Month: Oct 2026

Sober as a judge: cheats reveal the worst thing about a partner on the wagon – they remember EVERYTHING

Key findings

  • A partner who gives up the booze for a month is a cheat’s worst nightmare: 59% of those whose other half has gone dry say the worst part is that they now remember exactly what they were told.
  • A whopping 62% say the trusty pub alibi is dead, because nobody at home believes four hours in the pub any more.
  • The long lunch is back: daytime activity on the site has jumped 35% in the first fortnight of October as affairs move to the middle of the day.
  • Study of 1,215 members by IllicitEncounters.com, the UK’s leading extramarital dating site.

They say what happens in the pub stays in the pub. But what happens when your other half stops going?

For Britain’s cheats, a partner doing Sober October is the stuff of nightmares, according to a sobering new survey by IllicitEncounters.com, the UK’s leading extramarital dating site.

The site asked 1,215 members what changes when they or their partner go dry for a month. Among those whose partner is on the wagon, 59% said the worst part is that their partner now remembers exactly what they were told – what time they said they’d be home, who they said they were with, and what they said about it the next morning.

And the trusty pub alibi has gone too. A whopping 62% say it no longer works, because nobody at home believes a four-hour session in the pub any more.

A clear-headed partner also notices the little things. 45% have been asked why they jumped in the shower the moment they walked through the door, and 40% have faced a grilling the next morning about something they’d already explained the night before.

So what’s a cheat to do? Take a long lunch. Activity on the site between 10am and 4pm jumped 35% in the first fortnight of October compared with the end of September, while the evenings have gone quiet. The affairs haven’t stopped. They’ve just moved to the lunch break.

Back in January, a third of members told the site that a booze-free month killed the spontaneity at home. Now it seems a dry spell causes even more trouble outside it.

Elaine*, 43, from Leicester, says her husband has given up drinking for a month three years running. “It never bothered me before. This year it’s a nightmare. I used to say I was out with the girls and he’d be asleep by ten anyway. Now he’s up when I get in, and he remembers what I told him.”

Jessica Leoni, sex and relationships expert for IllicitEncounters.com, said: “The drink was never really the point. What a shared bottle of wine on a Friday bought people was a partner who went to bed early and didn’t ask many questions on the Saturday morning. Take that away and you have somebody sitting up, clear-headed, who can repeat your own story back to you.”

She added: “Hardly anybody gets caught out by one enormous slip. They tell the story slightly differently the second time, and somebody is sober enough to spot it. That’s why the evenings go quiet every October and the daytime fills right up. Eleven in the morning is a lot easier to explain than one in the morning.”


Results


 What a sober partner has picked up on, among members whose partner has given up drinking for a month. They could pick more than one, so the figures do not add to 100.

What the sober partner noticed%
Remembering exactly what they were told59%
Asking why they showered the moment they got in45%
Follow-up questions the next morning40%
Being awake when they came in37%
Noticing a change in their phone habits32%
Commenting on what they had chosen to wear25%
Checking the mileage or the sat nav17%


*Name has been changed.

About Illicit Encounters

IllicitEncounters.com is the UK’s largest and longest-running extramarital dating site, established in 2004. The site has over one million UK members and publishes regular research on modern infidelity and relationships in Britain, with expert commentary from sex and relationships expert Jessica Leoni.

Press contact: [email protected]

Money off at the gym, the cinema… and now an affair: NHS staff get a “thank you” discount

Key findings

  •  IllicitEncounters.com is giving anyone who works in the NHS £20 off membership until the end of October, as a thank you. The code is NHSTHANKS.
  • Around 180,000 healthcare workers, most of them women, have joined the site since 2004.
  • 61% of the 1,250 NHS staff polled say their working hours have damaged their relationship.

NHS staff can already get money off at the gym, the cinema and half the restaurants on the high street. From today, they can get money off an affair too.

IllicitEncounters.com, the UK’s leading extramarital dating site, is giving anyone working in the NHS £20 off membership until 31 October, as a thank you. The code is NHSTHANKS at checkout.

Around 180,000 healthcare workers have joined the site since 2004, more than one in ten of all members, and most of them are women. When the site asked 1,250 of its NHS members what their hours have done to their relationship, 61% said they have damaged it.

Dawn*, 44, from Doncaster, has worked nights on a medical ward for eleven years. “We’re married but we live in shifts,” she says. “I get in at half seven and he’s going out the door at eight. We’ve not had a Christmas together since 2019. It isn’t that we fell out. We just stopped overlapping.”

And for anyone picturing doctors and nurses: only 18% say the person they started seeing works in the NHS too.

