How to Evaluate the Truth from Lies

Is he/she telling the truth or not?

When you start suspecting your spouse of cheating on you, your mind and your heart will be clashing. As such, when you ask your spouse a question, your mind may be trying desperately to read what he/she is trying to say while your heart fears what you will find out. This creates confusion and before you know it, you can't make heads or tails anymore of what your spouse is telling you.

The first thing to do is calm down. A tall order I know but one that you will have to try to do so that you can properly assess what your spouse is saying and if indeed he or she is lying about something.

Tell-tale Signs that your Spouse is Lying

• Check your spouse's overall facial expression while talking to you. People who are lying will obviously not want you to read anything on their faces so the result is that he/she will be giving you a very BLANK look. And if your spouse is the animated type when he/she talks, then there may be something there.
• Another way to judge based on facial expression is to see if expressions are limited in any way. For instance, when he/she smiles, the whole face should light up! If only the mouth is smiling (i.e., the eyes, forehead remain the same), then you know the smile is forced.
• The eyes are the windows to our souls. There IS still some truth to this adage. If you are conversing with your spouse and all of a sudden ask where he/she was last night (or some other night he/she went home late) does your spouse break eye contact immediately like get up and respond with his/her back to you?

Also, some studies have shown that when you ask somebody a question where they have to think about it first (it IS likely that your spouse forgot where he/she was THAT night last week or last month), their eyes generally look down and to the right. Now, don't jump to the conclusion that your spouse is lying if he/she looks down and to the left! First ask some basic questions that you know the answer too (e.g., what was the name of that restaurant again where we were last month honey?) and check the direction of his/her eyes. After you establish that he/she always looks to the right (or left), ask the question you really want to ask and see where his/her eyes go.

• Is your spouse defensive when being asked? Remember this - a guilty person will respond defensively immediately instead of answering your question. An innocent person almost always goes on the offensive.
• Is your spouse continually denying something? If you ask why he/she bought a new mobile phone and didn't tell you, he/she might reply what seems to be a valid reason. After a few minutes, he/she may go back (voluntarily!) to the topic again further explaining why he/she didn't tell you. This can go on a bit depending on how guilty your spouse is of lying to you.
• Keep track of your spouse's replies to you. If you ask where he/she was and says "at the office working late", ask again a week from now and see if he/she gives the same reply.