Was I out of order?

[nc20144]

I will try not to make this too long.
tonight while trying to install an app on DH tablet a FB message alert popped up from a woman whose name I recognised.

when I was 7 months pg with DD, DH had a work night out, got completely drunk, phoned me by mistake and I heard a lot of commotion in background and a woman telling him to 'get in the car'. when he came home I looked at his phone and there was a text from someone calling him babe. I text back saying whose no is this and reply was 'X' from earlier tonight.
next day I went ballistic. He said nothing happened and she was with a boyfriend. I let it go.
2 weeks later I find a receipt for a (quite expensive) lunch for 2. again, I went mad, he claimed he met her and her BF. He apparently ate nothing and the receipt was from their meal
then a text arrived from OW along the lines of "thinking about u too. hope all is okay but if not would be great to see u"
I phoned OW and she backed the story up but said her BF was out and she'd get him to ring me when he came in.
He didn't and i got a text from her saying she wasn't getting involved in whatever domestic we seemed to he having.
DH swore nothing happened, i had no proof, I let it go even though I knew he was still texting her.
I found her FB page and basically stalked her for months she was 4 or 5 mth pg when they met but was single. eventually I stopped looking but never forgot the incident.
fast forward 4 years to tonight when I find out he is her FB friend. He can't understand why I'm angry and upset. We argued and he got angry that I was talking about something that happened 4 years ago. again proclaimed his innocence. think he was shocked i knew a lot from my FB stalking. He deleted her off FB then said he was deleting FB altogether. said I didn't trust him, I'd ruined his evening etc and sat in silence all evening.
was I out of order?

I expect I will never find out the truth.
I probably shouldn't have created a stink about them being friends on FB but I reacted in the heat of the moment. In any case it allowed me to tell him a few things I had been holding back and get some stuff off my chest.
I don't want to end my marriage and my priority is my DD so I will put this episode behind me and hopefully in time I will feel less hurt.
I'm not sure I have ever trusted anyone in my life so there was probably no trust there to break and I will just muddle through like I always do

thank you for your replies and helping me through a difficult day.

I really don't want this to seem like a criticism of you, but my mum just split up from an extremely jealous partner (fake facebook profiles just for stalking her, accusations of affairs with numerous friends, reading her texts repeatedly etc), so I can't help but see the other side of this.

None of the things you have described factually happening (a woman telling him to get in a car, being facebook friends with someone, being referred to as "babe", saying "thinking of you" in a text, even having lunch with a friend of the opposite sex) are in any way necessarily indicative of an affair, and none of them are behaviours I would be concerned about with my partner.

However, I trust my partner, and the real issue here is that you feel you can't trust him, and that - more seriously - he's compounding this by lying. What you really need to consider however is why he is lying. Is he lying because he actually has something to lie about, or if he is lying because he knows that what he considers innocent acts (such as being facebook friends with someone, or having lunch with a female friend, alone) would, if you knew about them, lead to arguments?

Lying is never the correct response, of course, and the latter is not an excuse for lying, but he could just have not told you about the lunch etc to avoid an argument - it doesn't necessarily mean he's having an affair.

Certain things you describe in your post suggest you might be prone to jealousy and insecurity in your relationship. I say this because I trust my partner in that respect, and because of this I would never in a million years look at his texts - I definitely wouldn't reply to one - or object to him having lunch with a female friend (alone, at her house, as he did recently - he didn't tell me about it till afterwards, but it didn't bother me at all, and importantly there was no lying involved). However, I've had partners in the past, when I was younger and more insecure and the relationship wasn't built on trust, and I definitely felt the temptation to look at their texts, so I know how you feel.

I honestly don't mean this as a criticism, but there's clearly trust issues between you and your partner, and it's really important to work out if these come from your insecurity, his untrustworthiness, or a combination of both. Do you have a mutual friend you could speak to about it? That might help. I'm sorry I can't offer more advice. :(

Caucasus stop blaming her. Of course she's insecure. He claimed to buy a meal for two people while he ate nothing. He will tell her the sun is closer than the moon next. When someone lies so blatantly and expects you to accept it it's hard to know which way is up any more.

