A
female
age
41-50,
anonymous
writes:I was with my BF of two years the other day and he saw that I received a few texts. The battery died on my phone and as soon as it recharged he saw I had three texts waiting to be read.He seemed very interested in my texts from the moment he saw them. It was him who told me I had a few texts. I was not going to check them at that moment. I said I could check them later so that I could maximize my time with him, not be rude etc. But he grabbed my phone and asked if I would like him to read them to me. I said it's okay, that I would check them later. But he started reading them to me. Told me I got this one from so and so and this one from so and so and then started to read them individually. I have nothing to hide but one was from a girlfriend and the conversation was between her and I, not for him to read.WHY would he do something like this? He doesn't trust me? I have never given him reason.Was he wrong to do this? Should I let it slide?
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (25 March 2015): Thanks YouWish.
He is kind of paranoid sometimes. He accused me today of following him home the other night. I did not. I am not sure why he would do this?
Hope it does not get worse.
Will have to see what happens.
Thank you for caring. :)
A
female
reader, YouWish  +, writes (25 March 2015):
 Good, I'm glad he's not hurting you. That's a relief.
Yes, not only lock your cell phone, but change ALL passwords. Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, your email, your Paypal, Ebay, bank balances, instagram, snapchat, any program where you communicate with others needs a new password. Change the password of your cell phone account as well as the Cloud if you're on it too. Someone with trust issues will dig and dig and not stop.
If he's clinical, then this is actually good for him to break free from the constant surveillance. The last guy I heard of who had clinical trust/obsession went so far as to secretly add video recorders to the house.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (24 March 2015): Hello Cindy and YouWish,
Thank you for your advice.
YouWish, no he has never tried to hurt me physically. Not even once. I do not fear for my safety with him. He is not violent.
I think I will lock my phone and change my password and there is no need to tell him.
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A
female
reader, YouWish +, writes (23 March 2015):
Thanks Cindy. :)
OP, you asked "Should I let it slide?"
To be specific, do not make any speeches. Don't bring attention to what he did. Simply change all passwords, security codes, and PINS and lock your phone. Say nothing to him about him grabbing your phone UNLESS he comes to you after you lock everything and squawks about it. THEN you tell him that it's for his own good, and that if he can't even control himself from grabbing your phone to rifle through it, he needs to get MORE professional help.
If his jealousy and controlling behavior make you fear for your safety, you need to get the hell out of the relationship. Why are you in it to begin with if he's treated you like this to the point of it being a clinical issue?? Has he hurt you?
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A
female
reader, CindyCares  +, writes (23 March 2015):
 Ah then it's all another story, if he always was jealous and controlling. And you KNEW already the answer to your own question : he read aloud your messages, even if you told him not to.... because he is ( pathologically ? ) jealous and controlling.
It's good that he realized he has a problem and sought help for it, but apparently there's still lots of work to be done. In the meantime, follow srep by step YouWish's advice and do NOT enable him, you would not be doing him any favour.
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A
female
reader, YouWish +, writes (23 March 2015):
CHANGE YOUR PASSWORD and LOCK YOUR PHONE.
You cannot feed a trust issue, especially if he's gotten professional help to deal with it. You're actually harming him mentally by feeding into it by furnishing your passwords to him. I guarantee he's looking at all of your stuff. I change my advice when I said "what he wouldn't outright snoop and do anyways". Your follow-up tells me that he's not only snooping, he's doing it CONSTANTLY and couldn't wait for you to be out of the room, so he made up the story and then just took the phone. Trust me, he would have snuck that phone away the moment your back was turned.
Change all of your passwords to something he can't guess. Lock up your phone. If he protests, tell him he's a jealousy addict under a doctor's care, and you won't enable him. If he has an issue with that, it's HIS to deal with. If he breaks up with you over it, then GOOD. Controlling and jealousy can be dangerous things, and if he's gotten professional help to deal with them, I have to tell you that that makes me nervous, as in people who are stalkers who get restraining orders or who commit crimes or harm their partners are the ones who get professional help.
