Can He Leave Over ‘Circumstantial Evidence’ of Cheating?
His wife dismisses her shady behavior as “circumstantial evidence” of cheating. Can he divorce anyway? Does he need absolute proof of infidelity?
***
Dear Chump Lady,
What can you do when there’s no “smoking gun?”
My wife has been following the cheaters’ playbook since I found:
- Many flirty texts with multiple men at her work, a hidden calendar with appointments with the same guy mostly while I was traveling;
- She has been caught in multiple lies big and small;
- She has used dismissive anger, blameshifting, rage;
- And she has talked about vacation homes, and has displayed many other habits of cheaters after discovery.
But I have never found a dick pick, or I love you text, or any sex videos, just many things that seem really close to me and that she can never give a straight answer to.
She finally agreed to go to a therapist to discuss this after a year and a half.
During the therapy sessions, she lies and the therapist says she doesn’t hear anything that 100% states that an affair has happened, so I’m attacking my wife’s character whenever I bring this stuff up.
I’ve felt indescribable pain from the multiple lies and things I’ve seen that point to multiple affairs over the last year and a half. However, I feel like I’m stuck in concrete. I’m ready to get off this hamster wheel, but am I screwing over my life and my future sanity basing me leaving over “circumstantial evidence “ (that’s what my wife has called it).
Will I forever doubt myself? My wife has planted those seeds of doubt for sure.
Is it essential that I have a smoking gun? Can I base me leaving off trusting what my eyes have seen and my gut feels? Do I have to hire a private detective to prove I’m right to prove to the world I’m not crazy?
We are in a 50/50 state so infidelity doesn’t factor into a divorce from what a lawyer has told me. So that’s not an issue. We have a grown child, so that’s not an issue. My finances will be impacted big time, so that’s the biggest concern. But I don’t care anymore, I just want off this roller coaster.
At the beginning when I started to find all this crazy stuff, she was blaming her behavior on a midlife crisis or menopause. Do people really act like cheaters but aren’t really cheaters then?
Lastly, I’ve never been a jealous person, always trusted my wife a 100%, don’t have mental health history, I’m college educated, and don’t use drugs.
Would love to hear your perspective.
Sincerely,
No Smoking Gun
***
Dear No Smoking Gun,
My perspective is that you’re a chump. You say you’re looking for a smoking gun, but you HAVE multiple smoking guns — defensiveness, lack of transparency, much evidence of being inappropriate with work colleagues, etc. What you don’t have is a dead body (to use your metaphor.)
You can leave over a smoking gun.
Actually, Gun, you can leave because you don’t like her haircut. You can leave because you’re a Sagittarius and she’s a Virgo. You can leave because you want to be a deep sea fisherman and she doesn’t support your lifestyle.
But, but! Tracy that’s so shallow!
Perhaps it is, but it’s a hell of a lot more honest than cheating. Esther Perel to the contrary, no one chains us to a relationship. You’re not in captivity. You ALWAYS have choices.
The real reason you’re a chump isn’t so much that you’re married to a cheater, it’s that you’ve forgotten that you MATTER.
You’ve assumed her entitlement as natural. Being caught in big lies and reacting with anger is entitlement. It’s a big red flag sign of cheating.
Imagine another scenario, if you’d discovered circumstantial evidence of cheating, and your wife felt unfairly accused.
She could react with empathy. Someone who cares about you cares about your pain.
OMG! I’m horrified that you could think such a thing! Followed by: And how can I reassure you? Followed by actions — here’s my calendar, phone, whatever. People who have nothing to hide, hide nothing.
This whole “I think you’re cheating on me!” thing can be exploited, of course. In fact, cheaters often accuse chumps of cheating on them. (Hello DARVO my old friend..) And that’s where most advice columnists go — to the Jealous Spouse trope. You’re controlling.
My advice is examine the evidence of cheating, which is usually circumstantial. Why? Because infidelity is a power trip and cheaters don’t want to lose their strategic advantage of secrecy. Also, examine their reactions. Unless you walk in on them doing the deed, or an affair partner rats them out, you’re just going to have shady behavior and mindfuckery.
This is where we pivot back to you: Is this relationship acceptable?
I’ve felt indescribable pain from the multiple lies and things I’ve seen that point to multiple affairs over the last year and a half.
Indescribable pain is unacceptable. Ergo, leave. Rightly or wrongly, YOU DO NOT FEEL SAFE WITH HER. That’s a nonstarter.
You don’t need all the details.
You know enough. None of us have the full picture of our FW’s double lives. And that’s okay. You have enough evidence to know that the way she is treating you is unacceptable. This isn’t the court of law and you’re not going to achieve consensus from your wife about divorce.
I’m ready to get off this hamster wheel, but am I screwing over my life and my future sanity basing me leaving over “circumstantial evidence “ (that’s what my wife has called it).
Remember: YOU are the decider here. Your wife isn’t the judge. Counsel, I don’t see enough evidence of cheating here. I rule in favor of the plaintiff.
Who gets busted for inappropriate hookups with work colleagues and responds with “Hey, it’s just circumstantial!” That is just bizarre, to argue about technicalities. Essentially, she’s saying it’s not what it looks like!
Dude, it’s exactly what it looks like. Do you have a calendar of rendezvous with your workmates? Do you flirt with randos?
Plenty of people are sitting in jails right now, convicted on circumstantial evidence. Call the lawyer today. You know enough to know that YOU are miserable and that’s reason enough to get out.
This is a rhetorical question, you know what needs to be done deep down. It sucks, and will suck for a while, yet you will gain your power and life back from a human leech.
I stayed around and watched the smoke become a fire, you have a chance to put this out before it consumes you.
Just wanted to add that menopause doesn’t make you cheat, FFS. And midlife crises are bullshit.
Exactly! Menopause makes you feel like you are walking on the sun, you turn red as a lobster, stand in front of an open freezer, and ask family members if they can smell your pits from where they stand. A certain grumpiness, yes. But lying to your husband, flirting with office mates on secret calendars, and demanding from a hurt partner that they provide a smoking gun, no. No empathy towards your concerns? Cut your losses, my friend.
My ex fretted about aging from his late 20s onward (he was 28 when we married, I was nearly 22). I was too young and naive to realize that was a red flag. Although he loved both his parents, he once told me that he didn’t understand how his dad remained attracted to his mom as she aged.
