SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I understand that one of the things that is essential in the process of reconciliation is that my husband gives me access to all accounts - logins, passwords, etc. However, I know that he could set up a different account, find another app and use that to communicate with the OW, so me checking up on him in the places he gave me access to is pointless.

How do you check in on your wayward spouse, and feel comfortable that he isn't finding other avenues to communicate? At this point, one week past the last huge piece of discovery, I feel compelled to rake through apps and email servers to catch him in a lie.

This is absolutely horrible.

Help, and thanks.

Hi I am not in R but understand exactly what you are feeling and unfortunately if they really want to cheat and hide it they can. It is absolutely pointless at some point and you will have to go by gut instinct and the work your WS is putting into R.

My xWS did not put in the work to R, was not empathetic or remorseful. While he knew I looked at his phone and tracked him he was able to continue his A for another 2 years with a burner phone.

The hypervigilance you feel is normal as abnormal as it feels. Just try not to let it take over you and stay that way for years. If it does I would suggest leaving as no M is worth that after infidelity (my opinion of course).

Sadly, unless you are a forensic IT engineer, you just can’t know. There are so many tricks and apps and websites, and there are literally other forums just like this one that cheaters use to share them and get better at fooling us. You can do your due diligence, but you will never achieve certainty.
My wife used methods on her phone to avoid detection that I never would have believed she would have figured out, she’s never shown herself to be technically savvy. But when there is a will, there is a way
So you’ll need to learn to trust your gut and your feelings about what is going on. If something feels odd, then you act like something is off. It’s hard when you’ve been gaslit and you feel like you don’t know which way is up. But trust yourself, trust your ability to know what love and honesty feel like.

There are so many apps,sites, incognito, etc that it's impossible..add in the easy availability of a burner phone. Impossible.

You won't know, until you catch them. They're very sneaky.

One week since you've had another dday? Stop looking through his things. It won't get you anywhere. Practice the 180,and take care of yourself. Sit back and watch his actions. Is he doing the work? Listen to your gut. That will tell you waht you need to know. Trusting him right now is an exercise in futility.

You can't prove a negative. Try as you might (and I certainly did), you will never be able to prove that your spouse is not cheating.

That didn't prevent me from trying. Despite knowing this, I also felt compelled to monitor screen time and app usage and emails and his location etc etc RELIGIOUSLY in the early days. But yes, if someone REALLY wanted to cheat, they could potentially find a way.

I suppose that never finding anything helped a little, especially because I'm more tech savvy than my husband and I kept some of my methods and spot checks pretty close to my chest for a while. But there is no shortcut to rebuilding trust - truly. I wish there was, it would certainly make R easier. But trust is easy to break and hard to rebuild. The only thing I've found to work, is brutal honest, transparency, and consistency over time.

This is absolutely horrible.

100%. I'm sorry you're hurting. I assure you, we've all been there. It does get better.

HELLFIRE

Practice the 180,and take care of yourself. Sit back and watch his actions.

Can you explain what 180 is, please?

Molly, go to the main forum page. Up in the upper right corner there are 3 little bars,click on that,and you will see the option to click on the healing library.

Simplified..the 180 is about detaching,and working on your own healing. You let them figure it out. They must do the heavy lifting in the first few months. The 180 is about taking care of yourself, and detaching a bit(or a lot,depending on what they're doing), and you work on becoming stronger.

Many betrayed wives, while practicing the 180, stop doing the usual things they would have done for their husband. They stop cooking for them, stop cleaning up after them, stop having sex with them, and stop doing their laundry.

This is typically done when the wh is still lying,or angry, or defensive, or still in contact with the OW.

It's not meant as a punishment, or to try to wake the wh up(though that does happen sometimes). It's all about caring for yourself, and working on your own healing.

[This message edited by HellFire at 8:37 PM, Thursday, February 22nd]

At this stage, so soon after your last Dday, you should assume that he's lying. The onus is on him to prove that he's not.

I monitored what he didn’t know I was monitoring . I purchased a VAR that he unknowingly took to work everyday. He works 3 times a week at the office and 2 at home.

I listened to all calls in and out.

I also had the passcode to his office phone voicemail.

I would put audio recorders out in the house when I left.

I figured if he had a burner phone he would use them at his office where he was safe.

I haven’t found anything. I stopped sending the recorder because it was hard to save it on my computer and he had so many meetings that it was full of work stuff.

I might start back up just because.

I will never stop checking up.

His AP was a desperate woman who would probably sit next to a fly on a turd in a back alley for his attention so it’s never something I can feel clear of.

Someone said "you can't prove a negative. . ." true
but?

If you must keep checking - then I have the question - why bother? Will knowing/not knowing trigger a change of some kind?
Or, if you don't trust and find something nefarious - you start divorce proceeding?

Well, to answer the monitor question -

Start/keep a timeline of his whereabouts.
MONEY! - where is how much going where? Credit cards? Banking accounts? One scenario I read was WS was getting cash back when grocery shopping to finance their fun.
Mileage car accumulates? 35 mile commute to work - but occasionally (??!) 45 miles? redflag!

You DO have access to all $$ accounts right?

Cell Phone usage? Call log on provider web page for your account? Minutes used for data?
Consider a logging application on a shared house computer. Iphone? is it synced for back up to cloud?
Internet Browser? See if you can set up Google account - can monitor location and browsing. Location requires
location service "on" cell phone and phone tied to google.

Consider a GPS monitor for vehicle - some are much smaller than a tin of mints - easy to hide but one needs to make sure hiding spot will work. Most have a subscription fee for monitoring. Usually not to much

Do you have Apple phones/account? consider an "airtag" or two -

VAR - everywhere he can have a "private" conversation. Gotcha? He uses work phone/computers/email.

NEVER NEVER reveal your sources of info! Don't reveal even to your best friend!

Video cameras? if for home - consider something like "Arlo" - real time monitoring on your cell phone.
"secret camera?" all kinds available disguised as all sorts of common items (for house) Usually not very inexpensive though.

Long term? consider such monitoring is going to be a mental and time burden on you - it is worth it?

Bottom line is that if they want to continue the A, they will.find a way. My Exww and her assclown went old school. She would go to a hospital near our house and use a pay phone to call his company's 800 nbr. I only found out because she told a mutual friend and the friend told me. That's when I decided that I no longer wanted to be the marriage police. I wasn't going to spend the rest of my life looking over her shoulder. Bottom line for me was I finally listened to my gut that she was never going to be a safe partner. She never did the work.

Best wishes!

I did all this stuff. Like some seriously seriously in depth level of surveillance. All the above plus more. Did it for 7 years and couldn’t understand why i kept doing it. It was all based on this « inappropriate » relationship i didn’t know was physical. I would never have caught the actual cheating because it happened in the office IRL. There was no communication outside of work. I would have thought I would be doing the surveillance till I died. But after he came clean a year and a half ago I have finally stopped. For a while now I have been stopped…at least six months. I just have no interest and don’t care. Also, I am aware that if I spent seven years doing that with such intensity and never caught even a whiff of something amiss its pretty likely he’s clean. Never say never, but wow, he’d have to be Houdini.

My point is I guess sometimes you do it because you know you’re missing something. I was definitely missing something.

That is why some of us betrayed refuse to be the marriage police. It’s a never ending task.

I did tell my H that if I ever even suspect he’s cheating, I’m not asking him IF he is. I’m going straight to divorce. And he knows I mean it too. It’s not an idle threat.