The holiday can inspire a bit of truth telling and secret sharing, and last year a woman who used to work at a perfume counter spilled the beans.
Shannon Hill took to TikTok to reveal how she could always tell when a man was cheating on his wife. It turns out their holiday gift shopping habits were typically a dead giveaway.
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Shannon begins her TikTok by explaining, "I have got a little story, a little tea for you guys, if you will, about what husbands buy for not only their wife, but their mistresses too."
Shannon adds that she was pretty young at the time, noting, "I was only 19 at the time, but I learned this quick."
She says that men would often come in to order their partner's favorite perfume, which was kept on file.
To make things easier for themselves, the men would "buy their wife her favorite fragrance. They’d get it all wrapped really nicely — and then they would buy the same fragrance for their mistress."
The reason they bought both women the same type of perfume is pretty telling. Shannon says, "Because guess what? They did not want to leave their mistress’ house smelling like a different woman."
The perfume they all bought was the same, too. She says, "It was Coco Mademoiselle perfume. It was never No. 5 because people would come in and buy that for their mom. It was never the Chance perfumes. It was always Coco Mademoiselle."
Commenters confirmed the story and chimed in with their own similar accounts. As one person noted, "I worked in high end jewelry for years. Husbands did the same thing. It was always funny to see the mistress come in after Christmas and exchange it."
Another chimed in, "I used to work in fine jewelry and had husbands buying their mistresses the same pieces too!"
Bartenders confirmed the same thing happens at restaurants. As one put it, "Sunday brunch with the wife and kids, lunch breaks and cocktail hour with the mistress."
One person said their grandfather deployed a similar tactic, but went too far. They said, "My grandad had a mistress, and he would buy them both the same thing. He messed up by getting a custom paint color for the cars, and my gma went up to the lady and that’s how she found out."
