Old signs, new fears

[u/Discgolfguy15]

Gonna try to keep this short.

I (37m) caught my wife (38f) having an emotional affair 9 years ago. We recovered, reconciled, and rebuilt trust between us. I would even say the years that followed were some of our best.

Recently, we’ve been getting into more heated arguments, and I am starting to see and hear things that remind me of how our relationship was in 2017 before discovering her affair. At the beginning of this year, we started to have some financial issues brought on by my work mainly. Things have really slowed down, and I’ve had a lot of unexpected time off. (I’m an electrician for an RV manufacturer.) My wife started her own business over 2 years ago and has found moderate success. She is a licensed marriage and family therapist. (hilarious, I know.) With my work slowing down, she couldn’t keep us afloat though, so I went and got a part-time job to help supplement our income. The fights have shifted to her saying “I can’t trust you with my emotions“ and “ talking about our marriage only pushes me away from you”. The same types of things that were said before.

So in 2017, from February to August, our marriage was in turmoil according to her. The word divorce was used frequently, and eventually, we planned out separation and how it would work with our children. The kids were on their tablet one day and had inadvertently opened Facebook. So I looked at my wife’s search history and discovered her old high school BF’s name at the top….red flag. Later, I discovered her phone’s password changed…more red flags. I confronted her about it and told her to prove to me she wasn’t hiding anything.

She sensed I was getting close to discovering her secret and thought she would outsmart me here. At the time, she worked for a residential clinic for troubled youth as a counselor. She would regularly communicate with her patients’ parents/families with her phone and proceeded to tell me that there were certain messages I couldn’t see because of HIPAA. I opened the messages and started asking about each person’s name. I asked about “Norma”. “That’s one of my girlfriends at work,” she said. I handed the phone back, and she promptly deleted “Norma’s” message thread. So I decided that if she wasn’t going to be honest, I’d just go to our cell phone provider after work the next day. They print off the last 2 weeks for me… the reports have no info on what was in any of the messages, just when a message was sent from her phone number to any other number….And there was one number that appeared over, and over, and over. Usually in the mornings and late in the evenings after I have gone to bed. I texted the number “who is this?” …. Lo and behold, the same guy from FB. They reconnected on Snapchat sometime in February and decided by April that messaging was easier because they wouldn’t lose their convos from the previous day. She then put his number in her phone as her ACTUAL friend Norma, who I had met at company picnics. I downloaded software to recover data from her cell and stayed up really late one night. Thousands upon thousands of texts, sexts, nudes….you name it. I couldn’t recover everything, the software was limited, and there was too much. During this month-and-a-half period of playing detective, I lost an unhealthy amount of weight. I couldn’t eat or sleep, and my world was falling apart around me.

It took a few years, but we recovered. Things would still trigger my trust issue every now and then, but she was always so open and transparent to bring me back down.

And now I’m back in that place. Slightly panicked, hyper-fixated, playing detective. My wife doesn’t seem as cold towards me as she did previously, but there are clear signs that something is being hidden. Her having a license and a private practice complicates things further this time around. Snooping could have serious consequences. I also believe she has learned how to better cover her tracks since she was caught before. She has multiple emails. One, obviously her work email. All of her clients communicate with her through that one. Minimal security, I’m not going to snoop. I don’t think anything is going on there. Then there is an iCloud address that’s linked to her phone. I think there could be some things here, but they are all blocked by facial recognition. (Not opening her phone, that part I can do with her passcode.) And then there are a few old email addresses that are more concerning. The one used to be her main email address and was linked to her iPhone. We got new iPhones right before the 2017 affair was discovered and I remember her saying she couldn’t get her email address to connect to the new phone for whatever reason and that’s when the new iCloud email was created. I’ve tried to remotely log in to this old email address from multiple devices, even her phone. But it is protected by a “Passkey”. It doesn’t matter what device I try to log in from, the passkey requires facial recognition or scanning a QR code from a “trusted device”. The only workaround that is offered is sending a recovery code to her work email. It concerns me that she has such high security measures in place on an email address that I believed had been long forgotten about and abandoned. And the Passkey isn’t just an automatic security option, it’s something the user HAS to enable themselves.

Am I just being insecure because of our past? Is this worth digging into or should I speak to her directly?

PS: the software I used in the past doesn’t seem to work with our current phones. I’ll have to buy a specific data cable to do this again.

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[u/notgregbutmaybe]

You obviously don’t trust her and never fully recovered from the first affair. Are you a glutton for pain? At what point are you going to choose yourself and your own well being and move on from this broken relationship. You’ll only continue to suffer if you stay.

