I didn't know I knew it at the time. But, I found out later that I knew it the day he hit send on the craigslist women looking for men site. I called my friend and told her something was wrong. My husband who hates his job and hired people so he wouldn't have to travel for it and stopped taking classes because he was planning on leaving his field suddenly had a renewed interest in classes and travel. My friend had been cheated on so I trusted her judgement over mine when she said "no way, I've seen how he loves you, there's no way". I decided it was just me. This is what I wanted. This was why I remarried so that I'd have a H that had other interests and I could have a few nights a month at home alone while he was out. Be careful what you ask for! Now I was ruining my me days with jealousy and worrying.
A few weeks later I noticed him clicking quickly out of websites like sugardaddies.com and a yahoo site that was clearly a personal girl's site. He'd gotten a Blackberry, taken a call in the wee hours of the night, and had to drive the car to charge the batteries 4 times for a half hour each over the course of a week, didn't feed the dogs, clean the house, just to name a few changed behaviors. The next day he asked if I was ready to watch a movie with him before we went to sleep. I turned to him and said, "No, I'd like to know why you are cheating on me." His response..."what makes you think that?" My response - the fact that you didn't say "No I'm not, but you asked me for evidence." Not wanting to hear that it was true and not knowing enough about how to deal with all this yet, I accepted his words of denial.
The next day he "confessed" that he was distracted from our relationship and did look at some sites but that he was in love with me and would give up on doing all that and focus on us again. Note, we just got married 9 months earlier. How can you get distracted after only 9 months? I was still in la,la land! Then he invited me to help him put together his work out machine (so he could get all buffed for his new girlfriend) - it made me sick. He had a class scheduled for business two days later and "realized" that if he went down a day earlier he could do some work at an office in the area. He was giddy, it meant he could leave the next day. I looked at him incredulously - "I think you're cheating and you want to extend a business trip - are you nuts". He apologized and said he wouldn't go the extra day - dang tootin' right.
His first day gone I called all the hotels in the city he said he was staying in. He wasn't in any of those, but I figured he was just somewhere else close by. When he called while I was at my friend's she asked him what hotel he was in. Yah, he wasn't in that hotel when I called the next day...or any of the hotels in that city either. (He always stays in the same chain). So I look on line and can not find a class that meets his description. I'm incredibly ill, because I've eaten only 2000 calories in a week and half and I think I have to go to the hospital. So I call his work to ask for his class information. They don't know where he's at - not entirely unusual but not good news either. Now, I'm wondering if he's even in class at all. He calls and offers to come home when I think I might have to go to the hospital. But, still wanting to trust him and not having solid evidence yet, I don't want him to leave this really important work class to have a doctor tell me to eat and I'll feel better.
He calls me to check in and there's a seagull sqwaking in the background. He's supposed to be in a class from 8 am - 8pm in a hotel. But, I can't be sure if it was actually a bird, because I still want to trust him. He comes home with a tan - how stupid are these people? You're in class from 8 to 8 and you get a tan! It's like calling in sick to go skiing and coming back with sunglasses tan line on your face!
I've resolved to force him to confess or prove himself with documentation and to do so without crying - my mom's sage advice. I am successful. I ask for receipts from the hotel and something, anything from or about the class. It takes 4 hours of stalling, searching, and a series of more and more ridiculous lies before he tells me to leave if I don't trust him. I don't cry I just keep asking for one piece of evidence. He's thrown away the receipt, get me a confirmation, he can't find the confirmation, show me class confirmation, he can't find it, show me the course description on line, there isn't one, ask the hotel to pdf the receipt, accounting is closed, let's just call and get a verbal confirmation, he's sure they won't tell us over the phone (of course I know they will but don't want him to know in case I need to check on him in the future.) He pulls a receipt for his one night stay in the correct hotel - its for zero dollars and he's showing me a portion of the bill - I'd already seen the whole bill in his garbage from his car. He finally shows me his points useage for a hotel we vacationed at in the past. The hotel is at least an hour away from the class location. He's one to stay as close as possible, but there's some big event in town that weekend so he says he stayed further away. He tells me to leave. I don't want to go. I want him to tell me the truth or prove himself. So I ask him what was happening on the prior trip that he had to stay an hour away. He goes silent then defensive and says he just likes to stay at that hotel (well, duh your bed buddy is there!). I almost laughed it was so ridiculous. I sat down put my hand on his shoulder and told him to be brave and just tell me the truth.
