if and when it comes to a stated transparency arrangement, it is easy to get around that too. work phones, work e-mails, deleted messages.....It would have to come back to sincerity and trust.
That is why I'm asking here, how do A's usually end, with fanfare (a big announcement and apology and tears) or silently dying and just filed away?
We had fits and starts at transparency during the 3.5 months I've known about the A- she was very opposed to it (Of course! as Starsky says) and one day out of the blue after refusing for weeks she turned phone tracking on. Whether she was trying to fool me or was actually thinking about ending the A I'll never know. Anyway, I took some comfort from it, but quickly realized exactly what you said- that its so easy to get around if she wants to (and she did turn it off shortly thereafter). That made me realize that to me, transparency isn't about being able to check up on her but is really about her evidencing a true desire and willingness to make amends and do whatever she needs to do to save the marriage. Its a commitment to work together, nothing more. You can couple transparency with an ultimatum of what will happen if she breaches the agreement (to me that ultimatum is really more part of a NC agreement than transparency anyway), but again, she's going to do whatever she WANTS to do and the only hope (at least for my M) is to get her to WANT to be with me and have nothing to do with OM.
As to knowing when the A is over, I'm hoping to learn from you! I'm not anywhere near that (today I just gave her the "I won't work on our marriage while you are continuing the A" speech and she again denied it continues). But what I do know is that there usually is depression, melancholy, stress, etc. and I'm keeping an eye out for those behaviors as my sign something is afoot in her other relationship.
Me: 45 W:43 M: 15, T:21 2 Kids- S-14, D-12 A Started: 10/2013 Discovered as EA: 6/2014, as PA: 7/2014 A changing, not ending Start DB'ing 9/2014 Same house, same bed
