like "my phone has been playing up, got what seemed like an important text from somebody yesterday but it was garbled. If it was from you could you please fb message me or email so I can get back to you?". If you get a message from a spoof fb account or unknown email after that you know whoever sent it is on your fb friends list, and you will be able to reply and ask for proof.

If your DH asks what it's about you could say it looked like it was someone asking for an urgent favour (childcare or something?) but the contact info and text were a bit garbled?

Just an idea

YetAnotherUser · 18/07/2017 12:33

If it was an OW surely she would have some more recent dates to offer up? You'd think she would have moved on after 3 years?

Desmondo2016 · 18/07/2017 12:48

Is your number on his HR records as next of kin. Or else anyone could have got it from his phone.

Desmondo2016 · 18/07/2017 12:48

Good point @yetanotheruser

jeaux90 · 18/07/2017 13:02

One piece of advice.

Show him the message and then shut up. Don't say anything. Watch his reaction and wait for a response. Don't talk until he does.

Original poster
LittleNickola · 18/07/2017 13:10

@jeaux90 - doesn't that make it easy for him?!

OP posts:
Desmondo2016 · 18/07/2017 13:12

If you were going straight to confront hi.i wouldn't show or mention the message. I would ask him 'so who did you sleep with in x hotel on y date in 2014'. Just that. See what he says. That way he won't know how much evidence you have or who has been talking.

FreakinScaryCaaw · 18/07/2017 13:26

Yes keep it vague.

Really feel for you.

Do you love him?

rizlett · 18/07/2017 13:34

@jeaux90 - doesn't that make it easy for him?!

No. Because if you just say you know and nothing else you often find he will fill in all the blanks.

If you say what you think he might have done he'll just tell you the minimum he thinks he can get away with.

Paperdoll16 · 18/07/2017 13:39

If OP shows him the message he knows what he's got to work with and she's shown all of her cards.

If she says I know what happened on ....2014 date when you were at the theatre and leave it for him to answer he is more likely to spill.

Keep a poker face and just say that's not everything, is it?

You'll put him under pressure as he will have no idea what you know.

Then share with him you've had one of little friends come out of the woodwork to inform you of the details but you're giving him the benefit of the doubt to tell you the truth. Once and once only. No bullshit.

See how much he can withstand that pressure. You can have the upper hand if you want it.

Good luck. Flowers

Original poster
LittleNickola · 18/07/2017 13:50

I'm going to do what paperdoll has suggested. I just know he'll say "what do you know? You have to tell me!" over and over again though... and he'll say he has no idea what I mean. And then what do I do? I'll be no better off...

OP posts:
ThePlatypusAlwaysTriumphs · 18/07/2017 13:51

Kind of going against the grain here, but is it not possible that this could be a random message/ troublemaker? And by coincidence he was away 3 years ago at that time? I'm constantly getting phone calls/texts about the ppi I (never) had, or the car accident I had last week (nope) that I am due compensation for.

But OP does seem to think there is something to it, which in itself is a bad sign.

justkeeponsmiling · 18/07/2017 14:04

No advice but yes I would suspect the message is from disgruntled colleague.
Either he has had this over your DH all along and has only just told you because he is leaving and wanting to cause trouble, or he is making it up, again to cause trouble - in that case I think he is mentioning this speciffic weekend because maybe it's the only one he knows for sure your DH stayed away from home, especially if you say him not coming home is a rare occurrence.
Good luck with finding out.

WetPaint4 · 18/07/2017 14:40

It could be a coincidence but I doubt it. Someone has gone to a lot of trouble just to send this message. You can't just stumble across the phone number of a colleague's partner. And the use of an anonymous app. Then to just pluck a date out of the air for the message? No way, it's too risky. If he could prove he was elsewhere that night it's all been for nothing.

hatsoncats · 18/07/2017 14:45

Don't say anything or show your hand until you are fully prepared for the consequences. Prepare. Buy in extra food & household supplies, get your finances in order, get cashback & hide it. Get some savings hidden away.
"In other words I'd stay quiet about it and get all my things together in one place. Bank statements, pension info, marriage and birth certificates. "
THIS. DO THIS.

Original poster
LittleNickola · 18/07/2017 14:58

The financial consequences don't worry me. We both have substantial savings in separate accounts and more than one property, so I wouldn't struggle if the marriage was suddenly over. No matter what has or hasn't happened, I know him well enough to know that he wouldn't want it to be over. So he wouldn't suddenly leave either. The highly likely scenario is that he simply denies it. So if he has does something, I'm going to have to convince him that I already know way more than this text has told me.

OP posts:
Original poster
LittleNickola · 18/07/2017 15:00

@chops2016 - I don't think Facebook would work because the work colleague isn't a Facebook friend of mine, and neither is anyone female who works with DH... so the most likely people wouldn't even see a Facebook post

OP posts:
laGrosellaEspinosa · 18/07/2017 15:04

Don't show him the text.

He'll know your source is anonymous and he will just insist it is malicious baseless trouble making.

I agree with poster who says "a little friend has come out of the woodwork to tell me who you slept with on the xth of xxxxx 2014.

laGrosellaEspinosa · 18/07/2017 15:06

However i dont think it would be really hard to get your number if determined and if person had mutual acquaintances

OnionKnight · 18/07/2017 15:09

It's far too coincidental to be bollocks unless the sender really is unhinged and has done their research, your husband rarely stays out yet on that night three years ago he did.

Isetan · 18/07/2017 16:12

As upsetting and as frustrating as the message is, it doesn't change anything. You've already accepted that your H isn't to be trusted and even if you could corroborate the message, you'd probably stay.

I get it, the party line is that if you ever got 'proof' you'd leave but that's a lie you tell yourself to stay.

Your choices are simple, leave or stay and accept that this is who he is and what your marriage is. Don't torture yourself by looking.

Original poster
LittleNickola · 18/07/2017 16:18

@isetan - if I had proof, or if he confessed, I really would leave. I'm tortured by my own paranoid mind, which has been wrong about a couple of things, and by my fears about my kids being brought up by divorced parents and being sent backwards and forwards between two homes. I wouldn't want to do that to my kids without proof and certainty. But if I knew he had been unfaithful for sure, I'd never stay because I don't want to set that example to my kids either. It's sad but I could get quite excited about the life we'd have without him... it's just the parts that I'd need to miss out on that upsets me.

OP posts:
Original poster
LittleNickola · 18/07/2017 16:20

So to be honest, I don't love him! Not like I should. But it's very easy for me to ignore because I genuinely love my life. I love my kids, our home, our wonderful friends and wider family, and the social life that I have both with him and without him. But I don't really love him, no.

OP posts:
user1494187262 · 18/07/2017 16:32

You don't love him?

That's more of a reason to leave even if he hasn't cheated. More so than if you loved him and he had cheated imo!