LOCK UP EVERYTHING. You can't indulge his insecurity by opening your privacy. That is harmful to him AND YOU. Don't feed that. He's reading everything you get if he can get access to it. If you don't believe me, then don't ANNOUNCE you're changing everything. Say NOTHING and then just change the passwords to all of your social media, email, phone, everything. Do it on your own when he's not there, and just wait. Also, change your security questions as well so he can't guess what they are. Make up something he wouldn't know. I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't try to slyly ask what the make and model of your first vehicle or your best friend in high school's name is. One way to handle those questions is to answer them, but spell them backwards. Example - if your first make of a vehicle is a Toyota, then enter "atoyot", and do it for friend names, city of birth, pet names, etc. You should do that anyways because people have big mouths in social media and say too much when it comes to security info. Who hasn't posted a pic of their beloved pet or friended a best friend from yesteryear OR their mom who posted her maiden name in parenthesis to connect with her high school, not realizing that credit card companies use that info for a security check.
If your boyfriend were a recovering alcoholic, would you put out the bottles for him on the table in the interest of openness? NO! You'd lock them up or better yet, you'd not drink in the home or around him. Same with someone trying to quit smoking. Would you light up in front of him and offer him a cigarette? No way! You'd hide or get rid of them! Addiction to opiates? You'd lock up the pain meds in a safe, right? Not offer him an Oxy in the name of Better Bonding.
Likewise, his drug is YOUR PERSONAL INFO. It's compulsive to the point where he's grabbing your phone. If he's had professional help with jealousy and trust issues, what he did, he knows she should not have done. LOCK. YOUR. PHONE.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (23 March 2015): Hello, it's the OP.
Thanks for taking the time to answer my question everyone.
Some great insight.
Well, my BF is insecure, a bit possessive and can have a tendency toward being controlling and jealous. He used to have issues with jealousy but has since gotten professional help to deal with this problem.
This is why I am concerned about his looking at my texts. His curiosity comes from a negative place. He has had past issues. He has been away and just got back. I wonder if he is worried I was up to no good while he was gone. But he has no reason not to trust me. I have never given him any.
I need my privacy too. I don't think he has a right to know everything even if we are in a relationship. Maybe his looking at the texts is his way of reassuring himself nothing bad is going on?
Funny how I received three texts and he seemed to be most concerned about the text from my ex husband. He did not read the others in detail, just skimmed them but tried to read my ex's in detail. We text for our children. As co-parents and nothing else. But he is insecure about my relationship with my ex husband because we are still on friendly terms and civil to one another, mostly for our children. Yes it does happen that ex's can be civil and mature without having any feelings!
He knows my password and I know his. No secrets. But I still think it wasn't up to him to take it on himself to read the messages, especially when I said I would read them later.
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A
female
reader, PeanutButter +, writes (21 March 2015):
 It is fine for couples for reading eachothers texts but in this manner it is total BS honestly. I would talk to him about it. I am married for 9 years and will read my husbnd's texts cause he haets to deal with people and I will let him read mine cause I have nothing to hide, but he won't cause he doesn't care. IF your man has that much of an issue, you need to talk!
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A
female
reader, CindyCares +, writes (20 March 2015):
Yes, maybe it is harmless but it's a bit strange isn't it ? I mean, MY texts nowadays are so lame that I could show them to the whole Dear Cupid community, no problem. That does not mean that I would WANT to do it, or choose to do it, even if most just say : we remind you your appointment at the dentist, or the hair salon.
Why ? because it's still my own business, and I still want to retain the choice between things I care to share and things I don't, and when.
If your bf is not and never was a jealous or controlling or meddlesome type ... maybe he is just a victim of the instant communicative gratification mentality,lol. I notice it's getting worse and worse. Once it used to be just teenagers who could not, simply coud NOT, keep a text to read for later at a more appropriate time. Now it's also adults and more and more of them, it's like a compulsion, anything that's sent must be received on the spot, anything that's written must be read immediately, it does not matter if you are at work, in bed, in church. Let's hope that surgeons can resist the urge to read their texts while they are cutting people open, but I would not bet even on that.
So perhaps your Bf just assumed that for you must be a pain nnot to read your messages right away and just wanted to take you out of your misery, he did not really believe you when you said " it can wait- it SHOULD wait ".
