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I went through my boyfriend's phone


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I've been dating my boyfriend for about 1 year. I've pretty much been living with him since I'm working from home, although I still have my own apartment that I don't stay at. My boyfriend has A LOT of female friends. Many of whom he has slept with in the past. He says that just because things didn't work out romantically doesn't mean they can't still be friends because they're great people. He also wants to be a counselor and is going to school for counseling, so many people (mostly girls) call him to talk about their problems and he enjoys giving advice and helping them.

When we first starting dating last year, I noticed he was talking to one particular girl daily. I asked him about her and if there was anything going on. At this point we had only been dating for a month or so and he would have had no reason to lie to me. We had not discussed exclusivity so if he had been dating her I would have understood at that point. He said that they dated in the past, she lives in Canada and came out to visit him. That was the first time they had ever met in person. He stated that after she came to visit, he was not interested in her anymore and told her that is was not going to work out. At which point he claims she couldn't handle that reality and continued to act as though they were still dating. They continued talking daily. I found it odd that they would continue talking daily after he told her that he was not interested in a relationship with her and it was not going to work. I started getting really suspicious and went through his facebook. I read through their conversation and at one point she told him that she wanted to change her relationship status on facebook to show that they were in a relationship and he replied to her and said "that might cause some problems for me". Another message from her was when she was upset that he had not called or contacted her for the entire day after she had been trying to get a hold of him. She sent him a message that said "You're going to need to answer for last night". I looked at the date of the message and noticed it was a night that he was with me. They continued arguing and then the messages suddenly stopped. I confronted him about this and said that it appears to me that you are still dating her and this is more than just a friendship. To which he said that he she was delusional and refused to accept that he didn't want to be with her. And then said that the messages suddenly stopped because he told her about me and told her that he wanted to pursue a relationship with me instead and that is why she blocked him on social media and stopped talking to him.

Fast forward 9 months later....I'm still suspicious of his interactions with other women. So I go through his phone. One conversation is with a girl that I know and have met before. She is much younger than us and lives in Argentina. She was here in town for a seasonal job and worked with my boyfriend and that's how she met him. She has since gone back to her home country but still keeps in contact with my boyfriend. I read through some of their conversation and saw that she sent him a picture of her lifting up her skirt to reveal her underwear. She made a comment that said "I'm going to buy more panties today...black and lace." There was some other flirtatious conversation stuff such as her stating that she needed a spoon and he replied with "You're my kind of spoon."

In addition to this upsetting conversation, I also found that he was talking to the Canada girl again also. I didn't find anything inappropriate in that conversation, it was mostly surface level small talk. The only part that disturbed me was when she asked him if he was ignoring her and he replied "I could never ignore you."

So I confronted him about these conversations. I was upset that he was talking to the Canada girl again and also questioned his relationship with the other female. He explained that I misunderstood everything and took things out of context. The picture that the argentina girl sent him of her underwear was a picture she had posted on her instagram page and wanted his advice on. Apparently this girl wants to be a model. And the comment about her being his kind of spoon is apparently an inside joke between his work people. He stated he did nothing wrong with the Canada girl, they are just friends and there is nothing romantic or sexual between them. So I reached out to both women. I asked their versions of the story. The girl from Argentina said I was overreacting and they are just friends and there is nothing going on between them. And I shouldn't be so jealous of an underwear picture, it's nothing more than what someone would see on a beach if a girl were in her bikini. The Canada girl stated that she never knew about me. Their conversations were flirtatious and she had even asked him about coming back out here for another visit, which my boyfriend never responded to.

Now that this is all out in the open, my boyfriend is FURIOUS with me for going through his phone and for calling the other girls and talking to them. He said he doesn't know if he can be with someone as insecure as me and that he has lost all trust in me and doesn't believe that I won't go through his stuff again. He said I don't understand him as a person and don't respect him. That he enjoys being there for people and counseling people and I have no right to this information and I had no right to go through his stuff or contact the other girls.

