A
female
age
36-40,
anonymous
writes:My boyfriend and I have been dating for four years. We're stable and recently moved in with each other and we've never had trust issues (no concerns of cheating, etc). It's been an ongoing joke for a while now that once we move in together we should probably take the plunge and finally be Facebook friends, something we've never bothered to do in the past.I mentioned it to him the other day, though, and he said he doesn't think it's a good idea because Facebook can make problems in a relationship. I told him that personally, every single one of my Facebook friends is someone I know in real life and that I absolutely couldn't foresee any drama, because 1. I'm not that kind of Facebook user and 2. even when he and I have had fights we're the type of people who like to be discreet. He still refused to be Facebook friends, though, so I suggested he just pull up his profile and let me see it, honestly just out of curiosity (what his pictures look like, etc, since both of us currently have our settings on private). Again, he absolutely refused, and I started to get annoyed. When I told him how ridiculous I thought he was being, and that I could care less about Facebook but that the fact that he wouldn't even let me see his page was incomprehensible to me, he said that if it bothered me he would delete the whole thing. That made me even angrier/ more confused. Obviously now I'm questing if there's something he's hiding, which I've never before been concerned about. And, if he indeed isn't hiding anything, can someone make sense of why he'd feel this way? I understand wanting privacy in a relationship, but the whole point of Facebook is to put yourself out into the world for people to see; it's one of the least private things a person can participate in. I just can't make sense of it.
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male
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): If you got trust issues he may feel like your trying to manage his life. One of my ex's was like this so i wouldnt let me into mine. Only because she wanted to keep check on me whilst doing what the hell she wanted privately.
A
female
reader, So_Very_Confused +, writes (11 January 2012):
 I'm on facebook and my fiance is not. I use it to communicate with folks and play a few games. nothing more or less. I let my fiance see anything he wants on the page because i'm not hiding anything.
I know facebook is a silly game basically but to be honest if he's hiding it from you and won't even let you see his page with him there... yep He's HIDING SOMETHING...
sorry to be a debbie downer... if everything else is good then perhaps he flirts online to stroke his ego (my ex did that... it was one of the reasons we ended our marriage)...
I know that folks think having secrets in a realtionship is ok... I DO NOT....
In my definition of cheating your man is cheating on you.
Cheating is defined as ANYTHING you can't won't or don't tell your partner. He won't tell you about facebook.. he is cheating you out of a part of his life.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): Big red flag. Don't mention it again so he doesn't edit his profile but get a friend he doesn't know to add him.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): After 4 years together and the fact you are committed and now live together but have never had trust issues in all that time..why do you even NEED to see his FB page?
Perhaps he feels its his space, where he can make 'lad' comments share lads stuff with his mates without being critisised or judged.?
Why not BOTH of you come off the site completely if it causes this much bother.Or, if your really concerned that he has something to hide, why haven't others alerted or hinted at you to whatever it is, you must have mutual friends who ARE on his friends list after 4 years together.........
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): I don't understand what the big deal is with him. You prob already know him enough that any complaining he does on fb you've prob already heard. My bf and I have been together almost 2 years. Fb almost destroyed us due to jealousy on my part with females sending my bf private messages. I would over react and he wouldn't think anything they said was wrong. I can tell you that after having long conversations with him on why it bothered me he now has my password and I his. Nothing is secret and I don't even log onto his to check. After 4 years the trust should be there.
