Evidence is he's probably cheating. How to deal with this?

[worriedbee]

Regular but namechanged as DP knows my mn name.

I really don't want to believe it but the evidence seems to be there.

1. A condom is missing. I know because I only just bought the box, we've had sex twice, but 3 are gone. And not just gone, but ripped off - it hasn't just fallen out somewhere - someone has torn it off.

1. On his phone a young female work colleague who lives in his home town has sent a text saying she's passing through (our new) town, does he want to meet up.

1. His call history said he called her when he was back home a few weeks ago.

1. I challenged him about the missing condom (but not the calls / text). Since then he has deleted the text

1. A few days later he deleted all calls

Clutching at straws here, but here are the things which are stopping me heading for the door:

1. when I challenged him about the condom, he was very convincing - not just that he had no idea how it's gone, but is very happy in our relationship.

1. We have been getting on so well recently.

1. I can't imagine when he would have had time to actually conduct an affair here! He runs his own business with a couple of people who are good friends of mine. The last few weeks he has either been working from home or with the other guys, I know for a fact. The only possible unaccounted time is perhaps an hour at 4 in the morning. This would include travel time, I find I hard to believe he's driven somewhere at 4, fucked her and come straight home?! Why not hang around a bit longer. Although if there is something going on, perhaps he took the condom hoping they'd get a chance, but didn't actually find the time, this time.

1. We have a baby together.

The evidence doesn't look good does it? But the thing is I challenged him, he denied it, sounded very convincing and I accepted his denial, at least on the face of it. Where can I go from here? I don't want to be constantly full of suspicion. I lived with a jealous man and it was horrible. If there's any chance I'm wrong, I don;t want my lovely DP to have to live in that kind of climate.

Fuck.

I love this man, and really want my DS to grow up with his dad. But it's also important to me that the relationship is genuine.

Is there any chance he's not cheating do you think, or is the evidence just too damning?

What would you do?

"issues like this can eat away at a healthy relationship until there is nothing left"

I'm acutely aware of this, it would be a tragedy if that happened, and this worries me also. That's partly what makes this so difficult!

FWIW we have a lovely day together yesterday, which left me feeling much more positive about things. I'm going to leave this aside for the moment. If I get a chance to get drunk talk to him, I may well, but if my instincts tell me all is well, I'm probably just going to give him the benefit of the doubt and get on with enjoying our relationship and family life for now, and try not to let it do my head in too much. If the suspicions are founded, and he is stupid enough to take condoms from our supply then I will find out eventually if there is something going on. If not, then there should be no more missing condom incidents or other strange occurrences, and I will get a bit of perspective with time.

I agree totally with the comments about not letting these kind of thoughts fester, and I'm pretty sure I won't be able to keep it in forever anyway - it's really not in my nature for a start. I love this man and don't want to have secrets from him. But I just don't feel ready to bring it up now.

worriedbee - glad you are ok(ish) A bit of background about my situation:
DH (partner of 18 years) had an affair with a work colleague when ds was 2 yrs old. It lasted a year. I was totally clueless as his behaviour towards me seemed much the same. Now here's the thing........he was happy to have sex with her on the odd occasion he went out (said it was lads night out)and this was about 8 times in total. In retrospect the main clue was him being glued to his phone. I am not the type to snoop but something made me suspicious one morning - something he said. I looked at the PC and found loads of porn. Some more digging led me to a subscription for a dating site and eventually the proof of infidelity - an incriminating email and hotel invoice . I am so glad I did snoop because I was driving myself crazy and needed to know. I do agree that snooping is horrible but if you have a guarded dp who is now deleting texts and denies everything when confronted............how else will you find out?

I doubt he would be silly enough to take a condom from home again.
Imo men are pretty good at compartmentalising their lives and that's why a lot of them get away with infidelity - woman doesn's suspect. Equally because they can close off aspects of their life, they can maintain a loving relationship with their main partner and keep some semblance of happy family life.

I have read about half the posts on this thread, but I just want to add my experience to this. Sorry, if what I'm saying is redundant.

My DW had an affair for several years. I had my suspicions about a new "friend" that she had met on her course. I confronted her several times and she denied anything other than friendship. The thing is that our sex life got better for a while (she was probably feeling guilty), before disappearing completely). She also continued to tell me that she loved me (I think she did).

Based on what you have written I would be very suspicious of your partner. In my case DW lived her life through her phone talking and texting to him when she was with us.

Each time I confronted her I backed down, thinking that it was wrong of me not to trust her! You probably need more evidence that things are as you suspect, but you shouldn't be afraid to say that you are not happy about his behaviour. In my case I eventually discovered incontrovertable evidence.

OK, I've read all the posts now. I'm with those who say you need to confront him as soon as you are comfortable. This issue is toxic and as you say is starting to undermine your trust in him. It also makes you think that you're the crazy unreasonable one.