I feel as though he has emotionally cheated but he doesn't agree. He looked up the definition and said that in order to emotionally cheat it would require him to ignore or neglect me in some way which he has not done because the times he was talking to those girls are times when he was not around me. So he was not stealing any of my time away from me. And he didn't do anything sexual with them, so there was no physical cheating in any way. But I still feel as though boundaries have been crossed and I still feel hurt and betrayed. I don't know how to explain it to him why I feel that way. We have agreed to go to couples counseling and try to work through things. Am I more in the wrong than he is for going through his stuff and invading his privacy?

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I honestly think the relationship was over the moment you had to snoop. Sorry to be so blunt.

 

If you were feeling mistrustful of him that’s a bad sign. A relationship really needs a solid foundation of trust.

Trust that you know he won’t cheat and that you stand in good faith with him. If you felt he was going behind your back you got that nagging gut feeling, you should have confronted him about it right then instead of going through his phone and Facebook messages.

 

You violated his privacy and in a way self sabotaged your relationship. You probably felt my guess is that you were already on un sturdy ground to begin with?

 

I think all you can do is move forward from here by either accepting what he tells you which may be truthful but maybe not. If it’s the latter then you need to just walk away.

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Bottom line is I think your boyfriend is basically a womaniser and a flirt. It's very clear he enjoys living a bachelor lifestyle even while in a relationship. Of course he is doing something, he's flirting with those women and encouraging them to send sexy pictures and so on.

 

A woman isn't going to just flirt or send an underwear picture for no reason. They obviously had interest from your boyfriend to do that. And it tells you what kind of person the Argentina girl is too. She knows he has a girlfriend, sent him an underwear picture and then tells you that YOU'RE overreacting!

 

Emotional cheating is actually still cheating by the way. I'm usually someone who is for having opposite gender friends because I have a couple of close male friends. Although one of them is actually gay...But it does become suspicious if your boyfriend is always talking to all these girls from his course and "counselling" them. Does he counsel guys too or have male friends? It's OK to have female friends but only if it actually looked like it's friendship only. Only if he wasn't flirting with them or receiving sexy pictures and so on.

 

And the worst part is I think deep down he's not a nice person and he doesn't care if he plays with people. When that Argentina girl said "we should put on Facebook that we're in a relationship", do you think she was just being a psycho? I don't think so. She obviously had good reason to think they were in some kind of relationship because he made her believe that. And now you found out that he never even told her about you. So obviously he lied about that. When someone lies you have grounds not to trust them.

 

Normally I'm againat going through someone's phone but in this case I can see why you did it. He's just mad he was found out so he's gaslighting you and blaming you. If it was me, I would break up with him. I think this is exactly who he is and how he behaves in a relationship. He's a womaniser and a player. Sure, he's only chatting to those girls now, but one time he actually might cheat for real. You can see what his character is like and he doesn't think that he has to stop with other women when he's in a relationship.

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Am I more in the wrong than he is for going through his stuff and invading his privacy?

 

I'd be asking a different question in your shoes. Namely, what is it, exactly, that you get from being in a relationship with someone you clearly do not trust and have never trusted? To spend the majority of the year in a heightened state of suspicion about him and other women sounds awfully agonizing and unsatisfying, a recipe for magnifying insecurity and atrophying self-confidence. But it's clearly meeting some craving in you. What do you think that is? And does indulging it bring out the best in you, as all relationships should?

 

I'd give that some thought.

 

As for the nuts and bolts here? Well, I'm personally a believer that a relationship is over the moment someone snoops. It just means that trust and respect aren't things that two people are committed to building together—or, when need be, working to repair together—and without that shared mission I wouldn't see the point. Just me and my personal values. I can't sleep well on beds stuffed with eggshells, or in a home without a ceiling. A relationship without trust is kind of like that.

 

Anyhow, all your sleuthing has certainly helped you understand what you already knew: that he is a guy who cultivates a certain kind of relationship—friendly, with a dash of hot sauce—with multiple women at the same time. Seems this is pretty critical to his identity as some kind of ultra-woke guru, though it certainly sounds a bit more like frat boy stuff with some highbrow gloss more than anything. And his responses to all this has made it very clear that he wants this accepted and understood, to say nothing of him making it clear that his interest in understanding your feelings clocks in at just about a flat zero.

