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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

Original poster

I’m 99% sure my friend’s boyfriend isn’t what he seems

548 replies

Maybeknights · 14/12/2021 20:34

Ok this is a bit of a saga but I’m constantly worrying about her and don’t know what to do. Here goes…

My friend met someone online a few years ago and they ‘dated’ for about 6 months. By dated I mean he popped over to her flat whenever he could. They never actually went out together and nobody met him. He is apparently in the army and everything he does is very secretive, he can’t take any time off so those stolen moments were all they could have. After a while my friend found this too difficult so threatened to break it off and he told her he would leave the army. He wrote his resignation letter and showed her before submitting it. Next thing she bumped into him in public at a busy tube station and went to kiss him and he pushed her away and acted like he didn’t know her… when she text to ask wtf he said his feeling had changed and that was that!!! She was REALLY sad. He never contacted her again.

Fast forward 3-4 years and she says that she’s dating him again. After 4 weeks they have said they love one another and are talking about buying a house together. My friend owns her own flat but is currently job searching after bing made redundant earlier this year. I asked her how he explained what happened last time and she was in total denial - said it never happened. He was in a bad place, ptsd, etc and wasn’t in the right space for a relationship so it ended. Now he’s all good and they’ve picked up like they were never apart…

I asked what had changed in terms of his availability and she said nothing has, but now since being alone in covid lockdown she’s willing to put up with it rather than not be with him. He’s still coming over at night a few times a week and they still haven’t been anywhere together and nobody had met him still! He has said he’ll go to her parents for Christmas Day but I 100% guarantee some kind of emergency will mean that he can’t!

On to the red flags:

  • The regiment he says he’s part of isn’t based where he says he’s based.
  • the stories he tells about what he’s been doing are totally out of line with his supposed army job. The things he’s supposedly doing are like scenes from James Bond movies and would be the responsibility of anti terror police, MI5, interpol etc. so far fetched
  • I asked if she’d be going to any Christmas balls or dinners on his arm and she said there wouldn’t be any. My friends with army husbands are going to lots of different functions
  • she said his family live up north and he’s not close to them but he has a sister who lives nearby with her two kids who he sees a lot (I’m sure this is cover for his wife and kids incase my friend sees him out with them!)
  • he can’t book any time off work
  • he smothers her with compliments and platitudes and I think he’s just making her drop her guard completely so she’ll do anything he says
  • he won’t have his photo taken. She doesn’t have a single photo of him apart from the one from his original dating profile

I’m really worried if I ask too many questions or act too suspicious she’ll start keeping secrets from me but I feel like I need to keep a close eye on this! What would you do? I also think she’s so deeply in love that if I ever speak against him it would deeply threaten our friendship. When she told me about being back with him she was almost manic. It didn’t sound like her speaking at all. It had only be 4 weeks and she started talking about weddings and things.

During lockdown she was suffering from really bad anxiety and depression and was incredibly lonely. I really fear he could break her heart and push her over the edge. She’s even said now that she doesn’t want to look for a new job or will look for something exclusively from home so she can be around when he’s available…

Am I just be super suspicious? And what would you do?!

OP posts:
Parentcarerandcrazy · 15/04/2022 09:21

He sounds like some sort of real life catfish. What an awful situation for your friend and the stress for you too 😔

AngelinaFibres · 15/04/2022 09:39

I worked with a teacher whose bf worked at GcHQ. It was all very secret.He couldn't talk about it. Turned out he serviced their photocopiers

elbea · 15/04/2022 09:40

Some of that seems correct - not booking any holidays, balls are very dependant on the regiment. Being in a specific regiment but attached elsewhere. Certain regiments and roles do not allow any photographs anywhere, no social media etc. The only bit that doesn’t seem right is the description, the soldiers who do these roles don’t go round telling people to what they are doing.

2Gen · 15/04/2022 10:32

You are a really wonderful friend to her OP! I think you've been doing the right thing by treading carefully, as it could well have driven her to freeze you out if you had been more open about what you think of the situation and of him! He sounds like an absolute nightmare and even perhaps a psychopath!
From your last post it does seem like he's fading away. I hope so anyway before he's done too much damage; he could have ruined your friend's life! Hopefully he'll disappear very soon or already has and thanks be to God your friend has you! You're a diamond!
The sorts of men who latch onto those who are very lonely and vulnerable are like sharks, they smell the loneliness as sharks smell blood!
What's happening now? I hope to it's over and your friend is on her way to recovery? All the very best to ye both!

WhiskerPatrol · 07/07/2022 09:18

Sorry to bump am old thread but I'd love to know how this situation is going, if @Maybeknights is still around...?

ThinkingaboutLangClegosaurus · 07/07/2022 11:06

NOTANUM · 01/01/2022 16:20

Is it possible your friend is suffering from delusions? It strikes me as strange that no-one has seen them together, him entering her home, photos, ring doorbell footage..