I was aghast. His mom was an amazing woman–smart, accomplished, energetic, engaging, and while not beautiful, she took care of herself and always looked great. His parents were married 68 years, and it was clear they remained crazy about each other their entire marriage. I didn’t understand at the time that my ex was so obsessed with youth and appearance that our marriage didn’t stand a chance.
My marriage left me so beaten down in terms of feeling any self-worth, it took years for me to fully realize what a shitty partner he was in so many ways. He went on to have two more failed marriages and, last I heard, a longish-term relationship he had after marriage #3 went south is running on fumes or is in the rear-view mirror.
Oh it happens, mine cried when she turned 30.
Oh God, the out-of-fashion stretch skinny jeans and manic manscaping once he turned 40. https://ar.pinterest.com/pin/690880399087811896/
I remember when the ex and her AP went on a date in front of me and our sons (it was an MMA fight for the jujitsu gym I attend), she was dressed like 21 year old going to a club (she was 36 at the time and he was 29). I felt bad for my sons. I can’t make this up.
I think it’s great that the late British designer Vivienne Westwood and French actress Isabel Huppert wore/wear miniskirts and leather jeans or form-fitting wiggle dresses at 70 and beyond. They certainly had/have the legs for it.
But (and it’s a big but– lol, pun) these women are/were wearing tailored haute couture, not bum-baring mall gear for teenagers. And if the setting is appropriate and it doesn’t violate ethical norms, there’s something revolutionary about women owning sexuality or enjoying a sort of rock and roll esthetic beyond the traditional “expiration date.” Many younger adult women especially like seeing this since the idea of older women still having fun and having what appears to be an active love life takes a bit of the terror out of aging (terror which is shoved down their throats from every insta page and infotainment website, etc.).
So, pardon me while I parse this to death because the issue is political to me… Because sexuality can be, say, an expression of love or procreation or used as a weapon of terror and war, it’s the definition of an unavoidably “fraught issue.” Therefore any attempt to be “groundbreaking” about sexuality only works when the people doing it are conscious and clear about what exact “ground” is being “broken” because some sexual ground should never be broken– like adults cosplaying children or adolescents in public, either because it looks like an attempt to normalize the sexualization of childhood or because it could look like an attempt to attract children sexually.
So how is it being conscious and responsible for the impact of sexuality and what “ground” is being “broken” by showing up in spangled CFM gear from Forever 21 at a sports event attended by kids? What’s the political message? Because– whether someone admits it or not– there is one.
Adults who don’t take responsibility for sexuality or who cop the alibi of being “unconscious” (“I’m jUsT eXpreThiNg mYtHelF”) of social impact are dangerous creeps regardless of gender. Clinical literature on childhood sexual trauma is loaded with accounts of young boys being subjected to deliberate exhibitionism by adult women. Maybe it’s not statistically as common as girls being victimized but it’s still significant and still matters. If it’s about equality and defying patriarchy, then a grown-ass woman dressing as a sexed-up bopper at a kid-strewn event shouldn’t be seen as any less creepy than a dad or grandfather showing up to cheerleader camp with a nipple ring and gold lame hot pants.
Just one of the million of excuses. Midlife crisis, menopause…too many snow cones. It’s all the same
My ex went through around 84 “ midlife crisis” events. Starting in his 30’s and continuing for the next 30 plus years. The panic to hold onto his youth, willing to sell his soul to keep it. ( which he pretty much accomplished in the end).
He would say to me that I was different, I was okay with getting old, but that he would never be.
It’s not like I looked forward to growing decrepit looking and less capable, no one does!
I just accepted life and found a way to deal with whatever would get thrown my way is all. Seemed pretty logical a perspective to me.
I didn’t opt for creating the fake narratives and superficial lives to avoid the inevitable at any and all costs. That was the difference between us.
If someone can’t adjust to getting old, they’re always going to be unhappy because…it’s inevitable. You can try to do some things to preserve health which might make you appear or feel younger but the only real alternative to aging is death. Headstones are not a slimming look.
I’m thinking of a cheater I nicknamed Howard the Whoremonger who got a facelift in his seventies !
I pity people who chase youth, it’s actually really sad.
Because I worked in media where appearance equates to career longevity and effectiveness, I modify signs of a little vanity against how people treat those they have power over or the people who love and depend on them. The impression I have is that people who use appearance as pragmatic armor never cry over aging (or do evil things like betraying their families) but just joke about the stuff they do to combat it.
People with shallow value systems can’t accept aging. Their self worth is built on who they want to be and pretend to be, not who they are.
My split happened after my ex retired, and I know that some of it was due to his “before it’s too late” attitude. But in your 60’s, you pretty much who you are who you are. For most of us, it’s a time to rest on what you’ve built and enjoy friends and family.
Nope. He wanted to be Casanova. Nevermind the wreckage he created to pursue that.
Mine also wanted his “last chance at happiness” in his 60s.He is so “happy’ he keeps asking me to take him back now that he has lost most of his relationship with his adult children and the grass wasn’t quite as green out there. His pursuit of what I call “high school happiness” wasn’t as much fun as he rememberedI guess. Oh well , stinks for him.
I’ll never get it. I’m now the age that my ex was when he took off, and I have zero interest in acting like a teenager. Zero!
My first cheater started his life ending stories at 30, left me by 35. Thereafter always an excuse and life is too short. I had to agree
I only found circumstantial evidence – a blank Valentine card, a deleted photo of a romantic destination, a woman’s cosmetic case in my guest room. But it was ex-FW’s reaction to my discoveries which provided the most evidence. I KNEW when he lied or deflected.
The lack of compassionate reassurance suggests that a cheater will not work on the marriage or fight a divorce. Proceed quietly, but proceed.
I remember when my ex was continuing to act strangely (after years of my catching him in some major lies that weren’t related to cheating) and I was trying to use some of the communication stuff our couples counselor had talked about, I started off a question, “I’m feeling insecure & am asking this for reassurance…” Didn’t even have the chance to actually ask my question before ex proceeds to flip out at me & yell, “YOU DON’T HAVE THE RIGHT TO BE INSECURE!”
Definitely not the words of a caring, compassionate spouse.