 

So, without judging his behavior as "good" or "bad," I'd just see as a fact, and then ask yourself if that's a fact you can live alongside harmoniously? Does living with that fact help you become the kind of person you want to be, in your own skin and in a relationship? Does 6 months of parsing through this with a counselor sound like a worthwhile way to spend 6 months? Or does it sound like a whole lot of exhausting drama of the sort you've already outlined?

 

Just being honest, when I hear of people talking about going to counseling after less than a year together I can't help but hear a story of two people who are not good for each other, not compatible. Couple's counseling works best when people have built a solid foundation over time, one that's taken some blows, and need some help getting back to it. Your whole foundation here—where the bond has formed—is constructed around paranoia and distrust, sometimes simmering and sometimes exploding, so you're kind of trying to go about the business of rebuilding a house that has never once felt like a home.

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Thank you so much for your response. He's been saying that what I did (went through his stuff) was much worse than anything he did. He said he didn't tell the Canada girl about me because he didn't want to hurt her and have her blame me for him breaking up with her.

And as for the sexy picture from the Argentina girl...they both don't see any problem in it because it is a picture that she posted on her instagram for everyone to see. It wasn't just for him. So if it's a public picture, then I shouldn't have any problem with it.

I agree that he emotionally cheated, but he doesn't agree. And I'm having a hard time explaining to him why I think he emotionally cheated because he seems to have a valid reason for everything he did.

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Thank you so much for your response. He's been saying that what I did (went through his stuff) was much worse than anything he did. He said he didn't tell the Canada girl about me because he didn't want to hurt her and have her blame me for him breaking up with her.

And as for the sexy picture from the Argentina girl...they both don't see any problem in it because it is a picture that she posted on her instagram for everyone to see. It wasn't just for him. So if it's a public picture, then I shouldn't have any problem with it.

I agree that he emotionally cheated, but he doesn't agree. And I'm having a hard time explaining to him why I think he emotionally cheated because he seems to have a valid reason for everything he did.

 

Yes, cheaters say a lot of things in order to shift blame, gaslight you, lie, and so on. Don't ever confront a cheater and expect him to just own up to what he did. That might happen in fairy tales, but you live in the real world. Cheaters cheat for the thrill of deceit. They literally enjoy duping people. Bottom line is that your intuition that he is shady was confirmed by your snooping. So is dating a cheater good enough for you or not?

 

You don't explain to a cheater that he is a cheater. You have a decision to make - you either stay and accept that you'll never be the only one, just one in his stable of many OR you pick up your self respect off the floor and dump this loser with extreme prejudice.

 

This guy is literally fck'ing with your head, manipulative af.......so ....yeah....I hope you find it in you to get rid of him.

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Thank you so much for your response. He's been saying that what I did (went through his stuff) was much worse than anything he did. He said he didn't tell the Canada girl about me because he didn't want to hurt her and have her blame me for him breaking up with her.

And as for the sexy picture from the Argentina girl...they both don't see any problem in it because it is a picture that she posted on her instagram for everyone to see. It wasn't just for him. So if it's a public picture, then I shouldn't have any problem with it.

I agree that he emotionally cheated, but he doesn't agree. And I'm having a hard time explaining to him why I think he emotionally cheated because he seems to have a valid reason for everything he did.

 

Let's remove the hot word here—cheating—and look at his explanations.

 

Are any of these "valid" to you? As in: Do you want to be with someone who prioritizes "not hurting" a Canadian random over celebrating being with you? Or: Do you want to be with someone who cultivates relationships with Argentinian women who fill their Instagram feed with panty pics and ask some male friends for "advice" before posting said pics?

