The Friend Affair

Excerpted from, "Warning Signs: How to Know if Your Partner Is Cheating -- and What to Do About It" by Anthony DeLorenzo and Dawn Ricci, with Ken Baron and Frank Gunzburg, Ph.D.

If your partner has been acting friendlier toward a friend -- or vice versa -- that doesn't automatically mean the two are having an affair. But it could be one indication of this new breed of cheating -- the "friend affair." Here, the authors of "Warning Signs: How to Know if Your Partner Is Cheating -- and What to Do About It" uncover the dirty details of the unfriendly friend affair.

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Warning Signs (Hes Having an Affair with Your Friend)

It's (Not) All in a Name

One of the most common (and least subtle) clues that he's having an affair with someone you know is when he mentions her name more frequently than usual. Friends are often topics of conversation between couples, as we're all amateur gossip columnists of sorts, finding pleasure in discussing other people's lives. Friends also serve as points of reference in a conversation. So while the names of friends weave their way throughout our daily lives, when a name -- a female friend's name -- seems to your ear to be mentioned more than it used to be, make a note of this increase.

Excerpted from, "Warning Signs: How to Know if Your Partner Is Cheating -- and What to Do About It," by Anthony DeLorenzo and Dawn Ricci, with Ken Baron and Frank Gunzburg, Ph.D.

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Note the Context of When He Mentions Her Name

Pay special attention to the relevance or need to use her name. Why would he find it necessary to mention that your friend Regina likes Tom Hanks when the two of you are in the car heading to a new Tom Hanks movie? Innocent and isolated as these mentions of a name may appear, the combined accumulation of many otherwise inconsequential statements that include a female friend's name can serve as a clue that he's more than friends with her. Perhaps at this stage he's merely infatuated; but it could likely be more than that. Or maybe it's only a coincidence that her name has come up with far more regularity than it has in the past.

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Criticizing a Friend's Spouse

Take notice if he seems critical of her husband or partner, especially if he hasn't spoken negatively about her spouse before. Attacking or making derogatory statements and slights about your friend's husband or partner serves as a kind of defense of your husband's own infidelity; in a way, he's sanctioning his inappropriate behavior.

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He's Jealous of a Friend's Spouse

Lovers are almost always jealous of and angry with the spouses of their lovers; they view the spouse as an encumbrance to their own relationship and as the other person their lover is sleeping with. Combined with another warning sign, this clue should focus your attention on a friend as a potential suspect as your husband's partner in committing marital crimes.

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How to Tell If They're "Just Being Friendly

Recently you've noticed that your husband and the wife of a couple you're friends with often end up together, chatting in the kitchen, working the barbecue grill, arranging a friendly lunch during the week. Is this a natural part of being friends, or is it something to worry about or even become a tad jealous over? If your partner is a naturally friendly person, gregarious even, and enjoys being with others, then factor in those traits when gauging if his warmth toward a woman friend warrants serious concern. We're not saying that you should dismiss your concern because your husband is "a people person," but do consider that his friendliness with a female friend of yours might not mean that she's the other woman. That said, his natural friendliness might be disguising his deeper feelings for her. On the other end of the personality spectrum is the husband who rarely exhibits interest in being close with the female side of a couple you know but now is unabashedly friendly with her. If this latter description fits your husband, then the warning flag should be raised.

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He Calls You by Your Friend's Name

This is a telling, and more than embarrassing, slip of the tongue. We've all made stupendously embarrassing remarks, usually at moments of stress or fatigue. And conducting an affair can add great emotional strain and anxiety to one's life. Many clients have said that their husbands call them by the wrong name, often without even noticing it. But you should certainly notice it -- especially if the wrong name he calls you is also the name of a good friend of yours. If this happens, act like you didn't hear his faux pas or that you weren't sure what he said.

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Notice the Context

For example, was he noticeably nervous when he called you your friend's name? Or even amorous (as the wrong name pops up in the bedroom, too)? And did this occur on a weekend or some other time when the lovers would be away from each other and her name would be on his mind? Also, be prepared: Chances are, the first time he calls you by her name might not be the last. In each occurrence, rather than correcting him, pretend you weren't paying attention, but note the day and the context of the miscall.

