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Lost of perspective and good advice here. I wish I had know about this site sooner as I would have had a better plan to sort through and find truths. I was reactive and probably blew the window of opportunity. Stuck in a believe her words and stay or pay attention to actions and decide from there.

If kids were not involved the choice would be easier. I don’t want to break up my family over a gut feeling. Nor do I want to be in a marriage with a spouse that had been unfaithful.

I don’t want to break up my family over a gut feeling. Nor do I want to be in a marriage with a spouse that had been unfaithful.

But it sounds like your marriage is not so much anyway, with "duty sex" as you put it. For sure, your relationship needs some maintenance. Do you want to stay in the marriage in its current state? Is your wife comfortable with it?

She has definitely crossed boundaries. But a boundary isn’t a boundary unless something changes when you cross it. Unless there is a response. So what has changed?

A polygraph test is a very helpful resource and proof is always preferred, but I've found one's "gut feel" to be the most accurate measure to go by with confirmation of duration, depth of connection and scope of betrayal, left to uncover.

But as others have said, you want to be calculating about this and not panic into a premature confrontation. Currently you have an advantage, however a premature confrontation can compromise your advantage in two seconds. It's equivalent to informing your competitor of your plans, which of course decreases your chances of winning and increases theirs.

I only recall two stories in my five years of being on SI where intuition was incorrect, so believe what you're feeling. The first and possibly the most difficult first step in surviving infidelity is accepting its mind-blowing reality. Most can't or don't want to believe it's happening and wallow uncomfortably with hesitation and fear, which is understandable by the way as the betrayal can cause trauma.

Your ability to move decisively through the (disbelief) barriers will help you immensely. The collective experience of SI members can help guide you through the hard stages that must be navigated to get you to survive and possibly thrive.
Surviving infidelity, by the way, is your choice and can come in the form of reconciliation or divorce. It's personal to you. However, the tact needed to get to the truth will come from the experienced members here.

Anyone have good advice on how to bring the polygraph into the equation? Should I say, I believe you have cheated, I want to end the marriage if you have, the only way to prove you have not is to take a lie detector test?

Anyone have good advice on how to bring the polygraph into the equation? Should I say, I believe you have cheated, I want to end the marriage if you have, the only way to prove you have not is to take a lie detector test?

You say you don't want to blow up your marriage over a gut feeling but in my mind, asking her for a polygraph based on your gut feeling is likely to blow up your marriage. Pre-infidelity, if my spouse approached me and demanded I take a polygraph, I would believe that he was off his rocker. I would VERY MUCH resent taking one and if he insisted, it likely would have done irretrievable damage. Even now, if my friend came to me and said her husband was demanding a polygraph, in the absence of prior proof of her lying to her spouse, I'd think he was borderline abusive.

You've been digging for 3 years and the most you found was a single text message from a number you didn't recognize (you don't mention whether the content was questionable at all). That is not to say that your wife hasn't shown some serious red flags (the photos and the showing the photos to strangers at the bar - in my mind, the latter is an obvious line cross but is likely more a case of bad judgment and poor boundaries than anything else), but based on the explanation you've given (which you say is plausible) and the fact that she does not appear to be protective of her phone at all, I'm concerned that you are jumping to conclusions here.

I'm not saying that she's not cheating - I just think a polygraph is a nuclear option. Approach her. Tell her that you noticed her phone password has changed and that it gave you a bad feeling because of the photos you found a few years ago and the incident at the bar. Don't tell her you suspect she's cheating, but let her know that you don't want there to be secrets in your marriage and that you'd be more comfortable giving her access to her phone. Be conciliatory rather than accusatory. If it's no big deal, she should be forthcoming, if she balks, then you may have reason to worry. Be ready to hand over your phone.

**Inappropriate**

[This message edited by SI Staff at 3:02 PM, Tuesday, June 13th]

OP, I should start by saying I've never done a polygraph. My wife has lied and we have talked about it as a way to lay the basis for building trust. (It's still an option and we are still working on things.)
I would suggest never saying if (fill in the blank) then we are done (or divorce or whatever). When you say that you are giving her a good reason to lie.
Instead give her a reason to be honest. You might say I am having a real problem believing you. Maybe something like a polygraph could help me.
Then it becomes something you can use to gauge her response and a you can be more or less forceful as the context dictates.

Hey Woodsracer:

I wanted to give you my two cents on your situation, for what it is worth.

Red Flag # 1: Your wife has nude pictures of herself on her mobile telephone that she claims are for her own use in tracking her fitness progress which is helping her to feel good about getting her body back in shape.

One thing we need to remind ourselves about mobile telephone (and other related) technologies is that one of the main overriding purposes of these tools is for the transference and sharing of information and content.