Definitely you can end the marriage. She’s a shitty person.
Also, did anyone else catch this today? While the author didn’t state that cheating on your SO is traumatic, it IS traumatic.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2024/07/29/not-forgive-danger-pain-apologies/
I saw that and thought that it was very well done. I’m thankful that our long-term therapist warned me early in our mess that forgiveness is very individual and situational and not to push that for myself or our college students. Sure, some of us come to a “let go, let God” type of forgiveness, but some do not. And that’s OK.
I never understand the forgiveness shit. Mistakes I can forgive, I probably can forgive quite a bit if I know it really was an accident and not intentional. But someone who intentionally lies to me, steals from me, future fakes me (which I think is the worst – it’s one of the reasons I don’t have kids) , blindsides me, hurts the kids, takes my home…..why should I forgive this? Would I have to forgive the guy who breaks into my home, beats me up and steals my stuff? WHY? It’s to make THEM comfortable, it does nothing to me. If years went by and I was still focused on whatever happened and it was hampering my ability to live then I would have to learn to cut it loose and get rid of the trauma but I still don’t have to forgive anyone who shits on me and calls it ice cream. Even Christ who gets stuck with this forgiveness shit actually said “Go forth and sin no more.” and they sure as hell don’t do that. They not only keep sinning, but they keep all the benefits of the past sins. So…forgiveness is a BIG SCAM designed to make cheaters and other crooks more comfortable in their chosen lifestyles.
I pity them. I see someone who is getting their needs met at the expense of others, not being honest with themselves and unable to form deep, loving connections. Someone who breaks the trust of the people closest to them or of their own children. And even if they seem to come off better (with more money, freedom or apparently less emotional damage) I still feel like I’m better off in the long run. Because what is any of that if you don’t have deep genuine connections and are truly content in your life? Ultimately I’m going to be okay if I stay on my path. They will not if they stay on theirs. The work to change paths after making so many awful choices is immense, and if they do it they’ve genuinely earned it. Otherwise they just have to keep living the life they do which I…..don’t envy.
I don’t forgive because I don’t believe it’s my job to morally evaluate and absolve them. I don’t have that insight into their mind or past (or present/future as I’m firmly no contact with people that hurt me on that level), so I can’t make that judgement call. If you’re religious like me, you can leave it up to the ultimate judge. If you’re not, you could leave it to natural consequences to sort out.
An emphasis on forgiveness is the result of a society that enables and even prioritizes anti-social and criminal behavior, especially lying.
That resonates super hard with me. I have traditionally struggled with forgiveness. My excuse in a lot of ways has traditionally been “it’s because I give so many chances to begin with.”
I think in a lot of ways people that harp on one’s lack of forgiveness are the same people that are going to expect it for something they either have already done or are not above doing. The further I get from D-Day, the more I see that some people simply do not want accountability for their actions…”that’s on them.”
I kind of like the bit from the end of Pulp Fiction in that regard. “We cool. The thing about you and I is that there AIN’T NO ‘you and I’.” That’s about as much forgiveness as any of us should be expected to muster. Or as we call it here, “no contact.”
After the divorce was finalized, my ex reached out to me asking about cat sitting the kitties that she kept. The request was a surprise because we hadn’t discussed any of that during the divorce, with there being no direct contact as all matters went through the mediator.
With that and other minor requests or emails from her, I quickly realized that if I engaged her that would imply some sort of forgiveness to her on my part, because it would be as though she hadn’t done the horrible things she did and that we could engage civilly with each other. And I knew that I couldn’t forgive her, even implicitly, so I went hard no contact and eventually blocked her everywhere.
And besides the other benefits of no contact, in the end, I think of no contact as forgiveness of myself, for doing the chumpy things, like trying to reconcile, or discounting her lies and actions, or beating up myself for not being “good enough” for her. That’s good enough forgiveness for me.
“Will I forever doubt myself?” This is indication of the damage that her presence in your life is doing to you. People in relationships based on honesty, mutual respect and reciprocity do not feel this way, and she’s not holding up her end of that bargain.
Exactly! OP isn’t getting the reciprocal marriage he deserves while his wife casts about to find someone else.
I’ll second it. You have the smoking gun. You have an arsenal of smoking guns.
But there’s no need to split hairs or wade into Extreme Word Game Olympics with your so-called wife.
Very simply, her behavior is NOT the behavior of someone who loves you.
If that’s OK with you, stay in it.
It wouldn’t be OK with me.
The whole point of a relationship is trust, loyalty, devotion, safety, security.
You don’t have that. And I suggest you bail and hold out for it.
You can’t have a relationship with a liar.
Dr Frank Pittman (who would kick the ass of your therapist in a cage match) wrote a great book about affairs called Private Lies. Here’s a quote which helped me get clear:
“In lying, one is identifying the other as one’s opponent, even one’s enemy. In marriage intimacy is developed through confessions, explanations, and soul searchings. But of course intimacy involves equality, and people who are telling lies are not seeking any aspect of intimacy, especially equality. Liars are hoping for advantage, which will be produced by disorienting and distracting the other person. The liar is stepping outside the relationship. The lie may be a greater betrayal of the relationship than the misdeed being lied about. It takes very little misinformation to disorient and destroy a relationship. I often point out to people that if I gave them detailed instructions on how to go from Atlanta to New York City, and threw in only one left turn that was a lie, they would end up in Oklahoma.”
-Dr. Frank Pittman
Private Lies
(p. 59)
My first long-term therapist did workshops with Dr Pittman. I’m not impressed with your current therapist. I recommend finding someone else.
Big hugs to you. I’m sorry you have to be here but glad you are.
Great points – you can’t have an intimate relationship with a liar. The whole point of lying is to protect themselves from your discovery of who/what they really are.
I love Jefferson Fisher’s Instagram page. he has excellent communication tips. He now has a podcast….here’s what I listened today.
The takeaway is basically what I said above. You can’t communicate, or therefore have a healthy intimate relationship with someone whose MO is deception.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-jefferson-fisher-podcast/id1754592060?i=1000662347200
What is the reference of “talking about vacation homes”. Is that a thing?
Some stories about vacation homes/fuckpads/country houses.
