I’m having hot sex with my PT and my husband is paying for it – I feel guilty but it’s all his fault
STROLLING through the door of her home, arms laden with shopping bags, Eliza Gold feels a pang of guilt.
Smiling at her husband James, she offers to show him her new shoes.
He rolls his eyes and shakes his head, a familiarly dismissive gesture.
But Eliza has been nowhere near a shop.
She spent the afternoon in a five-star hotel, in bed with her lover — and her husband unknowingly paid the bill.
It is not the first time she has used her well-off partner’s money to pay for a rendezvous with her personal-trainer boyfriend — there have been numerous hotel stays and dinners.
The ruse has gone on for so long, Eliza now has a stash of shopping bags with “just bought” clothes hidden in her car boot, in case she has to explain where she has been.
The retired author says: “I do feel guilty about cheating on James and lying to him about how I spend his money, but there’s no way I could admit to him I have stopped loving him and fallen for another man.
“He’d divorce me and I’d be left penniless. He’d take everything and I’d be homeless. The only way for me to be happy is to stay married, but have a lover.
“I do feel guilty about cheating – I don’t hate my husband, but I feel so lonely and unloved in our marriage I feel it’s the only option for me.”
Eliza is not alone, with one study finding that a staggering 40 per cent of those who cheat admit to using their partner’s money for expenses.
Another study revealed a quarter of married couples, and 30 per cent of people in a committed relationship, say they are keeping a financial secret from their partner.
Cotswolds cottage
Those who commit financial infidelity — lying to your partner about the money you spend — are statistically more likely to go on to have a full-blown affair.
Eliza, 40, says: “Sometimes James and I barely see each other for days — and he’s always tired after work, so I stopped initiating sex. We’ve not slept together for over a year.
“Even though I’ve always made such an effort with my appearance, it made me feel so unattractive and undesirable.
“A little over a year ago, I decided to employ a new personal trainer and I found Rob, who’d helped get a friend in shape for her wedding.
“He’s 6ft 2in, with beautiful brown eyes, and I thought he was gorgeous from the moment I met him.
“As we spent more time together, it was obvious we were attracted to each other. He made me laugh — and he’d drop me little messages asking how my day had been. There was a chemistry I’d never had with James.
“And I felt like he really fancied me. He was always complimenting me or touching me — it made me feel wanted again, and I knew I was falling for him.
“I didn’t want to, but it was just such a difference to the life I had at home.
“One day in December 2023, after training in the park, he kissed me out of the blue. I couldn’t ignore my feelings any longer.
“He told me he has a partner, but they are only together for their daughter, who’s eight. He said when she is 18 and off to uni, they’ll divorce, but he doesn’t want to miss out on time with her.
James and I have not slept together for over a year. Even though I’ve always made an effort with my appearance, it made me feel undesirable
Eliza
“I believe him, and that suits me too because I’m not currently in a position to leave my husband.”
Unwittingly helping fund her affair, barrister James, 45, gives Eliza a monthly £2,500 for shopping and beauty. It’s a far cry from the life she led before she wed.
She says: “I first met James at a mutual friend’s wedding ten years ago. I was living in a grotty flatshare in East London, struggling to work as a writer. He was a barrister, living in a townhouse in central London.
“At the wedding, he was handsome, but I can’t deny I clocked his expensive suit and Rolex, and I was attracted to his money as much as him.
“A few days later he took me to dinner and the rest is history. He proposed 12 months after our first date, with a £10,000 diamond ring in our favourite restaurant, and we married in a lavish ceremony six months later.
“I moved into his ultra-modern flat with views over Hyde Park, which is probably worth around £6million, and he bought us a cottage in the Cotswolds too.
“Every morning I woke up, I had to pinch myself. Money was no object.”
She adds: “Before I met him, in the run-up to pay day I’d be living on soup.”
But since meeting James, her life has changed.
She says: “I’ve never had to work, and he bought me whatever I wanted — I swapped my Ford Fiesta for a gorgeous white Range Rover, jewellery from Accessorise for real diamonds, designer clothes — it was the lifestyle I’d always dreamed of.”
James now makes at least £250,000 a year, but money alone could not fill the deafening silence Eliza experienced during the 2020 lockdown.
She had already been feeling lonely because her husband was rarely home.
She says: “James was always at work — travelling the country or working at home — and at the weekends he’d go golfing with his friends.”
Then Covid hit, but Eliza says: “Suddenly he was at home a lot, but I realised we didn’t have a lot to say to each other, and I was still lonely.
“I found it incredibly sad but I don’t think he really noticed. He certainly doesn’t really seem bothered.”
She adds: “Neither of us ever wanted children — I’d never felt maternal and James never showed any interest either, so it was just the two of us.
“I started to feel foolish for valuing his wealth so much when I had a husband who barely spent time with me and, when we did chat, we had nothing in common. I began to feel very trapped.
“We’d had amazing sex when we first met, but over the five years we grew apart and our sex life slowly petered out.
“There’s such a huge gap between us now that it feels like we can’t really have an honest talk — it’s the elephant in the room that neither of us ever brings up.”
Countryside spa
But Eliza’s needs are now met by Rob, who she treats to posh hotels and fancy restaurants.
She says: “Rob isn’t well off but I’m used to the finer things, so I decided to book us a room at a five-star hotel to sleep together for the first time.
“I don’t have my own income, so I paid for it with James’s money. That first time we booked a room, we drove 30 miles to a spa hotel in the countryside, stopped at a cashpoint and I paid £250 in cash. The secrecy definitely made it more exciting.
“I was nervous about having sex with someone new after so long, but it felt amazing. He’s a good-looking man anyway, but as he’s a personal trainer, his body was incredible too.
“Afterwards, I was paranoid James would ask where I had been or where his money had gone, but he didn’t. I’ve never told Rob that I’m using James’s money to pay for our hotels, because it would be awkward. We try to avoid talking about our spouses. But he knows I don’t work, so will have figured it out.
“James is never likely to look at just how much money is going from our account. If he thinks I’ve been shopping, he’ll expect a dent in the finances.
There’s no way I could admit to James I have stopped loving him and fallen for another man. He’d divorce me and I’d be left penniless
Eliza
“In the year since we started the affair, I’ve probably spent more than £10,000 of James’s money — as well as the £3,000 I’ve paid to him in PT fees.
“The most I’ve ever spent was £600 on one night in a hotel — James was working away in London and I didn’t need to go home. I did rein it in later that month and made sure I didn’t spend anything else for a while.
“And when James is home, I make sure I return from my ‘shopping trips’ with clothes. I keep a few bags in my car boot and I’ve bought some cheaper sale items from designer shops. He was pleased when I told him I decided to pay for all my shopping in cash, so I can keep a closer eye on what I’m spending.
“And he jokes to his mates about my shopping addiction. He’s no idea he sees me buy the same stuff again and again.”
Eliza feels there is no way out of her situation.
She says: “I sometimes feel guilty. I don’t hate James, I just shouldn’t have married him and now I’m trapped.
“But selfishly, I get to have somebody who adores me, and to feel good about myself, and my marriage feels more bearable. I don’t feel as guilty towards Rob’s wife — they’re not in love, anyway, but I’d feel awful if his daughter knew.
“I try not to think about what would happen if James found out. I suppose I could get a job, but whatever I would earn wouldn’t be enough to keep me living in the area I am in now.
“Maybe one day, when Rob is ready to leave his wife, I’ll be brave enough to leave James too, when [Rob and I] can find somewhere to live together.
“But for now, I don’t have a choice but to stay married.”