It's difficult to trust him after these two incidents...

[soybeans]

The other night when I went to my boyfriend's house, I found a long blonde hair stuck to my shirt after I got up from his bed to go to the bathroom. My first reaction was sheer panic, my heart dropped. I knew that earlier in the day he was at his sister's house with his best friend (a woman, with blonde hair). I knew from day one they were "best friends" but never thought to question their friendship. At one point I casually asked him if they had ever slept together or been physical to which he assured me they hadn't. On one occasion when I was with him, she was stopping by his place to drop something off to his roommate, and he told his roommate to not let her know he was there. For what reason, I am not sure, but it did seem shady.

 

Anyway, I immediately told him about the hair. He acted nonchalant about it and I never once accused him of cheating, although it was obviously implied. He did become angry, saying how dare I imply he was " his best friend", also mocking me sarcastically saying things like "oh yeah, I go around behind your back and other girls because your sex isn't enough", things of that nature. I did consider that maybe he gave her a hug or something, but I am sure that the hair was from his bed. Despite it, he made me feel bad about it, like I was making it out to be something it wasn't. So I apologized and we moved past it.

 

I just decided to drop it. From the beginning I had trust issues caused by previous relationships and dating that had little to do with him personally, and it has been tough to really let my guard down. I never snoop, never look to see who he is texting, go through his phone or anything. But tonight I noticed on facebook that he became friends with a girl and since we started dating I haven't noticed any kind of activity like that. Well, based on several mutual friends, I can tell that she is obviously from the same online dating site that we met on.

 

Not to mention she's gorgeous.

 

So I'm trying my best not to be paranoid or insecure right now but considering recent events I just can't control it. We have been spending a great deal of time together lately, seeing each other just about every day, except today. And my mind is going crazy wondering what he is up to, even though he told me he is with his guy friends. I know that he deleted his dating site account very early in to our relationship so unless he made another account (highly unlikely but again, how would I know?) why would he be adding this girl?

[tresqua]

unless he made another account (highly unlikely but again, how would I know?) why would he be adding this girl?

 

Its not too tough to do a search in his geographic area by age and height. You gotta do some snooping here, you've got good reason. If you don't, the worrying is going to do a real job on you. We're talking self preservation here.

[Moontiger]

His reaction seems way over the top. Why get so angry? I personally do not endorse snooping, if you feel you cannot trust him then, IMO, you need to A) Find away to talk to him about it. Or 2) Break up with him.

[soybeans]

Its not too tough to do a search in his geographic area by age and height. You gotta do some snooping here, you've got good reason. If you don't, the worrying is going to do a real job on you. We're talking self preservation here.

 

I just did a search with specific criteria like you suggested and I didn't find anything. I'm assuming the next step would be going through his phone, I mean he leaves it out most of the time when we're together but I don't know how I would feel about invading his privacy like that...

[TakingtheBlame]

How long have you been dating this guy? Have there been any changes in his behavior toward you recently, other than this?

 

I can see how the hair incident may have been an overreaction...frankly, if my boyfriend insinuated I was cheating because he had found a hair of a different color on his shirt after getting out of my bed, I would be furious. A hair can come from anywhere...maybe I'm naive but I just can't imagine a single hair meaning anything.

 

I'd be a bit concerned about the girl he added on Facebook, though. How exactly do you know she's from a dating site? I don't understand the part about the mutual friends. Are you sure there's no other explanation? I have a lot of friends from college who are also members of the same dating site as I am, even though we obviously didn't meet there...so we'd be friends on Facebook as well.

[Glowguy]

I definitely think you overreacted about the hair. If he was around her, one of her hairs could have easily caught on his clothes and then come off on the bed later. His reaction sounds pretty childish so I can see why you would be upset about that. Try to give it some time and see if there are any drastic behavior changes. I think you will only be lowering yourself if you resort to snooping. If you really don't trust him then you are better off just breaking up with him. Once you start snooping, a line is crossed and you will be in confirmation mode where you are looking for anything to condemn him. I urge you not to go down that path.

[soybeans]

We've been together for 3 months. I haven't really noticed any changes in his behavior. Sometimes he will become distant when we are together and will always take it upon himself to inform me of who he's texting, as he's texting them, and what they're texting about. I honestly find it unnecessary but I'm assuming he's doing it based on my history of trust issues.

 

The girl on facebook is friends with several guys that I met from an online dating site yet has no mutual friends between myself and my boyfriend. These guys aren't close in location to each other either, and it isn't so far-fetched since I met my boyfriend on the same site.

[soybeans]

I definitely think you overreacted about the hair. If he was around her, one of her hairs could have easily caught on his clothes and then come off on the bed later. His reaction sounds pretty childish so I can see why you would be upset about that. Try to give it some time and see if there are any drastic behavior changes. I think you will only be lowering yourself if you resort to snooping. If you really don't trust him then you are better off just breaking up with him. Once you start snooping, a line is crossed and you will be in confirmation mode where you are looking for anything to condemn him. I urge you not to go down that path.