Howard the Whoremonger (mentioned upthread) left his wife and their three little kids out in the ‘burbs of northern New Jersey with the housekeeper/nanny for weeks at a time to have fuckfests with other women in his Manhattan pad. I always wondered how many abortions he had to pay for and if the kids have any half-siblings.
I worked in an art gallery with the ex-wife of a famous architect and furniture designer. Kelly (American) was briefly married to him;he thought he could ensconce her in his country house outside Paris and screw around during the week in the city apartment. She filed for divorce when she realized what he was up to. He had already fathered a daughter in his late teens who died the year before his death in 2020. No mention of wife number one on his Wikipedia page, just his much younger wife (#2) and their young son. I always wondered what happened to Kelly. When we worked together, she was shacking up with the now husband of Christian Dior’s head jewelry designer.
I think a lot of shit happens at vacation homes because it’s a place to take Schmoopie. That’s an issue with a lot of affairs, where do you do it. After a while you get sick of cars, LOL, offices can be risky, and hotels cost money. If you have a long term Schmoopie or serial Schmoopies, it might be worth it to have a convenient vacation home .
Makes sense. Really did tick me off though when I went there and saw a bottle of “Red” perfume in the top of the bathroom med cabinet. I was sooooo tempted to take it down and fill it with piss water. I didn’t but I wish at the very least I had pissed all over it. That was about three months before he left. I had frozen my ass off lugging deck lumber up the hill to finish the deck. I was suspicious of a whore, by then and then I knew he had taken her there. Wonder which one of them left it there for me to see.
My guess would be her. That’s a territorial marker for me. There are so many stories of (usually female) chumps finding panties, bras, pieces of jewelry, etc, and think – have you EVER lost a pair of panties or a bra? I sure haven’t….I’ve had them stolen from public laundries, LOL, but I’ve never lost a pair and I’m pretty old. They’re left deliberately as territorial markers and maybe to force the issue with FW – oh now the wife knows I’m here, maybe she’ll push you into a divorce. Or off a cliff. I would have peed in that Red and put it back, LOLOL!!!
Better to drop some indelible dye into the perfume bottle…
I agree it was likely whore. She was likely not happy about having to wait yet another year for him to drop kick me, or at least treat me so awful, I would leave.
I even wondered if she wasn’t the one who urged someone else to file an ethics complaint against him. Probably not, but one never knows for sure.
It was for me. FW started talking about getting a vacation home where I could spend a lot of time while he worked in the city. He portrayed it as wanting me to have my dream (I had always wanted a vacation property) but it was really about getting me out of town so he could cheat even more.
Now I live in a vacation home year round. Without FW dragging me down I was able to get my dream. 🙂
I just wondered because, I have shared before that early in the year of discard (unknown to me) he started talking about getting a river front property. Now we had discussed this years before, but he seemed to have such an urgency about it. I wanted to wait a year or so, but he pushed me and we bought the property in early spring, and he spent a lot of the summer going there on weekends to work on it. I went when there were things I could help with. Any way turned out he was taking whore there on a regular basis, I only went when there was heavy work to be done that he couldn’t do alone. I even helped build outside steps that in hindsight I realized princess whore would be using.
I believe he had anticipated taking another year before dumping me, he needed to get the mayor reelected with my help. Unfortunately, he was outed by an ethics complaint and his house of cards fell.
Unfortunately it’s the “vacation from marriage” home.
They may have even been planning to have her quit her job and move there. Then he likely for the next year until the election made excuses for why I couldn’t go, as he had been doing except when work was to be done.
Then when he finally got me to kick him out, he could drag the whore out of the alley and, oh well best laid plans etc.
NSG,
The only person that you need to give you permission to divorce your Cheater is you, and do understand that it is a very rare Cheater indeed that owns their own sh*t and admits to what they have been doing.
And as for what the divorce will cost you (financially, emotionally and reputationally etc), just think of it as the entry price that you will be paying for a FW free future.
LFTT
Well, I caught my cheater in the act, so to speak, by picking up his phone randomly to see all the cheating texts, kiss emojis, affirmations of love, etc. So I had all the proof I needed! He could not deny that since it was in writing from his own hand, but he did go into rage and full blown “it was your fault, you made me do it”, tropes. He also did the drip drip drip of info, lied and confabulated still. It was horrible. This is such a horrible way to treat someone you “love” yet people do it every day, and it causes permanent damage to the victims, giving us trust issues, ptsd, etc. These people are have bad character and will never change, never get a character transplant. They suck.
SG: “Is this relationship acceptable to you?”
Because it sure as hell should not be!
This one really aggravated me to read.
How thoughtlessly and unnecessarily cruel she is being to someone she supposedly loves.
She should have immediately wanted to put these scary thoughts of yours to rest.
Of course she would never hurt you like that, OMG, how it should hurt her that you went through even a single second of doubt about her love for you!! That should have been her take out of the gate.
Instead she’s taking the fifth and claiming you only have circumstantial evidence?!
She’s got the bloody knife behind her back, only the body or bodies are missing here.
She is playing with you in the cruelest of cruel ways, deeply hurting your heart and she KNOWS it!
Ask yourself this question, our fellow chump who is having trouble seeing the forest through the trees right now and I understand, we have all been there!
Do you think a loving person would enjoy seeing you suffer with this level of daily uncertainty swirling around your life?
Would you ever dream of putting HER through the level of pain she is subjecting you to right now?
It would hurt you greatly to think she had any such doubts of your love for her and you would do everything possible within your power to get that burden of doubt off of her.
ANY loving person would! A caring, giving, decent, morally sound, trustworthy person would absolutely do that.
And they would do it immediately, not still a year and a half later in counseling painfully trying to get to the bottom of it as she denies, denies away, collecting ever kibble she possibly can in the counselor’s office.
This lowlife character you are having to deal with here has blurred the lines that should never be blurred between two loving committed people.
She has left you severely doubting your gut and in agony over it and writing to advice columnists because of the fog it’s created in your psyche.
Ask yourself, who would ever hurt you like that?!
You know who does that kind of thing Smoking Gun?
CHEATERS!!! Cheaters hurt you like that!
You don’t need the dead body, the private eye, the advanced spyware, the GPS tracker, the bug on her phone.
You already have the DNA evidence at the crime scene and her standing in front of you with the bloody knife behind her back swearing she didn’t do it, it’s all ‘circumstantial evidence’ she snickers.
