Are They Cheating? A Guide To Being Your Own Private Eye

Are They Cheating...

What is Cheating?

Cheating, according to Merriam-Webster, is defined as being deceptive, practicing fraud, violating rules dishonestly, and being unfaithful in a relationship. Obviously, we are talking about being unfaithful in a relationship. 

Cheating can go one of two ways.
1. Your significant other is cheating on you (or you are the cheater).
2. You are the "other" man or woman, either knowingly or unknowingly. 

In either scenario, this guide will help you become your own private eye and may lead to peace of mind or heartbreak, depending on what you find out. However, this guide is meant to help you determine if you are the other person.

How do I know?

I know from experience. I have had two friends go through a nasty divorce and  break up over the last three years, because their spouses were cheating. So they fit scenario one above. Me, well... I fit into scenario two several times since my divorce in 2010. Since then, I have met Mr. I Have A Girlfriend and Mr. Married too many times. I learned really quickly, how to break it down to who I had to eliminate from the dating pool. 

After meeting Mr. Married for the 4th time, I began to notice some similarities in the men I was meeting online. So I started researching the guys I was talking too, no point in getting involved or meeting him if he is married or has a girlfriend. I flat out told one guy the information I found out about him on our fourth date and he called me a stalker. I told him his stories consistently change, and that my gut was telling me something wasn't right. Always, always, always go with your gut. I proceeded to tell him that I am not a stalker, because if I was a stalker I would be sitting in his driveway waiting for his wife to come home or sitting at his place of employment (Shhhh...I don't even know where his place of employment is - but he didn't know that). The point is I called him out, and backed it up with FACTS. Facts he tried to weasel his way out of, but couldn't.

What to look for...

Time of Day:  What time of day is the person contacting you? What hours to they work?
For example: If the person is consistently contacting you during their work hours, but you do not hear from them in the evening or during the weekends this is a RED flag. If you are so important that they can take time out of their work day, what is so important that they can't return a text or call after work or over the weekend? Chances are its their spouse and or family. Also, returning texts and calls late at night, another RED flag, because they most likely waited until everyone else was asleep to respond to your message. 

How Do They Contact You: How is the person contacting you?? Are they only contacting you by instant messenger? Email? Telephone? Text? If the person is only contacting you by one or possibly two of these means, this is another RED flag. If they don't give their phone number to you after several months of chatting online and via instant messenger, either he isn't interested or he is hiding something. Either way, it's not a good sign. 

Free Texting Apps: Apps like Text Free, kik, Tiger text and text now don't show up on monthly telephone bills. I can understand just meeting someone and not wanting to give them your real number, because I have done it myself; however, after talking to the person for a few weeks I let them know that I gave them another number just in case they turned out to be a weirdo and then I give them my real number. I am just putting it out there that sometimes people have these kinds of apps so there is no "record or evidence" trail of who they have been chatting with.

Google: Yep Awesome tool! Just Google the person's name, make sure that you verify the information with what you already know about the person, since there are a lot of people in this world that have the same name. Make sure you also use the images tab to see if there are any incriminating photos.
Example: My first Mr. Married had his wedding photos on the photographers website and the hotels website where he was married. Absolutely no denying these, not only were his pictures there, but so was his name!! Then we have the gentleman who contacted me on a dating site. He didn't have any photos on his page and gave me his name, telling me to look him up on Facebook. I don't add just anyone to my Facebook page, but I wanted to see what he looked like, so I tried to find him, but couldn't, so I Googled his name. I found several mug shots of a gentleman with the same name. I freaked out. Always, giving the benefit of doubt, I contacted him via the dating site and said, "I couldn't find your Facebook profile, so I Googled you and found a couple of mug shot pictures for possession of drug paraphernalia and trafficking." He responded with, "Is that a problem?" UM...YES that is a problem. Needless to say that guy was BLOCKED from my page and didn't get a response to his last email. Google yourself sometime, you might be shocked how easy it is to find your own information online.