 

Just trying to get you to see the forest, not the trees. All the semantic arguments don't obscure what even he is being completely up front about, so you two can go 12 rounds on the semantics of "cheating" but it doesn't really move the needle out of what 99.9 percent of population would call shady behavior that has no place in a mature, respectful relationship.

 

Are you part of the .1 percent? That's the only sensible reason to stay in this, best I can see.

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I think the point is your boyfriend is what we call a "Casanova". He loves to flirt with lots of women, get lots of attention, and surround himself with women. It's obvious a lot of what comes out of his mouth is lies. I was obsessed with a guy ten years ago who was very narcissistic and was a huge player. He told me a lot of bs, that he had feelings for me and really liked me, but just wasn't ready for a relationship. He sent me a lot of texts and E-mails. At the same time he was also seeing other girls. I spoke to his best friend about it and he said something to her along the lines of that I'm obsessive, I imagined things and I'm just a friend and nothing going on. I'm not saying your boyfriend is as bad as that, but probably close to it.

 

He's a player and he lies and there's always some bs explanation on his lips regarding everything he does. "I didn't want to hurt the Canada girl". But really he has zero regard for her feelings because he was leading her on the whole time. The reason he never told her about you was for HIM. Because obviously if he told her about you, that would be the end of all the hanky panky and the sexy pictures and whatever. This is all very transparent and full of deceit and lies. There are no good explanations for any of this other than that your boyfriend is not committed to you and he doesn't even feel bad about it.

 

Why you spent a year with this guy when the writing was on the wall from basically day one...

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I think you are getting a lot of great advices here.

 

I've been gaslighted with "she's a friend. I would never ask you to stop being friends with so and so" or "I was protecting you! My ex is crazy and she would contact you and confront you" - You get the gist. They have an explanation for everything.

 

I also don't like the snooping part. I believe that if you have to snoop, you already know. But if you snoop a second time, it's time to call it off because yes you're gonna be that insecure partner who has to justify their snooping and your ex is just going to have an answer for everything and tell you you're crazy either way. Oh yea, I've been there and done that. Save yourself from this guy or you will lose your sanity to this player.

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This guy wants to be a counselor? He sounds like the type who would sleep with his clients.

 

Sorry OP, but you've known for a long time that he's not trustworthy and not a great boyfriend. It's time to accept that truth and move on. Let him throw his tantrum, blame you, blah, blah, blah - it's noise meant to distract you from the fact that he behaves badly when you're head is turned.

 

Get rid of him and find a guy who you don't feel compelled to check up on.

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I wouldn't call it cheating, he just has poor boundaries. What he is doing isn't something a person should be doing while in a committed relationship. BUT he thinks it's ok, and you don't. This isn't going to be fixable with counseling. All he is going to do is change his PWs and bury his activities to make it look he is being a good boy. If you were smart you would just next him.

 

Next time, don't date a guy that has a bunch of females, flings, ex lovers on his friends list.

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You two can hash out the blame game, he's 35% percent and if he has it his way youre the other 65. . . or the other way around. But no matter how you slice this your snooping was a symptom of something else. That makes you both wrong.

 

I've been in your position. The naughing sense that something is wrong. And you know what? I was right everytime. The lesson here is to listen what your gut is telling you. Not his phone and not from strange woman from other countries.

 

-Then you have a relationship where not once does it spike your insecurity. Everything lines up and you wonder why on earth you wallowed around and drug yourself down with someone who's values are clearly not in alignment with your own.

 

I don't see any coming back from this. He isn't going to admit that he seeks the attention of other women and will acknowledge how it makes you feel disrespected. Instead he'll paint you crazy and you'll turn yourself inside out and buy into it, just for the sake of staying in a bad relationship.

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My own private rule is that I won't mess with anyone who is still involved with an ex lover in any way, shape or form beyond shared children. You've found out WHY.

 

I'd go live in my own apartment and move my focus onto healing and finding someone loyal and loving. This guy is a gaslighter, which is why you ended up snooping in the first place.

 

Bottom line: if someone raises enough mistrust to prompt snooping, you already know what you need to know. Proving it to yourself is a waste of your time and dignity.

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