Today's burning question from Redditor DEDCMDM94––"What is your "accidentally caught your spouse" cheating horror story?"––might ring rather personally for some of you.
Warning: There's some rather sensitive content ahead.
"He was so exhausted..."
Not me but a medical resident who I met on rotation recently. One of the nicest guy I ever met, super intelligent and hardworking, and training to be a trauma surgeon by humble as they come. He had been married for 2 years to his wife. One night he gets off a 30 hour call early and heads home to surprise his wife with some flowers and her favorite dessert (it was the anniversary of the day they first met). Only to find her in bed with a random dude.
He was so exhausted and confused, he didn't know what to do and just left and went back to the hospital. I saw him at 5AM, sitting in the parking lot, hunched over crying. He didn't even have his phone with him, he was just sitting there. Man, nothing breaks your heart more than seeing a grown man cry, it's not something you see often. We called his dad up and he came and picked him up, the guy ended up taking a leave from his residency. Turns out, it wasn't the wife's first time sleeping around. Hope he gets back on his feet, he will make an amazing physician.
"On family vacation..."
On family vacation, I picked up his phone because I was bored and the kids were playing on mine. Saw a message to some girl describing the sex he and I had the night before. Spent the rest of the vacation fighting via text while trying (and failing) to act normal.
"Friend of mine..."
Friend of mine was hanging out with some guys at a bar and went home to chill with them. He asked how they knew my girlfriend at the time (realized she was a mutual friend at the bar). Guy said she was f*ck buddies with his friend. My friend was confused and mentioned she was the girlfriend of a friend of his (me) to which his response was "Oh, I hope you're not good enough of friends to have to tell him."
"Had a really close group..."
Had a really close group of friends who would always prank each other. One of my mates found out the Facebook password of another, so while on Skype the whole call - included myself, logged into his Facebook account (being 7 people) to make a stupid status. At the same time my partner of 5 years was messaging him on Facebook about how good sex was last night and about meeting up again.
"It gets worse..."
College girlfriend and we lived together for a year after I realized she would always have her phone on silent or just plain ignore calls from "Jennifer." One day I write down the number and call it a week later. It ends up being her other boyfriend who she had never broken up with before she came to college. Neither of us knew about each other and she had being visiting him when she went home to see her parents on some weekends and breaks. Broke up soon after and her mom said that sometimes you just have to accept things and how I owed her an apology for breaking up with her. It gets worse but that was the gist.
"Walked in on my girlfriend..."
Walked in on my girlfriend while she was having sex with another guy. "What are you doing here?!" she says. "You gave me a key, remember? I ended up not working today and wanted to surprise you."
15 years later she reaches out, leaves me a message that she'd like to talk. I figure she's doing some 12-step thing or something and wants to make amends.
Nope. She wanted to try and sell me on Amway.
"This sent my unit home..."
Mt St Augustine erupted in Alaska in 1986. They had to evacuate all planes out of Elmendorf AFB due to ash in the air. This sent my unit home from Korea 3 days early. I got home at 2 AM and there was a guy sleeping next to my wife in our bed.
"I just got off work..."
I just got off work after working the graveyard shift, I walk into my apartment with my fiance riding some guy she met at a party on my futon which they broke. I walked out with so much rage and broken feelings, I went to my car and cried.
"Found my wife's notebook."
Found my wife's notebook. Written on the first page was a 10-step plan detailing how she was going to leave me for another guy.
I turned it into one step.
"Her phone went off..."
Her phone went off and she asked me what it said. I looked at it and it said, "I wanna bend you over and spank you."
"Woke up to her..."
Woke up to her on her phone with hearts scrolling in Facebook Messenger.
We were married 7 years at that point. 2 kids.
It was my birthday.
"We argued..."
Came home early. They were fast enough to get dressed but not in a natural state of being, if that makes sense. It was obvious something was just going down. Very cliched "got walked in on and tried to play it cool" like you see in tv. I asked him to leave and he did.
We argued, she tried to lie but soon confessed. It wasn't the first time she cheated but it was the first time that I caught her in the act. Everything in the past was just texts and stuff. She said that she never slept with the other people and it was just pics and flirting. In retrospect, that may not be BS.
We divorced, both remarried. Not friends by any stretch, but civil.
"Went to log into email..."
Went to log into email and a suggested one that I didn't recognize popped up. I answered all his security questions, and reset his password to find emails between him and the neighbor. We were in therapy to recover from him cheating with her and there they were waxing poetic about their love and when I'd be out of the house so they could be together. The actual horror sorry is that our 7 year old daughter is the one who accidentally caught them originally by walking into our bedroom while I was at work.
"Girlfriend ran over her phone
Girlfriend ran over her phone by accident and destroyed the screen.
Asked me to backup all her stuff and transfer it to her new Pixel
Use backup tool that captures all sorts of dirty messages and nudes with another guy.
"Early 2000s..."
Early 2000s, my friend's husband was deployed to Iraq. Together, they had a 10 year old son and a happy marriage. One day, while he was deployed, I am at home when another one of our friends calls and screams "Holy Sh!t, turn on the news right now!" I turn it on to watch a human interest story about a fundraiser at a high school 30 miles away. They're doing Relay for Life or something, and as a "surprise" to one of the participants, they had her "husband" and father of her two grade school children do a video call from Iraq, and displayed it on the football jumbotron.