I really hate that she is putting you through this shitstorm of a situation.
Your safety, trust and peace of mind in your marriage were not optional purchases you forgot to buy, they should have come in the box.
She is cheating you out of feeling comfortable and safe in your relationship and she is okay with that.
But you should never be!
She’s getting her jollies from deeply disrespecting you and loving the hell out of the fact that you don’t see the full crime yet. Cake, cake and more cake!!
The love is gone when the trust has left the building. I can guarantee you that’s true.
Go see a lawyer.
Sorry she is putting you through this, no one deserves to be treated that way.
Please don’t tolerate it any longer. You don’t deserve it and it’s not your fault.
This is who they are and you will never have all the answers you want, but you have more than enough to leave.
Rest assured that when you DO find evidence of the affair, she will DARVO that too. The goal posts will always be moving.
NSG, you know what the answer is without the evidence: she’s lying and disrespectful, flirting with a bunch of guys, deflecting your questions/concerns. angry and abusive.
it’s painful as fuck.
so, deep breath. get yourself a therapist, just for you. find a lawyer, and a good one. see your GP and have all the STI tests done, as well as checking for all the hepatitis’. in fact, have a big check-up with your GP–being chumped does a number on your health. your BP may be elevated from the stress of the past couple of years.
do you have a friend who has gone through divorce? talk to them. even better, talk to them while going for long walks. walking is good for the brain and body–and it’s free.
i started a list of things I knew to be true, a list that grew as I understood, accepted, processed what was happening. mine started with HE’S AN ALCOHOLIC. when my chump journey started i understood his addiction, but not his narcissism. as I grew to understand what narcissism was all about and how it pertained to him, and me, and my family of origin, the list grew. i have reached the end of that list and it ends with AND I DESERVE MUCH MORE THAN THIS.
all I’m saying is that it’s a process. you will get through it. you deserve much more than this.
You can leave you can leave you can leave. Someone who loves and is committed to you would not be doing any of these things and would respond to you with love and assurance. You’re just off your game because you are being lied to and abused. I love the quotes from the private lies book. Maybe you should read it. Get yourself an attorney and protect your assets as best you can. Get out! You’ll eventually feel better than you ever have when you are out from under this outrageous bullshit that you don’t deserve with this piece of shift you are married to.
My cheater said he did not have “affairs”, just visits to adult bookstores for sexual release. All hidden from me and acted like it’s no big deal. Then he left things for me to find, clues so to speak, instead of talking to me. He absolutely could not understand my upset. In the end, he wanted me to be the bad guy, the one to confront, the one who said no, this is unacceptable. Yes it WAS unacceptable, lying for an entire marriage is not conducive for intimacy. In to me see = truth. I DO have a mental illness. Major Depressive Disorder. And always made sure I was treated properly with meds, therapy, etc. It was not easy for him to watch my struggles I’m certain. My relationship was 37 years. Probably a trauma bond as well, (we both had traumatic childhoods). I’m thankful I ended it in my late 60s and not my late 70s. Listen to your gut and talk to folks you trust, then decide course of action. It’s OK to take your time and please have compassion for yourself during this stressful time.
I had solid suspicion. Then I found a note she wrote to herself listing all the items she was taking to a motel to meet up with her AP. I confronted her with it during a counseling session. “That doesn’t prove anything. It’s only circumstantial!” Ha! But her beet red face only further confirmed her cheating.
The point is that they may well deny it all despite mountains of evidence. You have to be the one that decides when to end the marriage, not the cheater.
…who the hell makes a checklist for an illicit meet-up? That is BEGGING to be caught. Unless that was the point…
Bruno,
The Cheater’s mental agility when it comes to avoiding taking responsibility for the consequences of their own unilateral decisions is breathtaking.
Ex-Mrs LFTT refused to discuss the texts between her and her AP that the children (then 11, 15 and 18) found on the grounds that “those messages are private and are therefore nothing to do with you.”
And don’t get me started on her Google search history (which the children also discovered because she was too dumb to delete it) …. things like “what should a woman in her 40s wear on a first date?” and “how to have an affair and get away with it?” Again, she refused to to discuss anything and denied everything.
Plot spoiler; I divorced her and got custody of the children.
LFTT
No Smoking Gun,
Trust your gut. If you are doubting your own reality that much it’s because you have been gaslit. You trusted the idiot-you’re supposed to.
I strongly recommend you listen to the episode of the podcast where our Noble Leader interviewed the Private Eye. One of the things said there made a ton of sense-even if there are pictures of them entering a hotel together that is not evidence of evildoing in and of itself.
These are all private actions in the best functioning relationships-there is rarely going to be anything that incriminating. You are never going to have the complete picture. And for your sanity-you really don’t want it. You’ve been through more than enough and you are about to go through more.
Mine did most of the same stuff before D-Day and she came clean(as clean as that level of filth permits, I suppose). There were the lies(bad ones at that), the mysterious absences, the stories. Most mini-confrontations came with defensiveness, counter-projection, and the occasional minor admission that a boundary had been overstepped “but nothing inappropriate happened, I still love you, etc.”
The real question-even in the backwards world where everything is wrong and she isn’t cheating(she is)-do you want to go through this every day? Not being able to trust? Being lied to? Being gaslit and attacked when you ask simple questions or catch her in lies? Even under the best operating circumstances-do you want to sleep next to somebody that you can’t trust to be honest with you?
I didn’t want to lose my relationship either. I’m a definite “sunk costs” type. But almost a year after she left following D-Day? My mental health has dramatically improved. I don’t walk on eggshells anymore, I don’t have to suffer lies and “little comments”, and I don’t worry what(or who) she is out doing. It won’t give me 14 years of my life back. It IS making the ones moving forward better.
And “midlife crisis.” PTAH! I started buying Laserdiscs when mine started.
Have a Mighty Monday!
You always know- even if there is nothing concrete.
Your body has a built in alarm and bullshit detector – it never malfunctions or runs out of battery life.
Menopause , rather than an excuse to go haywire and cheat, is a great leveller for us female chumps- we drop estradiol, the swallow the shit sandwich hormone and the scales truly fall from our eyes. No more Ms Nice Chump.
Evidence? Pfffft- you live with the lying, cheating ball bag- you know them better than any nay sayer who says otherwise- even if you don’t want to believe it, you’re right on the money.
