AIBU to not want my DH to know where I am and what I'm doing at all times?

[Izzosaura]

This is inspired by the recent thread about people who are on tracking apps with their partners. My DH has no interest in us being on a tracking app and nor do I so this isn't a practical question so much as a theoretical one.

During the tracking discussion, I found myself having really strong negative feelings about being tracked but found it difficult to justify these rationally. As a few people put it, why worry if you have nothing hide? So I went away and analysed why I was so hostile, and I realised that apart from my wider worries about tracking (the danger of it not being truly voluntary due to pressure to agree to it; the potential for coercive control; a dislike of a world where people don't have to make the conscious choice to commuicate but just expect others to know their movements and fulfil their needs)... there actually ARE things that I want to hide from DH.

These are the exapmples I can think of from the last few months:

• I'm working to lose weight at the moment and have had considerable success, but a few weeks ago I had an appointment cancellation that unexpectedly gave me a spare half hour for lunch at work and gave in to a craving to go to a local chippy. I was embarrassed about breaking my diet and wouldn't have wanted my DH to know I'd been there. He would have been fine with it and wouldn't have seen it as his business to judge but he'd likely have made a joke about it and I wanted to avoid that.
• Last week I was meant to be out on a work visit about an hour away but it got rescheduled so I ended up spending the morning working from home unexpectedly. I didn't tell DH as knew that he'd then have expected me to do some tidying round the house - something he always does when working from home. But I had deadlines to meet and didn't want to do anything other than sit on my laptop. I therefore didn't mention the change in my schedule to him.
• About 3 months ago I was meant to be meeting up with a friend for a country walk and my DH agreed to look after our daughter whilst I did this. My friend met me but needed to leave earlier than we'd planned so we did a shortened version of the walk. Rather than rushing home, I enjoyed an hour to myself going round some nearby shops. I didn't tell my DH because although he'd have been cool with it, I felt guilty.

If my DH and I tracked one another, these omissions / white lies on my part would have been busted. I suppose I like to continue to be free to do this sort of thing once in a while. I'm also fine with the idea of him doing things he doesn't tell me about that are of a similar nature.

Some would perhaps say that this is the sort of dishonesty that breaks relationships and is a sign that our marriage is doomed... so am I being unreasonable to think that this sort of thing is fine or not?

YABU - These things shouldn't be hidden from your DH and you should be totally honest with him about where you are at all times.

YANBU - It's fine not to share these sorts of things with your DH; it's ok for married people to keep some things from one another.

Yes this...of course it's fine to want privacy. But it's odd that you feel this sense of shame for things that are perfectly fine. I wonder if your husband is truly as relaxed as you say or would he make snippy comments.

My partner and I knew where the other was on Google maps but wouldn't actively look unless unexpectedly late. And also my partner would not be commenting negatively on anything I was doing or vice versa. Now we've split up I don't want him to track me any more but it genuinely wasn't an issue before even though our relationship wasn't great.

We are all entitled to a degree of secrecy in our own lives and those tracking apps remove any of that. Very sinister.

Wales. My husband's commute varies between 20 and 45 minutes. Somehow I get by without knowing the precise moment he'll walk through the door.

Do some couples have to know where their partner is all the time?

I doubt it. If they did they would have to spend all day looking at their phone.

In other words, you like your privacy. Nothing wrong with that. And it isn't "lying" to not tell your husband you went to the chippy. We don't have to tell our spouses everything we do every day!

I don't want to be tracked because it's completely weird! I am a grown-up, I don't need a chaperon or a babysitter, I can't imagine having someone following my movements.

Young kids who start getting independent, it's for reassure and to keep them safe. For older teenagers it is already not needed.

If you have a tracker it's usually on your phone, so.. use the phone. Works well to communicate 😂

Similar to how people managed to cook on an open fire but now people find it easier to use a cooker.... Or people used to hand wash clothes and now most use a washing machine .

This is similar, it makes life slightly easier.

exactly! No one is perfect, and we all need freedom to trail blaze and go off on a tangent whenever we can and want to for a bit of harmless pleasure. I think of the find my as a safety rope… (I used to rock climb)..so I can go anywhere, at anytime for any reason and feel secure that this digital safety rope is linking me to my DH. It’s useful and it’s extra safety.

I've never had any interest in turning on tracking all the time. It feels like the difference between someone reading my diary and that person asking me how I feel about something.

I also just feel like it could easily become a substitute for healthy communication (for us, everyone else do what works for them). If my DH needs to know when my plane has landed and how long until I get home tomorrow and I haven't updated him then he can text and ask. And if I add 15 minutes to the ETA so I can stop a few streets over and sit in blessed silence to decompress before walking in the door then that never needs to be a topic of conversation - I'm an adult and I've taken care of my own needs.

We take the same approach for our teens, for whom tracking is on as a safety backup but we never check it. Our oldest recently responded to a reminder to text when he got somewhere with "you can just look at tracking" and we pointed out that we bought him a phone instead of having a tracking chip implanted for a reason. We want them to learn to communicate and also to have a respect for privacy whenever safety allows.

