My husband and I have been together 17 years and have 2 children 11 and 14.
He's recently started a new job and told me he had to away for training on Friday / Saturday 2 hours away. No issues, I'm often by myself with the kids. Then Friday afternoon he called me to say he was late arriving as were some other people and he'd have to stay Saturday night too as they'd finish the training on Sunday.
This seemed a bit weird to me. He sent me a photo from where he supposedly was on Saturday. I did check and the location was right.
Then 8am on Sunday he sent me a photo of the training course. Only it was a screenshot, no metadata attached.
I looked again at the deleted photo from Saturday and it was taken 10 days previously.
When he got home on Sunday I confronted him about these photos and asked him what was going on. He seemed a bit flustered and admitted the photo was not taken on Saturday and he didn't know why he did it. He showed me his photo on his phone and one was a hotel lobby looking one where he said they'd got coffee. When I asked to look at the details the location was 30 minutes from our house in a different direction to where he said he was 2+ hours away and taken at 9:30 Saturday morning.
He had no explanation for that other than the phone was wrong and that was taken on Friday. He then got really cross and started shouting and one of the kids came in.
When I asked again to see the photo as it was eating me up he would let me touch his phone and he had deleted the metadata. Although he claims he hadn't. I told him I just wanted an explanation. He threatened one of his "tantrums" if I carried on talking about it. So I dropped it as I'm in shock.
Our marriage has been very up and down for years, mainly due to different sex drives. It's very down at the moment, we're basically just living in the same house.
In the last 12 months or so he has started working away at weekends occasionally which I had initially joked meant he was having an affair. He's stopped even trying to initiate sex for 8 months since we had a massive argument on holiday.
He's either having an affair or going to orgies or something isn't he? I need to speak to a solicitor don't I ?
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Relationships
Husband is lying I'm sure...what do I do?
scaredofdoingitallwrong · 21/02/2023 22:56
DoILeaveHimOrNot · 24/03/2023 13:38
Not sure where to start really... so ive been with my partner nearly 2 yrs and for the most of it we can be pretty happy but there have been sooo many issues already, i will start at the very beginning of our relationship. We were both in long term relationships when we met (i was in a near 10yr relationship where we just ended up being like Roommate's with a 3yr old daughter) he was in a 4yr relationship with a 1yr and 2yr old! My relationship wasn't perfect but we never argued and we were just so distant with each other and there was NO romance at all. His relationship was very toxic, fighting, shouting, swearing all in front of their children to the point police had been called etc. When we met we had instantly connected and got on so well, after a year of working together we started to really like each other. I broke up with my partner at the time and told him everything about me liking someone and feeling really attracted to them etc BUT he never told his partner about me but they had broken up due to her cheating, he stayed living with her and then started seeing me. It got to a month in and he still hadn't even mentioned me so i got defensive and told him he needs to tell her as i wont be a secret especially if they weren't together (all while he was still living there) so anyway he was on the phone with her one day and i said for him to say something now. He didn't want to but i made him so all he said was he was going on a date... she then went mad and was shouting and swearing that they were still sleeping together, he was confessing his love for her still etc and of course i respond to him and said that better be a lie and he just told me to shhh while he was on the phone!!!! Anyway she sent me a message and told me everything and even sent a photo, he was 100% he never received this photo but i had the screen shot, he said for months that she was just making it all up, few month later she needed to get to a town that she also needed to be in and again i overheard her say that she got in MY car and he drove her there, he also says this is a lie and that he only took her up the road? Again months later we had a row and i said i just can't trust him and i will never believe that he didn't sleep with her the whole time being with me and then he finally admitted to actually receiving that picture and he didn't want to tell me because he would lose me! Fast forward to now, we have a 13 week old baby (that's a whole other story about fertility issues) and i broke up with him the other day and he just cried and cried and said how sorry he was for all the lies and that he would do anything to keep us together and im at a loss, i have agreed to try once more for the sake of our daughter but i just cant help shaking the feeling that he still slept with his ex and he will never admit it and i really don't know if i can ever move on from that no matter how much he tries to prove that he is a better man now.
OliveToboogie · 23/02/2023 20:32
Life is too short. In the space of 5 mins my partner suffered catastrophic burns and lost both his parents in a fire in July. Please don't waste your life. It is not unlimited. He is lying.
Crazypaving22 · 23/02/2023 06:50
Wow this post has raised a lot of nonsense.
OP I hope you’re still reading.
Your reactions to your husbands quite frankly strange behaviour and gaslighting is absolutely normal. You’re not unhinged or taking things too far.
This level of gaslighting comes with withdrawal and dishonesty. You’re recognising that and feeling emotionally and mentally unsafe. That lack of safety is what drives the hypervigilance (checking up/watching). You’re in fight or flight mode.
This is really unhealthy for you but I know it’s hard to pull a relationship when you’re in this state and not sure of all the details.
I think from what you’ve said your relationship is over. His behaviour has red flags all over it. He clearly knows that you’re in this state and is not showing you any reassurance. Personally I’d place bets on an AP or shady dealings.
Individual counselling is good but not to place blame on yourself but to delve into why you’ve allowed his treatment of you to continue when there are red flags all over it and to find the courage to leave.
You haven’t fought some of the quite frankly nasty comments on here and even described yourself as a shit parent. Please don’t let mumsnet strangers perpetuate untruths about who you are.
You deserve so much more than this half life.
Good luck
GreenFingersWouldBeHandy · 21/02/2023 23:12
You keep going in about metadata (whatever that is), you’re trying to track him and you don’t trust him.
I’d say that yes he is cheating and also advise him to run a mile away from you!
PolicyOfTruth · 22/02/2023 08:38
I'm not sure if you've actually read all the posts made here, but I don't think a personal attack on the poster is going to be all that helpful to them.
This reply has been deleted
Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.
Napmum · 22/02/2023 10:28
Yes. You do sound like you've gone off the deep end.
But I am a counsellor, and what struck me is he threatened a tantrum, and this was enough to stop you, questioning him? That and your need for lots of hard evidence to believe yourself yo the point where others above said 'That's not normal' raised an alarm bell for me.
This feels emotionally manipulative and possibly emotional abuse and coercion. I would advise that you speak to someone like a talking therapist to work out if he's being abusive and manipulative.
It is hard to tell sometimes, and it might not be what is going on. For me, I know that my past abusive relationships meant I saw emotional abaur where there was none. And I managed to "self gaslighted myself". I nearly ended my marriage until I realised that it was me that needed to get my head straight (well, actually, hubby had counselling, too).
scaredofdoingitallwrong · 21/02/2023 23:17
Do I sound that unhinged? Yes I clearly don't trust him do I. It's only just writing this has made me realise how weird that makes me sound but something just didn't ring true and my instincts have been telling me something is wrong for a while now.
GreenFingersWouldBeHandy · 21/02/2023 23:12
You keep going in about metadata (whatever that is), you’re trying to track him and you don’t trust him.
I’d say that yes he is cheating and also advise him to run a mile away from you!
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scaredofdoingitallwrong · 21/02/2023 23:17
Do I sound that unhinged? Yes I clearly don't trust him do I. It's only just writing this has made me realise how weird that makes me sound but something just didn't ring true and my instincts have been telling me something is wrong for a while now.
GreenFingersWouldBeHandy · 21/02/2023 23:12
You keep going in about metadata (whatever that is), you’re trying to track him and you don’t trust him.
I’d say that yes he is cheating and also advise him to run a mile away from you!
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