Constant cheating accusations - why is he so paranoid?

[whendidisaythat]

My partner is driving me crazy. We've been together not much over a year and he seems to have major trust issues. Early on in our relationship I noticed he had a tendency to over-analyse things I said to question if I believe in monogamy (which I do) or if I had feelings for other people.

These accusations started to build over the last few months and they've got quite intense. He flat out accused me of cheating about six months ago because (after I got a coil fitted) I had discharge and had worn a thong to work that day. Since then, there have been lots of random accusations. He gets very anxious when I go out for drinks with male colleagues and there is one particular male colleague (who years back I had a crush on) that he is especially suspicious over (who I wouldn't go for a drink with one on one, because it would be disrespectful to my partner). He has demanded before that I stop going for drinks with male colleagues, that I stop speaking to this other male colleague at all, accused me of cheating because the same man appeared twice in pictures from a day out with my family (coincidental), accused me of secretly being in contact with my ex because he saw their first name on my phone (it was a song by a singer with the same, very common, first name!), accused me of hiding something because someone whose number I don't have saved messaged me, accused me of cheating because the passenger seat had been moved in my car and I forgot my uncle had been in the car...

Some of it has improved (he's stepped back from the ultimatums over me drinking with male colleagues, for example, which is part of my job) but I feel like he has absolutely zero trust in me, even though I haven't so much as glanced at someone else.

He's broken up with me a few times and we've quickly got back together, but in that time he was asking a lot about whether I had slept with someone else (when it had been just a few days!!) and whether I saw us as exclusive while we talked through our issues (which I said I did).

All of a sudden last month he mentioned we should get STD checks because he still is suspicious of his ex gf. We've been together for nearly 1.5 years and we both did an STD check before we first slept together. I would usually see this as cast iron evidence of him cheating, but logistically it's not really possible he has been sleeping with someone else. I think he must have suggested this because he was suspicious that I had slept with someone else while we were very very briefly broken up? Even though he asked me and I said no. It had only been a few days so it didn't even occur to me to ask him.

He hasn't really been in relationships before and so he hasn't ever been cheated on. There wasn't infidelity in his parent's marriage. I did cheat on an ex but that was over a decade ago and I've learned a lot from it in the time that has passed.

This is never going to change is it?

You need to move on from this - this is coercive control and you must leave him.

You will never, ever be able to convince this man that you are trustworthy.

Don't bother trying. You owe him nothing.

End the relationship and be firm when you end it. He will promise you the earth, all kinds of self-improvement, undying love, whatever, in order to reel you back in. He may also threaten suicide.

He is accusing you of cheating in order to devalue you in his own head, to prove to himself how unworthy you are of his attention and affection, to exert control over you in every aspect of your life by making you try to show him you are trustworthy - he likes to hear you explaining you had your coil put in because he knows you are paying full attention to him and his accusations. He wants to make sure that you will end up considering every aspect of your life through the prism of his expectation of your behaviour. Maybe you haven't been torn down to this extent yet, but if you stay in the relationship, you will eventually live as a prisoner with a capricious and cruel jailer.

Eventually you will find yourself explaining tiny details of your life, like why you were five minutes later home than usual. He is building an environment where you will gradually isolate yourself, where you wont be allowed to wear certain clothes or makeup or have your hair a certain way, maybe not even be allowed to lock the bathroom door so he can keep close tabs on you, lose your friends because you don't dare socialise, maybe even give up your job because he stalks your workplace or causes so much stress about your relationships with your colleagues that it isn't worth working any more.

Don't get sucked into the madness this sociopath is trying to engage you in. His motivation in this relationship is power, not love.

He knows you're impressed by "vulnerability," and he's being "vulnerable" and using therapy speak to keep you hooked.

It is pure manipulation.

Don't fall for it.

If you end the relationship, don't get sucked into a discussion of why.

Tell him it isn't working for you any more and do not discuss it any further.

He will try his utmost to keep you in his orbit, only because it involves effort to identify, snare, and reel in another victim, and people like him are fundamentally lazy.

I'm in love with him and have been with him for nearly 18 months - of course I'm going to be interested in understanding his behaviour. I don't think, based on my experiences, that he fits the profile of a sociopath / narcissist and I think BPD could be involved, which is why I wanted to see if anyone else had been in a relationship with a man with BPD.

