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Original poster

DH, Ex Girlfriends and Facebook

60 replies

TinaSparkles · 25/11/2009 21:10

I've been on Facebook for over a year and on Sunday my DH decided to join so I set him up with an account suggesting lots of people we both know. I was logged into his new a/c to keep an eye on who his friends were on the Sunday and he made a lighthearted comment about me prying on him and I said I wouldn't go into his account personally because everthing I would need to see would be on his profile from my own login. On Sunday night he went on to search for people he knew through work and university etc.

So on Monday I had a nose at who his new friends were and - lo and behold - one of the first to come up was his ex-girlfriend from Uni. He's only mentioned her a few times when we first started seeing each other, 10 years ago, and from what he says they were still friends but split after she was seeing someone else, behind his back, though everyone else knew. From what I can tell she lives far away and they've never been in touch since they graduated.

I know logically that she was one of the group of friends at uni and the I myself have been curious about past boyfriends, but I still feel a wee bit hurt that he got back in touch and she responded to friend request so quickly.

He hasn't mentioned her to me but it's preying on my mind so much that I;ve now looked her up on twitter (can't get onto her profile) and decided that she is so much more interesting than me and that DH will be at the least intrigued by her and at worse, who knows.

Has anyone else felt this sort of chasm? I don't want to be all paranoid but at the same time I think my sense of hurt is understandable. Our relationship has been very strong but I still feel uneasy that he's wanted to get back in touch and that her life is now open to him.

OP posts:

thesunshinesbrightly · 26/11/2009 01:53

Thank god it's not just me who thinks that, thought i was going too get flamed.

My ex used too check up too see what i was doing and it is awful and you feel like you have done something wrong even though you havent.

lou33 · 26/11/2009 02:09

checking out your past is not wrong

UnquietDad · 26/11/2009 09:40

The internet is a tool. You can't blame the tool. People are either inclined to go checking out exes or they are not.

Is that a "surrounded by idiots" tone too?

nigelslaterfan · 26/11/2009 11:30

Yes, fairly so, imho.

I'm not blaming the internet; the internet is in itself, of course, morally neutral. But the opportunities it offers do have moral implications. I assume that in your Dawkins inspired universe the use of the word 'moral' is probably akin to some mad affectation like the wearing of a hideous bonnet in a built up area. But maybe other people don't see the world in exactly the way you do, and maybe they are not necessarily wrong either.

That's my only observation. Blaming the internet itself is like Jen in the IT Crowd being worried about dropping it. Of course the agent of the activity is neutral. Imo, that goes without saying.

BitOfFun · 26/11/2009 11:37

Erm, atheists do have morals you know!

I agree that the internet facilitates cheating though.

nigelslaterfan · 26/11/2009 11:45

Of course they do! I wasn't making a religious argument really. I was just anticipating what UQD might say in response. I've wrangled with him in the past and he appears to think he is simply right about these issues as does Dawkins. And that people who don't understand are unenlightened and ill educated.
I like to think that in certain cases different things can be true for different people and that science does not provide the world's only illumination.

abedelia · 26/11/2009 11:47

"I assume that in your Dawkins inspired universe the use of the word 'moral' is probably akin to some mad affectation like the wearing of a hideous bonnet in a built up area."

Riiiight... . I am an atheist, so just because I don't believe someone is faffing about up in the sky keeping a beady eye on me, ready to strike me down if I step out of line, obviously I live in a moral vacuum where other people's thoughts, lives, feelings and opinions matter not. Just off to strangle some small animals, then...

(PS OP, I have a handful of exes on Facebook, so does H. As long as you are open about it and don't spend half your time on there then there is nothing to worry about. On the other hand, if he is often hiding away and clearing his history on the internet then worry away.)

Lizzylou · 26/11/2009 11:58

NSF, women could find their exes on FB too, not just feckless men.

