Do You Have A Secret Life? Pretend Someone You Trust Knows. It Might Just Save You.

I am going to make a bold statement. The rest of this page could save your life if you have a closely guarded secret of a certain type.

A long time ago I wrote about secrets and people’s shadowy worlds in Chat Magazine. There we talked about affairs mostly and how to spot if your partner was cheating. Chat Magazine had a wide, mostly female, readership and the letters we got often told of stories where they had another self.

This self was closely guarded. Often I got the impression no-one knew exactly what these people did during certain times. It struck me then how vulnerable it could have made them. In the pages of this website are all manner of awful unsolved murders. Time and time again cops look into victim’s backgrounds and are baffled because they can find no motive. In addition, they run out of people who could have known the victim and carried out the crime.

These days a secret life is often exposed in a police enquiry. Your cell phone will be checked, social media and CCTV of your last movements might give clues. It can still be the case that a closely guarded alternative life leaves few clues

Talking of secret relationships there are different types. You might hide AA meetings from your partner, platonic friendships or all manner of interactions. What about a newly divorced woman with a couple of older kids? I will add to this a now ex partner who is a bit abrasive and controlling. Might this woman keep a new relationship quiet?

I can say I know this happens.

I will get to the point. I have been involved with people in crisis all my life. I have had a fair bit myself. As I read of cases of stalking, jealous murder and killings that seem to be motiveless, one thing screams out at me.

Some of those baffling murders only happen because the victim keeps a secret. More importantly they tell the killer they have kept it all to themselves.

If you are in a relationship and want to have another self. Maybe you are single but want to avoid nosey friends or ex partners finding out:

PRETEND YOU HAVE TOLD AT LEAST ONE PERSON ALL ABOUT IT.

I might be a lot of things, but a criminal I am not. I can think like them though.

If I were a person who could kill just for fun or to vent anger. If I was the sort to get rid of a person I thought was trouble, secrets would make me feel better about the killing.

As I read of women being killed in their homes or simply disappearing I wonder if they were meeting someone. So many times there is no witness who saw a man force their way into a car. There is no damage to a house that proves a murder was a burglary gone wrong. Did the victim put themselves in danger because they were opening the doors and covering a secret?

It is hard to write about without refereeing to a case or two. It would be unfair though. The murders I write about are unsolved. In almost all the motive is only going to be known if the killer is caught.

I can talk in general terms however.

This is what I suggest. If I was talking to a female friend that hinted she was seeing someone. Further she was meeting them alone and did not want anyone to know for some reason…

I would tell her to tell that person she had told me everything about them. 

I would urge her to mention it in passing, ‘ No-one knows except Tim. He would never say anything.’ They could always come up with an excuse for telling me.

‘I told him because he will warn me if he hears about anyone asking about us.’

You can even make someone up. I would advise you actually tell someone though. I’d say take it further. Set up a bit of a security check, a text or call. Make out your friend is just over protective like a big brother or sister or anything.

I will always wonder how many women died because the person they kept secret knew they were a secret.

Take Care

Tim

tim@reasonedcrimechronicle.com