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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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43 replies

Sparkle5 · 01/02/2011 06:57

The other day my dh forgot his mobile phone which is always locked and glued to him. I picked up the phone and noticed it wasn't locked!!! Yes I know I shouldnt have but I did as the temptation was too much.

To my surprise I find he has a secret Facebook account with all his work colleagues and friends new and old which has lots of banter on it. We both have Facebook accounts that we both know about and surprisingly on that one he has 56 friends of which we have 48 in common. This one is made up family and mainly my friends. On his secret one he has over 200 friends. To add insult to injury I also find that he has blocked me on this account so I would never have found it anyway.

I confronted him about it and his answer is that he likes to keep his private home life separate from his friends and colleagues. I must add I found nothing untoward on the site but the main thing that hurts is the deceit. We've been very happily married for 20 years with one dd aged 9 and up until now have always been open and honest.

Last night I was so wound up I demanded to see the Facebook account. He would not let me hold his phone but let me click on it over his shoulder. He denied blocking me so I made him go into the security and lo and below out of the millions of people in the world there I was the one and only blocked person.
He has gone all defensive and called me paranoid and said that, he will never show me the site again!!!!

To sum up I just feel so crap that the husband who I thought I knew so well is being so secretive and deceitful. He stormed off to bed last night and slept in spare room and told me that I'm unreasonable as loads of people have 2 Facebook accounts. However, if I had another one I would just say and my phone is always unlocked so if he wanted he could go through any time. I'm so peed off I've now changed all my passwords and locked everything to see how he feels.

Any views, help or support on this would be appreciated. Thanks.

OP posts:
AttilaTheMeerkat · 01/02/2011 07:41

How long has your H's phone been almost surgically attached to him?. This is not good in itself either.

There are warning signs here (you may think you're happily married but I reckon he now thinks differently) and the FB account is only a part of the problem.

What was his reaction when he himself saw that he had indeed blocked you?. Does he often try and mess with your own perception of things?.

What are other areas of your relationship like; look at this honestly. Is he critical of you all the time, whats he like at home generally?.

Taking your own FB account and locking it to show him how you feel will actually achieve nothing. Tit for tat is not the way to go here.

You both need to talk honestly, if he cannot or will not do that I would go to Relate on my own.

HavingAMaybe · 01/02/2011 07:47

Really? Lot's of people have two FB accounts?

I don't know anyone who does. Or maybe that's the point.

I second Attila's comments and questions.

It seems a little worrying TBH. Sorry you're having to deal with this.

FreudianSlippery · 01/02/2011 07:51

That is really horrible. I'm shocked TBH.

It doesn't matter a jot that there's nothing 'dodgy' on this secret account - he blocked his own wife FFS! That's...

:(

nje3006 · 01/02/2011 07:57

I don't have 2 fb accounts, neither does DP. I don't know anyone who does but I can see that people might want to have a professional and a personal one. But...I would think a spouse would have access to both. DP and I have access to each others fb and phones, including all passwords.

Yes I think it's worrying that he blocked you. Why didn't he even want you to know about it's existence. Yes he might be having an affair but even if he's not, he wants to keep part of his life secret from you.

His reaction last night was just to being caught. There's no reason for you to feel bad about this, he just doesn't want to answer some hard questions.

Sorry you have found this but I think it's important information for you about him.

noddyholder · 01/02/2011 07:58

I don't know anyone with 2 either.He is having another life that you aren't part of and has deliberately orchestrated that.I personally would hate this and probably couldn't be with someone so sneaky!

Mirabelle77 · 01/02/2011 08:05

Who were all the extra friends? Do you know them? It is not normal to block your wife on fb, please don't let him make you think you are paranoid , you are not.

Just because you didn't find anything he could delete his inbox straight away. He could just be a bit weird but it's not the fb secret account that worries me the most its the way he tried to make it sound ok and that you are making a big deal out of nothing you are not.

PfftTheMagicDragon · 01/02/2011 08:10

"his answer is that he likes to keep his private home life separate from his friends and colleagues."

My first thought would be that most cheaters like to keep their work and home lives separate.

There are several worrying things. His blocking of you from the account, his keeping the account secret, his keeping the phone near him at all times, his telling you that you are paranoid, his being defensive.

All of these raise affair alarm bells. Maybe not an actual affair, but certainly warnings of something.

emmyloopsylou · 01/02/2011 08:15

So he's a gaslighter, a liar and a probable cheat. Not to mention he has a whole secret life sway from you he has deliberately kept secret.

You are not the one with issues here, he is don't let him make this about your paranoia, mh, etc. Time to get angry.

Squitten · 01/02/2011 08:18

Agree with everyone else - very suspicious behaviour. I don't know anyone with 2 FB accounts. Me and DH don't use the same sites (he's on Twitter, I'm on FB) but there's no question of keeping them private from each other!

microserf · 01/02/2011 08:30

Hi, no real advice other than to say this is very concerning behaviour. I've only ever come across one person with 2 facebook accounts, and he is an MP who needs to keep his personal life separate from the public profile for his constituents.

