Discovered man I’ve been seeing for 5 years is a full-blown conman running a double life.

[PurplepenguinZ]

I am completely shell-shocked and running on no sleep. I've been with a man (44) for 5 years. I thought he was a divorced single dad living with his parents due to debt. The reality has just exploded and it is a total horror show.

• He met me on a dating app claiming he was single/divorced. He has kept me completely isolated from his home, parents, and workplace for 5 years. I never even had his physical address, and after he kept cancelling and postponing my meeting his parents these past few months - he’s finally admitted last week they have no idea I exist.
• He also admitted he lied about where his parents actually live in Cheshire just to make them sound wealthier than they are.
• He completely hid the fact that he has a second son (9 years old) from me for 5 whole years, and only just dropped that bombshell. I was only aware he had a 14 year old son.
• He claims his wife (ex wife as he told me) tragically died of terminal illness (breast cancer) in May. He flashed a quick snippet photo of a death certificate to me where I only saw the date, no name last week when it all came to a complete head.
• He is now spinning a tragic story about becoming a "widowed dad" to care for his two sons, but now wants to start afresh and wants me to stage a fake "accidental park meeting" to introduce our kids and lie to them about our 5-year timeline.
• He let slip his debts were caused by a gambling addiction, and the police were called to his house last October because debt collectors were pounding on the door. He claims his late wife cut him out of the will and put the house in a trust for the kids because her mother hated him.

whilst not admitting he was having an affair these past years, he has now said he was in a loveless sexless marriage where they agreed to do the best for the kids when young and live separate lives. It sounds like a complete and utter lie and itis clear he was a fully married man who has been living with his wife and kids in the family home this entire time, and he only used me, manipulated me in some sick game. He is currently acting completely normal on calls, aggressively trying to book a weekend getaway for us next weekend, and telling me he "needs my support going forward”. I am mid 40s and reeling from everything that’s come to light the past few days. He has always caled me every day, he was always lovely, fun and seemed so normal when we were together. my trauma-bonded brain is struggling to know what to do next. Please give me the brutal, honest truth I need to hear.

You won't get the truth, just more lies. I'd say there's a very strong chance he's covering up lots of things which make him look very very bad.
Please cut your losses and walk away.
If you want to try and understand what was really going on with maybe write an account of everything that happened, if you can review everything at a distance you may be able to get a sense of the true bigger picture.

The wife won't be dead.
He'll make up more excuses why you can't meet the children just now.
You should bin him immediately.

I thought he was a divorced single dad living with his parents due to debt. The reality has just exploded and it is a total horror show
To be honest, I would have binned him at "divorced single dad living with his parents due to debt" because I don't need someone like that in my life. It's just going to lead to no end of problems.

For the future, don't start a relationship with someone like that. In any relationship if he isn't inviting you to his home within a few weeks or introducing you to friends and family within a few months then you should be very sceptical and question why.

This.

And will the police even want to know?

Well that depends on what crime you think he's committed. He's not tried to commit bigamy and cheating on a spouse or partner isn't a criminal offence. Neither is being a fantasist and a liar.

I'll ask again, how did this all come out and for what reason did you threaten to call the police? If it's simply as you say it is, and he's faked being divorced for five years and told you a pack of lies, then no the police will not be interested. If he's using those lies to scam you of money or something, then that might be different.

Assuming you know his real name, where he works etc, and at least some things about him that aren't made up bollocks, it is not impossible AT ALL to get to the truth. Just spend a bit of time and a small amount of money looking at public records. Births, deaths and marriages, then use that information to look at address listings in certain areas under those names, on 192.com. Find him and his wife tied to one property and you are almost home and dry. At least you'll be able to see whether she's really dead or not, and to see where she lives/was living. If she's not dead you can watch the house and see if he's still there.

Or you could just accept that whatever the hell has been going on, he's spent 5 years lying and taking you for a ride so just leave him to it and move swiftly on.

I'm sorry to say but I have to agree, a fully grown woman needs to take agency of her life, at no point did you think this is all a bit odd? I suppose you hear what you want to hear and believe what you want to believe which I know many men are good at. but the second the excuses came in about meeting family that's when the alarm bells should ring

You don’t need more detail. Finish it then dig for more if you need closure, but you don’t need more to finish it.

My parents only met my ex once in the 12 years we were together. They didn't like having guests, would make excuses to avoid staying away from home, and my DF was an appalling driver so my DM would never have countenanced doing a 300 mile round trip in a car with him!

You've been treated appallingly, OP and he's an absolute shit. Even though you must be hurting like mad, if you can get angry it will help. Men like that should have the words "cheating lying bastard" tattooed on their cocks imo.

None of this is your fault though, so don't beat yourself up. You weren't stupid, just trusting.

Im so sorry you have been deceived by this pathological liar.
The thing is once someone has told repeated lies that distort your perception of reality trust is decimated . How could and why would you ever trust someone who has lied to this extent for so long again.
I can understand those saying you will never get the truth so dont try.
I can understand those saying try to do some due dilligence for yourself.
I would feel i had to try to find the truth my researching this man more fully.
Death certificates are public record ,id check that first.
But regardless he cant be trusted so do not continue and kind of contact with him.
Im curious though when you say you have been "with him" for 5 years what do you mean,what did your relationship involve other than phone calls ? How often did you see him and where?

