Is He Cheating Read online

  Men with a longer vasopressin receptor gene are more likely to be faithful and happily married. Men with the shorter version of the gene are more likely to be bachelors.

  He has a low number of oxytocin receptors

  Oxytocin is a bonding chemical (scientists call it “the cuddle hormone”) which helps you bond with others, form relationships, feel love, and causes you to trust people. Men who have fewer Oxytocin receptors form weaker relationships and are more prone to cheating.

  He has high self-esteem

  Men who are confident and have high self-esteem cheat more often than men with lower self-esteem. Why? They feel entitled to cheat. If he’s self-assured and wealthy, it magnifies the cheating effect. (I know, I know — rich, arrogant men cheat more often? Who knew!?! )

  He’s creative

  Creative types are more likely to cheat. Why? The same trait that allows him to come up with new ideas and consider alternate possibilities is the same key in helping him justify his dishonest behavior. What’s interesting about this is that at some level he wants to feel like a decent human being, so even though he’s cheating, in his own mind, he feels like it’s okay because he’s been able to concoct some fidelity loophole to make everything okay. This is the same guy who will tell people “she just wasn’t happy” after you break up, like he was doing you a big fat favor by screwing around on you.

  He’s Mr. Testosterone

  High testosterone means a guy is more 38% more likely to cheat. How can you tell if your man has a high level of testosterone?

  He’s handsome

  What makes us handsome or pretty? It’s symmetry. The more symmetrical a person’s features are, the more attractive they are. People with symmetric faces have higher genetic value — being attractive means more options for sexual partners. If he’s a classically handsome guy, he’ll have a nice strong jaw line (thank you, testosterone) and a prominent brow.

  He’s well-endowed

  A guy with a big penis is more likely to cheat, again because of a higher level of testosterone. How big is big? The average erect male penis is 5.9 inches long. If your man is significantly larger, high testosterone is most certainly a factor.

  His ring finger is longer than his index finger

  The length of his ring finger is linked to testosterone levels. If his ring finger is longer than his index finger, he likely has a higher testosterone level, which means more partners and a significantly higher risk of cheating. If you want to check his finger without calling attention to the fact that you think he might be cheating, tell him you’re concerned about his health — a longer ring finger is also an indicator of lower risk for heart attack. Or you can tell him that a longer ring finger means he’ll be more successful in business. A University of Cambridge study of 49 male traders found that guys with longer ring fingers earned 10 times more money than men with short ring fingers.

  He has Attention Deficit Disorder

  Men who have brain disorders such as ADD are challenged by impulse control, which is linked to cheating.

  He’s got a history of cheating

  This is one of the strongest indicators he’ll cheat on you — if he’s cheated on you before, or other partners in his past. Also, if your relationship began as an affair (he was cheating on someone else when he met you) your relationship has an approximately 95% chance that he will cheat on you.

  He drives a Toyota

  According to AshleyMadison.com, the dating website for people looking to cheat on their significant other, 20.9% of cheating men drive a Toyota. The second most popular car for cheating men? Ford, at 12.3%.

  So these are the types of men who are most likely to cheat on you. (And definitely some to avoid if you find yourself single again.) Take out your journal and write down all of the characteristics on this list that fit your guy. While it might feel like this list includes every guy on the planet with the exception of 7 guys in Duluth, MN, it doesn’t. And it is important to remember that if your guy fits one or two of the categories on this list, you probably don’t need to freak out just yet.

  Don’t confront him until you have concrete facts and evidence — photos, receipts, phone logs, and more.

  But if you’ve just realized you’re in a relationship with a tall, handsome, well-endowed guy with a masculine jaw, ADD, a love of horror films, and a history of head injuries, you need to read the next chapter right away.

  Chapter 4: The Cheat Code and the Decode (or, the unmistakable signs he’s cheating)

  The weird hang-up calls.

  The erratic work hours.

  The stories that just don’t quite add up.

  You have the gnawing, sickly feeling that your sweetheart is cheating on you. But how do you know for sure?

  Okay, here’s where we get into the nitty gritty of things. In this chapter you’ll find a number of Cheat Codes, the common and less-common things that men do when they cheat.

  Before you read further, I want to tell you a few things. First, you’re not in this alone, I’m with you on this journey every step of the way. Second, just because your guy is exhibiting some of the Cheat Codes does not necessarily mean he’s cheating on you. (Although if he’s exhibiting the majority of them, he most likely is.) Third, don’t throw this book down in the middle of the chapter and confront him if you haven’t already – I can assure you that a cheater’s answer to “Are you cheating on me?” is always a resounding “No.” Studies show that when confronted, cheaters only confess about 6% of the time. If you want to know whether he’s been faithful or not, the most important thing you can do is pretend like everything is perfectly normal and hold off confronting him until you have all the evidence. Otherwise, he’ll just do a better job covering his tracks. (We’ll go over when and how to stage a confrontation in Chapter 9.) Read all the way through this chapter, and finish the book. I’ll help you to gather the evidence you need to either exonerate him and get your life back, or make him confess on the spot.

