How Can You Tell if the Guy You're Dating is Married?

It's a fact that only about 1% of married men who have affairs leave their wives, and many men cheat on their wives. With the Internet, there’s even more chance to be elusive in the early stages of an affair. So you're right on the money if you’re concerned and want to know if that guy you just met who’s coming on to you so delightfully is married before you get involved. But how can you be sure he isn’t married and just fooling around?

Married men who are fooling around can be the MOST wonderfully attentive and romantic. Romancing you via phone and text, showering you with gifts, and making pasionate love to you when you get together. It truly can be the stuff of which fantasies are made and the main reason is this. To him your forbidden love is just that...a fantasy, often nothing more.

If you’ve experienced it, you’ll wonder how a man could do that to his wife. It’s important not to delude yourself into thinking that he's the victim.

Here are 10 ways to know he’s cheating on his wife:

1. You’re suspicious. If you suspect every man you meet of this, it can be a safeguard or a prejudice that you have in place and that suspicion is misleading. However, if you suddenly get suspicious about the individual man you’re dealing with, then you should definitely trust your instincts. Where there’s smoke there’s usually fire.

2. His tone of voice gets guarded, he fidgets or he won’t make eye contact and is evasive when certain topics come up like family, children, vacations, where he lives, etc.

3. He insists that all contact be on his terms only. He gives some reason why you must only call him at work or on his cell. He'll put limits in place. Disregard the “reason.” They can be ingenious about this and if you’re blinded by romance, you’ll find a way to rationalize his particular excuse. DO NOT. 

4. You ask for his home phone number and he refuses or avoids giving it to you. Or, the classic, I'm sure I already gave you it, or I must have forgotten. Again, disregard the “reason" and listen to that rational voice in your head.

5. His heart is not on the line. You sense an imbalance of vulnerability, and this is intuitive. When two available people are dating, both presumably are anxious for it to work out, and are equally at-risk. When you’re playing for keeps and he’s just playing, he won’t care as much about how you’re getting along. He has the security of the marriage and nothing to lose but an exciting good time.

6. There’s a white line on the fourth finger of his left hand, a tan-line from where his wedding ring usually is, and is not when he’s with you. Or there’s the outline of a ring in his shirt or jeans pocket. 

7. He isn’t fully disclosing when it would seem appropriate. He alludes to “things he’ll tell you about later”, and the timing is never right to divulge to you these "things".

8. He gives strange reasons for not wanting to go to certain places (like your favorite restaurant). You first met him at a dance hall (where he’s known and someone might tell his wife) and after that every place he takes you to is in another town or city. Often times there are complete areas that are completely overlooked. A coincidence? I think not.

9. He seems strangely addicted to paying for restaurants, motels, resorts, and airplane tickets in cash rather than by credit card. 

10. He is never available on Sundays or holidays. In some cultures, and with many men, Saturday night may be Boys Night Out, but Sunday is strictly “family time.” Obviously, the cheating man would find it difficult to come up with a valid excuse for his absence at the Christmas family dinner.

First point: What he says and more importantly what he doesn’t say. Anything you sense as secretive should set off alarms. Lovers in a developing relationship disclose more as time goes by. The married gigolo discloses up to a point and that’s it. 

Second point: His nerve and calm demeanor. No matter how self-confident a man is, if he’s available and wooing a woman he cares about, he’ll show moments of anxiety and/or confusion. But a married man who’s dating is living the high life with no regrets or anxious moments. With the security of his little wife keeping the homefires burning, what’s to stress over? 

Third point: The sex is the best you’ve ever had. Nothing stokes a man’s fire like forbidden love unless it’s forbidden love that carries no threat of the “c” word. The romance and passion is at an all time high because it's all play and no committment. A win-win situation for a cheating spouse.

Keep your wits about you; don't adopt a wait and see attitude. Don't stay with him because you think you'll never find anyone else that you connect with on that level. His motives are false and his professed love for you is one based on what he thinks you want to hear in order for him to keep getting what he wants. If you find out he’s married and confront him about it and he says he’ll divorce her, don’t count on it. The odds are strongly against you.