Gaslighting?

[ItsJustNotHappening]

I’m prepared to accept that I might be losing it but I’ve started noticing recently that stuff that belongs to me personally is disappearing. For example:-

1. My eczema cream. It’s prescription only and I make sure I know where it is. Particularly at the moment as I’m having a nasty flare up. It’s always in the same place. Now it’s gone. I’ve looked everywhere.
2. Two boxed candles. Those three wick ones. No longer in the place that they were.
3. My tweezers. I had three pairs. All gone.
4. Books that I have bought and not read yet. Gone from the bookcase.

There’s other stuff too but too many trivial items to list here.

There is only me and DH in our house.

There is other weird things too, like things being moved when I know I didn’t leave them there. For example I leave my straighteners on the heat mat on the floor. Always. Last week I came home and they were on my bed.

My H denies it’s him but I have a horrible feeling it’s him doing this stuff.

No one else has a key to this house.

In the past, before we lived together he used to take stuff from my fridge and take it home with him. He used to deny this but it could only have been him. For example I’d buy milk and the next morning it would be gone after he’d left.

Nothing like this has happened for years so I’m unsure as to what is actually going on here.

I feel like I’m going a bit mad to be honest.

H is out tonight and I’ve just noticed some chocolate he bought for me last week has gone. I’ve not eaten it. He is following some faddy diet so he’ll deny taking it. So I’m going to bed before he comes in because I’m feeling really pissed off and unnerved. I’m almost certain it’s him and I can’t be bothered listening to denials.

This thread has got me hooked - I can't imagine someone being mad enough to move your stuff like this for no other reason than to mess with you! But you're right, it sounds like there's no other explanation for it. What a weird thing to do! You must be so annoyed, OP

he could be just an extremely messy person who keeps moving stuff and forgetting he did that

but the chocolate incident points otherwise - so I would say getting cameras is a really good idea. especially since he has a history of stealing your stuff

The cameras is a great idea, it might take a while now if its him as he knows you are on to him. Id stop mentioning it for a while. And please update!

I'm with the PP who thinks cameras are an appalling idea and a complete invasion of his privacy.

You have no evidence whatsoever he is being abusive or moving your stuff around. How on earth would you feel (and how would MN react) if there was a post saying a woman had found cameras installed in her home without her knowledge by her partner.

Please rethink the cameras and try and find another solution - like a conversation !!!

i think i would care very little about how someone feels if my possessions were routinely stolen or moved

@PaintedEgg but she doesn't know he's moving or stealing them and rather than have a conversation about it she's installing cameras in his private space?

The OP had said she has tried talking to him. He has a history of lying.

OP has had convos with his husband with no result

he already denied taking the chocolate so what do you expect him to say?

there are three scenarios this will play out:

• someone is breaking in and cameras will catch his person
• its him and cameras will provide evidence for it
• OP unknowingly suffers from severe mental health disorder and she will watch herself move these things around, then blaming her husband

she needs those cameras now

It sounds very unnerving. Hope you get the results you want.

@ItsJustNotHappening

This is a very illuminating article.

https://www.simplypsychology.org/how-to-deal-with-a-gaslighting-spouse.html

It is absolutely NOT okay to install cameras in his home without making him aware of that fact and asking his input on having cameras!

If this was a man secretly installing cameras without telling his wife everybody would be screaming!

You think him moving a chocolate bar and then putting it back is bad, but are okay with secretly filming someone in their own home, absolutely baffling

Might he have eaten the chocolate, then felt guilty when confronted and replaced it?

Depending on where eczema cream was left, I might have tidied it away without thinking and forgotten I'd moved it.

The books strike me as oddest. Three of them? i mean, I would happily take a book off a shelf to read it, but I would know I'd done it, and I wouldn't need three at a time, and the one I was reading would be somewhere obvious, such as on a side table or in my handbag - they don't just disappear.

With all of it, even if I felt embarrassed (eg at snaffling someone's chocolate) I would come clean straight away if I could see that my partner was upset.

My EHX used to do this. He was also a compulsive pathological liar and also used to spy on me and did many other weird things. I’d make the mistake of saying something like “ooh these new jeans fit me so nicely” and I’d never find them again. Food (particularly treats) would disappear off the face of the earth, and so would things like nice bath stuff, gifts etc. I felt like it was an extension of his jealousy and contempt for me in general, he hated me enjoying and having nice things. If I quizzed him about missing things he’d turn it against me and say something like I’d wasted money on something I wasn’t looking after nicely. He also used to break a favourite mug/plate and say he was sorry and it was a horrible accident.

Does your husband do any of these behaviours, too?

precisely, most of us think that moving and then putting back that chocolate, alongside other insane things he seems to be doing is worse than catching him on camera

No the eczema cream has not reappeared. I am using some hydrocortisone cream at the moment but it's not really strong enough for my current flare up.

The double standards on this thread are insane, even by MN standards. At least a couple of posters agree! What I don't understand is why it's perfectly ok to install cameras in a person's private space, but not to move a chocolate bar. OK it's weird to move chocolate but not a complete abuse of privacy!

because its not about just chocolate bar

medication and books went missing, hair straighteners were moved onto flammable surface (I hope they were at least cold by then!)

is anyone having real doubts that he is moving those things? by the sound of it it's a case of gathering evidence so he cannot deny it, not checking IF he does it

@PaintedEgg FFS, I can read and know what it's about, I'm just summarising. It doesn't change the facts.

Moving a few random items versus a complete and absolute invasion of someones privacy, secretly in their own home.

Just take pictures - of your dressing table / bathroom / hair straighteners/ whatever before you leave for work then check when you get home if you think something is missing.

moving and stealing your partner's possessions and then denying it is not "moving few random objects", its outright insanity

so i would say everyone who does insane stuff like this should expect their rights to privacy to be placed on hold

@OldandTired66 - perfectly reasonable action.

Cameras - not reasonable in the slightest

@PaintedEgg I'll say again - she doesn't know he's done it!!!!! That's why she wants the cameras! Ask him, take photos of the item before work as PP has said, find another solution rather than finding him guilty first and taking such drastic action.

so she should have an entire photoshoot before work? take picture of all her items and snacks in cupboards?

and if he has not done it then she will know for sure she has early dementia and will be able to come clean

otherwise he has done

Whenever I have spoken to him about the items that have gone missing ( and I have spoken to him about it, told him it's making me feel really uneasy etc) he obvious listens to me and says how odd it is.

Without going into loads of detail I have suffered from a lot of violence over a very long period of time (not with DH) and as a result of that I have had extensive therapy. I have been told that I am hyper vigilant and in 'fight or flight' almost all of the time. I notice things that most people don't. I know when I have closed or locked a door, or not. I know these things because, at one time, not noticing these minor things might have ended my life. So I don't do things absent mindedly. Never have. Things that I have bought have a place in my home and I do not move things around.

When I have a uneasy feeling about something there is usually a good reason for that and I don't really believe in not listening to what my body is telling me. Something is 'off' and I need to know what the cause is. It might be him. Equally there might be another explanation.