[lifeisajourney]

I know this thread is old.. but I found it while googling" texting and cheating" even after having found out that my husband did this as well to me 8 months ago, I still once in a while need to read about others going through the same thing.

Back in july I found out from my neighbor that my husband and his wife had been texting for a year. It is cheating, it's hurtful and if kept a secret no different than a physical affair. sexy texting leads to phone calls and progresses to innapropriate talks and exchange of racy pictures.
I felt so betrayed... to me it was a coward way to cheat.. I think they somehow thinks it's OK to desire another woman if they do it on text cause it "wasnt real"
Oh, it was all "real" to me.
We ended up splitting up and going back together again and we have been doing marriage conceling. It helps some but to this day I have not forgotten the betrayal.
Its a year of my life that I see as a total lie and I wonder how much longer this would of went on if the other husband didnt find the naked pic of herself on her phone that she had sent my husband.
The worst part is she is my neighbor...I have to see her going about her business and it takes me all my self restraint to not want to tell her how I truly feel about her.. but then again... he's the one to blame, she wasnt married to me, he was...

anyway, just wanted to say that months later this little game of texting still hurts, it gets better but it's very hard to ever trust again.

thanks for listening.. just needed to vent?

[tracylee]

I have just recently found out my man of 6 years has been texting non stop back and forth with a woman he works with. At first he tried to say it was work-related, but I told him I saw the phone bill ( I found a way to get into the verizon account) I am so very deeply hurt by this, and he claime is was just flirting, and nothing has happened physically, but they have gone out a couple of times. He travels for work, so it makes it even harder, because he is not home to talk about this, and althouhg we have talked on the phone several times, I am not accepting this very well. He assures me that that type of texting is over with this woman, he is sorry I am so hurt. But says they will continue to communicate because they are working on the same "project" I am now blocked out of viewing the verizon account because I put on a parental control, where she could not text or call him and he obviously found out. It has been going on for 3 months at least, and if I wouldnt have just found out, I am afraid of what may have become of this...or is it going to happen anyway??? I am wanting to trust him, but I just can't and I am even trying to get a job with verizon so i can see if he is being faithful or not. anyone have any suggestions??

[lifeisajourney]

Traceylee,
I am so sorry... I know how much it hurts
and if I learned anything in therapie is that trust is not a given and you have to build up that trust again and it's done by a trial period where the cheating spouse has to share everything, give access to email account, phone records ect ect
This is how the therapist had us do it, he had to not willingly let me snoop around his stuff but even do it together.
after months of doing this, you do start to not think about "what is he up to now" it does make it easier to realise all this is in the past and so far it looks like he is not willing to make that mistake again and you can start trusting again... little by little.
If your spouse is not willing to let you in on his phone records and still leaves part of his life unreachable for you,Im afraid he is going to open an even bigger gap between you two, ( in my opinion) and why should you trust on blind faith? you did before and look where that has gotten you...

He should be willing to show actions of working towards bringing you together, words are only words... everyone says they are sorry when they get caught.
but being truly sorry requires actions.
again.. I feel your pain, it is a dark place to be betrayed and it hurts.
( hugs)

[MarriedMan]

Similar Situation but reversed

The few posts I have read on here seem to be all from women regarding their husbands/boyfriends so I hope no one takes offense to one from a man regarding his wife. I think a woman’s perspective on my situation would be better anyway. I am sorry this gets a little long, but I wanted to make sure as much of the information was available as I really want some honest opinions on my situation.

To start from the beginning, my wife and I have been married a little over 5 years. We have 3 children (2 were hers from a previous marriage). We have had our rough times over the years, but have always managed to work things out.

