Flirty texts to another woman

[Dontknowwhattothink2]

My partner and I have been together nearly 10 years…
Found out today that he’s been flirting with a woman that he’s known since school.
I knew they spoke previously but was assured they were just friends.
By his admission she was sometimes flirty but he told me it was only ever a one-way thing.
They had apparently not spoken for a while.
He asked me to fill out a form on his phone today and to save it for him so I was shocked to see her name come up on ‘recently contacted’ people.
I immediately asked him and he said ‘oh she messaged me the other week to tell me she was having an operation soon’
I asked to see the messages and he asked why so I explained that, because she had been flirty in the past, I wanted to see.
He said no - followed by ‘they are flirty back and I don’t want you to be upset by it because it means nothing’
He’s shown me them now. He’s also said he’s been chatting to her on and off since mid June but the messages only started on WhatsApp on 18th July. Apparently they were talking on TikTok but he closed that account a week ago (when the WhatsApp conversation started) so I haven’t seen any of those.
He’s asked what he can do to make it better and has shown me that he’s blocked her but I honestly don’t know what to think or do now. Any advice?

@FairyMaclary thank you for the book recommendation, I shall take a look.
We are living together (joint mortgage), have been engaged for nearly 5 years (did plan to marry but life/expenses meant long engagement instead)
We have 2 children together.
Up until now there hasn’t been any doubts over faithfulness and whilst I don’t particularly want to end a 9+ year relationship I also don’t want him to just think it’s fine/done with because he’s blocked her

I would say things more likely to increase in flirtiness over time rather than decrease so I wouldn’t necessarily assume they were worse.

It’s a tough one but I would say if she’s now blocked and you don’t want to end the relationship, draw a line now and hope he realises how close he came to losing you and has learnt his lesson

What the actual fuck is wrong with MEN? When they are a perfectly good relationship with a GOOD woman, they just love to flirt with other woman/make female friends/cheat/have emotional affairs and private chats with other women!

Honestly, men just don't deserve women, they really don't.

I would leave him if you have no children @Dontknowwhattothink2 If he isn't cheating yet, he will be soon. Why the fuck is he exchanging messages with another woman - that you are not privy to?

MEN!

It’s a long story - initially I ignored it but did voice that I didn’t trust her no matter how much he reassured me he had no interest in her. I do trust him. I just think it is really important to stay away from people who want to cause trouble and blokes w really naive to women sometimes. Then he didn’t answer a call when she rang I was there! I went a bit nutty to be honest - why not take a call, he would have done if it were someone else. I dont think he keeps in touch with her anymore but it is tricky as they have a lot of mutual friends who we see regularly.

I'm sorry but once they start sniffing around other women and get caught out it usually makes them go off their partner even more as they feel humiliated at their wrong doings being found out.

Resentment sets in and they then find ways to be more secretive.

So I spoke to him last night and asked to other messages…don’t know why but I feel like I need to, to try and move past it.
He won’t let me see them as says that he can see how much this has hurt and can’t see why I would want to make it worse.
Claims he was worried all day at work that he would come home and that the kids and I wouldn’t be here.
I explained that I wouldn’t do that to the kids (as it’s not their fault) but was very clear that, if we didn’t have them, I would be gone.
At one point he said he didn’t see the problem because he was never going to act on any of it, it was just messages?!
His reasoning for sending them was that ‘we don’t have that kind of text talk anymore, so it was nice to have it with someone’

He is protecting the narrative. How can you forgive when you don’t know exactly what you are forgiving?

Hes a common garden cheat saying typical cheater things.

The fact he won't show you certain messages shows it is MUCH more than the jokey ones. I don't see the point in you asking to see anything at this point as he will have deleted anything bad and just kept some borderline ones in the hope you will believe that's it

If you're willing to to take him back at least set boundaries for him to go no contact with her and if he breaks this it would be game over for me.

Good luck and I'm sorry your going through this x

‘we don’t have that kind of text talk anymore, so it was nice to have it with someone’

So if you didn't have sex as much as you used to, would he go to someone else for that too?

He’s not showing you because his PRIMARY concern is you leaving him and this will upset him. Because he thought in his life he could have his cake and eat it. He wants to remain in control of the situation. He wants you to provide 80% and the missing 20% he thinks he deserves to get elsewhere. ‘Woe is me you never text me ego kibbles so I deserve them from Janet’.

When you see the messages you may leave. He cares about him. Selfish just like when he was getting his ego kibbles via his phone.