She isn't being abusive, she is not a stalker.

caucasas there is a lot of truth in what you say. I was/am jealous, needy and suspicious. I thought I had got over it. I stopped reading his texts and snooping after DD was born. He has exes and women I don't know as FB friends and it doesn't bother me (when I said this to him he got angry and that's when he said he was deleting Facebook).

When you know someone is lying though it makes it hard to trust them.
This woman was not a friend, she was single, pregnant and was chasing a married man she met on a drunken night out. If she was an old friend I would feel different

Why do you think sweeping this under the carpet is the best course of action?

You don't trust him because he doesn't sound remotely trustworthy.

OP, if it was all so innocent why are you still trying to find out the truth years later...

nc20144 I can totally understand how you feel, and it's awful - there's no worse feeling than not knowing if you can trust someone who is so important in your life. The fact that you feel you are generally NOT jealous of other women/exes etc, but that you are of this one in particular, might be significant. I'd talk to a good (trustworthy!) girlfriend if I were you and get it all out. She may help you work out if you feel he's really done something terrible.

How good is he at making you feel better when you feel insecure? Is he the kind of man that if you told him you were feeling a bit down, would give you a compliment or take you out for dinner and make you feel loved?

rinabean I wasn't blaming her, just saying that except for the lying none of the things he's done (that we know about!) are necessarily indicative of him being unfaithful - and that even the lying (as wrong as it is) could be for innocent reasons.

causacas I don't have anyone I can talk to which is why I'm posting here.

apart from this we have a good life. He is a lovely, kind generous reliable loving, husband and a good father with strong family values. which is why his previous behaviour seemed so out of character.
He is adamant that nothing romantic happened and he didn't want it to. He said did I really think he would leave me and his (then) unborn child to run away with her and raise another man's child? maybe he is angry because he is telling the truth and he knows I don't believe him.
on the other hand I don't believe that the lunch was her and her boyfriend. I'm not that gullible!

I'm 'sweeping it under the carpet' so to speak as I see no other way forward, nothing remotely suspicious has happened in 4 years apart from this being friends in FB (he says past 6 months or so).

I'm worried you said you have no friends and family to talk to. This will make you feel so alone, and make everything so much harder. Are you happy to talk about how isolated you are? Is it that you have no friends nearby or that there's no one at all you can trust? (Almost put a kiss on the end there. We're your friends!)

I know I'm isolated and don't mind talking about it. I do have one friend who supported me at the time but we are not as close as we used to be and she lives far away.

Why's he willing to risk so much for the sake of keeping in contact with this woman if it is all innocent though and why's he reacting so defensively/avoidantly?

It is not an unreasonable suspicion based on his behaviour to wonder whether he was at least giving her the impression that he may leave you and his baby for her. Whether or not he would really have done that.

I think you really need some support. It will make everything easier to deal with. At the moment, you're 100% dependent on your OH, so no wonder you feel bad. I know everyone says this, and I know it's harder than it seems, but are there avenues you can go down to make friends? Mum and toddler groups, that kind of thing? Regardless of what happens with your hubby, you need some good girlfriends to support you.

I've moved twice recently, and I know how hard it is to make friends. The first place was particularly hard, but after what seemed like months of loneliness and searching (going to meet ups, joining book groups and dance classes etc etc) I made two nice friends, one male one female. Looking back, during that lonely period I did get a bit jealous of occasional things with my partner and other girls (nothing as serious as your situation! In fact, I got jealous of this girl that he met through work. She's in a similar field to me and I followed her on twitter, but then I had to stop following her as I was convinced she was better than me at everything, and every tweet she posted made me feel like a loser!) and it was probably because I was so lonely and dependent on him for socialising/affection/everything. I'm not at all saying that's the case for you, but I know that being isolated can make everything so much harder, and if I felt bad about some random girl on twitter he showed no interest in, then it must make your totally valid situation 1,000 times worse!

