My mom has always sworn my dad never shows her love, attention, or affection. She swears he is all thats wrong in her life, basically. Why she’s unemployeed, why she has no friends, etc. None of it is true.
When I was 12-13 my dad caught her cheating through text messages. It came through on the phone bill. She wouldn’t accept her actions at all, and the man she cheated on my dad with began harassing my entire family and we had to get a restraining order. I am 99.9% they had sex because I had caught them in a bed together. (Him, my mom and I all went to the beach for a day before I knew she was cheating). My dad has never found out about this.
Well, on my 18th birthday I was setting something up on her phone. She had broken her arm at the time and a Facebook message came through saying “Hey beautiful, how’s your arm doing today?” or something along those lines. The way the man had worded it made it seem like they had spoken prior. This bothered me all day, and I told my dad. He was furious and confronted her. She was now furious with me, but at the end said “I’m glad you told him, I didn’t know how to stop it.” You don’t know how to block someone?
Throughout the course of the past 5 or so years, she deletes messages like crazy. Like, does she really think I believe she’s not texted someone other than my dad in the past 3 months? Come on. She will tilt her phone away from someone, not let them use it unless she’s around it watching over you, etc. All that kind of suspicious shit. She removed messages before she let me speak to my grandfather on her phone.
She started talking back to an old friend and I believe that this friend is possibly exacerbating this behavior. My mom now has random men added on Facebook with their only mutual being this friend. She was very technologically illiterate and now all of the sudden she’s not. She now has a passcode on her phone when I knew she didn’t know how to put one on her phone. She had forgotten her phone at lunch with her friend, her friend brought it to me, and with her phone you can’t turn it off without a passcode (what kind of shit is that?) so I texted her friend she was with to ask my mom for the passcode so I could turn it off, since she was getting spam calls and I was about to throw the shit at the wall. No response.
I texted my dad and asked if he knew it, he didn’t even know she had a code. Later that night I give her the phone back, and she went to show me a picture and I accidentally locked the phone. She faced away from me, held her phone up to her face like she was at the ATM putting in her pincode, and said “Everyone wants my code, haha! Your dad is trying so hard to see it!”
We had discussed getting Life360 for all of us since I frequently make a 3 hour trip to see my boyfriend. I was fine with it, my dad was fine with it, my mom was not. She said it was “stalking,” and she frequently accuses my dad of stalking her to the point my dad has broken down in tears because he’s so tired of being accused of shit he’s not doing. I asked my mom why she didn’t want to get the app, and asked if she was going places she shouldn’t of. She freaked the fuck out. My dad and I also thought it was a good idea because my mom is an alcoholic and she tends to lie about when she’s drinking so she can go out. We thought it would be a good idea if she tried to lie or if she was drinking somewhere and got too drunk to drive home.
If I ever want to stay home from work because of something, she goes on this long ass rant and is extremely annoyed I don’t go. I believe it’s because she’s calling someone or texting someone while she’s home alone and doesn’t want anyone to have the chance to hear it. Every single time I come home earlier than usual, she’s on the phone and she will sometimes practically sprint to get away from me. I’ve heard her on the phone whispering in the bathroom, I’ve heard her say “I love you” to either a man that’s not my dad, or a woman with an extremely masculine voice.
My brother has and still is cheating on his girlfriend. My mom takes up for him, and I tell her all the time that’s fucked up. I don’t get into it because my brother is 23 and grown. I told her I don’t want to hear it because it weighs heavy on my mind and makes me feel guilty for knowing it. I know it would DESTROY my already strained relationship with my brother if I told his girlfriend. Basically, I feel like since she’s defending him and making excuses for him, she really sees no issue in cheating. She always comments on “window shopping” which I think is disgusting.
My dad isn’t ignorant and has his own suspicions. I just don’t know what to do since to me, it’s glaringly obvious she’s doing some shit she shouldn’t be, and it makes me feel so guilty. Recently, the man from the past has tried adding my brother on Facebook to fuck with my mom again. I asked myself, if it’s been over 5/6 years, and she’s not contacted him at all like she swears and wasn’t intimate with him on a physical level.. why is he back?
4 comments
You are too invested in their relationship. You need to step back and let them handle it on their own.
This is a conversation to either have with your dad, or not at all.
Your mom is cheating on your dad, fullstop, and has been for at **least** the better part of a decade. This isn’t something you even need proof of any more, it’s so insanely obvious. Any attempts to deny it are really her telling you how stupid she thinks you are, or trying to play gotcha games, like, *”I know it, you know it, I know you know it, but you can’t **prove** you know it!”*
If you want to support your dad, talk to him about it. Tell him what you’ve seen, encourage him, but let him take the lead on this. It’s his marriage, not yours. If you can’t handle that conversation with him, then you’d be best off staying out of it.
As for your relationship with your mom, honestly if I were in your position I’d treat her (and your brother) with open contempt. They’re despicable and pathetic and don’t deserve your respect. Don’t feel obligated to give them any.
At one point you have to let it go. This isn’t your relationship and it’s causing you stress for thinking about it. My parent’s relationship isn’t good but i tend to just ignore those thoughts/feelings. I know you love your dad but your dad eventually needs to find his own self worth. I think the best thing you should do is stop worrying about it. If you already given your dad the basic information what more can you do?
What consequences in life has your mother ever faced for her behavior. Your family dynamic is truly messed up. Your dad is included her because he sets no consequences and accepts the behavior. Everyone sucks here. If you truly want to change and live a healthy lifestyle, go low contact with toxic people. Your parents and brother are toxic people. You have ZERO control over any of them and none of them will change. But you DO have control of yourself.