He broke down crying. He's not a crier. It was pitiful really. I felt so bad (how sad is that?). But, he confessed. At the time I was so happy that I was right and that I wasn't a crazy, jealous wacked out, psycho brat that I didn't even care. I let him talk, I asked him why he'd given himself permission and then I said I was hungry and we should go get dinner. I told him that I'm sure I'd be mad later but at the moment I was just glad I wasn't crazy.
Then the pain and anguish begin... He's conversed with her for a week or so, met with her for dinner, spent a 3 day weekend, a night, and a 4 day weekend with her over the course of about 4 weeks. He did not go to any class - he went on VACATION!!! for goodness sakes. I'm afraid he's fallen in love. He insists he told her on the last trip that he couldn't do it anymore, but I don't believe him. He was so happy when he came home - that wasn't the happiness of someone who just gave up a source of a great deal of excitement. He was ready to work out and get buffed for her, you don't do that for someone you're not going to see again. (Maybe now I think its possible he told her that, but maybe thought he could still work something out in the future, but I don't think that's on his mind at all these days, it took a while but I think he let the fantasy go, finally.)
He sent her flowers so I ask for a copy of the receipt. 4 weeks later he hasn't given it to me and comes up with some malarchy story about how they can't get it for him without all sorts of work. So I call and have it pdf'd to me in all of two minutes! I get her name and work address for my efforts. My friend googles her and checks out her myspace site. Now I know she's not a poor lonely single mom looking for company but a sleezy slut that's also quite attractive - cute as a button. The good news is he hasn't sent her a love note. Just wishing her happy birthday 9 days before mine (will I ever enjoy my birthday again?). Guys are so dumb sometimes I guess since he was sending her flowers it was convenient so he sent me some that day too - what an @xx. Maybe it was buy one get one free!
This is when I realize that looking for evidence is just trying to see if there is some piece of evidence that is going to put me over the edge and make me leave. Sunflower and all of you help me realize that if I haven't left because of the A, there's not going to be some detail that has me leave. So I decide last week that I'm not leaving him come hell or high water. I have someone walk a bunch of flowers over to his work with a note that says there's nothing he did or that he can say that will be cause to make me leave. I ask the girl to try to get him to walk through the lobby of his business to receive the flowers. She's successful. He's thoroughly embarrassed and has to endure the 20 women that work there telling him jokingly that the flowers had better be from his wife!
He is tormented by these comments. I've told him that I had a private investigator organized to go take pictures of him on his last trip. But I couldn't find my H so there was nowhere to send the PI. Now he worries that there's a PI taking pictures of him when he's outside of his work. He sits at his desk all day waiting for me to call afraid if he doesn't answer I'll freak out. He went to pick up burgers and called to talk to me the whole way there and back so I'd know he wasn't calling someone else.
He's trying. He's really bad at all of this but he is doing the best he can. And, he's trying to share his feelings which I'm trying to accept as a really really great gift, but sometimes find it hard to do so in the face of his actions. He hasn't gone to IC yet, but he came to one of my IC appointments with me. He says he is going to go to IC because he has a lot to work out, but he just hasn't had the time yet.
Now that I've decided to stay I can get mad and not go through the whole anguish of deciding if I'll stay or go. I just get mad, get it out of my system and then get back to loving, healing, forgiving, compassion, support. Gotta go, he's coming home from working late. He invites me to dinner when he's working late so I know he was there with other guys. Ciao! Thank you all.