A couple of months ago, she was all excited one evening that she “saved” an old friends marriage with some advice she had given him (they reconnected on facebook). I congratulated her and didn’t think anything more of it. The other day I noticed here receiving and sending quite a few text messages (which she normally doesn’t do as her phone plan wasn’t set up for it, so I just recently upgraded her plan due to overages). I didn’t think much of it, but I looked her direction and caught a glimpse at the name out of the corner of my eye (I honestly wasn’t looking to see her phone). It was a name I only recognized as someone she had talked about from her past. That nite, while she was getting ready for bed, I looked at her phone (I am not the kind to be snooping and usually respect her privacy, but my curiosity got the best of me). Her message inbox and outbox were full of texts from this guy. This upset me a bit, but I figured I would keep my trust in her and forget about it.

A couple days later, I realized I hadn’t paid the cell phone bill yet so I went online to pay it and saw that she had used about 3 times her allotted text messaging, so I looked at the detail. I have found that in the last 2 months, she has sent and/or received over 1,700 text and picture messages from this guy (mainly text). Before I dug into the full extent, I questioned my wife about this. The guy is someone she dated long ago (she was about 18 and in college at the time). They dated about a year and were intimate. The guy lives about 2,000 miles away from us where they went to college

We went out on a rare date night since this happened and discussed this a little more. I told her I wasn’t going to tell her what she could and couldn’t do, but that I wanted her to know this really bothered me. She said she didn’t think I would mind, but now that she knows, she would stop. Well, we changed up our date night and instead of a movie went to a bar and danced. We pulled over on the way home and got a little crazy and intimate (she let loose and drank a little much as she rarely gets the chance to let loose and I stayed sober as I was driving). After our little intimacy moment, while we were driving home (maybe 10 minutes later), she kept reaching down to her purse and phone. I asked what she was doing and she said that is what she does when she has drank too much, she continually puts on lipstick and checks the time. I pointed out there was a clock on the radio on the dash.

After we got home and she was getting ready for bed, my curiosity got the better of me again, so I checked her phone, and sure enough, she had received and replied to a text to him. The next day I asked her about this and she at first got upset as I was “checking on her” (which she has the right, I know I shouldn’t invade her privacy, but felt I was justified given the current situation.) I feel this was very disrespectful given we had just been intimate and am now wondering if it was me or him she was intimate with that evening.
She says there is nothing going on, the texts are just for fun, like jokes and things and they remind her of the person she was and the fun she used to have before she got married. I told her I think about those times as well, but the reason they were fun wasn’t because of who we were with, but because we didn’t have the grown up responsibilities of children, marriage, careers.

I know the other guy lives 2000 miles away, but her parents and the rest of her family is within a couple hours of this guy so even though there is no chance of her physically cheating on me with him during the normal course of our lives, there is always the chance that she may be there visiting family some time and I am not with. (this would not be normal, but we had previously talked about the possibility of her going to do just that this summer while 2 of our kids are with their biological father, and I joining her for the last part of the visit). She swears she would never cheat on me, but I consider this cheating. When we got married, I cut ties with all my old female acquaintances, even ones that were just friends, out of respect for my wife.

I am curious how other women view this situation. To me, this is cheating any way you look at it. Maybe just because I am hurting from this my judgement is clouded, but I don’t think this is right and I am not sure if I should be the bad guy and demand she stops, or just wait another month until the new phone bill comes out to see if she has followed through and stopped or what (I guess she could always switch to emailing him, I know her email log in information, but I don’t feel right checking it, I believe in trusting each other and allowing some privacy).

Does anyone else have some suggestions on how I should approach this?

[Hopeless Dork]

I think emotional affairs (especially where woman are concerned as we tend to be more emotionally attached to our sexuality) are something to be taken very seriously.

I would assume she has no intentions of being with this man in real life, but I see that he must be filling some kind of need in her or else she would not be talking to him.

Please don't take that to mean I'm saying this is your fault... her actions are her own and only she is responsible for them.

Since this guy is from her past , He remembers her for the vibrant 18 year old she once was. A lifetime ago before marriage and family and responsibility. Its like she can giggle and be that young girl with him, she once was, she still is.

If she's getting older, or even feels that she is, this revisit to the past may be a boost to her ego, to a time she felt hot and fun. He doesn't see her as she is everyday so it probably is a bit of an escape.