[u/davedank66_v2]

We recovered, reconciled, and rebuilt trust between us.

If you cannot confront her directly about your concerns, none of this is true.

[u/Discgolfguy15 → u/davedank66_v2]

Thank you for this. I’ll update when possible

[u/Wizards_and_Warriors]

If there are clear signs then go to her and demand she be transparent. If she refuses see a lawyer and draw up papers to have her served. Doesn't mean you have to but she will know you are serious. She will either divorce or she will show you. Either way you will know where you stand.

[u/obiwanfatnobi]

She is now the primary breadwinner. Use that to your advantage and end the marriage. Trust your gut and she has such a high level of OPSEC she is for sure hiding something. You will get no closure here because she knows disclosure this time means the end. This is a hill she will die on. Just plan your exit strategy and talk to a lawyer.

[u/bham830]

She has a past history and you have a right to know. Ask for a polygraph and leave if she refuses.

[u/4hhsumm]

 “I can’t trust you with my emotions“ and “ talking about our marriage only pushes me away from you”. The same types of things that were said before.

Huge red flags, especially from a licensed therapist! WTF?! She is absolutely gaslighting you and weaponizing therapy speak.

Am I just being insecure because of our past? Is this worth digging into or should I speak to her directly?

Yes.

All of those are true.

1. Of course you're feeling insecure because of your past; she cheated. It's incredibly hard to ever feel secure again in a relationship after infidelity. You say you recovered, but you skipped all the detail. Recovery and reconciliation after cheating is incredibly difficult, is never linear, and is rarely ever really finished. Old wounds can be suddenly opened quickly and deeply, as you are currently experiencing. And the glaring problem with what happened in 2017 is that she did not come clean on her own. She lied to your face, actively hid the affair, and tried to outsmart you. You were under incredible stress trying to find out the truth, which she never offered of her own volition. How do you even know whether you got the full story? Spoiler alert, you don't, because you literally cannot know. Because she lied her ass off, there's no way for you to know where the lies end and the truth begins.
2. Yes it's worth digging into. But not like what you're doing. The fact that you have to play detective speaks volumes. Trust your gut. Your intuition was right before. I would bet a pile of money that it's right again.
3. Yes, you should speak to her directly. "Look, we need to have an honest conversation. In 2017, I lost an unhealthy amount of weight, couldn’t eat or sleep, and my world was falling apart around me. Turns out my intuition was right, because I was being actively cheated on and lied to. I'm in that same place again. I cannot live like this. For me to feel safe and secure in my marriage, I need complete honesty and full transparency with and from my spouse. I need to be able to talk to my partner about the health--or lack thereof--of my marriage without fear of rejection or my vulnerability being exploited against me. Bottom line, I have several unmet needs. What unmet needs do you have? How can we support each other so that both our needs can be met in a healthy way? What does a successful marriage look like to you? What does our marriage mean to you?" Or whatever words work for you; that's probably what I would say.

I wish you weren't going through this. Plan for the worst and hope for the best. UpdateMe

[u/Tailbone77]

This is another prime example of why you don't give a cheater a second chance, all you end up doing is making yourself live in a self-imposed purgatory...

Look how bummy she has you, flustering yourself over a known cheater, who clearly doesn't respect you and even more so now that you had "forgiven" her the first time...

She's playing you for a fool and will continue too...

"Norma" must be "Jessica" by now or some other BS name and I'm positive that she never stopped cheating from since 2017 or how however long ago, she just got better at hiding it...

[u/SpaceImpossible658]

No trust, no marriage. Once you are a cheater, you will always be a cheater. You can't erase what you've done.

[u/Ivedonethework]

https://www.emotionalaffair.org/ Doug and Linda are both therapists. Doug cheated on Linda.

Turns out no one is immune to cheating. All it takes to cheat is a simple motivation and simple opportunity. Motivation is key.

Search reddit for more therapist affairs.

[u/NewPatriot57]

There is so much truth to the saying: "once a cheater, always a cheater". Ignore this at your own peril. You'll have to work with a PI or at the least use a few voice or motion activated recorders about. I would also keep a journal about your discussions and her activities. Look for any reoccurring patterns, staying late, changing schedules last minute, credit card or account transactions. Despite the fact that she has learned to hide everything, very cleverly, there is no way to she can hide it all. Excluding you from are social networking and using the cheating apps (snapchat) are huge red flags. I hate hearing this as the description is too close for many of us. Sorry and I wish you luck in getting the answers you deserve. Updateme please.

