Affair or innocent Flirty Banter?

[dwgs]

I became suspicious of DW going on a girl’s weekend with a friend. Initially I was under the impression that it was a couple’s weekend away including me and the friends husband. But then it was just the two of them. They wanted it to be Sunday/Monday as it would be busy and then it was changed to a Saturday/Sunday.
I was already a little suspicious, as the last time they had a weekend away three years ago, DW txt to say they were in a bar in the town centre, but I looked at “find my friends” and saw they were at the hotel and then a bar next to the hotel about a mile away for about an hour. I quizzed her on her return and initially she denied it and said I was mistaken. Then said they were in the hotel lobby with the manager who is a cousin of her friend, then said her friend was on the phone with an ex boyfriend for an hour in the bar across the street telling him not to contact her any more as she is married. DW said she didn’t tell me the truth as she didn’t want me to stop her going out with her friend any more. She has also had a habit of going silent when away from home. No calls/txts etc. But if I am away she expects constant contact.
So on the morning of departure, I was beside myself with worry about the trip. She had packed her case and gone downstairs, so I looked through it and saw that she had packed some nice underwear. I don’t know what I expected to find TBH. I took them to the train station and returned home. But I absolutely was certain something was going on. I looked at her IPAD and somehow the browser let me look at her email account. I saw that you could see archived deleted emails, which she had deleted the sent/received and then emptied the deleted mails. For info we have been married 25 years and I have never looked at her mails before. But I did think it suspicious that she kept her password closely guarded – she said she didn’t want me seeing receipts etc. for Christmas presents.
I found that she was emailing a man, who she later admitted was an ex-boyfriend. Very flirtatious, talking about old times, but also him asking her to send him topless photos (she didn’t though). Some emails went back as long ago as 12 years. The latest ones were about her going to his home city for the weekend ( 80 miles away) with the friend shopping and he was out with a friend for the afternoon watching afternoon football. She asked if he was staying out all day into the evening, she was having a few drinks and shopping and then going to the hotel to change for the evening. He responded that he was staying out and then going to her hotel to watch her getting changed. Her response was “ The sight would burn your eyes”
So I screen shotted the email and sent it to her saying “don’t disappoint your boyfriend” . She responded that it was just a bit of banter with an ex colleague from years ago.
Looking through the emails it was similar two way inuendo. One comment was he wondered if her mother would recognise him if they passed in the street, to which she replied “ I’m not sure that I would” which does suggest it was many year since they had been together and also if it was recent i.e when we were together , I’m sure her mother would not have covered for her.
The last message on email was as she was on the train he said “you are very quiet, are you travelling? Text me on xxxx number” she didn’t respond as she knew I was able to see the emails now. She denies calling him texting him or meeting him. She said they never met up. He must have been upset she didn’t respond and never contacted her again.
DW was very upset and came home on the 7pm train rather than stay overnight. Very apologetic, etc etc.
So was she having an affair ? Or having flirty banter?

Either way she's crossed a line.

Flirty banter is unacceptable when your married.

Whether she has or hasn’t, you don’t trust her and feel the need to go through her emails and do detective work while feeling beside yourself with worry when she’s away.

I’d be reevaluating staying in a marriage where you don’t trust them. How can you live like that forever.

I can't believe that the contact would have stopped immediately the moment I told her I had seen the emails. So either she did phone/text/meet him and tell him I had found out and they ceased whatever it was they had. She did spend 6 hours in the city before catching a train home. Or the contact moved to a different medium that I don't know about.

If I found that from my partner, I'd be gone.

I found far less than that before kicking my husband out. I posted about it on MN at the time and was told there would he more - including what. I thought, how can they know? They don't know him. But they were right.

As PP have said, she crossed a line with the ‘banter.’ At the very least she’s not discouraging the flirting and I very much doubt she’d have been happy if the shoe was on the other foot.

It’s up to you whether you can live with this. You’re already suspicious / worried about what she’s doing when she’s away. Presumably she’ll go off ‘shopping’ with her friend again in due course so what are you going to do then?

Are there kids to worry about or is it just you and her?

We have two teenage kids. She's actually "supermum" and a very attractive 50 year old.
She's not showing any appetite for venturing away any more with the friend and if she was to mention, it's not a discussion that would end well.
She's always felt that as I have an exec. position with work, that young women will throw themselves at me. (It never happens I must add) So she is very insecure. Probably due to the way her father was as he left them when she was 11.