None of that means I won't end the relationship though. I will - I just want to understand what's happened, and I think that's only natural. It's much easier to write someone off and forget about it if you don't know or love them; if you do it's natural to wonder about what's happened. Definitely not the most productive use of time though, I would agree!

@whendidisaythat Just a word of warning...I married a controlling man who who was a total narcissist bordering sociopath. I had two kids with him.
By the time they were 3 and 6 he had them 50/50 custody and more recently I just see them EOW.
He destroyed my life and that of my children.
Please don't put up with his behaviour.

Yes, you're right, I have a tendency to over-diagnose everyone including myself, when my time would be better spent on watching The Traitors Australia and having a bath...

I know it doesn't make any difference, I just have this nearly obsessive need to understand and sort things through. When I divorced I wrote pages upon pages and read and consumed things about narcissism and coercive control for months, I was completely obsessed.

I missed this first time round but it made me laugh out loud; sad but true

think about this way - you bent over backwards trying to paint him in as positive light as possible and everyone who has read your posts thinks this man is selfish, emotionally abusive, controlling narcissist

if you cannot make him sound nice when you try he probably is not nice at all

Also, from personal experience - sometimes it's best to not try and understand why people do the things they do.

There may be thousands of reasons why someone mistreats us, and we don't have to care for any of them. People are responsible for their insecurity, baggage and how they treat others - it does not matter why he gaslights and tries to control you. That's on him. all of it

I didn't paint him in a positive light at all! I focused on his damaging behaviour on the basis that I think this is unable to change and wanted to get insights and views about it to make me feel better about walking away from the situation. I can't stop anyone from commenting to say he's a narcissist, but based on knowing him and having experienced narcissistic relationships, it's not what I think is going on, and I'm pretty sure about that bit. There's something damaging and I did read again about covert narcissism again but it just doesn't fit how he behaves and seems to think.

you did say he is vulnerable with you and you believe that he did no cheat, you did try to defend him - which is fine, I get you're trying to paint a fair picture.

Thing is he does not have to have a full blown personality disorder to be mean and controlling. I understand the need to try and put a label on it but sometimes people just have mean personalities

He is using manipulation - he shows (or fakes) vulnerability, makes unreasonable demands of you, leaves you and then makes you "work" for him to come back. At best he is very selfish and immature - at worst he is slowly turning on next levels of abuse

Those things are true though, there's no point me lying about it to paint him as worse than he is (or maybe equally as bad but in a different way). He can be vulnerable with me and faithful and still not be a good partner. There are ways in which he is a good partner or I wouldn't have stayed at all. But they don't outweigh the bad bits I guess and I don't think he can change the bad bits. It's really the last bit I wanted reassurance on with the thread - is this pattern going to change, or is it not? Is this all as bonkers as i think it is?

I believe 100% everyone here (which actually is everyone) who says it is not going to change and the relationship is too dysfunctional to even try to save. I just don't think he's a narcissist is all, though I think he is mentally unwell in some way to be so paranoid and have such difficulties with trusting anyone at all.

@whendidisaythat this sounds exactly like my ex and I can categorically state that it does not get better. In fact it makes you ill. Until you tie yourself in knots trying to prove your innocence so much that you lose all grip on how unhealthy and downright abusive it is. My ex analysed everything to a terrifying level. From my word choice to my connections to complete strangers.

Walk away.

@whendidisaythat I agree with you that he may simply have some sort of mental health issues, perhaps extreme insecurity, and not be "all bad". Nobody is all bad.

But you're also right that he is not going to change. Not because he cannot but because he does not want to - he expects you to amend your behaviour to ease his paranoia, and he punishes you emotionally every time you don't back down.

He should be managing it and he's not doing it. If you stay with him you will find yourself being made responsible for his moods and anxieties, and you would likely become his emotional punching bag

To be fair some bits of what you're describing sound like my ex at the beginning of the relationship - I wish I saw these red flags back then because it eventually escalated to the point that years after divorce I am still not exactly fine.

Op, no offence but I think there's a weird feeling of security in a relationship for the partner of an insecure, jealous person (if they don't appear to be unfaithful) because you perceive their insecurity and jealousy as them being very attached, invested, scared of losing you etc.
If they end the relationship - apparently due to insecurity/dissatisfaction with your lack of prioritisation/"commitment" - but you know they will very likely get back together and aren't really serious.... Again you feel relatively secure (even though they're "ending" the relationship).