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He Has Her on the Payroll

Another serious sign of trouble arises when a husband, often with little notice to or consultation with his wife, hires the wife's friend to work for him or strongly recommends the friend for a position where he works. If you already have suspicions about the two of them, you should be very concerned about such an employment situation. Now, it certainly isn't uncommon for friends to hire friends or to be instrumental in helping a friend land a job in the same place of employment. Friends do end up working together, especially if one of them is looking for work and the other has a position or knows of a position that's open -- after all, what are friends for? But if your husband comes home one evening announcing that he's just hired one of your friends as his associate marketing director, you should feel right in not wanting to necessarily celebrate her good fortune in employment. This especially rings true if the friend is, in your estimation, under-qualified or even totally unfit for the job or project. If the two of them are lovers, then the job was offered to her as a way for them to spend more time together, even if it's a part-time job or project.

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Watch His Explanation for Hiring Her for These Clues

If it seems forced, unrealistic, or contrived, your fears should not only increase but are more likely to be confirmed. However, at this stage, you should appear to be noncommittal, disinterested, or if you can manage the act, even delighted at your husband's largesse at hiring or helping out a good friend. But in reality, you should be searching for any and all other relevant signs that your husband is having an affair -- because now you might have a good idea of who he's having it with.

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He Receives More E-mail from Her than from Anyone Else (Including You)

Checking your spouse's e-mail -- without his knowing it -- can give insight about whom he's communicating with and what he's saying or reading. Short of using sophisticated tools that can remotely capture e-mails found on his home computer without his knowledge, it's still possible to glance at his e-mail page to see from whom he's receiving (and to whom he's sending) numerous e-mails. Consider sending him an e-mail with an attachment -- say, a photo -- and tell him that you want to see how it look, which is an innocent request. As he pulls up his e-mail, try to quickly scan all the others on the page, looking for familiar e-mail addresses that belong to friends of yours. Lovers often send more e-mails over the weekend or when they're apart, so try this tactic on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon. And if you see a familiar address, your warning flag should begin billowing.

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"I just know he's having an affair, I'm positive of it -- but I don't have a clue who he's having it with." We hear some version of that predicament from clients every day. In fact, for many clients the identity of the other woman is at first a mystery, one most clients want us to solve, along with proving for certain that their spouse is cheating. If the suspecting wife has little idea of who the husband is cheating with, we usually pose a question that almost always surprises and often troubles many clients: "Is your husband good friends with a female, including someone the two of you are friends with?" We can reliably predict the response, which usually follows along the lines of a disbelieving, "You're saying he's sleeping with a friend of mine?!" (You may have just heard yourself asking the same question.) Well no -- and yes. We ask this provocative question because beyond someone he's met at or through work, friends should be placed near the top of the likely lovers list. And, unfortunately, this category often leads us to correctly answering the "who" question.

How Friends Become Lovers

Each partner brings into a new relationship his or her own friends, who then become the friends of the mate as well. "My friend" becomes "our friend." And as the couple moves through life together, they acquire friends jointly, be they neighbors or friends of friends, or from friendships formed at work or at church or in countless other ways our friendships are forged. While it’s good to have mutual friends by embracing your partner's friends as your own, sharing your own friends with him and building friendships together, a danger lurks that the compatibility and warm support between good friends of the opposite sex can migrate into something beyond friendship.

Four Kinds of Friends, the Same Worry

The Best Friend

The affair with the wife's close friend, even her best friend, though she has also become, by extension, the husband's friend as well:
I met Susan at my very first Lamaze childbirth class, so that had to have been 12 years ago. We hit it off right from the start, and after our kids were born, we remained friends and become closer when Susan and Phil, her husband, split up. David and I would invite Susan and her daughter, Meghan, over a lot, always for holiday dinners and family celebrations, and we'd go to the town beach with them, stuff like that. I felt good knowing we were helping Susan through a tough time, plus I like Susan -- make that I liked her -- a lot. About six months ago, whenever we'd be together, I began noticing that Susan and David would always end up hanging out together, rinsing and putting the dishes in the dishwasher then staying in the kitchen to talk, or they'd end up walking together if we went to the mall, innocent things like that, but I noticed it. I wasn't jealous, but Susan seemed to be hanging out more with David than with me. Plus, David would be laughing with her a lot but seemed kind of stressed out with me. Then a few weekends ago, David was at soccer with our son, and I went into David's office at home that he set up for the days he telecommutes, looking for some tape. His computer was on, displaying his office e-mail account. I wasn't exactly snooping, but I just thought I should look. I can still feel my face turning red when I saw Susan's e-mails to him from just that morning alone, each one signed ILU for I Love You! I lost my two best friends that morning. -- Patti V.

Next: Three More "Friends" to Look Out For