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The original was posted on /r/relationship_advice by /u/Nitro_magic on 2023-10-06 20:35:15.

Bare with me… just a little long…

Background… Me (46M) and my wife (49F), have been together for almost 8 years. Married almost 4. This is both out second marriages. Hers, she was married for 20 years. He cheated on her. Me, married for 6 years… just fell apart from each other and was for the better. Been living together for 7 years. Bought a house 3.5 years ago. She has 2 kids… grown adults… I have 2 kids one adult (married F) other is teenage boy. No kids in the house full time… unmarried ones, and obviously teenager, stay for periods of time. We’ve had a good relationship. Within the past 6 months to a year, it’s been rocky… but no major fights… no yelling… no nothing. Not as much sex or intimacy though. Both faults.

About 2 months ago, something felt wrong in my gut. I just couldn’t shake it. I’ve known the password to her phone our whole relationship. (I pay the cell phone bill… it is 100% in my name. I pay for her 22 years olds also… they are all on my line.) She got up to go upstairs to do something, which I knew would take a couple of minutes… change over laundry. Her phone was on the couch. So I opened it and went to her texts. And that’s where I saw them. I quickly scanned over them… they were sexual in nature. I didn’t see them all… but I saw enough. She came back down stairs and I didn’t say anything… I wanted to think… her son was also in the living room, but napping on the couch so he didn’t see anything. I started to go upstairs and I called her to come upstairs. I didn’t want to wake him up or anything. She came up and I just hit her with, “who is he?”. I could tell it took her off guard because she said “what are you talking about”? I said, “Be honest with me. Tell me who he is.” I said, “I’m giving you this opportunity to come 100% clean.”. Now… there was ZERO yelling… zero raising of the voice. I said, “I saw your text messages. I had a feeling in my gut that has not been sitting right. So I looked, and I saw them. Who is he?” She finally broke down and told me. She said it was a guy from bowling… she said it was nothing more than text messages and never crossed beyond that line…

So we talked for about 15 minutes. I took part of the blame as there had been some neglect there and she obviously was looking for attention. I get it. I said… “What can we do to fix this?” “How about counseling?” she said… “Let’s talk to someone and work on our communication skills.” I agreed. And we have set that up for a few session already. And our communication has been very good and a lot better. There are things that have opened my eyes that I need to personally work on. And she has admitted likewise. She has also admitted that there are “blockers” up right now as far as wanting to be intimate that she is trying to overcome. As she pointed out things that were lacking before hand… not as much casual random touching… or feeling wanted by me… I do admit, she had put on weight from when we started dating and in the back of my mind that may have caused some issues, but I always loved her and I always wanted to be with her. I never cheated or went elsewhere. She has now lost the weight within the past 6-8 months from working hard and also she had some minor liposuction done to get rid of her pregnancy skin that was there… basically to tighten up her body. She looks great!! And I have for sure noticed that. But I know she is for sure going to be getting more attention with the way she looks. She said he bowled with them on their league on another team. She said she was done with it and that it was a mistake and we will work on us. She also said he wasn’t bowling there this year.

For the past month or so I have really been making an effort to show her more attention. More cuddling… more random smacking of her butt passing by. Sitting together on the couch and just rubbing he legs. Falling asleep spooning… etc… I have also tried to send more flirty texts, tried to initiate intimacy and show that she is wanted. And in our weekly conversations (we have these for about an hour each week just to talk about the past week, how we are doing, how we each feel, etc) she has said she has seen these and she has noticed them. I have also noticed her being more receptive and looking “happier”. However, in trying to initiate intimacy, she is also turning me down as in “i’m tired”, “I have an early morning”, “I’m spotting”… etc… So in the past month it has been non-existent.

We talked last night. Normal conversation. About trust and that I want to trust her and that I know it was broken and will take time to heal. She agreed.

Now… a few weeks ago she changed her phone password… we talked about that. She said she feels that had I asked to see her phone and not just went through it, that it would have been a different story. But she said she is having conversations with her friends, talking about her and I’s relationship and going through what we are going through and she doesn’t feel that I need to be privy to that conversation. Fine… I respect that… you need people to talk to…

Gut feeling is still not quite right… She was in the shower this morning. Her Apple Watch was charging. I tried her code that I felt it would be… and sure enough, it opened. I went to messages, and just started scrolling… no name jumped out at me… no “just phone number”… however… there was a name that had the bell with the line through it… so you don’t get the notification. Stephanie. So I clicked on it… sure enough… messages to that guy. pics from him… not “d*** pics”… but there are conversations about making out again… etc… I took pics with my phone of one of the messages… I also got the phone number… I put it in my phone just under that number… I also started making notes. I googled the phone number… found out his name… address it was tied to… found him on FB… it’s the guy 100000000000%. Was able to to see that he does in fact STILL bowl on the league. And they are bowling against each other next week. So they do mess around on that night after bowling for a bit before she comes home. She has flat out lied and said that it never went beyond that. The guy is a total tool… looks like a loser… a total downgrade from anything she could ever get… I feel it’s “safe” for her as this is not someone she would ever be with in an actual relationship. Just my feelings But a mess around guy… for sure.

I did not confront her… we talked a little about us more this morning and what we can do to get things right… .kinda went nowhere. But I don’t want to let on that I know 100%. I want to play the long game with her. I know she will charge her watch and leave it out there again. I am going to get more pics of the texts… more proof… I have proof of all the texts, not what they are, on the t-mobil site that shows his number and texts… and some calls.

Our anniversary is coming up and I had planned to take us out of town for the weekend. I’m probably going to cancel that. I had her 50th birthday party planned as a surprise that I had invited a bunch of friends too… I’m probably going to cancel that. We had a trip to Punta Cana planned with about 24 other people in February. That will probably be cancelled.

Here’s the kicker… 90% of her friends… are my friends that she became friends with through our relationship. She has a small circle of friends… and most don’t live by us. She will lose…everything pretty much. Our friends… my family… my kids… She will put a strain on her relationship with her kids. She will have to find a place to live, which she does make good money, but it will be very hard. We have pets.

Her ex husband cheated on her… one of her ex-boyfriends was not 100% truthful with her. i have treated her as best as I can.

Now… I am stuck with this of not knowing what to do. Do I let it play out and see what happens? Do I confront her with the absolute proof so she has ZERO leg to stand on? Do I randomly show up at the bowling alley one day… I bowl also at a different alley… but could just say I got done early… Do I blindside her with divorce papers? Do we separate? Do I bring up everything in counseling?

I’m not a violent person… but I have friends that will have my back on this guy if I were to confront him with no problem…

What are my options here? I’m looking for help in making a knowledgeable decision. I would love to save my marriage.

I’m sorry this is long but there is no real way to make this a TL:DR option.