I discovered my partner of more than a decade has been going behind my back and I would love to hear other people’s opinions on how they would react to this. So one morning a few days ago my partner (father of my three children) left his work computer screen on whilst he popped out - usually this is always signed out. I was tidying his desk and glanced at the screen and noticed it was on his emails but not his usual personal email address or his work email address but a different account that I never knew about and it was full of emails from porn sites along with a few investment emails, property bits etc which made me knew for sure it was definitely his and in current use.
I was absolutely devastated, it felt gut wrenching to see. I consider myself very relaxed in our relationship, I let him see his friends any time, go out wherever and whenever he likes, if he doesn’t come home and says he’s at a friends I believe him - he has never given me a reason not to. I don’t check his phone, I’ve never had a reason to, I fully trusted him and he was the same with me. I considered the trust element of our relationship very healthy but now I don’t. I wouldn’t have been this hurt if I had seen some porn history on his computer (depending on what I had seen) as this has happened before early on in our relationship and I was upset and we did speak about it and he said he wouldn’t do it anymore if I was unhappy. I consider myself pretty liberal all things considered, I used to watch porn before we met but I wouldn’t do it now as it doesn’t feel right, if I am in the mood I feel it is him that I should turn to rather than the internet and I thought he felt the same way but clearly not.
The email address was completely random, not linked to his name or anything familiar at all and the emails we verification emails to 5 different porn sites, 3 of which were a.i “deep, realistic” ones without going into too much detail but not just two people having sex, rather simulating you having sex with the person on screen with an image you upload and other email was verification for an app which I cannot seem to find much information about. There were also a couple of emails asking for refunds for subscriptions and to close an account so I knew he was actively using these accounts. My first thought was why do this, we have a good sex life, he knows I would be upset and he has tried to hide this so knows this is wrong and my second question was why sign up to these, why pay for these, you can easily access free porn so you what is so special about this that he has gone to this much effort. The emails were all recent too, within the past few months.
Immediately I packed an over night bag for myself and the kids and thought stuff it I can’t deal with this right now I’m off for a few days. I saw him come home as I left, he looked very guilty and shocked, I told him what I sore and he straight away lied and said it’s not my email account it’s a spam account, that then changed from those were spam emails (they weren’t) and then it changed to I was curious and it was only once and I was mortified - this doesn’t equate to making 5 different accounts to me.
I feel betrayed, he’s gone behind my back and lied and now I don’t trust him, now I am wondering what else he’s been doing behind my back and lying about. I don’t feel I deserve to put up with this, I want to be treated like a queen and for my partner to come to bed with me to be with me not some stranger on a screen. Am I overreacting? Would I be stupid to turn my children’s lives upside down and split because of this? I might add too that he called me the C bomb and stormed off the night before when I calmly questioned a DIY decision he had made so it’s not like he exactly treats me nicely a lot of the time.
Please give me some ideas opinions on what other people feel about this situation.