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Relationships

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

Am I being gas lit??

22 replies

AGirlWithAHandOnHerArm · 05/02/2024 12:34

I’m hoping you lovely lot can give me some advice.

I’ve been married to DH for 15 years, been together for 25 years (I’m 43, him 50).

Two years into our relationship, he checked out and didn’t want sex as much. I found out he was using web cams and had a porn addiction. I tried to break off the relationship, he begged forgiveness and promised to not do it again. I took him back.

The years that followed, we still had a problem in the bedroom - he still didn’t want much sex with me. One day I looked at his bank statements, I saw a subscription charge. He was still using web cam chat rooms with these women. This was about five years after the first time. So I called him out on it. He promised he would never do it again. I believed him.

We get married. I get pregnant, we move to a house. Our sex life was good when we had it but “when” we had it is the point. We didn’t have it often because he was just not interested. One year we had sex twice. I was completely rejected at every turn. We did not have sex on my honeymoon. I only have one child because not only have I got endometriosis but because he would not have sex during my window of opportunity.

In August 2022, my spidey senses were obviously on overdrive as he was trying to sort something out on his phone. He told me that he wasn’t going to tell me about it because I was obviously paranoid and would think something is going on, but it wasn’t.

Basically he got a notification from Royal Mail, informing him that the parcel he ordered from the Perfume Shop had been delivered to a neighbour in Eastbourne (we live in Essex). But he said he hadn’t sent a parcel to Eastbourne, his phone number must have been entered by mistake by whoever did order that parcel and he was on the phone trying to sort out why he got this notification. I believed him.

Then, the following Christmas Eve, he got another notification from Royal Mail, another perfume delivery to the same address in Eastbourne. So must have been the same error.

We don’t have a joint bank account (he has never wanted me to share his bank account). He is not financially abusive by the way, but whenever I ask to share the account he makes excuses.

He had to send me his bank statement to send re our mortgage application for a house move. I had a snoop and in the November between those two perfume deliveries there was a transaction on his debit card that read;

Southern Eastbourne R £24.71

It’s was a Tuesday, a day he should have been at work.

I think it looks like a railway ticket (I can’t be sure on that) but the value isn’t high enough?? You can get a train to Eastbourne direct from London Victoria. When I looked at the map to where the perfume delivery was from the train station…it’s about 2 miles. But surely a train ticket would be more money?

Im not sure if the above is innocent or not.

Over the last 12 months, our sex life has increased in frequency because I have basically said I’m at the end of my rope but the effort has not been good.

I basically service his needs and he does fuck all for me. He lays back and I do all the work.

This morning I was asleep alone in the bedroom and his Apple Watch vibrated and he literally dashed in the bedroom like a rocket to grab it because he didn’t want me to see what it was.

He isn’t secretive with his phone normally. He is a good guy, hard working and normally loyal and has a lot of integrity.

I know reading this back May paint a different picture, am I being gaslit here??

Please help me see sense if that’s the case x

OP posts:
MILTOBE · 05/02/2024 12:37

I wouldn't trust this man as far as I could throw him. He's clearly up to no good.

The fact is though that you have trusted him and believed him again and again, and he's always, ALWAYS, let you down and proven himself to be a liar.

He's not going to change, so either you accept you're with a cheating liar who yes - does gaslight you - or you make plans to separate.

Risun · 05/02/2024 12:38

Victoria has a coach station.

Aquamarine1029 · 05/02/2024 12:42

Op, what are you even doing? You know this man is a liar. You couldn't trust him any further than you could throw him, and he's been this way from the beginning, yet here you are, still wasting your life on him.

Honestly, what more will it take before you finally wake up and get rid of him?

AGirlWithAHandOnHerArm · 05/02/2024 12:46

I hear you all….its just so hard when you are in something and you have trusted someone for so many years

OP posts:
Purplecatshopaholic · 05/02/2024 12:49

Loyal and has integrity op? Really? Not from where I am standing. He’s up to something, and you know it, sorry.

samestyle · 05/02/2024 12:50

Too much of a coincidence to have 3 connections to Eastbourne without explanation and with his icky web cam past, I wouldn't trust him either.

Aquamarine1029 · 05/02/2024 12:54

AGirlWithAHandOnHerArm · 05/02/2024 12:46

I hear you all….its just so hard when you are in something and you have trusted someone for so many years

But you haven't trusted him. He's fucked you over every time you turned around. You just decided to brush it all under the carpet and stay, for reasons I can't even begin to comprehend. He showed you over and over and over exactly the kind of man he is. At some point, you have to take responsibility for your own choices.

Make a new choice and leave him.