This might have been attractive to you because you felt he cared and was invested and you were high priority to him, he was scared of losing you etc.

But .... It's not healthy or functional.

It's an unhealthy form of security.

No offence taken - that hits the nail on the head. Because he hasn't really had serious relationships before he said recently that I'm the person he's been closest with, ever, and I think my anxious / insecure self really feels that and likes that. I need to fix my own insecurities before I get into another relationship I guess.

Having a bath and watching the traitors is definitely a good use of your time 😁👍

He's broken. You can't fix him. Look after yourself first. For the future, there are resources available to help you build healthy relationships with boundaries to protect yourself.

That’s it, relax with Traitors and enjoy growing your newly single brand new self.

I struggled with leaving when I was in this situation mainly because I wanted him to acknowledge and understand that I wasn't cheating on him, that I wasn't even thinking about anyone else. I wasn't 'the baddie' and I felt like I needed him to show he knew it.

He never did.

I would ask him to trust me, and he would reply that he would trust me when I could prove I could be trusted. In the years we were together, I never cheated or considered cheating. How could I prove I could be trusted when all I had ever done was be honest and faithful and completely true to him? The simple answer was that I couldn't.

So in the end, I decided I WOULD be 'the baddie' and ended it without ever getting that trust from him. It was such a freeing feeling once the initial feeling of guilt had passed (far sooner than I thought it would too).

Free yourself, never go back, and raise your bar, so if you do find yourself another one like this, you'll remember to run for the hills the very first time they question you.

“He's broken. You can't fix him. Look after yourself first. For the future, there are resources available to help you build healthy relationships with boundaries to protect yourself.”

This. As MN taught me - women are not rehab centres for broken men. His behaviour now might be a result of his difficult childhood but plenty of people get through tough childhoods without growing up to treat their partners like shit. The fact that you’re wondering if you’re at fault here despite his behaviour clearly being horrendously unreasonable is one of the things that makes you vulnerable to abuse.

Reading through this right now:
https://www.baggagereclaim.co.uk/seeking-validation-understanding-in-your-poor-relationships-part-one/

Lots of good suggestions on this thread so I thought I'd add this as I'm finding it useful.

I think at the base of their behaviour are some values and beliefs, eg. about relationships/partnerships, about the opposite sex etc that they've developed and that are pretty much entrenched.

It's also their character - perhaps rather stunted in development/rather extreme. Perhaps personality disorders are involved too.

I found, when I looked at it carefully (retrospectively) and thought about all the things that he let slip - that while the man I dated was trying very much to make me believe (and had possibly even convinced himself) that he only felt like this and acted like this with me; that actually he had acted the same way in previous relationships.

I also realised that there were significant elements in his view of women that cast them as objects/possessions/acquisitions.

Tied with that was an entitlement to a level of control and power in his relationship.

There was zero introspection or awareness of whether this was fair or reasonable... . Just the strong feeling/belief that this was how things should be ... And the belief that the woman was being unfair/unreasonable/disrespecting him, not committed etc if she didn't go along with it.

When you look at extreme and unreasonable views like this .... It's useful to see them in the context of any extreme views eg religious fundamentalism, racism, sexism, xenophobia, conspiracy theories.
The sad fact is that the world is full of people like this, and it's unsurprisingly that it might also be populated by people who have similarly extreme and unreasonable views about personal relationships.

Do the above types of people ever see their beliefs and values as unreasonable? Rarely. They very rarely do and very rarely change them.

I think that's the bottom line with people like him.

It's sad but what can you do. No-one should have to live like he'd have his partner live.

I think it was Lundy Bancroft in his first book that really pinned the (I think, entirely correct) theory that so many behaviours ascribed to emotions and insecurity, anger/temper, bad childhood etc etc. are actually down to values.
And to a desire for control/power.

The abuser depicts them as being down to the former and many myths still exist in our society that help them with that.
It's smoke and mirrors though.

They just feel entitled to pretty much ownership of their partner,they feel entitled to being in a position of power/control and top priority in a partnership. They neither can see nor care if that's reasonable or fair. That's the real story behind their smorgasbord of justifications and excuses and distractions.