Showing you the messages means you will see who he is and what he was prepared to do to get his ego massaged. He wants to hide this from you.

Read the book ‘not just friends’ by Shirley Glass. He has opened the door to this nonsense. He is not showing you to protect himself and remain in control of the situation. If protecting you was his primary concern he wouldn’t have done it.

He is a typical cheat that doesn’t want to be honest and face the music - they are 10 a penny. We only text, we only touched hands, we only kissed once, she only gave me oral, we only had sex once, three times, 10 times, I didn’t enjoy it, etc. He may never have met up with her - it’s a shame he can’t show you the messages to help evidence that it meant nothing.

Cheats are boringly predicatable. They care about themselves and how they feel.

He is a cheat who is sad he was caught. He doesn’t want to give you the full information as he doesn’t think you deserve to make an informed decision about whether you want to stay with him. That is who he is.

So I brought it up with him again yesterday…
Looked at his WhatsApp and he asked if I was okay. I said I was just checking and he said I told you it’s gone, been deleted and she’s blocked.
I asked why it was open on a chat to a female friend - not the same person as now - from 2018 with a naked woman message (I think a gif).
He said he had been going through his chats to see if there were messages to anyone else that I wouldn’t be happy with.
I asked if that was it (if he was messaging anyone else) and he said he used to message between a male friend and her but it was banter.
I said but it’s flirtatious yes and he said some of it was but it’s only banter. As far as I know he’s not had contact with her since 2018 but we had been together 4 years at that point.

He then said he’d been thinking to himself that I’ve never liked him talking to other girls (named 2 people, said there were others too that he couldn’t think of who) so I said that this is exactly why and it has given me every reason to not trust him.
Said he understands why the trust has gone but it was ‘getting old’ now and I could do what I want.
I said that until I saw the other messages I wouldn’t know if I could move on from it.
He said there aren’t any as he’s already said he’s not showing me so he’s deleted them.

Not a great update OP. Not ideal at all. What are you thinking of next steps?

So your update is to say he is done this with more than one women...and that it's only banter and to get over it

So basically this tells you he will do it again so it's upto you I guess and what your boundaries are Are you happen to stay in this (open) relationship or not.

Sorry OP but this would be a deal breaker for me from your updates. No maybe hes not physically cheated but for me what hes done and his reaction to you finding out is just as bad. I personally believe there's far more to the flirty messages than what you've seen. Why would it be only her flirting then suddenly he starts from nowhere, of course it was both of them from the beginning. He doesn't want you to see the full chat because he knows its much worse, and hes gas lighting you trying to make you believe its for your own good to not get more upset. He could quite easily unblock her and continue this without you knowing. If it were me, id ask him to send her a final message saying he can't continue with the friendship as its disrespectful to you and to never contact him again. His reaction to that will tell you everything. If he cares more about you he would be willing to do that for you, as its already crossing a line now and needs to stop.

He's known this woman since school, they've had (at the very least) a flirty, bantering friendship, and now he's just blocked her out of the blue, without any explanation to her?

I don't believe it.

He did not want you to see them because it would upset you, please read what you wrote.

He's deleted them because he has something to hide.

Please remember the women of mumsnet love nothing more than getting someone to leave their fella.

I don't necessarily disagree with you.

The problem is that the men just make it so damn easy, don't they..?

My thoughts too what used to be a bit banter is now full of sexual misconduct

@Sugarsugarahhoneyhoney not sure if I explained very clearly sorry as my head was (and still is?) very muddled.
He didn’t want me to see them initially but he showed me the messages on WhatsApp which cover 1 week. He told me they’ve been talking since June.
I asked where the other messages were and he said they were on TikTok but that he’d already got rid of the account, which is when the WhatsApp conversation started.
I asked to see the other, earlier, messages on TikTok but he won’t let me/says they’ve been deleted.

@OVienna I was hoping to be able to post a better update…I honestly don’t know

@LilacRaven I know, not what I was expecting to see either.

Or maybe women have realised that they don't need to put up with their husbands having 'flirty banter' with other women outside of their marriage.

If men don't want to lose their relationships, they should do better.

There are worse things for a woman to be than single.

@GreenFields07 I also think there is more to it.
It’s the only conclusion that I keep arriving at, given that he is unwilling to prove otherwise.
Part of me hoped that, as he’d admitted the mutual flirtation, he would just let me see the rest so that I could know the full extent and whether or not we could move forward.