  And then I’ll help you dust yourself off and get on with your life.

  85% of women who suspect an affair are right.

  Some of this is due to our emotional intuition, and some of this can be attributed to laziness on the part of the cheater. The longer a man is able to get away with cheating on you, the more relaxed and confident he becomes in your cluelessness.

  Below you’ll find the Cheat Code, the completely predictable pattern of behavior that men use when they’re sleeping with someone else. It is important to remember that one sign does not a cheater make – if your guy exhibits one or two of the following signs, he may be innocent (we’ll still be checking to make sure, just don’t start panicking.) If he exhibits 7 or more signs, there is a high risk he’s cheating on you. If he exhibits 10 or more signs, he’s in the red zone.

  As you read this chapter, write down anything suspicious in your journal.

  The Cheat Code: He’s no longer interested in sex, or worse, he has a new bag of tricks and a trapeze with the tags still on it.

  The decode: Barring medical problems, a dramatic change in sexual behavior (no sex, less sex or different sex) can mean two things:

  a) He wants to avoid any situation where he might have to express emotion or attachment to you, or

  b) He’s getting it somewhere else.

  The Cheat Code: He’s working late all the time

  The decode: He’s constantly working late or the big boss needs him to come in on Saturday (again) for yet another emergency presentation on the Doggy Delicious account. It has been widely reported that 70% of affairs happen on the job (or with someone connected to his job, such as a marketing consultant, salesperson, or vendor) and even if he’s not fooling around at work, he may using his job as a cover. Another sign that something is amiss – your guy is an hourly employee but doesn’t seem to get any overtime pay for all the extra hours he’s been putting in. The number one most common excuse to cover cheating is working late. In fact, 75% of men and 65% of women admit to having sex with
people they work with.

  The Cheat Code: He spends a lot of time working out at the fitness club, but he’s not really getting in better shape

  The decode: Going to the gym is another common excuse to cover cheating — if he claims to spend a lot of time working out, but his abs aren’t getting any tighter, he may be using his workout as a cover. Many women have believed the “workout” excuse for months or even years before learning their man doesn’t even belong to the gym.

  The Cheat Code: He has friends who cheat.

  The decode: How many times has your husband or boyfriend spilled the gory details on a friend who is sleeping around on his wife or girlfriend, and followed it up with “I’d never do that to you”?

  The more people he knows who are cheating, the more likely he is to cheat. Studies show that infidelity (like divorce, unhappiness, and obesity) is actually contagious, partially due to the fact that we feel a level of social acceptance when “everybody else is doing it.” It’s a lot tougher to be overweight in a Zoomba class full of size twos than it is in a class packed with size eighteens, just like it’s a lot harder to maintain healthy eating habits when everyone in your office snacks on chalupas and birthday cake all day. The same is true with cheating. The more friends and acquaintances your spouse or boyfriend has who cheat, the more likely he is to do so as well.

  The Cheat Code: He’s picking ridiculous, nonsensical fights

  The decode: If you suddenly find yourself arguing with him to the point of a blowout about ridiculous things like which way the toilet paper goes or the superior pancake syrup, basically, things that never mattered before, he’s looking for two possible outcomes. First, your partner is trying to make you look like the bad guy so he can justify his behavior to himself. Second, this gives him a chance to storm out and disappear for a few hours and hook up with his fling.

  The Cheat Code: “You need to see a shrink” or “You’re so unhappy”

  He starts telling you that you are depressed, that your behavior is the cause of all your relationship problems, that you’re acting crazy.

  The decode: He’s not just telling you how depressed you are, he’s been telling everybody else too. So when he finally leaves you, they’ll all know it was really your fault, that you’re crazy and depressed and unbalanced and completely neurotic and that the poor man did everything he could. This doesn’t just give him a nice clean out when the time comes. It also makes for a lovely sob story to his other girlfriend (poor man!) and allows him to continue seeing himself as a decent human being rather than what he actually is: a guy looking for an excuse.

  The Cheat Code: Something’s weird with the money.

  Maybe he’s carrying around a lot more cash than usual, or maybe a statement that used to come home every month (retirement, credit card, bank) has suddenly disappeared. Maybe you’re finding strange receipts in his wallet or pockets.

  The decode: If you think your spouse is cheating on you, your finances and assets should always be the first place you look for answers. (More about this later.) Cheating is expensive – motel rooms and flowers and slutty underwear don’t just drop out of the sky. Most cheaters will begin siphoning off cash in order to pay for the affair, and if they decide to leave you, they’ll start socking away as many assets as they can. In Chapter 5, I’ll show you just where to look to find out the truth.

  The Cheat Code: His toes are always pointing away from you.

  The decode: Our bodies line up when we’re in love (heart to heart, face to face) and conversely, when things start to go wrong, the feet are one of the first places you’ll see it. He may be with you now, but if his feet are always heading out the door, or worse, towards someone else, he may be looking to walk.