She may be more unwell than you think and actually is caught up in an alternative made-up world, particularly if vulnerable.

Yes, I wondered this. OP, has anyone seen him, or any evidence that he exists?

SamBeckettslastleap · 07/07/2022 11:33

I hope your friend is ok

Heytheredeliah · 07/07/2022 11:33

ThinkingaboutLangClegosaurus · 07/07/2022 11:06

Yes, I wondered this. OP, has anyone seen him, or any evidence that he exists?

Show quote history

I was also thinking that she could be mentally ill and has made all of it up. Either that or he is married.

FlaccidCornFlake · 07/07/2022 11:43

In the US they call this Stolen Valor and it's highly illegal. My abuser got in trouble for using it for financial gain.

RUN Op.

FlaccidCornFlake · 07/07/2022 11:43

Zombie thread, FFS Hmm

Georgeskitchen · 07/07/2022 11:53

Have a look at the walter mitty page on faceyB. He might have popped up on there if hes going around bragging about his (non existent) forces career
Thats if he does actually exist x

SamBeckettslastleap · 07/07/2022 11:57

FlaccidCornFlake · 07/07/2022 11:43

Zombie thread, FFS Hmm

So? Someone posted (and apologiesed) for bumping an old thread as they wondered what had happened.

Helpyou · 07/07/2022 12:01

Would love an update op!

LetsGoDoDoDo · 07/07/2022 12:08

Hope your friend is doing well.

ThumbWitchesAbroad · 07/07/2022 13:07

WhiskerPatrol · 07/07/2022 09:18

Sorry to bump am old thread but I'd love to know how this situation is going, if @Maybeknights is still around...?

Ah, I wondered why this had resurfaced when the OP last posted in January!

I sincerely hope her friend has given this lying weasel the heave-ho - there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that he's married, not in the army (although he may have been at some point) and is using her as a booty call and maybe a money bank, and that's all.

I have some experience with one like this - although not as bad as this - and it's quite hard to dissociate yourself from them because you can manage to find a reasonable explanation of why he is like this, from what he says, and convince yourself that he's telling the truth.
As I discovered, he wasn't. He couldn't lie straight in bed, as the saying goes - he was a pathological liar and this bloke sounds just the same.

ginghamstarfish · 07/07/2022 13:21

FFS, how are women still falling for these routines? Sorry OP but if she cannot see what's going on then you'll have to tell her.

Christinatherabbit · 07/07/2022 13:29

I remember reading this at the time and did wonder how it turned out. I really hope she got away from him because a lot of things were definately not right!

HollowTalk · 07/07/2022 13:38

I remember this thread too. It's far more likely that he's married and lying about everything than her friend is suffering from delusions!

newnamethanks · 07/07/2022 13:40

Ohhhh, he's one of those. 'Don't tell anyone, I'm in the SAS, that's why I have irregular hours, can be called away urgently at any minute with no explanation, have different identities etc. Damn, I've forgotten my wallet, can you get this' meaning 'I've got a wife and 3 kids, local to here, she doesn't trust me and keeps close tabs on me, so we can't go outside together, fill in the blanks'

Flamingooooooooooooooo · 07/07/2022 13:45

huge red flags for already married/scam artists. End up fleecing women for thousands . Seen the stories time and time again. They’re always the same, bloke claims he’s got some kind of army/mi5/mi6 job.

Sounds like he doesn’t want his wife to see something he’s tagged in

Onlyhuman123 · 07/07/2022 13:53

TooWicked · 14/12/2021 20:50

Honestly, if this was a very good friend of mine and I was as worried as you seem to be, I'd stake out her flat and follow him home to where he lives with his wife and children one evening after he's visited and then take it from there.

Came here to write the same.
When he's next due round, go sit in your car outside the property and follow him...see where he lives and with whom.

Scottishskifun · 07/07/2022 13:58

I hope your friend woke up!

I had similar happen to my friend he even told her he was being deployed to Afghanistan she was worried sick as he wasn't in contact.... his regiment didn't exist I contacted a friend in the army. He was never in the army he just had a wife and used the army story as cover for being unable to go away, meet people or spend days out. She was heartbroken when I had to tell her it didnt exist at first she got angry with me but when she did get hold of him he buckled. Some guys are just scum and think they csn get away with it!

Ballsaque · 07/07/2022 14:13

I’d love to know how this turned out too!

BeverForget · 07/07/2022 14:14

Try Walter Mitty Hunter's Club on Facebk.
They specialise in exposing people lying about military careers.
There should be a law against it like in the U.S. (Stolen Valour Act).

BellePeppa · 07/07/2022 14:19

It sounds like the plot of a soap opera and very very dodgy. She probably won’t listen to you so you may have to let her get on with it.