Facebook: This is an EXCELLENT tool!!!
Examples:
Phone Number - Instead of putting the name of a person in the search bar, type in their telephone number without any dashes. If their number is listed on their page, their page will pop up. I found Mr. "In a Relationship" twice this way.
Last Name - Check out their friends with the same last name, especially if they tell you they are the only child or that their siblings are the same sex as they are. Remember, Mr. Married who called me a stalker?? Well, I went to friend him on Facebook, he didn't accept my request another RED flag. If you are talking to someone for months, you have had three plus dates and have discussed being exclusive, I don't think being friends on Facebook is a bad thing. Anyway, he stated he had a daughter, who was 8 years old, but his profile picture showed an infant. It could be a niece or nephew, or a throw-back picture, but my gut was telling me it wasn't. So I checked out his friends. He mentioned a brother and his mom. I found both of them and another woman with the same last name. Yes she could be a cousin, sister-in-law or aunt, but my gut said click her name. So I did, and guess what??!!?? Right there on her page it said, Married to and had his name!! When I confronted him, his response was she never uses that. Funny...they were supposed to be divorced like 5 years ago, and she had posted on her page three months prior. I don't know about you, but the minute I was divorced, my status was changed. Oh year, I forgot to mention, that also on her page were family pictures of the 4 of them, that baby I mentioned that was his profile picture? Yep, that was his son. Not only did this man lie about being married, but he also lied about the number of children he has.

Public Records: This is perhaps one of the easiest and best tools you can use, go to the Clerk of Courts website for the county you are interested in and select public records. Here you can find information about marriages, divorces, and traffic violations. I had one gentleman tell me that he was arrested once and spent a night in jail for hitting his ex-girlfriend. I was impressed with his honesty, but the fact that he told me this the second time we spoke on the phone made me think twice. That isn't something most people are proud of or want to share with someone they are just getting to know, so I did a public record search on him and found out he was arrested not once, not twice but THREE times for domestic battery. Another good public record tool is the Property Appraisers website. There you can find information about their property and if they really own the three houses that they claim they do. You can search by address or name. This will also tell you if there is someone else listed on the mortgage like a spouse or parent. 

Public Search engine sites:
White Pages You can type in name of the person or their address. Usually, it will tell you who lives also lives in the home. Mr. Weasel's wife was listed, but he claims she just never changed her address. Who moves and doesn't change their address for 5 years?? REALLY, do I look that dumb??
Spokeo Spokeo is similar to the white pages, but it lets you look up email addresses.
Intelius Similar to the two mentioned above, but gives you the option to pay for a background check, but that is not necessary. Anything you want or should need to know is public record. You just need to know what you are looking for.
Been Verified Found out about this site from a co-worker. It allows you to look up one person's information per month.

National Sex Offender and Inmate Databases:
National Sex Offender Registry You can search this site by the name of the person or your location. As a single mom, I want to make sure my children are safe first and foremost; therefore, I am going to check out any person that I am considering bringing around my children.
Florida Sex Offender Site For my Florida friends.
Federal Inmate Search Search for people who have done time in the federal penitentiary, this is a national database. You can also access your local county jail or state prison by googling the name of the facility and typing inmate list.
Florida Inmate Site For my Florida friends. 

If you feel the need to ask for a driver's license on your first meeting, do it. If the other person is offended then they are not worthy of your time. The first few dates I had with guy's that I met from online dating sites, I made sure to give a friend the guys name, number, where and when we were meeting. I also called her after the date to let her know I was ok. Once I even took a picture of the guys license plate in right in front of him and text it to my friend. I told him point blank, my friend is paranoid and she asked that I send her a picture of your license plate just in case I go missing. He laughed and said she was smart and to go ahead. He then offered me his driver's license to prove who he was. Maybe the fact that he was a former police officer made his willingness to comply much easier than a "regular" person, but he knew he had nothing to hide. The way I see it is if you have nothing to hide then you shouldn't care if someone wants to know about you or your past. 

Call me crazy, call me a stalker, but I call it being informed. I don't want to be the woman crying on the local news, because her boyfriend turned out to be a registered sex offender and raped her daughter or a neighbor. It's happened people. In today's world with today's technology, there are no excuses for not being informed about who you are bringing into your life and the lives of your loved ones. If you are uncomfortable or feel something isn't right, then it probably isn't. I have learned to trust my gut instinct about people and other things and looking back, I realize that I should have trusted my instinct a long time ago. 

Become informed. Know who you are bringing into your life. I promise it will save you from heartbreak and might even save your life.