Hi,
This will be quite long, i need to get this all out, sorry.
My Partner of 3.5 years had an online female friend before we started talking, met and entered into a relationship (we were all from the same online special interest forum) he always told me nothing other than chatting and friendship had occured and i believed him. After all people have friends and should have friends.
He's chatted to her throughout our relationship on and off. I started feeling a bit uncomfortable when she sent a gift of an xbox game they could play together online, apparently she had a spare one just laying around.
I then started feeling even more uncomfortable when my Partner told me she was going through quite a difficult time and he wanted to do something special for her. He came up with this amazing gesture to cheer her up, which was a kick in the guts as he's never really done or tried to do anything like that for me at the time. I would actually have to tell him what to give me as a gift for Birthdays and Christmas, because apparently i'm hard to buy for.
We had a few discussions about this which i brought up, and a couple of times it ended in arguments. I have no idea whether i put myself across correctly or not as it has come up that he seems to of taken from what i've said that i don't want him to have friends. But either way, this is when he started being more secretive with his phone. Subtle at first but has gradually got worse.
In the last 12 months we've both been going through a crap time, probably him worse than me. But he never really talks about it with me unless i broach the subject and even then he barely says anything. But seems to be able to chat to this friend about both their problems.
The last 12 months have been littered with arguments and i've felt we were growing apart, him being quite distant, although we did have a great 3 months before Christmas.
It was really fun and we felt connected again. But during this time he was also spending a lot of time on his phone aswell. He got addicted to twitter and was chatting to his friend quite often as apparently she was in the process of buying a home and she was scared.
This is when he started to take his phone into the bathroom more when he bathed or went to the loo. It was always with him, never out of his sight, glued to is face, in his pocket, face down etc. He had also told me a couple of times that he was chatting to his sister/mum and when i did manage to take a glance he was chatting to this friend. Although he was a bit more open this time round when he was chatting to her on the majority of occasions. We did have another argument about his phone and again it seemd he took from it that he can't have friend or mess around on his phone.
When we were christmas shopping he was always looking and finding things to add to this friends christmas present/new home survival kit box, but this was ok apparently because he was going to make this Christmas extra sepcial for me. But i still had to give him a list of what i liked/wanted. He also wanted to send her all our old Christmas tree decorations and lights, even though she didn't really need them. Just incase she didn't have any of this stuff in her new home.
From the new year onwards, things have been horrible between us. We have both been down as we were both going through things, again, him worse than me, which i'd been supprorting him with massively (he has been very supportive to me previously).
He stopped really telling me that he was chatting to this friend and kind of stopped doing most things. Although i always got the impression that he was still chatting to her, teling her about his problems and helping her with hers. Whilst our relationship was going to shit.
Fast forward to this last week, he came home from the gym, sat staright down and was chatting on his phone; he said "I'm just chatting to my sister and then i'll make dinner" When i went over to him i noticed he had two chat windows on his phone and he immediately shut them down.
I gave him a kiss and said "did you go to the gym". He said "Yes, can't you smell me"? i said "No" he didn't smell like he has gone to the gym. In the space of 5 minutes he'd lied to me twice.
He kept chatting on his phone during cooking dinner, i actually had to bring him back to reality as he was so engrossed in chatting on his phone he was not paying attention to the dinner. Again, he had already told me he was chatting his sister and never corrected me. I knew he wasn't talking to his sister and talking to his "Friend". He has done this before.
I was getting more and more pissed off but didn't know what to say. After dinner he went to have a bath with his phone. Him having a bath 9 times out of 10 is usually a quick affair, but this time round was about 45 mins. He was chatting to her in the bath.
When he got out i lost it with the situation and had a go. He said he was chatting to his friend. I told him that he deliberately mislead me by saying he was chatting to his sister, he kept saying he was at first but then started chatting to her, so i told him you never tried to correct that did you. I then told him i know he's lying to me, he admitted he didn't go to the gym and just sat in the library. I told him lying seems to come very easy to him. He said how he didn't want to tell me he was talking to his friend because it would upset me, i told him that lying and being secretive about it upsets me even more. Also i find it uncomforable how he was in the bathroom for 45 mins chatting to her naked. How would he like it if i was chatting to a male friend i had never actually met whilst sitting in the bath naked for 45 mins. He told me he talks about his problems with her because he doesn't want to burden me, i told him he is not burdening me, please be more open and honest with me etc. It kind of cleared some things, but didn't really clear anything up if you understand what i mean.
The next day was horrible, i felt i had lost trust for him and was quite shitty. The day after he went to the shop to get a couple of bits, something that is usually a quick affair was about an hour. I'm incredibly hypervigilant because of the situation. When he comes home he takes his coat off and then silence. He is hiding at the end of the hallway in the dark checking his phone for nearly a minute, he then walks down the hallway puttimg his phone in his pocket.
I get really pissed off and he tells me that she had messaged him when he was out and he was messaging her, he'd been ignoring her because he didn't want to upset me, and she kept asking him if he was ok and he messaged her when he was out. He said he was just checking his phone at the end of the hall and he hasn't done anything wrong. We had a very big argument over a few hours.
I told him i can't trust anything he says when it comes to this friend anymore because of the lying and secrecy, i said i was very hurt and upset that he seems to be able to talk to her about everything and says nothing to me, and how he always seems to be very thoughtful in gifts for her and not for me and how he seems to care about her feelings more than mine.
I told him i think something else is going on here, he said he has done nothing wrong, she's just a friend and they just chat about thier problems and life etc, i said yes, to the detriment of our relationship. I tell him i can't believe him because he can lie so easilly to me. I need to know that nothing else has gone on and asked to see his phone, he refused point blank an i told him that his actions speak louder than words.
I go into another room upset and come out and give him an ultimatum. I need to see his phone because i can't trust what he says about this friend anymore, if he can't show me than our relationship is over. He refused and said it will only make things worse, i tell him he seems to value his privacy with this friend over our relationship and he has 7 days to get his stuff packed up and get out. I transferred half our savings into his account.
It went round in circles for a while with him refusing about showing me his phone and how it will make things worse, i kept telling him that it can't get any worse than this and can't trust anything he tells me about this friend anymore, i need to see that nothing else has gone on. In the end i got even more pissed off and told him he needs to leave now, he has enough money for a hotel, he started packing. I started crying again.
Ultimately he came and told me that around november they started discussing about meeting up (she lives quite far away). Because they have never met before. He told me it was her that brought it up. He told me he said he'll have to talk to me about it, but he never told me and he said over the last couple of months it keeps coming up in their converstions. He said it is all totally innocent he would have always asked me if he could and it would have only been for a coffee. He told me that, that's the reason why he wouldn't show me his phone and that if i saw that i would get the wrong idea. I told him of course i would, how would you expect me to react after everything that goes on in regards to this friend. I said boundries have massively been crossed here. He told me he was sorry and he doesn't want our relationship to be over, he loves me blah blah blah. He'll stop talking to her.
In the end i caved about him leaving that night (lastnight) and did tell him that i don't want us to be over either and i think it will take me a very long time if ever have trust for him again.
I'm here today not knowing what to do, i'm so upset and still feel that something more has gone on. I also keep thinking what ifs, what if i hadn't said anything would he have lied to me and gone and met her. I told him this too, he said he wouldn't have done that, i said how can i trust that?
I'm so sad and confused and doubting whether i've been unresonable about this situation.