Trust yourself.
Bluewren, that is such an eye opener. At the first awareness of menopause I put myself on an array of vitamins, bio identical hormones, therapy and diet changes. But once the kids were grown, I saw what I had. My good friend and RIC member, told me how happy she was that she stayed with her cheater. Big house, intact family, money…dying here in front of me with chemo running into her artery while she was talking to me. She said she was so joyful they were together still. Cheater and member of RIC walks into.room. No hi, no greeting just..OH MY KNEE FEELS AWFUL, I don’t feel good today. Chump on live and in person chemo says, well honey, put an ice pack on that, did you take your meds? Go lay down…What can I get you? Friend dies a few weeks later, cheater gets condolences and support. Able to move out of big house to nice condo and continues getting support and casseroles. I didn’t want this to be my life.Chumps die off from the abuse, cheaters live on. No not me
Exactly- what did your poor friend actually win?
You know what’s up- good for you!
Circumstantial evidence is evidence. It’s right there in the name! Circumstantial just means it’s evidence you didn’t, personally, see happening in front of you. Your STBX is playing word games to she can pretend you aren’t allowed to leave her. (Spoiler, even if you did have a smoking gun, both she and apparently this idiot therapist would give you some kind of “who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes” routine to talk you out of leaving.)
Circumstantial evidence is even admissible in a court of law! Here is what my state’s jury instructions say about the use of circumstantial evidence in criminal cases, where a person’s liberty is at stake:
Facts may be proved by direct or circumstantial evidence or by a
combination of both. Direct evidence can prove a fact by itself. For
example, if a witness testifies he saw it raining outside before he came
into the courthouse, that testimony is direct evidence that it was raining.
Circumstantial evidence also may be called indirect evidence.
Circumstantial evidence does not directly prove the fact to be decided,
but is evidence of another fact or group of facts from which you may
logically and reasonably conclude the truth of the fact in question. For
example, if a witness testifies that he saw someone come inside wearing a
raincoat covered with drops of water, that testimony is circumstantial
evidence because it may support a conclusion that it was raining outside.
Both direct and circumstantial evidence are acceptable types of evidence
to prove or disprove the elements of a charge, including intent and
mental state and acts necessary to a conviction, and neither is necessarily
more reliable than the other. Neither is entitled to any greater weight
than the other. You must decide whether a fact in issue has been proved
based on all the evidence.
“During the therapy sessions, she lies and the therapist says she doesn’t hear anything that 100% states that an affair has happened, so I’m attacking my wife’s character whenever I bring this stuff up.”
So, the threshold is 100% to get this therapist’s support? Time to fire that therapist.
You already have evidence of infidelity. You may not have caught her in the act but all the flirting and hiding are evidence of cheating. She is treating you as an option–not as her one and only spouse. Traditional marriage vows speak of “forsaking all others” and this evidence clearly shows that she is NOT “forsaking all others.” You don’t have to have evidence of illicit sex for it to be cheating. (I suspect, though, it is FAR more than just flirting and hidden dates.)
So I was buried up.to my neck in cow manure with both cheaters and only needed one more scoop to cover my head. The scoop came and thankfully my eyes and nose were still functioning. My attorney helped to pull me out,my friends that were left, my family that held me, the various angels who were complete strangers that encouraged me. My therapist( s)and true angels with exist. So the question is, how much cow manure can you stay buried in? How long before you are near breakdown, how anxious, how much instability, how much disrespect for your own precious self? How much do you want to act like THIS IS NOT MANURE. How many lies to you want to believe? How much do YOU matter? This is your choice, cheaters are not the only decision makers. Go with your gut, go with your mind but Go.
Chump lady also pulled me out of the cow manure!!!! She got me through NO CONTACT which saved my mental health.100%!!!!
I’m so sorry, but you need to see a lawyer. If and when you find what you decide is ‘proof,’ don’t tell her. While you certainly know enough to divorce, she has also shown that she will deny and is probably a convincing liar. FW was a very convincing liar-I had a mountain of proof and didn’t tell him what I knew, which helped me negotiate a better settlement. He didn’t want his secrets coming out and couldn’t figure out what I knew and didn’t. When he lied to the adult children, they came to me and said you said you have proof, right? We want to see it. Because Dad says none of this happened.
I shared with them a sample and told them I don’t know exactly what happened, because the question I needed an answer to was ‘can I be married to this person?’
I didn’t trust my gut enough to go through with anything, but yes, it was there. I had bits-and-pieces during my entire marriage of several decades including an ex-girlfriend of his that he idolized who periodically reappeared. When he took off for the last time, he went to her area of the country. He constantly accused me of affairs, which of course was projection, whether he was with someone at the time or was thinking about it. And then there was the lovely porn habit which became his retirement obsession. He wanted to bring another woman into the relationship (NO!) and clearly found me inadequate when that took over. Then he took off to another state, and there were more signs. He let slip that he had female “friends” and became vague about how he was spending his time.
When the attorneys got involved, I told all that to my attorney. I live in a state where adultery still counts if you go to trial, and he was 95% sure we could get that to stick because all of the signs were very much there. He said that in over four decades of practice, he had never heard of a spouse taking off under similar circumstances who remained faithful. We just needed to dig further to get explicit evidence.
Well, I was broke and said to defer that, and ultimately my STBX’s attorney told mine that it was an adultery case and that he was considering quitting because they had nothing on me that way (duh!). My STBX was being a total pain and showing signs of significant mental health issues (no surprise to me). Thankfully, mine extracted a promise to stay in the game a bit longer, and we got it settled with a lot of drama but no court appearances.
So, my closure and confirmation came from my ex’s attorney. My gut was right.
I never has a smoking gun. What I did have was a stonewalling liar with poor boundaries who chatted up a skank ex gf for our entire relationship with zero mention of me. A guy who lied about everything and changed his story based on what he realized I already knew. A guy who was a nasty passive aggressive conflict avoidant prick that had never really treated me well but excelled in love bombing and painting a phony smile on his face while simultaneously being an asshole. A guy who didn’t treat my kids that well….wasn’t abusive, just a general prick.
When I put it like that its pretty easy to see why the smoking gun doesn’t matter. All of that stuff was true whether he actually screwed the ex skank or not.