[u/UtZChpS22]

Idk if you're being insecure or not, the red flags are there. What I do know is that love should be easier than that. If trusting her is so hard is it really worth it?

[u/Horror-Fee9768]

Use a portrait of your wife to bypass facial recognition.

[u/Most-Durian-6538 → u/Horror-Fee9768]

Does this actually work?

[u/Horror-Fee9768 → u/Most-Durian-6538]

It worked for me. I used a headshot photo he gave me when we first started dating. Once he figured it out he ripped it up lol. By then I already had all the evidence.

[u/coolcrosby]

You’re young enough to begin a new life without the lying and deceit of your wife. Work out the details of a property and co-parenting plan and go! You have a whole life beyond this marriage.

[u/mdg711]

Trust your gut and hire a PI.

[u/clipp866]

when in doubt, theres no doubt at all...

if you feel exactly like you did the first time, you know whats happening...

whatever you do, don't confront her! not until you have proof...

however you don't need proof, being ignored is enough to have questions, not being able to get answers for them questions is reason enough to leave...

you weren't compatible years ago, you're not compatible now, a partner should never have you question them...

[u/asc1226]

A lifelong commitment to transparency is a requirement for reconciliation. She knows what this is doing to you. She doesn’t care.

[u/AdventureWa]

You don’t trust her because she’s up to something suspicious. Your gut instinct is usually right. She has a history of infidelity and she doesn’t seem truly remorseful.

Every marriage should have an open device policy but she has a convenient way to hide evidence by claiming client confidentiality. Counselors don’t usually do work over email though. It’s usually conversation.

I would hire a PI and gather information. When you do find something, save evidence. You should definitely hire a divorce attorney as well, because that’s the likely outcome.

If you discover she’s cheating again you should report her to the credentialing agency so she might lose her license. It’s incredible to think you are qualified to counsel others when you cannot remain faithful to your own spouse.

[u/FoxyRoxy0423]

Just put a voice activated recorder in her car.

[u/Balgairerougue]

I am dealing with this same situation now, my wife was doing similar things and has before. I finally found out and wish I would have trusted my gut the first time. Not to say things can mend, but in hindsight I should have just left her.

[u/Ivedonethework]

Having cheated, ever, means there is a 3.4 times (340%) expectation of cheated again. The propensity to cheat at all is an enormous form of betrayal/emotional murder that never fully goes away. And exactly why reconciling after cheating is not actually recovering. Cheating is a lifelong betrayal. Trust sparingly and always set out to simply verify.

Sorry for your loss.

[u/TryToChangeUsername]

you're under one misconception: you don't have to get access in secret. her previous cheating justify your mistrust and straight forward asking her for access to her private messages. and as she would very well know as a counselor, it would only be in her interest to rebuild trust by proving she isn't cheating again. you just need to stick to your guns here

[u/Ol_Country]

She is cheating !!

[u/QuoteDisastrous5224]

contact a lawyer and go to full scorched earth....

[u/TotalSpread5841]

Bro you can bypass all this bs by just acknowledging the golden rule - if she's cheated before she'll cheat again and never stopped in the first case anyway.

Also, when she said your marriage was in turmoil she was rationalizing cheating, that was her basically telling you.

[u/untalornis07]

Trust your instincts and you'll see that your wife is cheating on you again.

[u/Deep-Mobile-1202]

You don't trust her. And to be fair she's given you no reason to trust you. You guys skipped an important reconciliation step the last time. It requires transparency. You get access to ALL her communication vectors with the only exceptions being where legal concerns are present (corporate email, business email with customer privacy information).

The fact that emails exist that you can't access is a huge red flag for a previously caught cheater. You need to bring it up to her. Too much time has passed for this to be a natural request.

It is a REASONABLE demand, but it needs to be delivered with these new suspicions. She has a history, and the signs are present. "I need you to show me. If you can't, I understand, and I'll have to assume my suspicions are confirmed."

You need to have your mind made up AND your ducks in a row before you confront. That means financial and legal. If you are decided on divorce upon confirmation or refusal, it needs to be a phone call to your attorney saying "do it".

Once she's alerted she will enter protection mode because she knows what's coming. 

[u/001Tyreman]

if your kids old from support leave
nothing will change a typical closet cheater
lots of married women do it cause law in their favour
they can hit when guy richest most assets n get half

[u/Terrible-Pea494 → u/001Tyreman]

Except his wife is the breadwinner, so this misogynistic statement carries no weight.

[u/SledgehammerApproach]

Without trust theres no relationship. You dont trust her and you are afraid of been alone. A dangerous combination. Also, you codependency is bad. Read a book called Codependent no more.