Harmless parhaps, still if you do not like it, SPEAK UP. Tell him loud and clear how do you feel about privacy. I am ( reasonably ) sure that you do not carry in your purse some letal weapon, or the severed hand of a corpse ; yet, this does not make it OK for anybody to open your purse and search it without your explicit invitation and consent.
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A
female
reader, Honeypie + ♥, writes (20 March 2015):
 I agree with YouWish on the lock, more for the SAFETY of your personal information then to avoid him "snooping".
And her analogy with the diary is good. People wouldn't expect their partner to let them go though their diary, so why is it so prevalent that people think it's OK to snoop on a partner's phone?
I actually asked my hubby about this (we were on the phone regarding another matter) and he said that would be ridiculous WHY would I do that?
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A
female
reader, YouWish +, writes (20 March 2015):
Have you ever heard the term "Crime of Opportunity"?
I'm guessing there was a *little* bit of curiosity and maybe the devil on his shoulder saw the opportunity to try to get him to indulge that insecurity, and he found a seemingly plausible excuse (yeah right..."I'll just read them to you"? hah!) to get away with what he wouldn't outright snoop and do anyways.
My question to you is - why don't you lock your phone?? I don't know why people don't do that especially with the financial apps with personal information floating about, for example, an iphone accesses the iCloud and iTunes which grants access to apps, games, music, and allows an unauthorized user to spend like a mad banshee. Never mind the bank apps where people can now pay using their iphone. Hell, phones are becoming more like wallets and certainly like diaries with the personal information and private correspondence it's used for.
LOCK your phone. And if he protests, ask him "You wouldn't ask to see my pocketbook or diary, right?" Just because one has a partner doesn't mean you forfeit privacy rights, and the idea of "If she has nothing to hide, she'll not have a problem with me looking through her texts" is complete crap. Like other people have said on here - sometimes the conversation is confidential.
I know for me - I WOULD let my husband get into my purse, and ONLY him. He couldn't care less about my phone and vice versa, but if he needed to get into it, I'd give him and ONLY him my code. But if he were a boyfriend or even a fiance, no dice. Heh, that's actually a point of argument between the two of us - I keep wanting him to lock the phone, and he keeps putting it off. Makes me nervous that his phone ISN'T locked.
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (20 March 2015): It can be normal and harmless, depending on the couple.
If you don't like it, then say so.
My rule of thumb is don't write things you wouldn't want him to read and I've never glad any problems. He has access to my phone whenever he wishes, but doesn't feel the need to rummage through. Same goes for me, I have access but don't feel the need to read his texts.
You come up with a system that works for you two
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A
female
reader, So_Very_Confused +, writes (20 March 2015):
 my idiot husband does that too. drives me nuts.
it has nothing to do with trust IMO it's just that my husband and I think that it's perfectly ok to have no secrets and we hide nothing.
IF he's stupid enough to read a text message to me from a friend bashing him, then that's on him.
IF you don't want him to do it, then he was wrong. IF your relationship is such that it's not an issue then he wasn't wrong.
My husband is not wrong to read my messages. I don't lock my phone just so he can get to it without trouble so that he does not feel like I am hiding stuff... I can read his phone or his email too...
If he gets upset that's on him.
IT's your call as a couple whether this is allowed or not.
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A
female
reader, Honeypie + ♥, writes (20 March 2015):
Why? It's hard to say why he would do that, but I would tell him that you don't want him to read your texts. Do you read his?
Is this a one time thing or has he done it before?
If it's a one time thing, I'd say NIP IT in the bud. If you don't he might start to feel entitled to going through your phone.
Was he wrong to do it? To me it wouldn't be a big deal if my hubby did it, there is absolutely nothing interesting in my texts (as I only use text for short little messages like "pick up milk" - "remember dentist @3pm"... not for conversations.
BUT with that said I find the action a bit patronizing. And I think you should have stood your ground.
Why not ask him what possessed him to go through your texts and how it made you feel?
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A
female
reader, MSA +, writes (20 March 2015):
 I don't think it's a matter of him not trusting you. It may be because after being together for two years, he feels you both are close enough that you don't mind.
If this bothers you, why not just tell him?
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