It’s more likely that she’s insecure because she knows full well she’s capable of cheating and is projecting. Let’s not blame the childhood, we make our own choices as adults.
Regardless of what you’re going to call their emailing, she’s been flirting with another man (for a v long time it seems) and seems to have made plans to meet with him in person. She also had acted in an untrustworthy way int he past. That’s not someone I’d be happy to continue a marriage with personally.

I have not heard the term "projecting" before. But that is exactly what she does.

Childhood/ past issues can form a part of why people might be more predisposed to cheat, but they don’t ever excuse it; cheats make the choice to cheat despite knowing full well it is wrong.
OP everyone has their own definition of cheating and what some think is ok others don’t. What is important is what you both agree a monogamous relationship like marriage looks like.
For me, cheating is any interaction with a member of the opposite sex (if you’re straight, obviously) that you feel you have to hide from your partner.
Whether it’s ‘banter’, messages, meet-ups, even just for a coffee, right the way up to dates and sex. If you have to hide it, you’re cheating. Any innocent interaction would never need to stay hidden unless you’re living with an overly jealous/ paranoid partner which would be a totally separate issue. Most people hiding stuff from their partner or conveniently ‘forgetting’ to tell them know exactly why they are hiding stuff.
This would be cheating for me, and her friend looking to meet an ex whilst they were away (if I’ve got that right) I find far too coincidental. It’s amazing that when others do something inappropriate it somehow minimises or normalises it, in the same way that stuff on girls’ or lads’ holidays happens, justified by ‘everyone was doing it’ or ‘I’d have looked like a party pooper if I didn’t join in’. Being ‘led on’ by others isn’t an excuse either, as a poster pointed out, as adults we all make our own choices.
It needs tackling head-on and she needs to know exactly why you think this isn’t ok, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say that any further contact with this ex is not acceptable and a deal breaker.
You can’t have a halfway house in situations like this, you’ll never trust that it's ‘just friends. She should invest the time and energy she puts into the relationship with him, into her relationship with you.
Who is more attractive/ desirable due to looks/ status/ achievements really is totally irrelevant where cheating is concerned. It’s a choice. It shouldn’t matter if twenty hot young men/ women/ exes throw themselves at you every day, you either choose commitment to your partner or you don’t. Not all good looking successful people cheat, no matter how more likely they are to get hit on. There are no excuses for her behaviour, or any other cheat, ever. Life has many grey areas and nuances but cheating isn’t one of them, despite what MN sometimes has to say about it.
Cheating is always simple black and white: no matter how complicated or difficult or unhappy your life is, (the grey areas/ nuanced bit) no matter how much people feel they had no choice, they always did. You can choose to cheat or choose not to. Your wife needs to choose, you can’t live constantly wondering if she’s contacting him or what the content of it is. It’s not appropriate.

@Thewookiemustgo Wow powerful words. Thanks.
There is no ambiguity in what we both believe monogamous means. She 100% admitted that it was totally wrong and said stopped the messaging immediately. But I struggle to believe that she didn't respond to the last email from him and this resulted in him never contacting her again. She says she didn't do anything with him , never intended to, and would never. But I think she must have txt him, called him or found him in the city and one way or another either, put and end to it or still communicates with him via another way. I cant find any other messages on her phone, Instagram, Snapchat etc. She doesn't guard her phone etc. So I think it was ended via some discussion ,phone, txt, meet in the city on the day. Which she denied.
It's very difficult. We have had rocky patches over our 30 years together. But we have always been very intimate, even more so in the last 10 years.
I think it started as banter. But what would have happened that night and or in the future if I hadn't stumbled on the emails can only be guessed. I regret not keeping quiet and then been able to see the post meetup emails. I'm sure it would 100% have ended in divorce from there.

@dwgs no problem. Whether or not you decide to stay or leave is entirely up to you, both options are tough and there’s no shame in either choice, but she’s got to change her ideas about her choice of friendships and be more open and honest in the future if you’re going to try to trust again. I stayed after my husband’s full blown affair after 35 years together, but on my terms and it’s a one time only chance, anything else, no matter how minor, and I’m done. It’s not for everyone though, and not always the right decision. Only you can know that and you can always change your mind at any time.

Maybe you should think about what divorce would look like for you?
could you ask her to move out for a while

I have always thought that divorce would be a catastrophe. But this episode made me face up to it very quickly. TBH if anything else was to transpire, regardless of how ugly it would be, I would have no qualms in divorcing. I have actually come to terms with the thought of not being together. Obviously the kids would be the main losers.
One of us moving out is not something I would consider. If we split it would have to be permanent.