DP wants to end relationship over old videos on my phone

[July26]

NC’d for understandable reasons.

DP went through my phone last night, and found very old videos I hadn’t deleted of me and my ex. Extremely stupid I know, both to have taken them in the first place (not something I was keen on, and my face isn’t visible), and to have not deleted them. But honestly, I forgot they were on there. I’ve got stuff on my phone going back nearly 10 years, it all carries over when I’ve upgraded my phone and I’ve never looked back at it/got round to deleting things.

He went mental, said we are over and he doesn’t want to listen to my ‘excuses’, he considers it a betrayal and questions whether I’ve still looked at them regularly when alone.

I am distraught, I love him and can’t imagine my life without him in it. We don’t live together but he was staying here this weekend and stormed out last night. He has ignored me today but I don’t seem to be blocked.

Do you think ending the relationship is over the top? Would you give it a day or two before contacting him again?

Lol. No. Watching prostitutes be fucked by strange men, prostitutes who are mostly at best bored, often in pain, drugged, coerced or even enslaved, is certainly not even in the same ballpark as filming two people having consenting sex, then forgetting the video was even there.

Nobody thinks you're this stupid. Nice try though.

Yes, this. He can have normal feelings, anyone would have been shocked, but his reaction was highly aggressive and frankly repulsive.

Any man who behaves in such an aggressive, demeaning fashion is not safe to be around.

If he comes back with a totally grovelling apology it might be worth looking into saving things - but he won't. When he calms down he will likely decide to be oh so gracious and take you back and then act like a martyr and scream abuse at you over this. Forever.

Are you also sure OP that he hasn't copied your video to use as a means of humiliating you?

You’ve had a lucky escape, the trash has taken itself out.

I wouldn't be happy if my DH had kept videos of him having sex with an ex. Saying he forgot would not stop me from dumping him.

Well, for starters, he's lying. He didn't just happen upon very old videos. He shouldn't have been snooping through your photos anyway. Weather, you use each other's phones or not.

But actually, the reason for his temper tantrum is irrelevant actually. Look at how he has handled this and ask yourself if you really want to be in a relationship with such a twat. Much more serious things will happen over the years and if this is how we happen, handles things you're far better out of it.

luckily, you don't live together.

You might feel like you love them and feel distraught about this at the moment and that's understandable but in time you will come to see that not tying yourself to this twat is for the best!!

One day you'll see it for the luckiest escape. It is.x

Video must be really old so he didn't just "come across it looking for photos of a recent holiday". So hes lying. He was checking up on you.

I think there is a big difference in checking your partners phone for something minor, very recent and with their permission and trawling through 10 years of stuff. For example I would check a text from my MIL about what sort of food she wants bought to a bbq on Saturday and not look for other stuff.

He’s projecting and up to no good.

I voted YABU because why on earth would you contact this prick again?

He's got serious jealousy and anger issues, and if I were you, I'd be glad the trash took itself out.

Now block him and be glad he left of his own accord. Then get your locks changed ASAP.

Similar here. I've never had photos or videos of me naked or sexual, and thank God no boyfriend ever asked for them. But my ex went through old photos in an album and scribbled out the face of my university boyfriend who pre-dated him by several years.

I don't doubt he'd have gone through my phone if he'd known the passcode and I bet he had a few attempts at guessing.

Instead he went through my journal, appointment diary and bag. Always saying things were "sticking out" of the bag when I knew they weren't. He was verbally abusive, jealous and controlling.

Not everyone is happy to be filmed having sex. A lot of people think it is the norm. It's not. Many of us don't want to do it. I certainly don't.

I would be fuming if I found that on DH’s phone, partly because of the stupidity of keeping it there. I’ve seen things go very wrong between another couple where police were called after the woman found out the man still had the videos on his phone (he was sharing them) after they broke up.

His behaviour isn’t great but you may also be minimalising this issue.

And charging your phone or being too lazy to get up when it is out of reach is not an excuse to use eachothers’ phones as a normal thing. Use your own phones from now on.

I think videoing one's sex acts is gross. Not to mention the stupidity of keeping a video of one's sex acts on one's phone for a decade, long after breaking up with the other person featured in the video. I could not be with someone who did that, so I would react the same as your partner.

Why did you keep the X-rated video? Did you sometimes to look back on the video to jog your memory? The problem I would find hard to understand is not making the video but that you kept it.

Most people would be upset if they saw a video like this. That is hard to forget and to move on from.

Yeah this. No way could he have just “stumbled” across it if it was 10 years ago! I reckon he searched for something, and found more than he intended.

OP I would break up with him over this, it sounds like a huge overreaction to me.

What happened in the past is nothing to do with him. He (not you) is being unreasonable.

If I found a video of my DH having sex with his ex, I would find it really difficult to get it out of my head. It was pretty careless of you to keep them, especially as you use each other's phones fairly freely. It doesn't really matter who is right or wrong though. Obviously, it was in the past but very few people would have a good reaction to seeing that kind of thing. Some people would get over it and some people wouldn't.

i'd be worried about his over reaction to videos from the past.

Actually, it is the norm to use one another's devices, when you've nothing at all to hide.

Obviously, OP has done things she would prefer hidden. Best not to keep that on your phone then.

I think this is a bullshit excuse unless you went on holiday very shortly after the videos were taken which I doubt. For some reason he thought it’d be appropriate to look at your oldest content. Whether that was in the expectation of finding something like this or not I don’t know. It could just have been mere curiosity but he obviously found something uncomfortable and unsettling. He shouldn’t have been snooping.

I think that's exactly what it is - but why should that matter?

You would end an otherwise long and happy marriage over an old video which predated your own relationship?

This wouldn’t bother me one jot.

It matters because I could not be in a long term relationship with someone who films sex acts they engage in.
It matters because I could not be with someone who finds videoing sex so banal and routine that they literally forget they have it on their phone.
It matters because I could not feel the same way every again after viewing a video on my partner's phone of him engaging in sex acts with another woman.

I can understand him going crazy considering what videos they are. If it was a man keeping these he would get crucified. Also, women are basically encouraged to go through their partners phone on here.