Left him almost 6 years ago, best decision of my life besides having my children.
NSG, just leave her. Her raging at you would be more than enough reason to call it quits even if she wasn’t cheating. She suuuuuucks.
As CL says repeatedly, if this relationship is acceptable to you knowing it will not change or get better, then stay. If it is unacceptable to you, you should leave.
‘but am I screwing over my life and my future sanity basing me leaving over “circumstantial evidence “’
Maybe. We all step into the void every day. Anything can happen to anybody at any time. You could just as well ask yourself if you are screwing over your life and your future sanity by staying with someone who lies to your face. You are not sure of the infidelity so then what are you sure of? And the eternal question: Is that acceptable to you?
“My finances will be impacted big time, so that’s the biggest concern.”
A valid concern to be sure, but as someone who lost out financially in my divorce I can say that living in a warm, gaseous swamp with money in my fists is shite compared to living in a fresh, green meadow of peace with an eye on a budget. It’s no competition whatsoever. Best thing that ever happened to me.
Unless I missed it in the original post, I’m curious as to how long the writer has been married, and if his wife’s behavior is something new or perhaps a worsening of past entitlement. I think that’s where the “s/he has a brain tumor” thinking comes from. I was so totally ignorant of my ex-FW’s entitlement that my sisters and my friends had to cite incidents that they witnessed to explain to me that, yeah, you’ve had a problem with this guy for decades. No brain tumor, no aneurysm. Think back, Smoking Gun. Who is this woman you married, for reals? Is it worth saving? Only you can answer.
Thanks for posting and the support. I’m the one that asked this question and the replies have been very helpful.
To answer your question we have been married for more than 20 years! And in all of this time I never witnessed this side of her until I uncovered so much stuff. The person I’ve seen for the last year and a half is totally different than the person I thought I married. Upon reflection of things the last decade, there are a bunch of fishy things I realized i just ignored or didn’t pursue because I never thought it was a possibility. Like a naive toddler :/ sucks for sure.
Thanks for posting.
“I can say that living in a warm, gaseous swamp with money in my fists is shite compared to living in a fresh, green meadow of peace with an eye on a budget.”
If there is ever a Chump Constitution, this needs to be Article I.
Bravo! 🙌🏽
Thanks, FYI! We chumps give up much more than cash money to live in peace, but most things we leave behind are worthless compared to a peaceful mind, heart, and soul.
If you’re really unhappy in your marriage, and your spouse does nothing to reassure or comfort you, which is what a good spouse does, of course you are justified to divorce, unless it’s against your religion which might require proof of adultery. I don’t think most of us are in that category. A spouse who acts in suspicious ways and will not stop doing it, is not the kind of marriage most of us want. There are people who divorce over political differences. If you are really unhappy and uncomfortable and your spouse won’t try to accommodate you, you absolutely should get a divorce – no point in living in a real version of the game Clue where you’re trying to figure out if the butler actually DID it.
Of course, If you have the money, hire a PI. PIs are way underrated (probably because of money) but they really are worth it. Probably a good divorce lawyer could refer you to one. If you really think something is happening and you want evidence – and maybe it would help you in the divorce for custody, asset splits, whatever – a PI will be able to uncover a lot, put the evidence together, document (probably record it), and maybe serve as a witness as well. It’s definitely worth the money and what I would personally do if I could swing it.
It’s good to give the PI some parameters though and see what they say.
My ex was in a gated community where law enforcement cracked down on PI’s that got around the community systems to surveil those types of places. My attorney had his paralegal call an established PI firm there, and they said specifically that they would NOT surveil that community unless they had written permission from the homeowner (my ex was renting) or the HOA. Ouch.
But of course, there are ways. A friend of mine bought a house locally in such a community, saying that her ex couldn’t get to her there because of the gate and guard. She invited a bunch of us to a party and told us to go to the main gate where they would check the visitor list and let us in.
I shouldn’t have done it, but I had an errand on the other side and decided to try the resident’s gate, which I assumed was unmanned and required a transponder. I got there and parked some distance away. Sure enough, it was a very slow, simple gate. I watched someone piggyback on a resident with a transponder, and then I also did that. I also noted that the cameras on that gate were all clouded over and rusty. I told my friend, of course. LOL.
I was going to suggest this myself. If you can afford it, it might help with the divorce, along with her attempts at image management during and post-divorce. It also might give you peace of mind that her protestations of “innocence” were just more lies.
And if you can’t afford a PI–or the PI is unable to turn up definitive evidence–you already have experienced behavior from her that is unacceptable (the secret calendar, the lies, etc.)
Let us know how things go–we’re rooting for you!
Many of us chumps wish we had taken action at the first of many red flags. I found out when logging into the public records to check on a deed recording that FW was in collections from American Express. We were always debt free. Financial infidelity is often an indicator of sexual infidelity. I bought the lies, he explained away the problems. It was a sad time in my life, my mother and sister died within 4 months of each other. It was quite a while before the bubble burst. Married 36 years when I filed. Trust your gut.
When your spouse becomes your de facto opponent in a struggle to determine what they’re really doing, it’s over anyway.
My own FW, after getting busted, started trying to erode the definition of “affair.” They didn’t do it in such and such a place, or they didn’t do it for a long time, so why are you so bent out of shape? That was just one of those things that happen in everybody’s marriages, where you just kinda have sex outside your marriage. It’s not like it was an affair!
If your wife is calling your evidence “circumstantial,” you know enough. The rest is details, and they don’t matter in coming to a conclusion that you shouldn’t have to live like this. I’ll wager over time you’ll become more certain and clear-eyed, not less.
“If your wife is calling your evidence “circumstantial,” you know enough. The rest is details, and they don’t matter in coming to a conclusion that you shouldn’t have to live like this. I’ll wager over time you’ll become more certain and clear-eyed, not less.”
Yeah, calling the evidence “circumstantial” is basically saying “you can’t technically prove that anything happened.” That’s … not a ringing endorsement of innocence. “All the cookies are missing from the cookie jar, and I was the only one home, but you didn’t see me taking a cookie.”
As for wagers, I’ll wager that she moves in with mystery man within days of leaving the house.