Op, it's nothing to worry about, agree with UQD.

mrsjammi · 26/11/2009 12:01

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

VinegarTits · 26/11/2009 12:14

FGS dont you trust him? he probably got intouch with an old uni friend then they have recommended other friends to him and she was one of them

What does it matter anyway? if hes the type to cheat, he will do it anyway, stop looking at his FB, you cant control who he adds as a friend

EldritchCleaver · 26/11/2009 13:19

Don't worry about her FB profile. The better it is, the more likely she's an immature sad loon. I mean, who has time to craft their FB profile, really? (Mine's crap, heh heh)

My foul SIL has the best FB page ever. You have to know her to know what selective, misleading self-serving cock it all is. Apart from my wedding photos, that is. Which she put up there without telling me.

MissMarjoribanks · 26/11/2009 13:46

Seriously, don't worry about this. The person I correspond most with on FB is my ex. We went out with each other when we were in 6th form and have remained friends since for over a decade now (including attending eachother's weddings, etc) - FB is simply the easiest way of keeping in touch.

The only thing that has been rekindled (after a discussion about gigs we have known) is a desire to get all my vinyl out of the loft and listen to music I've not heard for many years .

My DH is not in the slightest bit bothered. He wanders into the computer room, asks me who I'm talking to (out of curiosity - might be someone he wants me to say hello to for him) and wanders out again. I married him, not my ex.

Oh, and we both clear the history on the internet browser regularly. BIL is very religious and uses our computer frequently. He would be a bit about some of the things we look at, which are actually IMHO, pretty tame.

Biobytes · 26/11/2009 13:49

Most of my exes are in my Facebook friends list, we spend the time cooing at each other's child(ren)

UnquietDad · 26/11/2009 14:21

nigelslaterfan, what on earth is the purpose f bringing up digs like "Dawkins inspired universe", whatever that means, and trying to imply that these things happen because atheists don't have a proper moral code? I am in awe at your stupidity.

BlingLoving · 26/11/2009 14:27

Also you're making assumptions that he immediately chased her out. Far more likely that he was adding friends from uni and her name then came up as a friend suggestion as they immediately had lots of mutual friends or she saw him come up on one of their mutual Uni friends lists and then added him. I almost never actually go searching for someone to add to facebook. Mostly it just kind of happens - proving that the premise on which social networking sites work is, in fact, correct ie that there's a network you can tap into. I just sent a friend request to a woman I know through lots of mutual friends because I noticed that DH was tagged in a photo of a party we'd all been to on the weekend and I'd spoken to her at the event and we'd talked about me sending her some info ... which clearly I'd forgotten to do until I saw the facebook newsfeed at which point I added her and then sent her the info.

As UQD points out (and him and I have agreed at length on this before) Facebook is just a tool and you shouldn't read more into it than there needs to be.

UnquietDad · 26/11/2009 14:34

Some people seem to think there was no infidelity before the existence of social networking sites.

Rates of infidelity may have gone up in this decade (I don't have any stats to hand)... If they have, then it's likely to be one of those situations, yet again (one sees them so often on here) where people see a loose correlation and confuse that with causation.

More likely, of course, that people are no more or less unfaithful than they used to be, but you only really start noticing it when it happens to you. It's what I like to call the "newspaper article writer syndrome" (i.e. article on theme of "have you noticed how X is happening more and more?", because it has happened to 3 or 4 of the writer's friends in succession).

harimosmummy · 26/11/2009 14:37

I really don't see the problem.

My Ex BF from Uni is my friend on FB... He is not a threat in any way shape or form to DH. None whatsoever.

My relationship with Ex BF was well over before I met DH...

In fact, most of my friends are friends with past partners. In fact, one friend whose Ex isn't on FB but his missus is is friends with her....

I really don't get the problem.

wannaBe · 26/11/2009 14:42

you sound very controlling. "I was
logged into his new a/c to keep an eye on who his friends were" wtf? Can you imagine if a woman was writing about her dh doing this? The responses would almost certainly range from "he's controlling" to "leave him."