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reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): I agree that fb can cause problems in a relationship depending upon what is going on. But I don't see why he should have any problem with you looking at his page unless he has something to hide there.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): OP, I think that you were the one who started and escalated this conflict. Had you gone about it differently, you might find him being more open to the idea of changing the status quo and finally becoming facebook friends. But now I doubt that's going to happen anytime soon because of how you handled this situation. It sounds like it wasn't a big deal to him but he was leaning more on the side of maintaining the status quo (which is what people by default tend to do if you suddenly spring a change on them), until you wouldn't let him be and instead turned this into an issue of "I am right, you are wrong" so of course he has to now defend his position, whatever it is, because you put him on the defensive."I mentioned it to him the other day, though, and he said he doesn't think it's a good idea because Facebook can make problems in a relationship.""I told him that personally, every single one of my Facebook friends is someone I know in real life and that I absolutely couldn't foresee any drama, ""He still refused to be Facebook friends, though, so I suggested he just pull up his profile and let me see it, honestly just out of curiosity""Again, he absolutely refused, and I started to get annoyed. When I told him how ridiculous I thought he was being,""fact that he wouldn't even let me see his page was incomprehensible to me, he said that if it bothered me he would delete the whole thing. That made me even angrier/ more confused. "So the pattern is that first you mention it casually. He said no he wants to continue not being facebook friends, which is the status quo that up til now YOU have gone along with willingly too. You wouldn't accept his answer and tried to reason with him. He kept to his position so then you demanded that he give in to you some by showing you his facebook. You were getting pushy. This can cause other people to now resist you not because they really care about the issue at hand, but because your behavior is offensive to them. He continue to stick to his position in the face of your pushiness. So then you became angry and insulted him, saying his point of view is "ridiculous". Now do you seriously expect him to be open and share with you willingly now?? You set up an antagonistic situation. So he tries to calm you down and keep the peace and say he will just delete his facebook. In response you get EVEN angrier. In short, I think that this truly wasn't such a big deal to start off with. I mean, the status quo is that you are not facebook friends, it's something you prior agreed to yourself, he's not suddenly changing on you. Then you decide it's time to change things up and proceeded to get all mad at him that he's not ready for that yet... You invalidated his point of view by saying his opinion is "ridiculous" , so I doubt he will now feel much more inclined to share his private thoughts and feelings with you if doing so means he gets shot down and insulted.You should apologize to him for being rude, pushy, and inconsiderate in that exchange. Then if he has accepted your apology, you can then try to explain where you are coming from, and why you would now like to become facebook friends, and why it means so much to you and for goodness sake truly LISTEN to what he is saying and what it means and dont' just invalidate what he wants and decide it means what you have decided it means.
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A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012):
Here's an idea:
Give up Facebook - or at least use it less often. Both of you.
I am not on it. My wife is. Our marriage got a lot better once she started logging into Facebook less often. Now she can go weeks between logins sometimes.
Her sister is on Facebook and Google+ etc. and all her postings talk about how she is lonely and miserable. Facebook is not a good facsimile for life.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): Big red flag! Is there any way you can access his profile on your own and see? Can you make a fake girl profile? Any of your friends have access to his profile? Find a way to access it.
You're between 26-29, why four years dating and no marriage? Perhaps he's hiding things from you. To me this would be a red flag, his private life should be shared if you are in a serious relationship.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): the way I see it is, it wasn't a problem until you made it into a problem.here is how Facebook can cause problems in a relationship even though there's no cheating.let's say one of his friends posts something and he comments. It may have nothing to do with other women, or you, but let's say you still don't like it and when you see it, it makes you annoyed at him because you don't like it. Let's say they are talking about politics (whatever!) and he gives his opinion that actually he likes this presidential candidate and you see it and you don't like it because you disagree with his views. Even though you may know full well how he sees it, just seeing him express his views may inspire you "do something" that makes him uncomfortable whether it be bringing it up to him later and then leading to an argument, or whatever.Or let's say his friend posts about buying a new car, and your bf comments saying "I wish I had a car like that too now" and you see it and you start to freak out because you have been having money problems and he promised he wouldn't spend money and you misinterpret his comments to his friends.Or let's say it DOES have to do with other women. Let's say one of his friends is interested in a girl, and your bf wants to comment that yeah she's attractive. You may see that and freak out even though whether or not he posted that comment that thought is still in his head so it doesn't change the status or security of your relationship just from the act of him commenting on something. but still it could upset you and inspire you to "take action" against him.or let's say you meet one another's families and he happens to not like some of your family and wants to make a comment on his facebook about how annoying it was to have to sit through Thanksgiving Dinner at your family's with your relatives making him annoyed. He can't express that to his friends if you're on his facebook, even if you do know that he feels this way you might still get mad at him.basically, there's a reason why on facebook you separate your contacts into different groups so that stuff you post to your friends don't also get seen by your grandma or your coworkers. So he would have to 'separate' you since you're advocating for him to have no privacy on facebook with you. But then this can create problems later because you may want to know why can't you be included in that other group of his contacts?So it's just better to avoid the whole facebook thing from the very beginning. Or to completely eliminate facebook from his life.The fact that he made his position clear and first you tried to get him to give up his position in favor of yours, and then got increasingly annoyed because he wasn't seeing things from YOUR perspective, suggests that maybe this is why he doesn't want to include you on his facebook. If you are doing it with this issue of facebook, you could also be doing it with other issues in the relationship where you and him disagree. And if that's the case, then of course he won't want you have access to his conversations with other people even if they are totally innocent. And it could have nothing to do with cheating or the potential for it.you're right that people do have a right to privacy in a relationship. So, what's your problem with allowing him his privacy on facebook?