The second move to a new city was easier and I've been so, so lucky to make three good girlfriends in the past few months that although new in my life, have been extremely supportive through my pregnancy and problems with my partner (see "I'm pregnant and my (previously sane) partner is being a total knob"!).

I know that I couldn't deal with my problems and keep a smile on my face if I didn't have people to talk to about it. Where are you based, if you don't mind me asking? Do you think you can join some groups with your daughter, or even alone? People laughed at me for going to Meetups, but I met a nice friend through one and would definitely recommend it.

I always say someone should start an online dating site for friends, that would be awesome.

Could you start a conversation with him that begins with an apology for getting upset about him being FB friends with someone, and implying that there is something going on between them when probably there isn't? And then go on to say that you do get insecure sometimes, and please can he try to help you with that? Being in a relationship is all about sometimes doing something to help the other person out even when you think they're being a bit irrational or unreasonable, just because it's important to them? Would he listen if you said that?

You said he offered to show you texts but you didn't take him up on that - maybe you should do, if he's doing it to be kind (rather than in anger) - let him prove to you that there's no reason to worry. And be a bit kind on yourself - he did act in a way that gave you cause for concern, and it has made you a bit insecure even 4 years on. If he's a decent bloke he'll be able to appreciate that, even if he thinks your current fuss about the FB friend is unreasonable.

I think that's great advice from purpleroses.

I do get out so not completely isolated but nobody I can talk to if I have a problem.
I don't think bringing up the subject again is an option. He came in from work, and has now gone upstairs.

It would be great to find someone you could talk to. Do you have any acquaintances that you could test the water of intimacy with? I.e. confide in them about something smaller and less important, and see how they react and if they seem trustworthy, then if that's the case open up to them?

That's what I had to do with some of my friends - I barely knew them at all and suddenly I was like "Oh btw I'm pregnant and everything's really difficult and I'm having relationship troubles WHAT DO YOU THINK?" and to their benefit they've been great.

That's hard if you are unhappy still but don't feel you can bring it up again. You could make it clear that you've no more desire than he has to keep bringing it up but that you need to clear the air. To be upset about something but not to feel you can mention it isn't great in a relationship.

Anyone you can chat to by phone? Family member?

Does he not realise that it needs resolving if it is not going to cause an issue again because either you sweep it under the carpet and it jumps out again or you have to leave him because you don't trust him if he avoids resolving it.

Is he avoiding resolving it because he has done something bad or because he doesn't feel he can resolve it? It does seem like 4 years on you are not likely to get a resolution tbh. You have to make a decision about what you believe happened to get some closure and then make a decision about what to do about your relationship based on that.

I think you are trying to do it backwards and decide what he did based on what you want to do about your relationship and this is what's causing conflict.

It might be useful to go to Relate, if he'd agree? Some counselling might get your relationship on an even keel again, or get to the source of the problem if he does have wondering eyes. I've never had couples' counselling but friends have been very positive about it.

TBH I think he feels it has been resolved and I should accept his explanation.

I think he doesn't want to discuss it as I know more about OW than he thought I did and he probably thinks the less he says the better as he doesn't know how much I kno IYSWIM
according to him I am bringing up the past for no reason.

I suppose I was just looking for acknowledgement of my feelings but I didn't get it.
I'm sure he knows I'm justified in feeling upset but he won't admit it.
He said something last night about something inside him not bothering but I can't remember exactly what it was. The basic gist of it was I should shut up.

He can't feel it has been resolved when it clearly hasn't for you. He might feel you shouldn't or that he doesn't want you to still talk about it but if he wants that to be the case I think he could do more to reassure you like not being confrontational, defensive and avoidant, which if he really hasn't done anything, just makes him look guilty.

We are still not speaking. I'm going to have to try and speak to him when he comes in from work tonight but I have no idea what I'm going to say.
I'll probably just inflame the situation further as he will say I'm bringing it all up again.