Just because he's got in touch with an ex on fb doesn't mean that he's going to go out and shag her. Facebook is a good tool for finding people from the past, most likely he found people from the past and she was one of them.

Dh and I both have ex's on facebook, but apart from a couple of messages at the point of adding as friends, neither of us have actually spoken to them.

This notion that people can tell their partners who they can and cannot be friends with, either in rl or online makes me very

And "people with 250 friends and minute-by-minute status updates
have no actual life to speak of." is spot on imo. Let's be honest - no-one actually has that many friends, they're just names on a list for the sake of peing perceived as popular. And as for the minute-by-minute status updates of people, generally no-one cares.

ilovemydogandmrobama · 26/11/2009 14:47

Part of the confusion on FB is that the people on there are not your friends. I speak to my friends, or the ones who are in the US, I email them.

Some people collect friends on FB, so don't take it personally about your DH's ex being a 'friend.'

or you could always invite her to be a friend of yours

Bramshott · 26/11/2009 14:55

Why would you NOT have an ex on Facebook?! I have plenty of people on my Facebook who I know a darn sight less well than any ex-boyfriend!

MorrisZapp · 26/11/2009 14:58

Totally agree with unquietdad. FB isn't at fault, people are.

Having said that, I've got no issue with people looking up their exes. I do it all the time. It's curiosity - I want to know what they're up to now.

I don't tell DP about it and likewise I don't ask him if he looks up his exes.

I do think one problem though with FB is that women will always upload the best, most flattering picture of themselves that they own - including me. So when you see his ex on there she looks like a goddess, but that isn't the 'real' her, it's her one brilliant photo.

Aussieng · 26/11/2009 15:00

Tina, I have sympathy. If one of my DH's first actions on FB was to look up an old GF (especially one who had broken up with him rathern than vice versa) then I might be a little thrown too so I don't think you're unique in feeling this way.

However I think your DH was a little damned if he did and damned if he didn't. If he had contacted all his old mates but her it would have looked as if perhaps he was still too hurt to contact her.

Just tell him that you were surprised that one of the fist friends he contacted on FB was his ex and see what he says.

FWIW, DH and I have each others FB passwords/email passwords and computer log ins etc and I often check his texts (just because I'm nosy and his job is fascinating) but it also means that when he forgets to tell me that his boss is coming over to work I can ensure that my knickers are not lying around waiting to be ironed! No room whatsoever for distrust or silly ideas taking root and I don't undrstand why anyone would think it is wrong in a relationship to access other people's mail etc - it seems sensible and normal to share such things to me - not "controling".

harimosmummy · 26/11/2009 15:07

FFS! Are you really saying that there has to be protocol of who you contact and in what order?

And where do you draw the line? If he contacts another woman, are you immediately going to think that he WANTED to go out with her? God, you would drive yourself mental!!

I, actually, also often check DH's e-mails and texts because he's mad busy and half the time he forgets to tell me things (things he would call mundane, but do need to be sorted, IYSWIM)

But, you know, for a relationship to work, each partner must be free to do what they believe to be right. If you don't have that level of trust in your partner, then I think you have a problem!

MorrisZapp · 26/11/2009 15:19

Each to their own but I'd rather be single than be in a relationship with shared passwords, email accounts etc.

I am me, not half of us.

wannaBe · 26/11/2009 15:50

for me the difference is between being able to access something and actually accessing it.

I leave my computer switched on with my email open, leave my mobile lying around, dh knows my passwords purely because for him they're easy enough to guess. I have nothing to hide and he could check if he wanted to.

But if he did I would want to know why he felt the need to, iyswim.

He opens all the post because most of it is bills anyway and we have joint bank account etc so I see no issue with that. But deliberately logging into someone's email/facebook/deliberately reading their texts shows intent and is imo a sign of insecurity. Why would you need to spy on your dh?

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