I am having a hard time wrapping my head around why anyone would have any pictures of any kind (especially ones of such a personal nature) on their mobile telephone if they were not intending on sharing them with someone in some way. It is what the technology was designed for.

This brings me to...

Red Flag # 5: This is exactly what your wife did. She claims the pictures were only for her own consumption, however, as soon as the opportunity presented itself, she had no problem "whipping them out" (figuratively speaking) and sharing them with a group of young guys. For me, this would be a BIG NO-NO. I know you said it was all a big joke amongst your family and friends and that everyone had a great laugh about it, but I would not be laughing.

A wise man once said that a woman who shares provocative pictures of herself (through pictures or social media or whatever) is advertising her sexuality. It is equivalent to hanging a "come fu** me" sign around her neck.

Here is what I would ask your wife if I were you:

"What message do you think you were sending to those men when you showed them pictures of your nude body? That maybe you are available? When you told them that your pictures were "better" than the ones that the other girls had sent them, were you trying to compete with those other girls for availability? It would seem that way to me. Do you not respect me enough to know that I am supposed to be the only person who has the privelage of seeing your naked body?"

Then I would express to her the amount of mistrust that this has sewn into your relationship with the only solution being a straight answer to the above questions ( and I mean real answers. None of this "Oh, I was just being silly." bullsh**). I would then follow this up with whatever prescription you feel is appropriate for the shoring up of the boundries of your relationship.

The other red flags need to be addressed as well, however, most of those seem to be at least explainable on some level. (I would knuckle down on the bartender situation and try to get closer to the bottom of that one).

I do not know if your wife has cheated, but I do know that she seems to have the kind of loose boundries that often finds a person like her in compromising situations.

Before I would even think about a polygraph, I think it would be more reasonable to maybe have a forensic diagnostic done on her mobile telephone. This would help you to find out if and with whom she may have shared any of those nude pictures along with with any inappropriate e-mails or texts she may have sent or recieved. If she protests, it's just the penance that has to be paid in order to regain the trust lost over showing your body off to a bunch of younger men (and it is another red flag!). I think you can have this done at any computer shop.

Sending positive vibes your way!

I mentioned previously my idea re bringing up the poly. I don’t agree that it’s the nuclear option. Your mental health is being negatively affected by your suspicions. It’s a nuclear option to continue down your current path. At some point you will get very angry, resentful, have blowups with your wife and she will have no idea why. You’re sitting on your own powder keg.

I would say it like this. I love you, snd want to spend the rest of my life with you. That being said, it’s come to my attention that you may have had had an improper relationship three years ago. It can’t be true of course, but I can’t get this out of my mind snd it’s negatively affecting my health snd our marriage.

I would like the both of us to take a poly to prove to each other that we’ve been faithful to each other. This is the only avenue which will set my mind at rest.

If you tell someone that an action will automatically and unequivocally lead to a certain result then they have no incentive to confess to that action. If your wife knows infidelity in any way or form will lead to divorce… she has no reason to confess to anything that might have happened.

Let me preface the rest of my comments with this:
Situations like the one you describe are some of the situations that bring out possibly the worst advice on this forum (probably mine included). To be a valid member here you need to have experienced infidelity – so each and every one of us has probably been in the spot where we wonder why we didn’t see all the red flags in OUR relationships. For US the nudes are near bullet-proof indicators of infidelity, the talking with the two men, the phone-number similarity… As one poster wrote a few years ago: For hammers everything is a nail. Although I care deeply for this site I’m in no rush to increase our membership. Therefore I won’t insist your wife is cheating – but she might be.

I’m a former cop and in my training some important investigative guidelines were burned into my brain:

Investigate to discover what’s going on – not to confirm a foregone conclusion.
In your situation: Investigate the leads you have to discover what they are about. They might be about infidelity, they might be totally benign, they might be that she has a gambling issue, they might be that she’s into stamp-collecting or whatever… Way too often we get posters that only investigate infidelity. Do that and you will be wondering if the convo with her best friend on the VAR where they talk about going to the Mall is code about meeting men for sex. Investigate for the truth.

If – after reasonable effort and reasonable time – you find nothing then maybe it’s because there is nothing going on.

I think the poly is not appropriate right now. Part of the poly’s efficiency is a level of fear from the person being questioned. When we recommend the poly it’s usually as a tool to know if a wayward spouse is honest in what has been revealed about a know affair. If used correctly it’s the stage where the betrayed spouse can reach a stage where he/she might be confident in committing a bit more to reconciling because they can have a sense of knowing the key issues about the affair. The WS knows that if they fail the BS will most likely give up and accept that divorce is the only viable path, and this causes stress and fear that encourages truth. It’s a well-accepted statement on this site that learning of 2 affairs early-on in the R process is better than learning of an untold kiss a year down the road. Trickle-truth probably is the main marriage-killer.

