Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To not tell DH who I was talking to?

80 replies

HopefullyAnonymous · 11/08/2018 11:29

I work shifts. The other night I was driving home in the middle of the night and called one of my friends who I met during training. Same job but she is based in a different part of the county and also have a long journey home. Now and again we catch up during our commute.

The next day DH “presented me with evidence” I’ve been doing something I shouldn’t. He’s managed to link my phone to the iPad (or maybe it already was) and had taken a photo of this particular call. The iPad doesn’t seem to have synced contact names so he just had the number. He wanted to know why I was having 20 minute calls at 2am. I refused to tell him out of principle as I don’t feel he has the right to police my calls nor demand I stop using my phone at night. He slept on the sofa last night and we aren’t currently talking.

Today he’s messaged me at work to ask why I’m not wearing my wedding ring. I took it off last night to make meatballs! He has never behaved like that up until the last few months when paranoid behaviour seems to be creeping in.

AIBU not to indulge this and refuse to tell him who I’m speaking to?

OP posts:
beachysandy81 · 11/08/2018 12:20

It's annoying but if the phone was synced he is not really snooping. Not giving him an explanation is feeding his paranoia but telling him the truth now will make him feel that you needed time to make up an excuse.

Feijoa · 11/08/2018 12:20

I would think it’d be fair enough just to tell him who you were speaking to. Despite you feeling his behaviour is wrong, the situation has the potential to spiral out of control causing more harm. Tell him how you feel, that his behaviour is demanding and makes you feel untrustworthy, but keep communicating.

slithytove · 11/08/2018 12:24

I wonder if he is up to something and he is reflecting that onto you

dudsville · 11/08/2018 12:25

My ex became super suspicious. He wasn't right but something was wrong. I'm v committed and I don't flirt. I speak of my partner often. He had no reason to be suspicious and I didn't like that he was constantly on the look out and I stopped reassuring him and just began smiling.

Topseyt · 11/08/2018 12:26

Just tell him who you were speaking to and show him that the numbers match up etc.

That would answer the immediate question there, but you will still have the issue of his paranoid and possibly controlling behaviour. That needs nipping in the bud. If he can't stop it and it keeps escalating then you will have to consider your options, clearly.

Maelstrop · 11/08/2018 12:29

Why would you not just tell him? I find that a bit weird.

Mookatron · 11/08/2018 12:33

This one incident is not the problem, is it? You need to talk about why he is behaving in a controlling way. Is he feeling insecure? Is this something you can work through (it may not be)?

I'd be using this as a way of having that conversation. Maybe even couples counselling.

(actually I'd be suspicious he was doing something he shouldn't be and transferring it on to me, but following that route just compounds all the suspicion in the air and won't help at all at this stage).

Topseyt · 11/08/2018 12:33

Oh, and if you share the iPad then unsync your phone from it. I presume that can be done, although I don't have experience of iPhones or iPads (Android user here).

If he kicks off about you doing that then that probably means he is trying to control you, treat you like a child etc.

GabsAlot · 11/08/2018 12:33

he sounds like a twat comments about whu u work with and phonecalls

how long is he going to make comments for

Neverender · 11/08/2018 12:34

I'd burst out laughing and tell him. Why would you not? Seems a bit silly.

HeebieJeebies456 · 11/08/2018 12:34

The next day DH “presented me with evidence” I’ve been doing something I shouldn’t. He’s managed to link my phone to the iPad (or maybe it already was)

this would piss me off big time and i'd be unlinking it from the ipad asap. You obviously didn't consent to that.
He's determined to 'prove' you're up to no good despite you answering his earlier questions.
I'd be wondering why he was so suspicious, is it his own guilty conscience being projected on to you?

Shoxfordian · 11/08/2018 12:35

He's acting like a jealous idiot
Has anything happened to cause this in the last six months? Spying on you like this is totally unacceptable.

Collaborate · 11/08/2018 12:36

37 messages and no one’s mentioned that perennial MN trope “red flag”? Standards must be slipping.

Collaborate · 11/08/2018 12:38

Red flag of course being OP’s late night phone calls to an unknown person who she refuses to name. Had the boot been on the other foot I’m sure we’d have also had quite a few LTBs by now as well.