Catoo · 05/02/2024 12:56

Sorry OP.
I have no idea how you have coped with this rejection for 13 years. Sunken costs fallacy maybe?
But now you have written this down. Can you see what it is?

Stop ‘servicing his needs’.
Start getting organised to divorce him and move on with your life.

💐

AGirlWithAHandOnHerArm · 05/02/2024 12:56

I just don’t know how to get proof from here. His phone is always open - there is nothing on it (I’ve looked). He doesn’t work late / start early, he is completely transparent so this wasn’t an affair.

The only gut thing I have with him is sex worker. Was that where he was going? Do men send perfume to sex workers??

OP posts:
Opentooffers · 05/02/2024 12:58

He's taken it to the next level of meeting in person and buying gifts. Probably wise to get an sti check. Can't think what kept you interested in wanting sex off him all these years.
Not really gaslighting, just straight up lying all these years, and for some reason you have let him off at every turn. Perhaps some counselling for yourself will help you to see the wood for the trees and want more for yourself.

Catoo · 05/02/2024 13:00

OP does it matter what he’s up to?
He makes no effort with you and hasn’t for the last 13 years? He also is obviously avoiding having more children with you.

Let it all go. Move on.
Your life will be so much better.
💐

brokenbitbybit · 05/02/2024 13:08

I'm so sorry but I'm really confused, how is he normally loyal?

He seems like an absolute snake

Veryinteresting24 · 05/02/2024 13:09

You don’t need ‘proof’ of anything. He sounds awful as a person, he lies and he doesn’t want sex.

AGirlWithAHandOnHerArm · 05/02/2024 13:24

Yes reading it back looks bloody hideous.

OP posts:
tenpoundpombear · 05/02/2024 13:35

He isn’t secretive with his phone normally. He is a good guy, hard working and normally loyal and has a lot of integrity.

He is not a good guy, he uses sex workers behind your back, won't have sex with you and lies to you. He has absolutely zero integrity or he wouldn't be doing the above. I don't know why you married him after the massive red flags he was waving in your face but now here you are.

You don't need proof. Just the fact that he treats you like a wank sock is enough to leave.

tenpoundpombear · 05/02/2024 13:37

Also you don't say if your child is a girl or a boy but if your son was treating his partner the way your H is treating you how proud of him would you be on a scale of 1-10? I'm betting 0

Watchkeys · 05/02/2024 13:47

People in healthy relationships don't have any of the collection of complaints that you have.

It doesn't matter if the label is 'gaslighting' or anything else. You are not comfortable, happy, or emotionally safe. Your needs are not being met or respected. Him being 'good' on a regular basis makes no difference. Psychopathic murderers spend a good quantity of their time being normal, doing normal activities in normal ways. 'Good' people are trustworthy and kind. People with integrity stick to their word.

He is a good guy, hard working and normally loyal and has a lot of integrity

None of this has any relevance. He's treating you poorly.

What was your upbringing like? What behaviour were your parents engaging in that you had to 'overlook' in order to continue to see them as good, loyal, hard working people with integrity? Something has gone wrong in your interpretation of what 'relationships' feel like, when they're healthy, and you are whitewashing him, as a result.

delphi13 · 05/02/2024 13:47

He definitely sounds like he's up to something. His phone is clean because he deletes it all but he had to rush for the watch because it's a fresh message so not yet deleted.

I love Nr Eastbourne and you can get tickets for similar amounts if booked in advance. Less even. I could book next Friday for £9.50 so it's not beyond the realms of possibility that it is a train ticket.

AdamRyan · 05/02/2024 13:52

Poor you. I'm sorry but he will be carrying on with the webcams. Men who do this compartmentalise so they don't think its a problem as long as they don't get caught.
Lost my marriage over this so I totally empathise with how you are feeling. Take your time and look after yourself, but also trust yourself x

AdamRyan · 05/02/2024 13:54

Some sex workers/only fans types have "sugar daddy" type arrangements where they provide services for items on a wish list. Some of the men who use them go for it because it makes it seem less like a pure transaction and is more palatable to their ego than being a mam who uses sex workers.

MassiveOvaryaction · 05/02/2024 14:04

Any other odd transactions? Appreciate it's unlikely with the stuff being posted to Eastbourne/him being notified by Royal Mail, but maybe his card has been cloned?

AGirlWithAHandOnHerArm · 05/02/2024 14:26

I have just asked him outright. He didn’t go to Eastbourne, it’s a transaction from a Shell service station (he has loads on his statement that all coincide with him working at that office when he stops for lunch or petrol). It absolutely tally’s (he has receipts to prove it). So I was wrong on that count.

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