If he flashed it and you coudnt see the name it probably isn't her. She must be a live and divorcing him , that's why you never knew his family and adress, you were the other woman unknowingly

Yes that’s all he would do evidently so I don’t know her name and can’t even attempt to track her down. All I know that she is / was a supposed teacher who he claims died suddenly in May after being diagnosed with breast cancer in April. I asked where her house was as he has been talking about “needing to spend more time their as executor if her will” and for the one teenage son I thought he had. All he would tell me was it was in North Manchester. He confessed on Wednesday amongst all the other bombshells that she actually lives in Cheshire too. He refused to give me the address as he’s now living there with the 2 sons he claims to have. And that the house is in trust to them when they turn 25. In his desperation on Wednesday he said he would take me to the house himself when he knew he could trust me with his boys best interests in mind. He also threw in that he’d been saving for an engagement ring for me as a secret to introduce me to his mum as finance! It was at that point that I called out his BS, refused to back down and let him gaslight me / deflect / avoid and lie until he started to reveal more including he was never divorced, separated as he claimed insisting he was living with his parents, which has now all been utter lies. I’m still reeling, heartbroken and don’t know what to do next for the best.

I'm sorry Op, this is one of the few cases where I think you need to just block and cut ties

You will never get the truth from a scammer. Just realized this guy will never be straight with you.

Block him everywhere, change your locks because he's likely had a key made even if you didn't give him one. If he shows up, tell him to leave. If he doesn't, call the police.

You ignored the big red flags he's been flying for years.

Has he taken money or valuables from you?

I know but I just cannot believe a man I’ve been seeing for over 1800 days can be so cruel and calculated. He’s had 5 years to tell me the truth if he was seemingly a married man and still living with his wife with 2 young sons, to at least give me a choice. Instead he chose to deceive me. Reading all the posts I’m now really concerned there may be other women involved too. That there’s even more to him. And I need the truth for any closure

@PurplepenguinZ you would never be able to trust him again, right? You can’t have a relationship with someone you can’t trust (well, not a warm, loving and secure one anyway).

It was at that point that I called out his BS, refused to back down and let him gaslight me / deflect / avoid and lie until he started to reveal more including he was never divorced, separated as he claimed insisting he was living with his parents, which has now all been utter lies.

Yes but are you going to give us even the tiniest bit of background information on how you finally found out that it's all been lies, or not? Because without that, no-one can say anything of use to you at all. Except leave him, his a liar and a fraudster. Which you seem to already know.

I also find it really, REALLY weird that you don't even know his wife's name after 5 years. If he was divorced, as he told you, then it would be perfectly normal to drop her into conversation in relation to his past, his arrangements to see the one son you knew about, just general chit chat about his background. I can't believe he's just referred to her as 'my ex' or 'Jack's mum' or whatever all these years and you've never asked him about it.

Can you do a reverse image search of his face? Find out if he’s on other dating apps? He may have a different name. There was a very good documentary recently about a man who had been sponging off a variety of different women. They managed to get together to unmask him.

But where did the threat to call the police come in?

Considering he's done nothing illegal, why did it make him spill the beans?

It would be very difficult to trust someone like that even now he seems to be telling lies so the best thing for you would be to end it. Maybe have counselling to process this massive shock and make sense of things.

His wife isn't dead but I bet she's kicked him out so he needs a home.

My friend got together with a pathological liar who claimed to have a fortune, a house etc. They moved in and then she found out he was barely employed and nothing was true. She married him and has spent 20 years financially keeping a gambler and a liar in a sexless and loveless relationship. All because she refused to see sense and be alone for a bit.

Tell his wife and block him.

'closure' is a luxury, not an entitlement.
There's no chance you're going to get the actual truth from this man.
Your 'closure' is going to have to come from you booting his lying arse clean out of your life.

It will take time to process this level of deception, everything you thought you knew about him is fake, and I think professional support will be necessary in processing it.

It's a scary but nonetheless unavoidable truth that it's vital for your wellbeing to accept as soon as possible that you will get neither closure nor truth from this man. Whether other women were involved or not is entirely incidental.

There is literally no trace of him on social media at all or on the internet. All I have is his name (may now even be false), his mobile number and his DOB (again may be false). Reverse image searches brought up no results. I had considered paying for a PI in the past year but given I have such little info and it may be false it would likely cost me thousands. I tried searching for the ex wife now wife on official death register and date of death he told me - no trace either. I am literally at a loss and he knows it. I’ve repeated asked and then demanded to know his address - he has always refused or delayed saying he was at his parents. Yes none of it rang true or make sense in my logical mind. But he has been so charming, confident and lovely seemingly normal in person I was talked round though underneath anxiety has been eating me up. I’m barely sleeping since end of August with the realisation that he’s completely manipulated and lied to me likely about everything.

He will never give the truth, going to him for closure will most likely be a mistake. Please take some of the advice given here. Look after yourself OP

So what's been in it for him? Have you been giving/lending him money? Somewhere to stay? Paying for things for him? What? He has to have had some reason to fabricate a whole life. What about a job? Where does he tell you he works? You've never met his friends or colleagues, overheard a conversation with his boss, picked him up from work or anywhere/anything concrete in five whole years? You say his name might not even be genuine but surely you've seen credit cards in his name? Something? You've never ever questioned why he's not on facebook, even if he doesn't actually use it much? What is he, an alien? Or are you just terminally gullible?

Why haven't you ever asked him his son's name, or his wife's name? Like I say, start with what you do know and set to find out if it's the truth. That big should be pretty easy to prove or disprove if you really do feel a burning need to find out.

And what happened in August to make the scales start to fall from your eyes?

I can’t even begin to imagine how you’re feeling OP. But it sounds like deep down you knew something wasn’t quite right. Take the fact that you were right to suspect him of wrongdoing as your closure.

Block him. Delete him. Get him out and keep him out of your life. Concentrate on you. Get yourself into therapy to talk it all through. You are worth so much more than this ‘man’ can ever promise you.