You know when your boyfriend is cheating on you, writes JANA HOCKING

Unpopular truth: you know if your partner is cheating on you. 

Now you can stomp your feet and insist you were completely taken by surprise but were you really? If you take a deep deep look into your relationship, and you will know that the signs were there early.

I speak from experience you see, I’ve been cheated on three times and each time I found out I was mighty upset, but was I surprised? Well… not so much. So, believe me when I say you one hundred million per cent know when your partner is cheating.

The first time I discovered my partner was cheating was with my first proper boyfriend just out of high school. He was a lovely, sweet guy, but guess what? That means diddly squat in the cheating universe, because yes even the lovely one’s cheat.

I can pin-point the moment I got a sixth sense that he was up to no good. He went to university a year before me and he started talking non-stop about this girl in his new friendship group. Immediately I knew something was off. When I travelled one weekend to stay with him at his dorm I was finally introduced to her. She was warm but distant.

Then we all went to the pub, and I noticed he would always jump up to help her get drinks, or they would be laughing at some inside joke.

Later that night I went through his phone and sure enough there was a text from her that read ‘When are you going to tell her?’. By the end of that weekend he had broken up with me and a week later he had made it official with her.

Heartbreaking stuff.

The second time I was cheated on was slightly more brutal, but once again the signs were there early. We first met when he came to my parent’s house to pick up my brother for a party. I was staying there for the weekend, and he saw me as I was running from the shower to my bedroom. Immediately he pushed past my brother, banged on my door, and invited me to the party. 

This is why your husband is cheating, writes SAMANTHA X 

I was a journalist on national magazines before ditching my ‘normal life’ to become an escort in my late 30s. Not the decision most people make when looking for a change, but it suited me, for many complex reasons that even I struggle to understand. So why did married men come to see me?

1. Someone to talk to

Believe it or not, men like to talk. They are emotional and extremely vulnerable. 

2. They miss foreplay

Men secretly want to spend hours in bed with you but say they got sick of being rejected. They miss foreplay (pleasuring you not the other way round) and they don’t always want it all to be over before you can say ‘pass me the TV controls, MAFS is on.’

3. You had an affair

While a wife may turn a blind eye to her husband’s slip up, men won’t. Their ego won’t allow it. If they stay (and men rarely leave), they will see that as a green light to do what they want so you are ‘quits.’

4. Seeing an escort doesn’t mean they don’t love you

They don’t want to leave you for another woman, and they most certainly don’t want to run off with an escort (and no escort in the history of this earth would ever want to run off with your husband either – that’s like taking your work home with you). Men are like puppies that chew your shoes, they just can’t help themselves.

 

Amanda Goff, aka Samantha X, was an escort in her late 30s

He had confidence, gusto and knew how to woo a girl. Yep, welcome to the ‘ladies man’. That should have been my first sign that he was going to cheat – the man was not afraid to make a move. The second sign was the non-stop side glances he gave women when we were out. I was always clocking him checking out other women. When I would call him out on it, he would simply state ‘What? I was just looking!’.

Sure enough, the first time I travelled overseas for work I came back to half the town gossiping about him sleeping with one of my friends at a party. Ouch.

The third time I was cheated on was a little harder to pick, and yet the signs were most definitely there. At the start of our year long relationship he was caring, attentive and smart. He was more brains than brawn. Fashion wasn’t for him, and the gym was ‘for people with too much time on their hands’. 

But then the ol’ signs started to subtly show up. 

‘The first time I travelled overseas for work I came back to half the town gossiping about my boyfriend sleeping with one of my friends at a party. Ouch,’ Jana writes

‘Now I don’t condone looking through your partners phone (trust me it sucks, and you know, all that privacy stuff) but if you feel like you might find something in there, then you probably will,’ she says

It started with him placing his phone face down at the table, he had never done that before. Then he would take his phone with him to the bathroom, never leaving it unattended. Then he decided he wanted to get super fit and actually signed up to the local gym. Who was he trying to impress? I mean, I had watched this man down a pizza in under five  minutes and follow that up with a bowl of ice cream before laying the moves on me. So, it certainly wasn’t me he was trying to woo into bed.

Spoiler alert: Turns out it was the new girl at his work. Yep, I’m ashamed to admit I waited until he came home drunk one night and went through his phone. (Yes, that makes it two times I’ve done that now).

The point to these stories is that my gut told me something was up before the evidence was placed in front of me. Whether it be as simple as updating their wardrobe, taking better care of their physical appearance, starting to wear cologne or consistently talking about the ‘hilarious’ new person at work, the signs are there my friends.

And I’ll go a step further. Usually our friends know something is up as well. Ask them at the end of your relationship if they had an inkling your partner was a dud, and after a few wines they will usually tell you yes. They caught him checking out other women, they noticed the new modern hairstyle he’s sporting, and they may have even seen him up to no good. A cheater may think they are a mastermind, but if you look close enough, the signs are always there staring you in the face.

Now I don’t condone looking through your partners phone (trust me it sucks, and you know, all that privacy stuff) but if you feel like you might find something in there, then you probably will.