To Spy or Not to Spy?

My husband was able to carry out both of his affairs without getting caught for a variety of reasons. First, he’s an accomplished liar. Second, even he says that  I was too trusting. And I was. I just refused to believe that he would ever betray me. Third, we were sleeping in separate beds due to his snoring. That reason, in particular, made it very easy for my husband to sneak out at night to meet his AP. I can honestly say that I never once caught him either sneaking out or sneaking back in.

One of the biggest reasons he was able to cheat was the nature of his job. He doesn’t sit behind a desk in an office all day. He’s constantly in and out going to various places to get his work accomplished. So when he told me he had to go to a neighboring town for parts, I didn’t think twice about whether or not he was lying. That was his first affair, if you can call visiting  erotic massage parlors an affair.   At any rate, it certainly was betrayal.

Then we moved 1500 miles away and my husband’s next job was the same. He was responsible for quality and safety in a production facility so when he told me he had to train a second shift, I didn’t think twice that he might be lying. When he left the house at 8:00 in the evening it was just part of his job, no big deal. And since we slept in separate rooms I had no idea when he returned. This was his second betrayal. As I look back it’s amazing how many lies I swallowed. Once during the first betrayal and once during the second I suspected something was wrong, but I “knew” in my heart he would never betray me. Yes, I was too trusting and too naive.

So now that my husband’s  affairs  have been exposed I’m left with the dilemma of the nature of my husband’s occupation. After D-day we sold our house, moved to another town, and we both found new jobs. But he still doesn’t sit in an office all day. It would be so nice if he did. It would allow me to pop over “unexpectedly” and see how he’s doing. If he stayed in one place I could insist that he call me from the office phone several times a day. If his job didn’t require him to travel all over it would be a lot easier to keep tabs on my unfaithful husband.

Enter my iPhone. It has an app called  Find Friends. I Love it! I’m sure the app was made for various reasons, but it helps me immensely.  Once set up all I have to do is search my husband’s location and I know whether or not he’s at work. If he’s elsewhere I can see his location and then call and ask  “Where are you? What are you doing?” I’ll know immediately if he’s telling the truth or not.

Unfortunately, this has created a whole new dilemma. Sometimes the app doesn’t work and I stress out. When it fails, I have a bit of a  panic attack wondering where my husband’s at, what he’s doing, who he might be with. Or sometimes the app picks up his location but doesn’t show him traveling so it looks as if he’s stopped in one place when he’s actually driving down the street. Then I really seem to freak out. 

Sometimes I feel ashamed when I have to check the app.   After all, I’m spying on my husband. Part of me feels guilty, but only a little part. I’m working on trust but it’s a day to day process. Hence my quandary: to spy or not to spy. Some days I don’t check the app at all. Some days I check several times. I’ve even gone several days in a row without checking. Pat myself on the back!

Trust. It used to be so easy for me. Rick says that trusting is a choice. I must choose to trust my husband. But before I can choose trust I must feel safe doing so. It’s my unfaithful husband’s job to not only make me feel safe in our relationship but to also prove that he’s trustworthy. Rick also says that until trust is earned back the unfaithful must replace it with honesty and honest communication. If caught in a lie, even a “little” one, then trust is undermined and safety compromised. My husband has done a surprisingly good job of replacing trust with honesty. But I have to admit that there are lots of times when I have myself a sweet little panic attack and begin to wonder.

My dilemma, to spy or not to spy, will probably haunt me for awhile. I’m feeling safer, more secure in our relationship, every day. Trust is creeping back into our marriage. But until it’s back all the way, I enjoy having certain safety mechanisms like “Find Friends” to rely on.  

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emotional wreck at this point

6 months into discovery and I can't seem to function from one minute to the next still. He says he loves me , wants to move forward, but won't come clean on some questions I ask. Tells me he made a mistake, get over it. As far as I know he hasn't had any contact for about 6 weeks with her. She is getting a divorce and will be final in 2 months. I am crazy with worry. How do I get him to understand my apprehension and open up to me so I'm not so fraught with worry. Sometimes the tension can be cut with a knife. I don't want that, I want us to heal. We've been married 23 years and I don't think either one of us want to throw that away.

I use the "Find My Friends"

I use the "Find My Friends" app, too. It's very helpful in rebuilding trust to know where my husband is at all times.

Find Friends has been invaluable

I use Find Friends, too. It has been invaluable in helping me feel safer and giving me peace of mind. I have no qualms about "spying" on my husband. His infidelity is sex addiction, and we are 10 months out from the second and real D-day, and I feel that keeping "tabs" on where he is during the day is paramount to me even approaching any kind of healing. Thank you for your blog, Lisa, it is reassuring to know that I am not the only one who finds the Find Friends app helpful.

How do you track with google

How do you track with google maps?

I absolutely am so overcome by how deceptive my unfaithful can be. It’s exhausting to know that I have to go to these measures to protect myself. I have to consider whether or not it’s worth it. ☹️

How do you track with google

How do you track with google maps?