 

In retrospect I can now see that I did overreact about the hair. As much as this bothers me, I truly don't want to go through any of his things just to ease my mind or possibly find something I won't like. I'm thinking of just telling him I saw in my news feed that he added this girl, and ask how he knows her, but based on the previous incident I know it will cause a fight.

[soybeans]

I woke up this morning and looked at his facebook profile, to see that he deleted the post that says "--- is now friends with ---". Hiding something?

[tresqua]

I woke up this morning and looked at his facebook profile, to see that he deleted the post that says "--- is now friends with ---". Hiding something?

 

This is bad.

[lavenderdove]

If finding a hair on someone's person or bed were 'evidence', then one would have to assume i am dating my dogs! Hair can be picked up anywhere, someone sits down on a couch, the hair gets stuck on his shirt, he throws his shirt on the bed etc.

 

And people really really hate to be falsely accused of cheating when they aren't, or for you to be constantly suspicious or insecure or tracking where he is or what he's doing as if he were up to something.

 

Now on the other hand, that doesn't mean he's NOT cheating either. So you have to try to calm down first, and assume he is innocent until proven guilty rather than the other way around which you have been doing. He might well be starting to look around again at other women if he is unhappy enough in the relationship with you due to your accusations. So this can become a self fulfilling prophecy, where you are so jealous/worried that you do drive him away because he gets tired of being accused of things he isn't doing.

 

So what do you do now? Stop doing anything at all. Stop accusing him of cheating or looking at other girls, and stop looking at his FB or anything else. Look at how he TREATS you, and don't suspect cheating until he starts to have a whole lot of the signs of cheating, not just some random thing like finding a hair or adding a person on FB. Many people add anyone who asks, or they just like to spend time spelunking around on Facebook looking at other people's profiles.

 

When someone is cheating, there is a whole constellation of signs they are cheating, that accumulate over time. Don't overreact to any one thing since there can be innocent explanations for simple things like a hair on one's clothing or some random girl getting added on Facebook. If he stops seeing you as much as he used to, has unexplained absences, stops being affectionate, starts to lose interest in you, he starts disappearing in the bathroom or outside with his phone, then you can suspsect cheating, but just because he's a guy and you're dating him doesn't mean he'll cheat. Don't let fear control you.

[soybeans]

I'm just confused because I am getting mixed responses about this girl on facebook. It could be that he is looking around at other woman although it would pretty much crush me if this were the case.

 

I won't bring it up to him because I do agree that my jealous or paranoid behavior could be pushing him away. I guess I'll just let it go for now?

[lavenderdove]

Look, I think FB is a voyeuristic and false world. Some people have HUNDREDS or even thousands of friends, but it doesn't mean they are dating or sleeping with all of them. Just because he added ONE woman to his list doesn't mean he's dating her or cheating with her. Would you be having these same feelings if it was a less attractive women he added? This could be more about your own insecurities than anything else.

 

The interesting thing too is that men frequently are more likely to cheat with less attractive women, whom they might have more in common with or an emotional bond with than just some random attractive girl they add as a friend on FB. They cheat because they are bored or angry or feel this other woman 'understands' them while their regular partner doesn't. So if he's going to cheat, it isn't because he sees some pretty girl, there are a whole lot of other factors that play into that, like how well you are getting along, whether he is bored wtih you, whether he wants out of your relationship etc.

 

The best defense you can have against cheating is to choose a decent and moral guy who believes in fidelity, and then make sure you both are as happy as possible in the relationship and don't engage in endless bickering or trouble that will make him wnat to look elsewhere for sympathy or distraction or because he's decided he can't take it anymore and wants out and hence starts looking at who's out there. And if he has no character and likes to cheat, he'll do it no matter what you do, so there is no point agonizing over every woman he comes into contact with beacuse that is 50% of the population!

 

Just focus on having a loving stable relationship with him, and what will be will be, and descending into insecurity and finger pointing might just drive him away.

[tresqua]

I'm just confused because I am getting mixed responses about this girl on facebook. It could be that he is looking around at other woman although it would pretty much crush me if this were the case.

 

I won't bring it up to him because I do agree that my jealous or paranoid behavior could be pushing him away. I guess I'll just let it go for now?

 

Check his past FB posts and see if he routinely deletes notifications that announces he is friends with girls.

[soybeans]

Well when I first saw him today I knew that something was up; he was acting strange.

 

As I was getting ready he told me he wanted to be honest with me about something, that a "girl he used to hook up with" texted him last night at 3am. He didn't have her number saved so he said "who's this" and nothing else, and he knew who it was because she added him on FB. He claims to not have added her back, but he doesn't know I saw the post.

 

He kept telling me he doesn't want any other girls, just me, and that he stopped talking to her for a reason. But it's really getting me down today, I feel weird tension. He told me it was a girl, "K", but the one he became friends with was "L".