Aquamarine1029 · 11/08/2018 12:38

I think your husband is paranoid about his own shenanigans and is projecting this onto you. Keep your eyes open.

abilockhart · 11/08/2018 12:41

Stirner Sat 11-Aug-18 11:38:35
If the situations were reversed "spidey senses" would be "tingling" the op would be advised to "do some digging" and her partner didn't surrender his devices for inspection that would be clear evidence that he had something to hide.

Exactly.

I sympathise with the OP. Honestly, who wants to live like this.
Life is too short to have to put up with this level of paranoia.

DarlingNikita · 11/08/2018 12:44

You're being a bit petty but being 'presented with evidence' in what sounds like a pompous way would really piss me off too, so I get where you're coming from.

Maybe talk to him and try to figure out why his behaviour has changed?

SpoonBlender · 11/08/2018 12:52

Both of you are being unreasonable. Sit down and talk about it before his paranoia and your wilful feeding the paranoia break your relationship.

It may be that he needs medical help; it may be that your own actions are causing unjustified but reasonable suspicion. FIND OUT.

lapenguin · 11/08/2018 12:53

I mean I'm sure we've had threads where the wife has asked who dh was talking to and he doesn't say 'out of principle' and that leads to everyone saying leave him he's cheating, a lot of the time he is, but the point is we expect to be told if it's us asking.
If you having nothing to hide then you'd say
But you do need to have a conversation about his behaviour or what has caused this new distrust.

AnoukSpirit · 11/08/2018 12:56

It's sad how low reading comprehension levels must be for so many people to have responded without noticing the op is not talking about an isolated incident here. That seems a tad more pertinent than the tedious cry of "if the genders were reversed!!!". Yawn.

His behaviour is completely out of order. Was there no trace of any of this earlier in the relationship? Did something happen to trigger this when this started? Or has it been more of a gradual change that's only become aggravating in the last few months as his need to control has heightened and made you feel more restricted?

It sounds like you've previously cooperated with his inquisitions, which suggests the issue isn't really with him wanting to know, but with him wanting to make you feel you can't do those things.

Even if it wasn't, the fact answering has never put a stop to this before makes it pretty obvious it won't this time. What shit advice. "Do as you're told."

I'd want my own answers as to what he's doing and why. Who you were talking to is pretty irrelevant in the bigger picture here.

KirstyJC · 11/08/2018 12:57

So for the last 6 months he has expected you to explain every photo you are in with a man, to prove who they are. He is now digging into your phone details and demanding an explanation for that too. How controlling and horrible - who does he think he is?!

Sounds like he is either expecting you to be acting on his standards (ie he is doing something wrong) or he is trying to control you to make it not worth your bother to see or talk to others as it's too much effort to explain. Neither option is good.

I couldn't live with someone who didn't trust me. To all those saying to just tell him, I presume she did tell him about the photos and that hasn't stopped his behaviour. The problem is him, not OP.

OP I would have a proper conversation with him, ask him why he is increasingly distrustful of you and how he plans to stop this controlling behaviours. His answer will tell you what to do next. Good luck.

jellybeans44 · 11/08/2018 13:04

I'm sorry but some of the replies on here are baffling. If this were the other way around and the OP had found phonecalls at that time of night everyone would be saying it's an affair and to confront him. And if he then refused to tell her saying she should trust him they'd be saying it's definitely an affair! OP just tell him who it is, you could have avoided this all by simply telling him. I agree with PP that you need to have a serious chat about where all of this is paranoia coming from but I also think everyone needs to keep in mind that if the roles were reversed here you'd all be giving very different advice.

PickwickThePlockingDodo · 11/08/2018 13:07

Why didn't you put your wedding ring back on after you had made the meatballs?

AFistfulofDolores1 · 11/08/2018 13:07

OP, I don't think you're being unreasonable at all.

RB68 · 11/08/2018 13:09

I think it is a red flag for HIS BEHAVIOUR it is controlling and manipulative, jealous to the extreme. OP is having to name all and sundry on photos, defend herself against being friendly towards all male work colleagues, answer insulting presentations of wrongdoings that are purely ficticious and he is tracking what she is doing with who closely and challenging all the time and then tracked and spied upon private phone calls

sorry he is the one out of order and I would have been royally peed off with him too. It is however time to talk about HIS behaviour and lack of trust and what the reasons for that are and challenge whether in the months he has been doing it to date whether there has been any true evidence of wrong doing.