I absolutely am so overcome by how deceptive my unfaithful can be. It’s exhausting to know that I have to go to these measures to protect myself. I have to consider whether or not it’s worth it. ☹️

Tracking

I recently learned I could use my husbands google maps to locate where he's been and where he's going. That's how I was able to tell how many times he was with the AP and how long it'd been going on. He doesn't have an iphone and it's his work phone, so I can't really track any other way. I also read his texts. I've been told I shouldn't, however, until I can learn to trust him again, I feel it's for my sanity.

app

We installed that App on our phones and I am so happy we did. Similar story in our end...lies and coverups and me not guessing that the behaviors existed or that he would ever betray me. He worked in two locations and it never crossed my mind that he would be making stops in between his travels for his behaviors that were betrayal. He was always home on time and didn't out on the weekend....so, imagine the shock when I found otherwise...I guess no one on these blogs needs to "imagine" because, sadly, it's our reality...Find My Friends is a God send. It will alert me when my husband leaves a certain area...where he is, through GPs, and lots of other information. I thought it would help me the most, but it turns out, it's a safety belt for my husband, just as much. He is happy to be accountable to me and I know it gives him peace of heart to be living an authentic life...I don't consider this spying. i consider it a life line for those that have dealt with infidelity and trust issues. It's a free APP and I suggest everyone put it on their phone.

Google isn't reliable either...

Much of your story resonated with me. My husband took a job in another city and me and the children still stay at home. He came home most weekends. Unlike you, however, I had feelings that something wasn't right. He became more angry and me and the children, accused me of lying with small stupid things, and the like.
Finally, one evening when he was on his way back out of town I searched his google activity both for websites and his timeline and found exactly what I didn't want to. When I confronted him, he lied but then came out a few days later. We are still in the disclosure process, as I feel that there is more that I'm not being told.
Since then, I check his online activity and his timeline (GPS) through google, and while it gives some security... I still don't trust it much.
For one, the information is able to be deleted and I found that after I discovered places he had been and told him about it.. he deleted it off
his timeline. So, it's hard to tell if something may have been deleted that I have not seen yet.
Wish there was a foolproof way for it. It would bring about a safer feeling when he is at work out of town.
I need something to be reliable in my life.

Apps dont always help

Before DDay, when I suspected something was going on, I also used the Find Phone App. He got a second phone that I did not know about and he would forward his phone calls to the second phone. He would leave his phone at his office so I would think he was there. It doesn't work with texts though, so he always had to make excuses as to why he did not get my texts when I would finally call him. After I the first DDay (only partial because I did not get the complete story of what was really going on) , I used the Find Phone app as well. Plus he would be very careful to tell me exactly where he was going, when he arrived and when he would leave. After second DDay, when I found the second secret phone, I discovered my husband would just make sure the AP would meet him where he was going - to the store, or when he was on the road for work. She would meet him and they would have sex in her car while he left his phone in his vehicle. This is when I found out the two of them had been having an affair for 4 years and not just the couple of random sex encounters many years before.
He now says he has absolutely no contact with her and he has no more phones. She does not live in our area anymore so the potential for contact is greatly reduced. However she does come back to visit her family though. He does not seem to understand how he has completely obliterated any trust I might have been regaining much less that he has destroyed some of the few activities he had to help build trust again. He now does the same things - tells me where he is going, when he arrives and leaves. He says its different now. I see the same things he was doing before when he continued his affair under my nose. I am 4 months out from this recent DDay and completely back at square one or even negative square 10.
Bottom line - if they want to get together, they will get together. There is no infallible way to keep an eye on the unfaithful.

I spied

Your story is exactly like mine. My husband slept on the couch due to back problems, but that only allowed him to text and talk to the ow all night. He does not have a desk job, but he is the boss of small company. Only the secretary is at the office during the day, and he would stay there most days with her. I trusted too much and never suspected anything until my gut told me to look at the phone records. He left for a month because he wouldn't choose between us. He came home for three months but it has been a disaster. He refused to let her go at work but kept telling me that he did not communicate with her. I kicked him out once and he left twice because I would have panic attacks everyday knowing she was still at the office and I never knew if he was there or not. But he kept beating it into my head that they had no communication, all I had to do was look at the phone records to see that. I knew he was lying, so I stooped to an all new low for me, and I put a VAR in his truck one day. Three phone conversations between them through an app. When I asked him, he lied to me over and over saying I have not talked to her. Until I told him I have it on tape. Then he said but when you mean talking, you think it means me trying to have a relationship with someone. Nope, talking means words coming out of your mouth. He yelled and left me and said he made a f'ing mistake coming back to me. So I left the state for three weeks. He changed the password for the phone records. In those three weeks he called crying that he is broken and humble, and he set boundaries to have no contact with her. He was adamant that he had no communication. When I came home he tried immediately to woe me and come home, but I told him to give me the passwords to everything. He refused and after twenty minutes finally gave them to me when I threatened to finally tell her husband. He said I've been talking to her while you've been gone. Yep, texts and phone calls. That was three weeks ago. In these past three weeks, he has stayed some here, but I am so angry at all the lies and her presence that I sent an ultimatum to him at my counselors suggestion. My H has refused to answer questions, give me passwords, and to attend more than one counseling session. This counselor figured out right away that he hasn't ended the affair. So I sent my list of questions in an email that said I needed him to answer these questions and until then he is to have no contact with me. That was three days ago. No response from him, and I'm not sure I will get one. I feel good to stand up to all the lies, but I am struggling because I still have an intense love for him and I'm not ready to move on from him. But, the counselor says that if he chooses our relationship, he will answer the questions, but if not, then I have my answer.

What is a VAR? Sound like

What is a VAR? Sound like something I need!

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I would highly recommend giving this a try.
 
-D, Texas