  The Cheat Code: You’re starting to feel like a telemarketer when you call him

  The decode: Is your guy anxious to end phone conversations right away? A person who knows he’s going to end the relationship with you, but hasn’t done so yet will be itching to get off the phone with you. It is important to remember that this is only relevant when it is a change in behavior. If he’s always been quiet on the phone, there’s no need to panic. If out of the blue he’s begun acting distant, or he seems irritated or bored on the phone when that wasn’t the case before, that may be a sign he’s detaching from you. A few bad calls might just mean he’s had a rough week at work. A few weeks or months of bad calls could mean something worse.

  The Cheat Code: “I need some space”

  The decode: Men don’t leave unless they have somewhere else to go. If he tells you that he’s moving out because he needs his own space but assures you there’s nobody else, he’s very likely lying. And while he’s not technically breaking up with you (so no big crying scene to endure) he’s given himself a way out. Of course, the second he gets a little distance, he’s going to make a run for it.

  The Cheat Code: When he hugs you he gives you that little pat-pat-pat on the back.

  The decode: Watch out for this one. A person who gives you a hug while patting you on the back is indicating that they are uneasy, and the bigger the pat, the more discomfort they feel.

  The Cheat Code: He’s criticizing you more often, or becoming even more critical

  The decode: Again, this has to do with him justifying his behavior to himself, but ramping up the criticism serves several purposes. First, it keeps your focus off what he’s doing, because you’re so busy flogging yourself for being a terrible lover/housekeeper/mother/accountant/chef. Second, it helps him justify in his own mind what he’s doing to you.

  The Cheat Code: He keeps you waiting. And waiting. And waiting.

  The decode: If he keeps you waiting all the time, it’s a sign his interest is waning, and a sign of disrespect.

  The Cheat Code: He buys a pre-paid cell phone, or his cell phone bill disappears.

  The decode: This is bad news. Just about every private investigator in the book will tell you the pre-paid cell purchase is a sign of impending heartbreak, they call it the “doomsday clue.” The pre-paid cell phone is ideal for cheaters because no bill means no evidence. Some cheaters will simply intercept the cell phone bill at home and pay it before you ever have a chance to get a look at it. Then, when you ask him where it is, he’ll say he lost it, or threw it away. Another trick used by cheaters is to use their same cell phone but get a SIM card through another cell company – like having two phones in one. He puts the “home” SIM card in when he’s with you, and the “cheater” SIM card in when he wants to make calls to the other woman. That way, all the calls to her don’t show up on your cell phone bill, and if she calls when he has the “home” SIM card in his phone, it will go straight to voicemail and you’ll never be the wiser.

  The Cheat Code: He suddenly wants privacy when he’s on the phone

  The decode: If there’s a lot of whispering while he’s on the phone, or he jumps up to take calls in another room when he didn’t before, or if he refuses to answer certain calls when you’re in the vicinity, you have reason to suspect.

  The Cheat Code: He uses the computer in secret or late at night

  The decode: People who have nothing to hide don’t hide things. Sure, maybe he’s planning a big surprise for your birthday or anniversary, but most of the time when a guy hides what he’s doing on the computer it’s because he’s doing something he shouldn’t. Pay special attention when he keeps his personal laptop with him at all times. Another couple of red flags – he has a brand new email account, his browser history is cleared or contains strange sites, he’s suddenly deleting email messages when he used to let them pile up in his inbox, he’s on the computer late every night, or he changes the web page he’s looking at (or slams his laptop shut) the second you walk into the room. BIG sign.

  The Cheat Code: He used to be a three-blue-shirts-and-four-pair-of-Chinos kind of guy, and suddenly he’s obsessed with Armani.

  The decode: A person who is cheating will suddenly take much greater care with his appearance - updating his wa
rdrobe, losing weight, working out and even changing cologne.

  The Cheat Code: He has strange phone behavior

  The decode: Watch out for odd phone numbers found in his pockets, written on receipts or other little scraps of paper. Is he frequently unavailable when you call him at work when this was not the case previously? Are there strange numbers on his cell phone bill that are called frequently, or calls that last a long time? Does he go in another room, the bathroom, or outside to talk on the phone? Try following him and see how he reacts. Does he keep talking, or end the call quickly and ambiguously? Do you hear him talking on the phone in the bathroom with the water running?

  The Cheat Code: He’s got a bad case of road rage

  The decode: He drives like a lunatic, honks at old ladies who don’t have the good sense to go eighty on the freeway, and sees the shoulder as his own personal expressway during rush hour – a classic sign of putting himself before everybody else.

  The Cheat Code: He blames everything on someone else

  The decode: You’re too jealous, his boss is too stupid, and the rest of the planet just doesn’t get it. Does your guy think he can do no wrong? When this guy breaks the rules, it’s the rule that was wrong, not him. He may have cheated, but it’s your fault.

  The Cheat Code: His handwriting changes