Women can have an ego as fragile as men can. And need attention, need to feel special and sexy and hotstuff.

I see so many times (not saying this is you) but a man become so comfortable with his wife that he doesn't notice the little things anymore... that guys at the grocery store notice, that guys at the coffee shop notice.

And its something that both partners need to work on for each other that even though you've been together a while, that making each other feel like you are sexy, and wanted goes a long way into keeping the peace in the relationship.

It may or may not work, and you may be already showering her with attention and compliments and this is something she's just doing anyway out of a greedy need for attention...

But part of me instinctively feels that if you, back off of her actions on the phone and instead focus on you and her , her need for this guys attention will become less so.

Remind her that you still see her as that hot sexy young thing, remind her as often as possible. Flirt with her. Send her a naughty text mid day. You can be that crush that makes her tummy fill with butterflies... let her catch you staring at her rear end... just all those little things that give a woman the jolt of being a hot mama. If she gets that from you -- she'll need it from someone else far far less.

If she likes to rattle on and babble... let her do so. Ask her about her day, ask her about her friends and her feelings. This guy is likely playing up the I'm here for you card... and you know you are capable of providing her with any need he is filling.

Just a few thoughts.

[MarriedMan]

Thank You Hopeless, I try and be playful with her and compliment her (though she usually responds in a negative, such as I will tell her how good she looks in something and she will say no she doesn't) so the compliments have gotten to be fewer and farther between. She catches me looking (at her) all the time. I guess no matter how much and how often we think we do these things for our partner, they can always be done more.
I am not a very emotional person, probably less so then even most guys, as I look at things primarily from a rational perspective which often contradicts an emotional one. I realize she, in some way, is filling an emotional void by doing this. I just don't know how to provide the emotional support she needs/deserves. I can not rationalize emotion, therefore haven't been able to figure out how to extend it more. I have done things in the past like send flowers to her work for no reason (which she always tells me she doesn't like getting flowers, though I think she secretly really appreciates this) and things like that, obviously I haven't been doing this enough, and don't really know what else to do to be there emotionally for her.
I do appreciate your response and insight on this. Thank You

[LanaBear]

Have you told her, in a no sugar coating way, what your thoughts are on the whole thing? Does she know how much it hurts and bothers you? She may think it is innocent and therefore feel that it is okay, but emotions and feelings tend to build unsuspectingly and behavior like this may lead to some pretty rough waters.

Maybe wait until the next bill, if it is still the same, set her down and tell her truthfully and honestly how you feel.

[Messymiss]

All of these relationships male/female, -texting-emailing- close plutonic friendships etc ARE totally innocent untill the very second they cross the line and become non innocent. Deep down I feel they all have the potential to become non innocent at any moment. That was certainly proven in my case. I wish to this day I had have thrown a total tantrum when I felt my husbands "innocent" friendship with a young girl at work was a bit too close for my comfort 20 years ago. It would have saved us all a lot of pain. Twenty years on, still with my husband (who by the way recently had an innocent email relationship with an old girlfriend, untill I found out and threw a total tantrum) and I live with the fall out of it every day. Messy

[caterpillar79]

You and your husband need to sit down and draw a line here. You set your rules and see if he can compromise. Diplomacy is vital in marriage.

I don't think there is any cheating going on YET (since you said it's innocent), but if you don't feel OK with it, say so in a non-threatening, loving way. It is not what you say, but HOW you say it.

[Lizzy79]

All these women make really good points, and it is so true you have to follow your heart. but here is my experience with texting.

before my ex and i split last year he was texting a lot, he was never much of a texter previously. but he started sleeping with his phone and was on it a constantly. i was so curious so i looked and found some message from our neighbor's daughter (18 yrs old). i was so ticked off. i confronted them both and they said it wasn't anything, just friends. (he's 32 by the way)
so i said what i needed to say and let it go right?

well . now they live together and are going to get married. i wish i had listened to my gut and kicked him out before i got my heart handed to me.

some free advice, listen to your instincts they're usually right on!

good luck!