Have you ever checked a partners phone?

[GetMeCoffeePlease]

Please note that this isn’t about me!

I’ve been having a debate with my friend over the past couple of day’s as she has got into a rut of not trusting her partner and has checked his phone a few times while he is out the room saying she is sure something is going off that he’s hiding but also saying she wants to get evidence first before confronting him..

My argument is that, I just don’t believe that it’s right in checking phones. I think there’s a lot more respect on her behalf by just asking him outright and confronting him about her feelings. This way she’s not driving herself insane, she needs to have boundaries to respect him (even though she doesn’t feel like doing so right now) then if he comes clean and says somethings been going on then take it from there.

Most days she’s checked his phone and so far she has found nothing, so now she’s obsessed with doing it. I can honestly say, I’ve never done it and I really do not agree with it as I would hate for my own partner to do it to me out of pure respect.

I’ve ended up having enough of it today and snapped at her to stop being so bloody ridiculous and confront him in person or just drop it because I’ve had enough of hearing the same old paranoia...

What are you opinions about “phone checking”? Is this a thing that really goes on? Have some of you done it and found stuff out or are some of you on the same page of that it’s totally wrong?

Yes. Due to my own insecurities. Found nothing. Never messages anyone apart from immediate family, had a few bookmarked porn pages, not an issue. No longer feel the need to invade his privacy.

Yes.

See, IN A NORMAL relationship, it is crossing boundaries to check a phone.

But when your spider senses go off (micro signals that you are being deceived and played)

you have a duty to self, to protect yourself.

I went by the civilised rules (he is my husband, my best friend therefore he wouldn't lie in such an important matter)

and got emotionally abused for 2 years. Because I was playing by rules he wasn't. Fuck that shit. Always take firm action to protect yourself. What do the airline flights say about oxygen masks?

@1forAll74 "No way would I check a partners phone, I am always aghast when read that so many women do this. "

that is because you have never been in this situation and you HAVE NO IDEA.

I was married for 25 years. Happy marriage is wonderful. I lived in your assumptions.
Marriage post his mid life crisis and rebellion?

People really need to get their heads round the understanding that infidelity is ABUSE.
It is hostility and aggression that is unstated.
It is projection where you are blamed for everything.
It is the power play of secrecy and duper's delight.
It is gaining an advantage (the benefits of monogamy like laundry, childcare, administration and intact finances) THROUGH DECEIT [ you carry on playing by the rules and I will dupe you].
In the commercial world, that is called fraud.

People who have not been intimately betrayed by the person they trusted most in this world, have no idea what a vicious and distressing space this is.

Spidey senses don't come out of a clear blue sky. How many times on MN has gut feel turned out to be right even though 'he never would'?

Trust, but verify (Ronald Reagan). I didn't verify and continued to play by the rules.

More fool me, for sitting in denial, believing his self serving narrative and failing to lay down clear boundaries.

No, never. And if he snooped in mine I would be desperately upset. I've been in a relationship where he was checking my phone, emails, Facebook etc every day. I never want to go through that again, and wouldn't want to inflict it on someone else.

No, not something I do or would do. If there’s no trust and then there’s no relationship imo.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinions and different people situations may cause different points and views. Personally I am with the above in saying that if I felt the need to be checking my partners phone then that points out there is no trust. I know that by asking straight out there’s going to be some bullshitting, I’d rather be asking straight and direct without snooping.
I was just asking a yes or no question - don’t get too personal..

'I think I would just rather confront him at the first sign of my doubts and he would reassure me'

....And then get rid of the evidence

I've done it twice in my thirties both on instinct and both times was bang on and dropped them like a hot potato.

Lived with the one up to that point,

Went through a massive period of mis trust and anxiety around phones etc.

No more though

Think if I felt at the checking phone stage now I'd end it.

Oh yes indeed!
And so glad I did.
Both lying, cheating scumbags are now out of my life!

Ah ok, so no evidence to back up the claim it's illegal then?

Several people were jailed for hacking into peoples voicemail. Not sure of the exact wording of the law but hacking into someones whatsapp/text messages is surely the same thing.

Hacking is very different to accessing your partners phone.
If you know the password etc.... you are just logging into it.
Not hacking it. That is illegal.
I knew my ExH and ExP passcodes. They had 'nothing' to hide so didn't mind!
Both totally shit at covering their tracks and I was like friggin' Sherlock Holmes - he would have been proud!