Jessica Leoni, sex and relationships expert for IllicitEncounters.com, said: “Everyone else gives NHS staff a free coffee. We thought we’d give them something they might actually use.”

She added: “These are the people who keep the hospitals open at three in the morning. When we asked them about home, nobody described a big row. They described hardly ever seeing their partner. When you only pass each other in the hallway, it isn’t hard to see how someone else becomes the person you actually talk to. So this is our thank you. A cheeky one, admittedly.”

Results

What NHS staff say their shifts have cost them. Percentages are of all 1,250 NHS staff polled. They could pick more than one.

What the shifts have cost% of NHS staff
Never in the house, awake, at the same time46%
Missing birthdays, weddings and Christmases43%
Too tired to talk on days they’re both off39%
Sleeping in separate rooms because of nights30%
Plans cancelled when the rota changes at short notice23%
A partner who has stopped asking how the shift went21%
Arguing about who gets the weekend off8%

*Name has been changed.

About Illicit Encounters

IllicitEncounters.com is the UK’s largest and longest-running extramarital dating site, established in 2004. The site has over one million UK members and publishes regular research on modern infidelity and relationships in Britain, with expert commentary from sex and relationships expert Jessica Leoni.

Press contact: [email protected]

Forget the burner phone — a quarter of cheats say the first thing they changed was doing their own washing, and 68% say nobody at home has ever asked why

 Key findings

  •  27% of members say the first thing they changed once the affair began was doing their own washing. The site calls it the dark wash.
  • 20% started taking their phone into the bathroom. 14% keep a second aftershave or deodorant somewhere other than the bathroom cabinet.
  • Only 2% got a second phone, which is the least common change on the list.
  • 68% say their partner has never once asked why any of it changed.
  • The results come from a poll of 1,340 members by IllicitEncounters.com, the UK’s leading extramarital dating site.

A man who has never once put a wash on does not suddenly start running a dark wash on a Tuesday night for no reason. Perfume that is not yours, hotel soap, a hair the wrong colour – it all ends up in the laundry basket, and the people having the affair work that out long before their partners do.

IllicitEncounters.com, the UK’s leading extramarital dating site, asked 1,340 members what they started doing differently once the affair began, and a quarter of them said the washing, which made it the single most common change on a list of eight.

Almost everything on the list is housework. An affair creates evidence, on clothes and in cars and on phones, and the first instinct is to tidy it away. Others started taking their phone into the bathroom, or keeping a second aftershave where it will not be found.

Hardly anyone does the obvious thing. Only 2% had gone to the trouble of getting themselves a second phone.

The change looks different depending on who is making it. For men, it is often the first time they have used the machine at all. Women, who were mostly using it already, describe separating their own things from the family wash and putting them on the same night rather than leaving them in the basket.

Neil*, 48, from Derby, had to look the machine up. “I watched a video on my phone, standing in my own utility room, at forty-eight years old,” he says. “She thinks I’ve finally grown up. I just can’t have my shirts going in with everyone else’s.”

Bev*, 45, from Coventry, joined the site eighteen months ago. “I’ve always done the washing, so nobody was ever going to notice me doing more of it,” she says. “What changed is that my stuff goes in on its own now, the same night, and it comes straight back out. Before that it’d sit in the basket for days like everybody else’s.”

68% say their partner has never once asked why any of it changed. When anyone did ask, it was almost always about why the car was so clean – not about who had suddenly started doing the washing.

Jessica Leoni, sex and relationships expert for IllicitEncounters.com, said: “People think an affair starts with a big lie. It doesn’t, it starts with a load of washing. Nobody’s sat down and planned any of this. They’ve realised the shirt they had on smells of somebody who isn’t their wife, they’ve dealt with it, and once you’ve done that once you carry on doing it.”

She added: “It works as a warning sign precisely because it’s so boring. Nobody’s looking for a second phone, because hardly anybody has the energy for a second phone. What they’ve got is a husband who has developed a sudden interest in the fabric conditioner, and that would be a much harder thing to explain than a text message, if anybody ever asked.”

Results

What changed first once the affair began (one answer only)

What changed first% who named it
Doing their own washing27%
Taking the phone into the bathroom20%
A second aftershave or deodorant kept elsewhere14%
Keeping the car unusually clean13%
Showering the moment they get in11%
Changing the bedding more often8%
Parking further from the house5%
Getting a second phone2%

*Names have been changed.

About Illicit Encounters

IllicitEncounters.com is the UK’s largest and longest-running extramarital dating site, established in 2004. The site has over one million UK members and publishes regular research on modern infidelity and relationships in Britain, with expert commentary from sex and relationships expert Jessica Leoni.

Press contact: [email protected]