Last year, my husband had a drunk night out and called several prostitutes, but claims that no actual sex ever occurred. I have all of the numbers he called. Is there any way I could approach these women and ask whether one of them saw my husband that night? I feel like I’m fairly open minded, but in my book, sex outside of a marriage is cheating, period, and I just need to know. Is this a foolish endeavor?
Well, it’s a futile one. It is extremely unlikely that any of the ladies will answer that question; our professional ethics forbid it. More than anything else, what a man is paying for when he sees a professional is discretion; if it got around that a sex worker had betrayed one of her clients to his wife (or anyone else), word would quickly get around and her reputation would be sunk. There is a small chance someone might slip and give you info that she absolutely shouldn’t, but the chance is vanishingly small; you’d probably have similar luck calling a clinic to ask if your husband had been treated there. Even if he really did see a pro that night, please understand that it has absolutely no bearing on his feelings for you; men sometimes just think with the wrong head, and it’s our job to minimize the harm that can come from that. And if it continues to bug you, you might consider talking to a wise friend or counsellor so as to let off the stress before it ends up hurting your marriage over something that may not even really have happened.
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I feel that I should point out that “I am fairly open minded” and “sex outside of marriage is cheating, period” do not work together. One of the two has to be false.
You better find out fast whether you want to stay with your husband or not (ignoring this incident) and act accordingly. Blowing off steam with somebody else that is trustworthy is a good idea though. But you have to be clear on what you want in the end or things may just spiral further out of control and you may end up regretting this for a long, long time.
Open-mindedness does not need to be boundless in order to exist.
Seems to me another point is if this all took place a year or more ago, and assuming it only happened once, would any of the ladies even remember this one particular customer? Wouldn’t they have just moved on by now?
Unless it’s a customer I see regularly (or the person really made an impression for whatever reason), I’m unlikely to remember him after a few days already. So, not a snowball’s chance in hell after a year.
If cheating really is a problem for the OP, the the fact that he went looking for a bit on the side is all that really matters. OTOH, presumably she’s been snooping ever since she found out, and there’s nothing more recent.
Assessing her priorities is really her job, not anyone else’s.
She asked for advice. That makes it perfectly acceptable to give it.
Yes. My reply was intended for Maggie’s correspondent, not at Maggie.
(Shades of that Faulty Tower’s sketch: “I was looking at you but I was talking to him”)
I hope the lady who was asked this gets a chance to let that guy know that the asking happened. If I were involved with a woman as controlling as the OP, I would want to know about it so I can avoid divorce unfairness by filing first.