I would suggest the following:
If she’s having an affair, it requires communications. Knowing your stance on infidelity she won’t be talking to anyone in the home, but rather in a place she feels safe to do so. That’s the car. A strategically placed VAR will quickly give you a strong indication of if something is going on.
Affairs require money. Do you have access to online accounts? Is there some unusual financial transactions? Like if she mainly uses a card but when going out she takes out cash – and that maybe a higher amount than would be needed for a salad and her drinks? Would the amount cover an extra plate and some drinks, or a motel-room? Or the opposite: does she go out with her BFF but there are NO transactions – as if someone is paying for the meal and drinks?
(Like if her AP is the bartender at that bar then he probably might comp her for the drinks)
What about purchases leading up to going out? Spend money on lingerie, or more "personalized" beauty treatments? (Like having her eyebrows plucked or her legs waxed are not really big flags IMHO, but maybe a full Brazilian would raise a flag…). Spend money at a chemist (thinking condoms…)?
Does she use ATM’s at sites you two don’t frequent? She’s not likely to meet up with AP at places she might show up with you a week later, or where she might run into joint friends. If she’s having an affair and meeting her lover it will be Eastside rather than your Westside.
Note the odometer on her vehicle. Again – not likely to pee in her home-garden. If she says she went to that bar (5 miles away) but her vehicle was driven 50 miles…
When she comes home does she look/smell freshly showered? Does she immediately take a shower coming home?
If you can – before she leaves – check her bag if she has extra undies. Or the laundry once home if there are two freshly placed in the laundry.

What about phone-records? Once again: infidelity requires communications. Now – it’s to be expected that there is a flurry of calls between friends when arranging a meet-up, but you should be able to recognize those numbers. Is there an unknown one that is called in-route or has been dialed several days previously?
If you have a wireless network and have basic knowledge of routers you can probably monitor what sites are being frequented. Won’t give you details, but you can possibly see that she’s using some form unknown to you to communicate with possible OM.

I would suggest you look at the above ideas and do some research. Frankly – only hearing a convo on the VAR would "prove" infidelity per se, and most of the above should either help you realize there is more that needs to be investigated OR there is nothing going on. But start as many of the above as possible to get a good base to work from.

Once the VAR is in place and you have scanned her phone-records…
I would confront her along the lines Serpico suggested.

A conversation where you describe your concerns about the nudes. You can add to that the big risk she’s taking in being so careless about them. The Internet is full of pics of women that had no intention of sharing their bodies. Don’t know if you have kids, but woodsraier jr. would have a hell of a time if the school-bully were to pull up pics found on amateurmilfsdotcom of Mrs. Woodraiser.
Add her behaviors and be open about your concerns. Remember that she THINKS and KNOWS that if she confesses you will divorce. Give her a one-time offer: If she tells you the truth NOW then no matter what it is you will give the marriage a try, or will not commit to divorce for 90 days. (It’s an empty offer since either one of you can file for no reason at any time, but it does give her an incentive to come clean).

Finally: IF she has cheated she has cheated. Denying it and keeping it a secret because she fears divorce will be like a boil that keeps growing. It will eventually burst, only maybe when her conscience cant carry the secret after 15 years, or when her then-worst enemy but now-best friend blurts it out to you. It’s better ALL DAY to get the truth NOW.

I think the issue is that the potential A was three years ago, and there’s been zero indication since then. I don’t think a VAR will reveal anything because his wife most likely isn’t conversing about something that happened three years ago, when nothing at current has spurred her to have these conversations.

Now, if he mentioned his A concerns to his wife, and used a VAR, that may provide some revealing conversations.

Either way, unless the hornets nest is shook up a little, no information will be forthcoming about a potential A that happened three years ago. Why would she discuss it out of the blue?

PS – IMHO infidelity is usually all about validation. In classic gender-based roles a man cheats to validate he still has the power and the masculinity and the pull-factor to get some tail. In classic gender-based roles a woman cheats to validate she can still get the attention of a man that’s willing to dote on her. Of course this gender-based definition is terribly faulty, but still holds water: People generally cheat to get validation. It’s not about the "love" or that the OP is so special – it’s more that they were available and (excuse the pun) their attention-peg fit in the need-for-validation slot.

