I left a 20-year marriage after a private investigator caught my wife cheating
DEAR DEIDRE: I HIRED a private investigator and he caught my wife cheating, so I walked out on my 20-year marriage and my home.
A month on, I’m still furious but think she should have been the one to leave.
My wife is 46 and I’m 48. We weren’t getting on and she was distracted, always on her phone, messaging someone.
But when I managed to peek at her phone, all messages had been deleted — a tell-tale sign if ever there was one.
I asked her if everything was OK between us, and she swore it was.
She even made a special effort that weekend — cooking my favourite dinner and coming on to me for sex.
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Still not convinced, I decided to hire a PI to follow her when she went to work.
Within a week, he’d taken pictures of her meeting a man at a hotel — and checking into the same room.
She had been blatantly lying to my face. Furious, I confronted her and said our marriage was over.
In 24 hours I found a flat, moved out all my stuff and contacted a solicitor about divorce.
But now, I’m starting to feel that I shouldn’t have gone.
I’m the innocent, blameless party here, sitting alone in an ugly flat, with cheap furniture and a suitcase of my clothes.
She’s the cheat who destroyed our marriage.
Yet she gets to be in our beautiful, warm home with all the things we bought together over the years.
Plus, I’m still paying half the mortgage on the house and will be until the divorce is sorted. It seems terribly unfair.
And I know I’m far from the only man this has happened to.
Why is it always the man who moves out?
MORE FROM DEAR DEIDRE
DEIDRE SAYS: Your anger is understandable, and it does seem unfair that you’ve lost your home when she’s the one who cheated.
It sounds like you acted quite hastily and left before you could talk or think things through.
You are clearly suffering after the shocking end to your long marriage.
Even if the marriage is over you would benefit from relationship therapy alone and if there is any chance you could reconcile – together.
Contact relate.org.uk for support. You can talk to them as an individual as well as a couple.
My support pack, Cheating, Can you Get Over It? may also help.