Emotional Affair

[mm2one]

Hello. I think I caught my wife having an emotional affair. We have been married for almost 16 years and together for almost 22 years. We have two children. I caught her by looking through her texts. I snooped because I was suspicious. She had been behaving like a lot of the classic symptoms of someone who is in a EA that you read online. I saved the evidence and confronted her on the weekend.

During the confrontation she admitted it looked bad and she said it was just a friendship and that she wouldn't have ever done it if she thought I would react that way.

The timing was awful because I discovered the evidence on the Wednesday, there was some item that made me think it might have been physical but it was my child's birthday on the weekend. So I kept it all inside because she was busy preparing for the birthday and I didn't want to cause a scene and ruin it all and the birthday. So what happened is I didn't sleep at all Wednesday through Saturday because of this. Needless to say, I was an emotional wreak and kept going back and forth between anger and crying probably because of lack of sleep. But I managed to put on a brave fake face and I think none of the other parents or the kids or our family noticed.

I don't want to go into too many details, I am posting this because I want to ask the following.

I am trying to figure out how to cope. Even though we did seem to make up and there was no blow up -- I am still going back and forth between feeling miserable and on the verge of crying and back to forgetting about it.

We left it at, she admitted that it looked bad and insisted I delete my copies. I didn't give her any ultimatums or demand she not have friends or delete his number. I know its improbable to go from texting almost daily to zero communication with a co-worker in one day.

I dont want to be the controlling paranoid husband who is constantly snooping on his wifes phone. I didn't demand anything from her or give an ultimatum. What sorts of signs should I be looking for to be convinced that she does really feel that she might have done something inappropriate and what should I look for to confirm that she has taking some sort of action on her part and I can start to try to trust her and feel normal again.

Any advice appreciated.

Op I feel I can actually comment on your post as my husband was guilty of this although he had distanced himself from his family so I knew something was sweriously wrong .
Tbh I think your being far to nice . The sheer fact that she was texting him during your Christmas lunch and whilst you was at the New Years Party is a big red flag . Did you look
At how many times she was texting other friends during those times . Has she kept conversations that long from other friends .The fact he was messaging her Christmas Day whilst he has a family at home is indicating some sort of
Emotional attachment . Your wife knows
that it is crossing a line but she is never going to admit that . My husband still won’t even though he hid it and was prepared to make out like I was crazy to do so.
I would flatly refuse to delete the texts and start giving her some demands instead like blocking him and telling her that you consider it a betrayal .
I can only speak from bitter experience that if you show any weakness it will continue one way or another .

Sorry I didn’t see post about her having some sort of breakdown . .. This absolutely mirrors what my husband did - said he was suicidal etc .the fact was he was humiliated in f out of his adult kids .Who were so disgusted with him . I have to say as soon as he see a chink in my armour though he reverted back to being distance and it wasn’t long before I caught him again contacting her .

Sounds like everything I text my male and female friends. Ask yourself, if he was female would you be so concerned?

I have closer male friends from work than female, doesn't mean I'm having an affair. It means I get on with them better.

Sounds like everything I text my male and female friends. Ask yourself, if he was female would you be so concerned?

I have closer male friends from work than female, doesn't mean I'm having an affair. It means I get on with them better.

Would you be sending a lot of texts to one person, during family Xmas dinner, Trinity?

I've had an EA and the thing that I recognise the most is the need for constant contact. Rather spending your time and attention texting instead of enjoying christmas dinner and talking to your family is weird. I don't text my girlfriends that much either during social events.

Her being depressed now sounds like grieving to me. I feel that she needs to cut contact.

For me the EA was because I was unhappy in the relationship and we didn't survive. But I do think that we might have if we had counselling to solve our problems and if I had changed my job.

@TrinitySquirrel I understand what you mean. It is a bit slippery slope. I feel in my case I wasn't sure if I was crossing the line of becoming a obsessive jealous husband denying my wife any male friends or whether I was justified.

As we have discussed earlier in the thread -- I think there might be justification. I think if roles were reversed, and my wife found out I was constantly secretly texting my female friend at the table while we were at her mothers for dinner or at a family event- she might have reacted the same way. Offended in some way. Probably more so if she saw that some of the texted were about her.

@Maatsuyker It's been a little over a week now. I have been working very hard to patching things up. I also feel she has as well.

But it's still a strange feeling inside. I can't quite place my finger on it. Its like something has changed in our relationship. I would have never thought this could happen through something as insignificant as technology and texting.

Every once in a while I am reminded of some of the more personal texts they exchanged and flip into wondering are they still texting -- then I snap out of it. Every once in a while I wonder how many other people are there or were there that she maintained such close friendships with that I don't know about because I didn't see texts.

I think its what another poster earlier mentioned, its the shock of seeing a completely different personality and side to your spouse that you never thought existed. Sometimes I look at her now and wonder has she already checked out of the marriage or are we really trying our best to build a stronger marriage now.

For my own part, I have come to terms that perhaps I wasn't as attentive to her as a husband as I should have been. I am trying to make changes on my part by spending more time with her and listening to her more. We also bought one of those how to build a marriage books and plan to read it together. We shall see how it goes.