We all crave and need validation, but most of us get the healthy variety: the praise at work, the acceptance of friends, being listened to, being asked advice, completion of complex tasks, managing our finances, the love of a spouse…

If you were to start hitting the gym and losing weight and toning your body you might after some time start wearing tighter shirts or shorter sleeves to emphasize your biceps. You might feel some power or validation when a colleague comments about your guns. Some of it might be "normal". Like it might be good and OK and healthy to get validation for your efforts from people that mention you look good and have lost weight or whatever. Doesn’t mean you want to have sex with them or that they are hitting on you. Buying a slim-fit shirt is not advertising your sexual availability.
It can be the same with your wife – She put some effort into her body and wants affirmation. Her version of a tight-fit, short-sleeve bicep-emphasizing shirt might be a dress with lower cleavage. I don’t think it’s sending a message that she’s sexually available, but rather sending a message that she’s hot, and confident with herself. I don’t see that as negative – as long as the confident in herself holds water.
However… sharing the goods with random men… that is going too far IMHO.

I have never looked into polygraph. Are they fully accurate or is it more of an interpretation by the tester?

No they are not - they are not admissible in court for a reason. The value (IMO) of a polygraph is the intent to get one - the "scare" which may (and often seems to) gain a confession if there is something to confess. Granted if my H were to ask me to get a polygraph and I really was doing nothing wrong I would be PISSED to high heaven. So if you get a reaction like that don't automatically think it is evidence of guilt.

None of us obviously know if your wife cheated but I would never tell anyone to ignore their spidery senses.

So, I am a former ws who has snap chat because it’s the primary way my kids communicate. I never talk to anyone on there other than them, and I don’t add people. I do have people who randomly add me who I do not have any idea who they are. I barely know how it even works to be honest. H and I agreed to the downloading of this app, and he has access to my phone at any time.

The biggest red flag of my affair is being freakishly protective of my phone. I wouldn’t leave it for a minute.

At the very least I feel that your wife displays behaviors that you do not feel befitting of a w for so based on what you are saying I would start there. It sounds like your values don’t align. And sometimes that in itself can feel like a betrayal. She shows low consideration of that too. So I would recommend that you think about starting MC. Tell the therapist all your concerns and move from there.

I personally don’t think it’s weird if she works in her body to document the progress for herself. So I don’t know if it’s a smoking gun or not, but your gut is telling you something. Whether it’s you don’t like the construct of your marriage and it feels like a betrayal or if she has cheated, it’s hard to tell. Follow it though because resisting those feelings isn’t helpful either.

[This message edited by hikingout at 6:54 PM, Tuesday, June 13th]

Replaying to 7:00.

Very good advice and probably my plan.

If you were to start hitting the gym and losing weight and toning your body you might after some time start wearing tighter shirts or shorter sleeves to emphasize your biceps. You might feel some power or validation when a colleague comments about your guns. Some of it might be "normal". Like it might be good and OK and healthy to get validation for your efforts from people that mention you look good and have lost weight or whatever. Doesn’t mean you want to have sex with them or that they are hitting on you. Buying a slim-fit shirt is not advertising your sexual availability.

Thank you for saying this B. This mindset is akin to the rape defenses in the last century: she shouldn't have dressed like that so she got what she deserved. You are not guilty of anything for wearing something sexy nor do you deserve something bad to happen to you.

That being said, I totally understand that nude pics would be red flag material, in a lot of cases. You know your spouse better than any of us here so you know if such behavior is totally out of character or not. In my WHs case, nude pics for himself - never ever going to happen - if he were taking a nude pic of himself (especially if he kept it) it would be for a specific purpose not just for his own benefit.

One thing we need to remind ourselves about mobile telephone (and other related) technologies is that one of the main overriding purposes of these tools is for the transference and sharing of information and content.

I am having a hard time wrapping my head around why anyone would have any pictures of any kind (especially ones of such a personal nature) on their mobile telephone if they were not intending on sharing them with someone in some way. It is what the technology was designed for.

Seriously?

Name me another one-time-cost (as opposed to a Polaroid and associated film), more private (as opposed to the photo center crew at Walgreens enjoying the free show while developing your pics) and more convenient means of camera technology than one’s smartphone? For the cost of a couple hundred bucks at most, you have an instant camera plus digital storage for thousands of images—not to mention everything else the smartphone provides, which is not relevant to this post….but of course someone who is interested in retaining ongoing progress pictures of themselves during a physique transformation will take, and store, those pictures on their phone—MOST of the time without any intention of transmitting those pictures to anyone else.

Regardless of what anyone else thinks may be going on with your wife...trust your gut.

I haven't read any replies, only your comments, woodsracer.

I see behavior that might be outside the comfort level of a lot of people, but not anything that indicates that she's cheating, especially since she's so free with her phone.

I would expect my husband to talk to me and tell me that he's not comfortable with me showing my boobs to other men, which is perfectly reasonable. I would expect him to tell me that he's got some concerns and wants to make sure that everything's okay. If he came to me out of nowhere with a request for a polygraph based on the red flags that you listed and "duty sex" 3-4x/mo I'd tell him to kiss my nether regions.