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): The same exact thing happened with me and one of my ex boyfriends. That's pretty sketchy that he won't show you. But there could be many solutions to this:1. You can jump to conclusions and start freaking out on him and accuse him of cheating and hiding something. (I don't reccomend this cuz trust me, I did this and it didn't end out well)2. I'm sorry to say this..but snoop behind his back haha. Not like crazy and start going through his things but I mean maybe u can go through his facebook friends and see who exactly he's friends with that he might want to hide from youor3. Don't bring it up, ever. But start going on your account more in front of him and do EXACTLY what he's doing to you. This probably won't help very much but it can mess with his head which in my opinion i think is pretty funny. Then somehow he might confess in the end.Overall, this whole situation is soo annoying to go through. Some guys are just weird, in my opinion.
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female
reader, Ciar  +, writes (11 January 2012):
 The whole point of Facebook, for me, is to play FarmVille not socialise. The only people on my list are those who leave me alone and/or play FarmVille themselves. There are a lot of other games and it might be that your boyfriend plays one of them and simply doesn't want to be disturbed.
One explanation for his reluctance to show you his page is if he thought you were pushy about it (not that you were, but he might have felt his boundries intruded upon) and dug in his heels out of prinicpal.
I hate to jump to the conclusion that he is up to no good if everything was fine until this. Maybe leave it alone and see if he volunteers to show you.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): I would feel the same as you!!Maybe he flirts on facebook (though it may be harmless), I went out with someone once, who logged into fb on my computer, he had an email, he didn't want to open infront of me...ended up in a row over it, he said it was addressed to him, it was private etc, etc, I didn't understand why he wouldn't want to open it in front of me? (I was happy to open mine infront of him, even from someone I had a crush on when I was a teenager, being a bit flirty via an email (though I was happy with boyf at the time, so it meant nothing, and I didn't feel the need to hide it from him)I don't want to worry you, but I will be honest and say, yes it would bother me too...and if you have nothing to hide, why act like that?But you know him better than any of us, so maybe if you think he is just a really private person, and have no reason to suspect anything, you will just have to let it goI wouldn't though! I mean you are asking him to be facebook friends...you never even mentioned putting up relationship status'P.s. most couples I know in serious relationships, know each others password to stuff like that anyway!I believe your 'gut instinct' is always right, (I hope I am wrong) but womens intuition, gut instict etc seems to always prove me right unfortunately...(I really wish it didn't sometimes...sigh!!
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female
reader, person12345 +, writes (11 January 2012):
 Facebook is only a problem when people make it a problem. I.e. someone is making inappropriate comments to others, sending inappropriate messages, etc... Or when someone purposefully hides things on it.
I think it's a pretty big red flag that he won't let you see it. If he's concerned about facebook being an issue then he shouldn't have one, period, not hide it from you. Something is fishy.
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reader, anonymous, writes (11 January 2012): Sounds like he's hiding something for sure. he probably has russian brides, flirts going on, collection of women. Probably been hiding the fact he was in a serious long term relationship and his guy buds supported his sneaking around. He might even subscribe to scantily clad photos of the day, suicide girls,ect and knows you might disapprove.
An honest man wants to share as much as he can with the one he loves. My Fiance added me after not seeing me for 3 days and he needed as much sources of ME he could get ASAP.
Of course he had to clean up his FB but he didnt care. He had me.
So the BF has some odd behaviour indeed. I'm a very honest, open gal myself that my teens have my FB pw and I theirs. Nothing to hide.
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female
reader, Denise32 +, writes (11 January 2012):
 Why does this matter so much?
Speaking of taking the plunge, have you thought about getting married now that you've moved in? (not that living together is necessarily a prerequisite for marriage, anyway).
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