OP. If you moralist and judge your friend, you are not being supportive. If you don't feel you have the experience to understand or support her, she should probably finf a less judgemental friend to confide in. Sorry if that's harsh, but am with others who say SOME men (not all) are excellent liars and gadlighted. Snooping is justified in my book sometimes. Not fishing expeditions, though. If there is no reason to distrust, then it's an issue with your friend, i would say

gaslighters

Yep...I checked my ex's phone and glad I did as I found out for sure he was a cheat and liar. I walked out that night and blocked him from my life.

As @ScreamingLadySutch has said above, unless you have been on the receiving end of a deceitful person, you will never understand.

My ex gaslighted me and emotionally abused me for a year. He had nearly broken me and had got me thinking I was crazy. My instincts/spidey senses were indeed correct. As soon as I saw the messages between them - which he had clearly been deleting each day on Whatsapp, but, had forgotten that day - I had fun confronting him with what I had read, but didn't reveal how I knew. He actually thought I had hacked into his Whatsapp, which was hilarious. Just for a while on that evening, it was great to see him squirm and try to wriggle out of it. I actually felt very empowered, finally knowing the truth and it gave me the strength I needed to leave. None of that would have happened had I not checked his phone. I will never regret it!

My dh has a basic phone, doesn't do social media and wouldn't have a clue. He regularly hands me his phone to ask if he's got a voicemail because he doesn't know how to retrieve them.
When (if) he gets tech savvy I may start checking.

I haven't, but I could easily if I wanted/needed to...in all honesty thought, I think if I truly felt the need to check his phone I'd call time on the relationship with even doing the checking. The loss of trust would be enough for me.

I had never checked Hs phone until one day he dashed out the Bath to pick it up when I came into bedroom and said his iPad was out of power. Something in his reaction made me then check that iPad which was perfectly ok power wise, after that I went full on Sherlock Holmes . Never say never ladies, I too felt it was a total infringement until
My self preservation instincts kicked in. I’m not ok with someone making an idiot of me

I havent checked like your friend does because of a bad feeling, but i use DHs phone sometimes when its laying around and mines upstairs charging or whatever.
I guess i would be suspicious if he removed my fingerprint from his phone and changed his password.. if that happened i would definitely try to find a way to get into his phone and start snooping!

No, of course not. If you have to check your relationship is over.

Yes and it caused the heartache of my life.

I didn’t do it looking for anything - he left his phone at home, I was working from home. Had to check something for him and found a load of messages. Very hurtful stuff in there.

No, never felt the urge.

There was one time where a preview of a whatsapp message from a woman looked iffy, which I accidentally read while handing it over to him. He saw my distinctly unimpressed face, burst out laughing and opened it up there and then to show me the full message thread which was nothing but benign office banter and absolutely nothing untoward.

But if there was a behaviour change or I had a gut feeling that something was going on, damn right I'd check his phone because if I'm going to tear DS's life asunder by slinging out his dad I'll make sure to prove the gut feeling first.

DH and I have each other's codes and use each other's phone regularly, so if he had anything to hide, that wouldn't be the place

Not his phone, because he always had it passcode protected and he wouldn't tell me the passcode.

But that was fine because I trusted him, and didn't believe he would be deceitful, because vows and shit.

And then one day, I asked to use his laptop, as mine was buggered. And I started typing in a web address, and the helpful laptop finished the address for me -Adultfriendfinder. So yes, I snooped. And found stuff I would never have dreamed that he would have.

Snooping gave me the information I didn't know I needed, to deal with a man who wasn't what he was supposed to be/had portrayed himself as. It gave me the back up I needed, when he lied to my face, over and over, and tried to make me out to be stupid.

I am not the least bit ashamed of snooping. He was the one who should have been ashamed.

I'd rather snoop, and be in full possession of the facts, than be 'honourable', and live a lie.

So you don't think its right for your friend to snoop on her dp phone. what do you want her to do? sit and wait for her world to fall down around her or take the matter into her own hands and move on. When you get that gut feeling it normally means your right, and she probably is. Friends are supposed to support each other op.

I think checking every day is bad, its controlling and abusive.
Checking as a one off because things dont stack up isnt the same. I've done that myself and like a lot of women on this thread, that was the moment I realised my exh was a lying manipulative gaslight.