My DW actually said after I'd disovered everything that she wished I had confronted her and said that I was unhappy about her spending so much time with her OM. I bore a lot of sadness out of trusting her. Don't follow my example.

worried bee, just a word of caution re the sim card reader - if you do go that route, if you do get proof, it will be a horrible utterly sickening shock to see in black and white, so it you have RL friend, pref one that does not know your DH, that you could trust to do it for you.

ladylush "I doubt he would be silly enough to take a condom from home again." Well that's what I would have thought the first time, and the second too. Even if he doesn't take any more condoms, it shows that he's not actually that good at being deceptive, and it gives me confidence that if there is something going on, I'll find out with time.

geekdad I'm really sorry to hear your experience. I do need more evidence I think. At the moment I think if I confront him again, he'll just deny it again and we will have got nowhere. Having said that though, I had planed to at least get Christmas and New Year out of the way, and probably have a chat with him in early in the new year. This is doing my head in. I had decided not to think about it for a while and get on with enjoying our relationship, giving him the benefit of the doubt while there is still a chance it is a series of horrible coincidences! But last night, I couldn't sleep for thinking about it. I feel mentally exhausted, and it's (unsurprisingly) affecting my sex drive.

MrsGuyofChristmasBorn, I appreciate what you're saying, but if there is something going on I need to see it in black and white. I want to know the truth. Yes it will hurt, but if there is something going on, it won't be pretty anyway. I see it like the pain of puling a plaster off. You know it's going to sting, but you have to do it.

Poor you worriedbee.

I know just how you feel. I had my suspicions about my XH. I found several bits of info that worried me and I asked him each time. He always made an excuse and I stupidly wanted to believe him. We had been together 17 years and I trusted him. I thought I, for some unknown reason, had turned into a paranoid woman. I felt as if I was going crazy and he let me believe I was.

I had considered following him or looking at phone records etc but I thought I was just over reacting.

Eventually (8 months later) I uncovered the truth. By confronting him each time, I had helped him become more careful about hiding the truth from me. I wish I had kept quiet (easier said than done) Then maybe I would have found out sooner. In a way I was relieved when I did find out. I then knew I wasn't crazy.

It's a horrible situation and I really feel for you. I hope it turns out he's telling the truth. But in my experience my XH was quite happy to carry on deceiving me. I had to become more devious than him in order to find out the truth.

Ha ha ha ha. Hee hee hee hee.

Yay for snooping! I have great news!

How's this for a horrible coincidence? ... The name of the ex-colleague is one of those gender neutral names. Lets call her Lee.

I have now found out (from snooping) that the Lee he's been communicating with recently (the one who was in town, the one in his new phone under Lee, the one he met up with when he went home) is definitely an old - male - mate also called Lee.

God knows where the condom went, but then again my Oyster card went missing out of my wallet yesterday - but none of the cards which were kept next to it. I mean how did that happen? Strange things do happen sometimes.

I still have an element of doubt (I am not naive) but it has shrunk to something very tiny. The fact that he definitely did take one to the work do and then lied about it, has sowed the seeds of distrust which are - plainly - having an affect on our relationship.

I will talk about this to him still in the New Year, he needs to know how I've been feeling I think.

But for now I'm going to leave this alone. I feel relieved and much happier than I did half an hour ago. I am going to get on with enjoying Christmas and time with my lovely DP now

Thank you everyone for talking this over with me, you have helped me enormously with dealing with a difficult episode. I know who you are! I will see you on the other threads under my normal name and be really nice to you!

Good news worriedbee Hope you can relax a bit and all have a lovely christmas

worriedbee, it's terrible the effect these doubts have on your piece of mind.

Coper is bang on about ending up feeling crazy and paranoid. The thing is I only once checked her phone (ironically, she told me it was before anything had happened), and found rather inconclusive evidence. After that I never did - out of feelings of misplaced trust. She said (once I'd found out about the affair) that if I had carried on checking I'd have found clear evidence pretty early on. However, she got very good at keeping her phone near her at all times. It may also be that I was partly in denial.

Have you no-one in RL that you can confide your suspicions to? I ask, because it will help share the emotional burden. Also in my case, it turned out that several friends and family members also had suspicions, but didn't say anything. Had I confided in them, they would have confirmed my feelings and I'd have more strength to confront my DW.

Thats great worriedbe. How about using this as an opportunity to talk to him about how you are feeling and asking him to be really open with you in the future as part of loving someone is understanding that sometimes we do need some reassurance etc. Plus I do think that 'posh wank' is the explanation for the condom thing - ask him about it!! Have a good christmas

Well I hope all is as it seems and you can stop worrying.

For what its worth, from the evidence you have presented I don't think that he is having an "affair" but do think that perhaps he is a chancer and takes condoms away on the off chance that there will be someone he can use them on.

Phew! Well, if you are feeling relieved then I think you should trust your feelings. The tone of your latest post says it all!

Have a good Christmas.

moopymoo "How about using this as an opportunity to talk to him about how you are feeling and asking him to be really open with you in the future as part of loving someone is understanding that sometimes we do need some reassurance etc." You're right, I do need to talk to him about this.

"posh wank" hee hee! ... But if I've had all this inner turmoil just because he's too shy to admit he's had a wank, I'll not be too impressed!!

Geekdad and cooper, thanks for the posts. Actually despite now feeling that the my fears are probably unfounded, it has really helped talking to people here and seeing that I'm not being a crazy woman - that plenty of others would be very suspicious given the same circumstances. So, even though I now think there was probably nothing to worry about, I don't actually feel bad about having suspicions. I am going to stop snooping now though!

Geekdad, I can talk to my sister. She gives really good, balanced advice but she's very busy. My other close female friends have all bloody emigrated! It's a recurring theme of my life (actually since primary school even). Meet a fantastic woman, become close friends - then some years later they emigrate! Not quite sure what I'm doing to drive them away I do miss them, especially at times like this.

Merry Christmas everyone