It’s not about the precise moment,…you do realise that 90min - 20min is over an hour difference in time? I like to know within a half hour window which is wider than your 25min window…..

sorry, but it's still weird. I get some people might find it easier, but I really don't.

Kettle doesn't need to reach boiling point the second DH or I walk through the door
The tracker won't tell us if we feel like having diner immediately or want a shower or do some work first.

With phones you can call, whatsapp, text, send voice notes. That's more than enough.

These posts are always madness. It’s always made out anyone using tracking is looking at it all the time every second. ‘I wouldn’t want anyone tracking my location 24/7’ - okay, pretty much no one is who’s using these days in healthy relationships. My husband and I have find my friends switched on after he had a big trip to LA and he wanted me to know where he was as it was a bit unsafe (his idea for me to ‘track’ him). We’ve left it on, because despite us not NEEDING it for dinner etc, it’s sometimes fairly useful for ETAs when driving etc, good for picking up, getting meals ready. If that’s not useful to you, fab, no need to denigrate anyone who does find it useful and go on about how we never used to need this; we didn’t have a lot of useful things we have now in the past, we can enjoy them now surely or we’d all forego medical care, TV, phones in general, the internet (including Mumsnet!!) etc.
I think it says more about you if you think anyone using these apps are tracking someone’s location every second of the day to be honest. Chill out.

We do use share my location for limited time periods, btw. iPhones make it easy to share location with a contact for a set period of time, which we regularly do when splitting up for an afternoon while traveling or when one of us is on a long drive. I do it with my parents and in-laws on similar occasions as well. We just make it a deliberate thing for a specific reason, not the default.

It's not remotely in the same ballpark though, regarding labour saving. And unlike the other examples, it comes with a massive downside. A complete loss of privacy.

No way would I agree to that, just so that my husband didn't have to wait more than two minutes for his dinner.

No trackers here. We have used them appropriately twice when we wanted to meet up half way through a charity walk/marathon, but otherwise no. Even that felt a bit creepy. I text dh from the Tube to tell him to get dinner on, my job is unpredictable so I need to let him know.

Kids are just about getting to the age where tracking might be a good idea so we will reconsider.

You are allowed a bit of privacy, op. It's a bit like maintaining separate accounts when married. There should be a bit of mystery!

DH and I have the "find my" thing activated. It is mainly used when one of us has mislaid our phone and asks the other to check it is in the house or wherever. I also use it if I'm expecting DH to take the DC to take one or other of the children to an evening activity and I haven't heard from him. There's a 50/50 chance that he's forgotten to confirm (so can take them) or is stuck in a meeting, in which case, I'm taking them and not doing an exercise class. On one occasion recently when that happened, he was in London. I was slightly surprised as I didn't remember him mentioning going to London that day and nor was it on the calendar but it was only when he mentioned having seen a particular friend that I remembered and asked if that had been on Thursday.

Similarly, unless DH needs to know where I am suddenly, he is generally too busy to want to check. We're also pretty independent so none of the scenarios OP has mentioned would bother either of us.

I don’t think it’s bad at all, it’s not proper lying, it’s just your freedom to do things guilt free, and it’s not that he’d be particularly bothered or judge you for these things, but you like to keep it to yourself, I see no issue with that :)

I don't understand HOW it can be useful. If you are happy with it, by all means, go for it, but I can't see the point. Even if commuting by public transport is the most unreliable around here, and commuting times are a joke, we just.. communicate. I don't see how tracking would do anything, or why I would need to have the meals ready at precisely 30seconds before opening front door.

My kids track me! If I'm picking them up from somewhere they can see when I'll arrive and be ready. It was very useful one day when I got stuck in hideous traffic on the south circular and was an hour late to collect them.

I sometimes look at my husband's location when he is cycling home from work to check he is moving but that's because he once got knocked off his bike so it's just reassurance for me!

I totally agree OP. I feel no inclination to be accountable to someone else to the extent where I need to justify having ordered an extra pint when I said I was heading home, or stopped off at a shop when I said I'd come straight back. Nor do I expect the same level of accountability towards me. It's just not compatible with being an autonomous adult who uses their own conscience to determine their moral boundaries.

I can track DH but he can't track me. I didn't even know he'd shared his location with me.

Ice only used it a few times. DH had a delayed flight & the kids wanted to know if he'd be home before bed so I checked where he was on the highway, or when DH & DS went to a scout camp but they were very late.

Otherwise I don't. I don't share my location but DH would never check anyway.

I do share my location for 15 mins/1 hour or whatever when I'm travelling or have arranged a place to meet but nfw am I doing it just on the off chance my family want to check up on me

What did all the 'it's nice to know' crew do before GPS? I can't help thinking life was so much less stressful when you weren't looking to make sure dinner etc were perfectly timed for partners walking in the door. Something about that concept seems so... 1950s.

We only share under specific circumstances where one is actively looking for the other in a crowd or similar.

It’s completely fine if you don’t want to be tracked, but nor should anyone assume negative connotations to a couple that do use tracking apps – some people literally don’t care, so why should anyone else?

(p.s we don’t use tracking apps)