There on our local news is my friend's husband, telling another woman and two kids how he loves them and can't wait to get back home to them. The news eats it up, about what a great guy he is. That night, our group of friends convened and decided how we would tell her. I was nominated, so the next day I had to sit her down and tell her what we saw. She called the news station, and they were happy to let her come in and watch the story. They were also incredibly apologetic.
Story has a somewhat crappy ending, I'm afraid. She called him out on his bs, they started divorce proceedings, and he went on to legally marry the mother of his other kids, and mostly ignored his son from the first marriage.
"Ex..."
Ex didn't realize her Iphone and Ipad messages were synced. Interesting texts started popping up on it.
"When I was 18..."
My spouse has never cheated on me, but one of my exes did.
When I was 18 I was having some trouble with my partner at the time over disagreements regarding sex (I was not wanting to do it but he wanted to). Eventually, at some point, we had a fight and from there things sort of were tense and weird. I can't really remember what exactly was said or how it went down entirely, as it was a bit over a decade ago but, in a nutshell, it sort of just erupted after a while.
The next week me, my mom and my sister were getting ready to go on a summer weekend trip to the beach, which we always did as a family despite divorces and such. Mom knew my ex and I were struggling and asked if I would like to bring him on the trip. I was really excited and texted asking if he wanted to go, but he declined and said he would see me afterwards.
That weekend I kind of felt like things were over; didn't want to admit it but I felt like either I'd be dumped soon or we would fight again and it would just end from there. I think Mom also felt this way because we had a talk during a beach stroll about relationships, and she called my crap and asked if I was actually committed to him, or being in denial. Considering how strained things with Mom and I were at the time, I appreciated the talk.
I am rambling, lol. Long story short, we ended up getting home earlier than expected on Sunday, and so I texted him saying I was gonna come see him. I never heard back, and he wasn't home when I got there- but when I got back home, he called me and confessed he had slept at another person's place all weekend.
Afterwards we texted and I asked if we were done and he said we were. I remember I got him a gift of some kind and he offered to bring it back, but I said he could keep it. I was pretty sad and I cried for a while; he actually called me back later and we broke up properly and amicably, and while he cheated and he apologized for it, I didn't really feel like I could blame him. In retrospect I appreciate that he was honest with me and that we broke up on decent terms.
In the end, Mom was absolutely right. I liked him but I didn't love him, and while she didn't want her kids having sex before marriage, she knew that if I actually felt committed to him, I wouldn't have hesitated so much. I was afraid of things like STD's, and I was wrong in how I asked him if he'd been tested. I realized all the mistakes I made in the process, too, and while I never regretted my decision to not have sex with him, the way I went about the matter wasn't very considerate. I grew a lot from the experience.
"I went off to college..."
I went off to college he was 2 hours away. I would see him on the weekends and everything seemed fine. I took a bus back to see him for our 1 year anniversary. Planned to stay with him all weekend. Made a huge basket of everything he loved and picked up his favorite dinner. Walked in on him with another girl. He made me leave so he could finish and then came out to dump me to "move to a trap house" so he could "have wild drug sex". I didn't have a place to stay with such short notice so I crashed at his place anyway and slept on the couch while he and the other girl shared the bed. Called a friend in the morning and spent the rest of the weekend elsewhere.
"Made me a lot more cautious..."
Came home from college and started dating a dude in a touring band (first mistake). Honestly, I wasn't looking for a relationship, but he was kind and expressed he really wanted to be together, so I gave it a chance.
Broke up with me a few months later, very suddenly. I was shocked and heartbroken. Told me that he was moving to another city to bartend (he didn't drink nor did he have any connections to that city). Moves in with some girl that I knew through a lot of mutual friends.
One night, sitting with all my girlfriends, and one of them bursts into tears saying she knew he had another relationship the entire time. First reaction, "Why are YOU crying?" Next was to see if he had the courage to tell me the true.
He refused to take my calls, but through mutual friends I was able to reach the 'other' girlfriend. I was very respectful and sent her a message under the assumption she didn't know I existed. Of course, she did, and simply said they were not in a committed relationship, so he had done nothing wrong to her. Didn't otherwise see it as a character flaw on his part.
Cut to two years later, he finally apologizes to me... and tells me she cheated on him after they moved to two different cities together. Justice served.
Honestly, thankful it happened. Made me a lot more cautious and careful about who to let in and pretty damn numb to people's fuckery.
"Went on a week's trip..."
Went on a week's trip to New York with him. It was our last day and I was packing while he was in the shower. His phone lights up, there's a few messages from a girl who was saying some pretty dirty things to a guy who had a girlfriend.
He came out from the bathroom, I asked what this was and he couldn't explain himself. I said nothing, went about my day while he was struggling wanting to 'talk about it' and checked in individually for our flight to Paris (which was a 'surprise' from him) and back home.
Found out that he was cheating with his colleague from work at an especially trying time for me at my new job where I was on set for 20 hours for a consecutive period. I took a separate cab the moment I got out of customs and packed all my shit & left. Never spoke to him again.
DQ: What's your cheating horror story?