[scarlett27]

go through the phone , dnt get caught i think he thinks he is clever , message the girl through another friend on fb and ask her relationship with him forget about his privacy something is amiss here

[soybeans]

I know something isn't right, but I don't know what to do about it. Just before when we were together, he gets a facebook "poke" and he says it's from his friend "L". He doesn't know that I know her name, but I know it was her because I went through his friends and she is the only girl with that name. Before I even went over to his phone while he was outside and I could not bring myself to touch it. I don't want to go behind his back like that. I want so badly to trust him but the whole day this has had my stomach in knots, and I have been in a truly horrible mood. It has been in the back of my mind and I can't just let it go.

[soybeans]

Just to add- it's not that I think he will cheat on me. It's more that I feel he isn't happy with me and wants to find a back-up plan for when he breaks up with me.

[lavenderdove]

>>Just to add- it's not that I think he will cheat on me. It's more that I feel he isn't happy with me and wants to find a back-up plan for when he breaks up with me.

 

OK, this is what you need to tell him. I think he is being more honest with you than a lot of guys would be telling you someone called him in the middle of the night etc. And you're just guessing at which girl he might be referring to... again, the girl he added might be someone else's GF or sister or who knows who, and he didn't talk about what was going on on FB, just on who called him.

 

You need to talk about this with him or else you are going to ruin this by descending into the depths of constant insecurity and jealousy. What you need to do is to tell him that statement i cut and paste above, and voice that and talk about what you can try to do to feel more secure with him. Maybe it is exchanging phone or email passwords so that you feel like nothing is hidden.

 

But my best advice here is to stop treating him like you're a private detective investigating him when all he did was add a girl on FB, or he WILL get sick of it and leave. So the relationship is already done if you don't get a grip on worrying about it constantly. Sure he could be cheating, anybody could, but just because you feel insecure and he added a person on FB doesn't mean he's cheating! You need to learn how to live with the fact that 50% of the population is women and he WILL talk to them, but you need to learn to calm down rather than going into a frenzy of distrust over one girl getting added on FB. And your insecurity level suggests that counseling might be good for you, to talk thru your insecurities and how to relax and enjoy a relationship without constant fear.

[soybeans]

Lavenderdove, thank you for your insight on this. I am going to work on learning to be secure with our relationship and most importantly, myself. He told me last night that he wants to make this work and I feel the same way. I need to realize that if I keep feeling this way that it WILL drive him away.

[stillstunned]

the flip side of this is that my husband, a man I'd been with for 14 years, told me he was texting with his aunt. Turns out it was his girlfriend from 17 years before. Turns out there were thousands of minutes on the phone together. Turns out he had a fake facebook account that only she was friends on so they could chat and send messages. Turns out he would tell me things about his aunt to make it seem like he was being honest with me when really he was telling me things about his girlfriend. After our phone bill went through the roof, I explained how to make his 'aunt' a myfave number so it would be free. Wasn't that nice of me, helping him like that?

 

My point here isn't that all men are dogs. It's that for every person that tells you not to snoop and to be more trusting, there is someone like me that was too trusting and was being bold face lied to.

 

My only advice is to trust your gut. Don't ask him any questions or seem suspicious, as this will do 2 things - drive him away OR push his sleazy activities further underground. If you sense something is wrong, my guess is that there is something wrong.

 

If snooping is what will either satisfy you that nothing is amiss or tell you that your instincts are correct, then snoop. I found out by looking on my husband's phone.

 

Talking about it sounds great, but if he's lying already, he isn't going to come clean just because you decided to talk about it.

[soybeans]

At this point I really can't bring myself to go through any of his things even though I want to. I don't think he is physically cheating on me but the possibility of him being in contact with another girl is there. In which case, I wouldn't put it past him that he has deleted their messages.

 

The thing that bothers me is that he deleted the post on his FB and based on the timing of it all, he lied about who texted him, saying it was his ex when it was really the girl he added. I really don't want to tell him that I saw the FB post (for obvious reasons) so I'm not left with many options, other than to just trust him, move on from this, but to keep my eyes open for any other suspicious behavior.

 

At the end of the day, I can't control him. I can only control my actions and honestly they have been immature and insecure lately. I just don't want to be made a fool of, or to have it turn out in the end that he was flirting behind my back when I give him all the love and respect I have.

[TomboyMS]

So what if he is talking to another girl? Girls are EVERYWHERE! Lavenderdove is right. You can never be 100% certain that your partner isn't or won't cheat on you. That's a fact. So unless you want to lock your bf in the closet so you can be sure, you have to either learn to trust him or let him go. Being scrutinized and questioned constantly is a miserable way to live. What do you think that misery will lead to?

[soybeans]

I typed her name into the search engine of the dating site that we met on, and her profile came right up. So it doesn't really sit well with me and I don't believe I am in the wrong for feeling this way.

[TomboyMS]

If you are convinced he's cheating then break up with him.