Well, I’m sure if you wait around long enough you’ll find irrefutable proof of her cheating. She’ll get sloppier as time goes by. But, as John Maynard Keynes once said, “in the long run we are all dead.”
If we are all dead in the long run, how do you want to spend that time?
I was doing the same thing in therapy when my therapist said, very simply, “you don’t have to prove anything. This isn’t a court of law. If you are unhappy, you can leave.” FWIW, my therapist was aghast at the evidence I put before her, and she thought all of it was unacceptable behavior from my then-spouse. Nonetheless, her words freed me.
Her words were so stupidly simple, but it had never really occurred to me that I can just leave a relationship that traumatized me so much.
Here are some things that happened after separating and divorce:
To quote everyone else here, adult don’t just flirt, they fuck. But, if there’s no “open” arrangement, even evidence that someone’s angling to screw someone else or just floating the idea around their work arenas or social environments that they’re open to it is humiliating enough to justify ditching a marriage. Genuinely loving people don’t humiliate the people they love. They don’t set up dynamics where their partners, say, show up at work related events and there’s an iffy “vibe” because coworkers even kinda/sorta suspect cheating.
I was in a similar spot not that long ago. There was circumstantial evidence of affairs over the years, and as of October 2021, pretty clear evidence of an emotional affair, and circumstantial evidence that it had gotten physical recently. But he intermittently love-bombed, gaslit, raged, blame-shifted, and talked in circles, and just generally did everything possible to make me doubt my own perceptions. I started individual therapy immediately, which I would highly recommend for you. We did couples therapy but I ended it after six months. Couples therapy with these liars is at best ineffective, and at worst will make you feel even crazier.
I never found actual proof of a physical affair. From the day I discovered the emotional affair, it took me almost two years to leave. Part of that was the time it took me to figure out he was a liar and a covert narcissist, and to rack up many more instances of him lying, hiding things, playing mind games, and being verbally abusive. Then another eight months to start divorce proceedings and get him to agree to spousal support, because I had been a stay-at-home mom for sixteen years. I understand the fear that life will be worse without them (look up “trauma bonding”). As others have pointed out, staying will eventually make you crazy, sick, and, possibly, dead. You deserve a happy life. When someone shows you so clearly that they don’t (can’t) love you, believe them. It will be hard at first, but ten months out of that house and still going through the divorce, I have no regrets except for not leaving sooner.
You can always see a lawyer, separate, and reconcile if after a year or so she is not behaving this way. But I’ll bet you lunch at a good restaurant that if you separate, she’ll be dating one of these fools quite openly within 30 days.
I want some counselor to fix this because I can’t make a decision.
This is how you remain a chump.
A chump will look for any excuse to stay. It’s easy to stay. You just do nothing.
No one can fix that mentality.
If I catch them they’ll stop cheating. Bwahahahaha. Nope, they just get better at hiding it.
Im the one that asked this question: Thanks Chump Lady and everyone that posted comments to support me in the shifty situation, it’s very much appreciated.
I’m still reading through the comments, thanks so much for them, but here are some answers to questions:
– we have been married for more than 20 years and I never saw this side of her untill all the discoveries. I thought we had an amazing marriage and the last few years she was saying she was more happy than ever with our relationship. Little did my chump self know what that meant.
– the vacation home comment- I’ve read that other cheaters do similar to my wife and discuss buying a vacation home, going on vacations, and looking at new cars to buy once they are discovered. My FW totally did that the first few months.
– also, it’s funny chump Lady used the matrix as the photo because my FW has said “theres a glitch in the system” a few times in the last year and a half.
How do people stoop this low 🙁 how do you make it through this 🙁
Will comment more soon.
I left on “minimal” evidence. We’d been having circular arguments a lot and he was acting depressed and unhappy, so we’d been going to couples counselling to try and build better conflict resolution skills, and he was doing individual counselling. Up until now this man had been boyfriend of the year for three years running, so I completely believed him when he said it was depression/work stress.
But the arguments felt like pushing through treacle because they would never, ever get resolved and he would talk circles around the issue, then blame me for always nagging him and starting fights.
He also had some shady behaviour like doing a 180 in how he treated me – no longer attentive, caring and kind. He no longer wanted to be intimate. He was distant. He no longer had any time and energy for me – he would work long hours and then come home and just want to sleep, but he could stay on the phone for hours with his female “best friend”. And when I expressed my hurt and unhappiness with this sudden change, I was of course jealous, controlling and insecure, not understanding – even though I’d never had a problem with how he spent his time or his friendship with her until then because I felt very secure in the relationship and I didn’t get any weird vibes between them. There was a lot of generally hostile comments, attributing bad intentions to me, even though I’d not changed my behaviour. Our shared life stalled: instead of planning a shared future together, he now couldn’t commit to even a weekend plan with me. I asked him several times if he was unhappy in the relationship and if we should end things, but his response was always that he loved me, he was just struggling with mental health and work stress.
Even at the time, genuinely believing it was untreated depression/poor relationship skills, I knew that if nothing changed the relationship would have to end. I still have old diary entries saying how miserable I was and that if he didn’t want to help himself there was a time limit on how long I could put my needs and life on hold. And I was teary, sleeping poorly, stressed and struggling to focus at work because I was so deeply unhappy with the situation at home and the worry that I was losing the person I loved. But, he’d been a great, supportive partner until then and never given me any reason to doubt him, and stuck with me through some of my challenges so I was here to try until I really couldn’t any more – and the quitting point was still some way away. *But I would have left eventually purely based on how he was treating me*.
I’m not sure what made me check his phone. If I’m honest, probably the way he always seemed to have the energy for his “best friend” and not me nowadays – his whole voice and demeanor would change, and I felt on a gut level it wasn’t just friendly friends. To my surprise, I didn’t even make it to their chats – I immediately found a few months of sexts between him and a lady I didn’t know. And that was enough for me to immediately confront him, and end the relationship. I’m sure there was more and worse I didn’t find because he immediately started deleting things on his phone in front of me while denying it!!!!
Having a dig around confirmed my instincts, and his response to getting caught out helped me move on quicker and with less guilt that I should have done more to support him in his “depression”. It also firmly slammed the door shut – he could so easily have wiggled his way back in later had I thought it was just depression/work stress. And of course saved me a lot of time and energy and money continuing trying to fix the relationship while he was secretly sabotaging it.