I was just thinking about how many people in Costa Rica, especially guys, got caught text messaging their other guy or girl. Since most Ticos have a girlfriend, lover and wife each of them expect a text wishing them Merry Christmas today. In order to keep up the game a message or email must be sent to show you are thinking about them.
Ayesha Vardag, who has acted in a string of multi-million pound separations, said she has noticed a marked rise in the number of break-ups stemming from text messages and calls on Christmas Day.
She said that Christmas Day “text message bustings” had become an increasingly common feature in divorce cases as mobile phones have ceased to be a novelty and using them increasingly second nature.
Where once the task of proving suspicions might have involved hotel bills and checking for telltale perfumes on clothing, now a quick check of mobile phone histories and email accounts have become the norm.
Some law firms have previously claimed that they see an annual surge in the number of inquiries about divorces when their offices reopen for the New Year.
The theory is that spending days in each other’s company, often accompanied by alcohol, leads to more arguments.
But Miss Vardag, who acted for the German heiress Katrin Radmacher in her £100 million divorce case, said that she usually sees more inquiries in September, after couples return from acrimonious holidays in each other’s company.
But Christmas is undoubtedly a dangerous time for many marriages, she added.
“It is really very sad,” she said.
“There is a psychological sense of Christmas being the barometer of how a family is doing.
“But the other thing we find a lot is that there are a lot of text message ‘bustings’ on Christmas Day, usually because the husband leaves the phone around and the mistress is sending messages.
“We see that a lot … it is amazing how many times that is what catches people out.”
She added: “It has just become very obvious and transparent.
“Husbands will go off and call the mistress and then the wife will wonder where they were or who they were calling, they will either find the number on there or the text message.
“I do wonder whether there is an element of people wanting to get caught because it is an easier way of dealing with it than saying that they want to leave.
“When people are discovered in adultery, rather than coming clean and saying that they are in a relationship, it tends to be through mobile phones and emails.”
By John Bingham, telegraph.co.uk
