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Click hereHow to Tell if Your Spouse is Having an Affair?
For the last 15 years I have worked as a corporate security consultant. It's an alternately exciting and terribly boring job. Most of my stories that I've written for this site have stemmed from my experiences at work and those same experiences have taught me a lot about human behavior and weakness. Because so many people on the Literotica site and forum know me for the work I do through my stories, I get asked for advice a lot. The most common question I get asked is "How can I tell if my husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend is cheating on me?"
Even though my firm handles corporate security, we also work with individuals, and like most firms this size, we have private investigators both on staff and on retainer. Many of the executives of our corporate clients reach out to us when their personal lives go up in smoke, so it pays to be ready for those eventualities as well.
This has given me a lot of experience dealing with this particular issue and I can tell you some of the patterns that seem to come up over and over, as well as some of the steps you can take to get to the truth. However, it's important to note that short of catching them in the act, there are few ways to know for sure.
Actually, that's exactly what happened to me when I was younger. I was in a long term relationship with a woman, a woman I planned to marry, and I caught her in bed with another man. In retrospect, all the signs were there, I just didn't see them. To be more specific I didn't want to.
So what do I do first?
You may not. It's been my experience that a lot of people don't know, they just have this vague and creeping feeling that something is wrong and that their partner is cheating on them. Don't discount that. We all have two minds, a conscious one and an unconscious one. Many times our unconscious mind picks up on things that our conscious mind can't. Maybe it's a look, or a casual touch or the inflection in someone's voice. Do you find yourself thinking about a particular event over and over, you can't get it out of your mind, even though it seems innocuous? Your sleeping mind is telling you something.
So what are the signs?
Changes in behavior are really the most important signs to look for. In fact, almost all of what I can tell you to look for, in some way comes down to a behavior change. Are they spending money differently? Are they acting more distant? Etc... however there are some really specific ones to look for.
These changes can be a result of them either trying to find time to be with their other intimate partner, or it could be an attempt to avoid intimacy with you. Both are important and mean different things.
Another important sign is failure to make long term plans. For instance, are you the kind of couple to make vacation plans a year in advance, yet for some reason your partner just can't seem to commit this year, and its only six months out? Have you two been talking about buying a new house, or having a child, and suddenly they don't seem as interested anymore?
Failure to make long term plans can mean that they are unsure that they will be with you in the long run, or that they are sure they won't.
Another strange one that a lot of people overlook are demotions at work. I've seen this one come up a couple of times. The partner in question is suddenly spending more money on the affair than they can account for, so they make up a reason for a salary reduction. I happen to find that one particularly shitty.
Another change could be that they are suddenly more liberal with their spending. They get used to spending more and forget to hide it in other parts of their life. This usually happens more toward the beginning of the affair.
A final sign is that they are running out of money and seem constantly surprised by it. "Wow, I'm sure I had more money on this card." This is a sign of someone that has compartmentalized the affair so well that they are not seeing the spending in one part of their life as related to spending in another.
The alternate is that if your spouse is used to having sex three times a week and suddenly goes to zero, and has no interest in getting back into the swing of it, they may be getting their cake elsewhere.
Another sign is that they are suddenly interested in different sexual activities that they never have been before. Maybe they seemed to learn a new technique or trick out of the blue. Again, you have to ask yourself where the change is? Are they the adventurous sort that may have looked up fun and exciting things to do with you in bed, or are they a traditionalist?
Again, something that I have heard people tell me over and over is that when their spouse suggested something new in bed they said "I know you'll like it!" How do they know? Well it could be that they have already tried it with someone else, and the other person liked it.
Now let's look at the other side. What if they normally talk about someone from work all the time, and then suddenly stop. They talk all about work, but avoid mentioning the other person. That could mean that they are trying to avoid calling attention to that person.
One of the dead giveaways is that they are purchasing new underwear. This is a lot more of an issue with women than men. However any new underwear, especially if it is different than what they normally wear is cause for concern. New sexy underwear that they don't mean for you to see? That's cause for a lot of concern.
Sometimes this happens when someone is feeling so guilty that they are looking to assuage that guilt by placing blame on you. Sometimes it's a conscious attempt to distract you from their own affair by accusing you of something. Sometimes it's as simple as they thinking that if they are cheating, you must be also. Regardless if they suddenly suspect you, and you have given them nothing to worry about, you should take a hard look at this.
Important Note: Any or even many of these warning signs could be exhibited perfectly innocently. Just because one thing has changed does not mean your partner is having an affair. The more categories they fall into, the more concerned you should be, but that still isn't proof that they are doing anything wrong.
So, who are they cheating with?
When trying to answer this question, the first thing you have to ask yourself is if it's an online affair or a physical one.
Online affairs are intimate relationships that occur over email, social media platforms like Facebook or communication programs like skype. They can include written or verbal intimacy or even physical gratification through the exchange of pictures, videos and mutual masturbation.
Often people discount these as "not real" affairs, and therefore somehow more innocent or less hurtful. Unfortunately sometimes the opposite is true. These types of affairs can be devastating to a relationship.
To spot an online affair, look for changes in behavior related to connected devices like computers, laptops, tablets, mobile phones, etc. Many of these will seem to be the same as the list on number 8.
If they are having a physical affair, the chances are that you know the person they are cheating with. People tend to pull from their own social networks, rather than a stranger on the street. Since you and your partner know many of the same people, it only goes to reason that you probably know the person they are cheating with. The most common people for someone to have an affair with, in order, are:
You may not know Number Six, but chances are you will know numbers One through Five. Again, look for the changes. Is someone you both know suddenly treating you or your partner differently? Do they seem to be spending a lot more or less time around? Do they seem to show up suddenly when you aren't expecting them?
Yeah, but how do I KNOW?
As I said earlier, you may never know. That's just the way it is. However there are some things you should start paying attention to, if you can.
The only way I can illustrate this is to give a couple examples.
Example 1) A buddy of mine finally had to accept that his wife was having an affair. Before he did though, his wife was traveling a lot for work. One time she told him that she was being sent to a national convention by her company. Two days before she was leaving for the weekend, she told him that the dates for the convention were moved at the last minutes and she would be going two weekends from now instead. His response was "Oh, that's strange" and dropped it. Obviously major conventions don't have their dates changed at the last minute. It just doesn't happen, short of something like a terrorist attack or natural disaster. But he was willing to believe her because she was his wife.
Example 2) The COO of one of the companies we work for contacted us and said she was suspicious her husband had an inappropriate relationship with his adult niece. They seemed to be spending way too much time together and were uncomfortably affectionate at times. Some weekends she would stay at the house and he would disappear into her bedroom for long periods of time. When we looked into it, the girl was not related to the husband at all. She was a college student that was basically a prostitute. He was paying her rent and expenses to college for her to sleep with him and pretend to be his distant niece when other people were around. This had been going on for two years before the wife decided she had to know for sure.
Okay, I know now. So what do I do?
I just can't answer that for you. I wish I could, but that has to be your choice. When my girlfriend cheated on me I broke up with her right away and never wanted to see her again. (I did, and it was disastrous, but I didn't want to.) I've known people in better relationships that could get past it and grow stronger because of it. I guess it just depends on the couple.
However the one piece of honest advice I can give you is not to make any rash decisions. If you do find out that your partner is cheating on you, you have a lot of different paths that you can go down. But if you confront them right away, it may limit some of your options. Instead, I would wait to confront them until you are clear what you want to do, and what you want from them. Remember that you are the wronged party, and that you have nothing to be ashamed of.