I had an ex who was on a similar site (friendster) who hid his account from me and when i found out about it, refused to link to me on the site. turned out there were a few other things he had not told me - such as the fact that he had agreed with his parents to move back to the US, was interviewing for jobs there and was planning on leaving me when he did! it seems he had formed a different opinion of the longevity of the relationship than i had. he had not mentioned any of this to me.... we'd discussed moving to my home country together and i was trying to find him a job there! tosser.

in both cases, we ended up having huge arguments and he tried to make out i was the crazy one, imagining problems when there were none.

OK, long irrelevant personal story over,Blush this seems to indicate a need for secrecy / independence of which you weren't previously aware. not saying it's an affair at all, but some serious discussions required as to how he sees your relationship imo.

GandalfyCarawak · 01/02/2011 08:36

seperate from his friends and colleagues? Why would he want to keep you seperate from his friends?

He is trying to make you sound paranoid and silly because he clearly has something to hide. Appaling man. I'm sorry for you. :(

Expecting06112010 · 01/02/2011 09:10

he wouldnt let you hold the phone?

You had to click on it over his shoulder!! No way! Shock

that phone would have been out of the window, with him following behind.

prettywhiteguitar · 01/02/2011 09:24

wow that is so totally out of order I don't know what to say....is he having a midlife crisis ?

No one I know has two facebook accounts, and my friends are mainly teachers, you just block your profile from people or make it so only friends can see.

So thats what hes done to you :(

I would just reiterate just how hurtful it was to find that out and see if his reaction is remorse...because it should be and if it isn't I would seriously consider that he is hiding something bad from you.

If he won't acknowledge that it looks like that then I would seriously consider his motives. I'm so sorry that you've had a horrid shock

Mymblesson · 01/02/2011 09:25

Agree - this is very suspicious behaviour indeed.

Me and my wife both have FB accounts and know each other's usernames and passwords, though we don't tend to use them much. I can get on FB at work (it's part of my job to update our company pages on there) and she'll sometimes email me because she wants me to check her FB messages for her.

To avoid problems with FB, absolute transparency is what's needed, I reckon.

BunnyWunny · 01/02/2011 09:28

Hell- I would be gutted if my dh did this....

sungirltan · 01/02/2011 09:29

i don't know anyone who has 2 facebook accounts. i doubt he knows anyone either except maybe one male friend who is a womaniser which is where he got the idea from.

he is telling whopping lies and theres more to come i imagine. sorry you are going through this

WhenwillIfeelnormal · 01/02/2011 09:35

You know it's odd behaviour though, don't you? You also know that he's putting the blame on to you, for his own actions.

I imagine there is other behaviour you're concerned about though and this is why you needed to post. What's been going on recently?

JackieBauer · 01/02/2011 10:32

Agree and i don't know anyone with 2 fb accounts either

blondegirl1979 · 01/02/2011 13:52

Im going to start by saying that I dont know anyone with 2 fb accounts either - how confusing would that be anyway, if it was completely innocent then he would have mentioned to you that he was going to set up 2 of them and why he was doing it. Insidently - are they both in his actaul name - or is one spelt differently ? Not that that would prove anything, was just asking out of interest really.
Unfortunetly now you have found this info out then you arent going to be sure, and are going to start wondering about other stuff...and if you ask him again are you going to believe what he says ? Sleeping in the spare room looks suspitious to me, as in my past experience when I was accused of doing something that I hadnt, I wanted to get it sorted out there and then, not let it drag on....

reelingintheyears · 01/02/2011 13:54

Agree with you all.
Well dodgy.

detoxdiva · 01/02/2011 14:05

Sounds very odd and I too would be upset by this.

The only person I know with 2 Facebook accounts is my friend who has a personal one, and a work one (she is self employed and has her business on the second account as not appropriate for her work contacts to be personal friends - but this situation does not sound anything like that!!)

TimeForACHEEKYWineOrTheBottle · 01/02/2011 14:15

Oh yeah cos everyone has a2 facebook accounts. he is being a wanker to you. and it wouldnt surprise me and others on her is he has someone on the go besides you.

As a PP said the phone would have been through the window with him and his things following. Dont stand for it. Get Angry with him, make him delete it.

LittleMissHissyFit · 01/02/2011 14:24

Actually HE'd be out of the window, a SmartPhone is always a SmartPhone .... The phone could clearly be USEFUL! Grin

He just sounds like a tosser.

kepler10b · 01/02/2011 14:51

this is seriously dodgy behaviour. not just the having of two accounts but that he had deliberately blocked you on the 'secret' one. what was his justification for that? do you know any of the people he is friends with on other account well? could you check his 'other' account by going in on their profile with their permission? it may well be there were other things on there that were hidden.

this is a serious breach of trust imho. i would go mad if my OH had another secret facebook account and he would if i did.

bubblewrapped · 01/02/2011 15:17

I have 2 facebook accounts. My husband knows about them both though and is on them both.

A few of my mates have 2 as well, and its simply because we play farmville and we keep our main known account for personal use, and the second one is for cyber friends mainly.

The fact he has kept it secret from you is very telling. Set yourself another account up, and search out his secret account. Dont send a friend request to it, he will know that is you. But look through all the other friends on there and see if you recognise any of the names.