I'm a long-time lurker and occasional poster and find myself in need of help from some wise ladies.
My partner has left me and of course I'm feeling hurt and scared which may be clouding my judgement.
He works in a mainly female environment although there are a small group of males that he sees socially.
In fact, a couple of years ago he would ONLY socialise with this group of men as he found the women annoying and had more in common with the men.
Over the last couple of years he has begun to socialise more with a group that is mainly woman although sometimes other men may join them. At one point he was went out 8 weekends in a row with them which left me feeling rejected as we both work full time shifts and to my mind a night off together over a weekend is precious!
There is of course one woman in particular who he seems to spend a lot of time talking about and I started to become fed up of hearing her name at home every 5 minutes and I admit I became very jealous. They started texting each other out of work, just jokey things, nothing to do with work and I 'went mad' as he says. This consisted of me getting very upset and saying how inappropriate I found it considering the fact they are both in long term relationships and see each other almost every day at work.
To my knowledge the phone contact petered out although they continue to socialise together as part of this group. He is aware that I am jealous and suspicious of there relationship but he assured me it was purely platonic and I accepted this and tried not to make my jealousy issues his problem.
Of course I do not try to stop him going out with them, and have never felt the need to check his phone. I think it's an important factor that sometimes this group only consist of him, the woman I am paranoid about, his immediate boss who is in her 60's and a mutual friend although she is now closer to him as I no longer work with her, and another mutual friend who he dislikes and is not in contact with out of work at all. He only sees her out of work because of the group dynamic.
Last weekend as he was busy doing DIY he received a text message. As he had his hands full I asked him if he wanted me to check the message. He hesitated but said yes.
It was this woman saying 'check your whatsapp' an app that he told me he does not use.
I said 'you haven't got whatapp' and he said he had so I checked it.
I found a long chat between them that has been going on for over a year. There is nothing overtly sexual but it is definitely flirty, things like 'it was lovely to see you last night' and 'guess what I had for lunch?'. They had been messaging each other from different floors of there work place 'where are you? I neeeeeeeeed you!' and one when he simply text her 'come' which he told me was because he needed her to pick up a shift.
There were so many other hurtful things but I can't remember them, I was so upset and was reading them through my tears.
I 'went mad' as he says and he spent some time protesting his innocence then left for his Dad's.
He says they are just flirty banter, I see them as inappropriate. He lied to me about whatsapp. He says I am jealous and paranoid and mental, that he is not going to spend his life not socialising with other women. I have apologised for my jealousy and have tried to see it as innocent but i just can't get over the shock and hurt.
Now he is refusing to come home and tells me we are over. I am devastaed and one minute think it's my fault, the next that it is his for flirting with this woman behind my back.
I'd really appreciate a reality check, I can't think straight at the moment.