If you have access to her phone, you can pair her Whatsapp with your desktop computer.
https://faq.whatsapp.com/en/web/28080003/

Ok, I’ve had some time to investigate and I really don’t think there is an OM of any significance.

We have talked about the way forward some, the plan is for her to stay here for another year while I figure out where I’m going to live depending on my job situation. We originally agreed to stay in the house together for that year but she now wants to move out as she says it will be too hard emotionally and too confusing, she wants to progress to “moving on”. She says the ideal situation is we move to the same city, maybe even the same neighborhood so we can effectively co-parent and remain friends. She wants the physical separation now to work towards that.

I asked what led her to the decision of divorce and she cited a stupid argument we had about her job and travel right before she left on a trip, I left for work and she left town. Neither of us apologized or talked about it when she returned a few days later. She says during the trip a coworker asked her how things were going with us and she realized they had had the same conversation last year with no improvement and an overwhelming sadness and depression came over her. She couldn’t eat, sleep, concentrate and she felt physically ill. She was overwhelmed with the feelings of how the marriage felt wrong and she couldn’t go on. I think she has felt a sense of relief after asking for the divorce and her mind is made up fully. Not sure what I can do.

Sadfather, I am sorry to see you give up so needlessly. I believe you were right when you said the above and that is the reason for her desire to separate. I wouldn't expect her to tell you the real reason. I hope you do a better job of snooping before you run out of chances to save this. Your marriage will be over if you don't try.

Is there an insignificant OM?

Your way 'forward' seems backward to me. Do you want to save this? Are you willing to put in a little effort or do you just give up?

Stay in your house, get intel on this 'coworker' and follow the plan from surviving an affair, if you want to survive.

If not, just leave your house and your marriage and hand over your wife to this wonderful caring insignificant coworker.

Sorry I wasn’t clear, this coworker is female, not the suspected OM. I think she is open to the idea of someone else but there really isn’t anything concrete.

I want nothing more than to save my marriage! It’s a one way street though, my wife is only interested in moving on with separation/divorce.

Yes, we already know this. It is because she is having an affair. If she were a falling down drunk would you take everything she said to heart knowing that her current feelings were based on a temporary state of intoxication? Or would you try to get her away from the booze so she could sober up?

We think it is certainly your right to walk away at this point, but it is not necessary if you want to save your marriage. There are no guarantees but there is a high chance this can be saved if you can follow this plan. It not, then you are guaranteed a divorce.

I understand your point but I don’t think there is an affair. There is nothing to “expose”. Not sure what plan to follow.

]
Here is what you previously told us: "I’m trying to be somewhat cryptic as this is a public forum, really wish there was a PM option. I don’t have all the pieces but there is an emotional (maybe more) affair with a married man who works in the same field and lives out of state. I know name age, location of OM."

You told us there was an emotional affair. Are you actively spying on her?

I have been here every day for 18 years and have not seen a wife leave a husband [in the absence of physical abuse] unless there is an affair. Dr Harley, who is a clinical psychologist for 50 years said this:


Something is going on. Affairs and divorce are EPIDEMIC in marriages where one spouse travels. I don't think you are shooting straight with us. I suspect you know something is going on but are afraid to confront it, hoping we will give you advice as if there is no affair. Please don't waste your time and ours with that tactic.

It is the plan we gave you: SPY AND GET THE GOODS!

There is some flirty commutation mixed in with work related stuff. That’s it. No “proof” or a way to expose anything that isn’t there. It certainly could lead to more once I’m out of the picture.

No one would ever ask you to expose what is not there. But what we have asked is that you do some super sleuthing to find out what is going on. If you want to do that, it would be enormously helpful in saving your marriage.

I have done the super sleuthing and there’s nothing concrete. The seeds are there like the flirty/thoughtful/concerned communication but that’s it.
I think she is entertaining the idea of someone else but it hasn’t gone anywhere yet.

How are you doing your spying? Do you have spyware on her devices? A VAR and GPS on her vehicle?

@sadfather,
Please realize, that an emotional affair can be as devastating to your marriage as a physical affair. It creates a contrast effect, where your everyday hassles are compared to the lightheartedness of having someone who cares and gives her attention in a setting where everyone looks their best in crisply ironed shirts and clouds of perfume and where there is no such thing as kids or morning breath or the odd quarrel about your mother in law or your dirty socks next to the hamper.
In comparison to that, her time with you is probably boring and full of commitments.
All of this plays at an unconcious level.

Apart from the sleuthing, you have to be your best self, as if you want her to date you.
Now you have competition, you should try to outcompete him, apart from sleuthing, and you have the advantage of knowing what makes her tick.

To add to this, my mother had an emotional affair for 50 years. An emotional affair does not burn out the way a physical affair does. My father knew about it as did his wife but neither realised how it was poisoning their marriages. Because it was not physical, they believed there was nothing they could do. In point of fact they could have(and should have) stopped the contact entirely.

There was an epilogue to this. After my father died, my mother married this man within 3 months (his wife had also died by then). They were miserable. My mother confessed to me that it had taken that experience to realise that she had married the right man for her and she deeply regretted what she had damaged.