A
female
age
41-50,
anonymous
writes:I feel funny about a situation that came up with my boyfriend last night but I am not sure how to handle it.Last night my boyfriend (of 3 months) was texting a friend and when i walked near him, he quickly moved the phone so I couldn't read it.I asked jokingly " you have something to hide?" and he says I am just having a private conversation. I didn't ask anything else but he decided to prove he had nothing to hide and showed me his phone. he starts to engage me in introducing me to who he texts and some of his friendships and as he scrolls down, something catches my eye. It says " hi, I know you don't remember me, but i think you are the most beautiful girl I have ever met." I look at the date and it is just 4 weeks ago. he opens up the text, and willingly says , oh yeah, this summer I met this girl at a bar and we hung out for an hour. He then shows me her picture, "look at her, isn't she just beautiful."At that moment, i knew I didn't feel comfortable. I expressed to him that sharing this didn't make me feel good and he went on saying that he was just going through his texts and saw her and decided to tell her so that he could feed her ego. He has no relationship with her and the last time he texted her, it was 6 months ago. I keep on telling him that it feels hurtful and kind of strange but he seemed more interested in defending his position and regretting that he showed me his phone.He kept on telling me how she means nothing to him, which seemed to even make me feel worse, b/c I kept on thinking, if she means nothing, then why reach out to her to make her feel good?I don't know what it is that bothers me, but it feels more like hurt and less like feelings of jealousy. This morning he apologized for unintentional hurt he caused, but said that he wasn't apologizing for his actions as making people feel good is part of who he is. I would have believed him if he had other texts of men and women that he had written that were loaded with compliments.I feel stuck not knowing what to do moving forward. I feel like making random strangers happy is more important to him than prioritizing our own relationship.But I also can't tell if i am over-reacting and this is just what men do. Should I just be glad that he isn't hiding things from me and remind myself that it is me he loves and wants to be with? He is the one who has been pushing for a monogamous relationship and I had agreed to be in one. In my mind, that means I shut off cultivating relationships with others. Anyone else run up against this? how did they handle it? Any guidance would be great!
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female
reader, So_Very_Confused +, writes (15 January 2013):
 My ex-husband would do it because he needed the ego stroke back from others that he was desirable.
he would then tell them "I love you" and I would find these texts and say "you're married you can't say that" and he would say "as a friend" I love them as a friend. Well NO they DON'T know that.
I could not get him to see i needed to be the most important person on his life and worrying about how strange single women who wanted to bang him felt, was not in his best interest if he wanted to stay married.
In the end what happened was I determined that truly I was NOT enough for him. He did not love me enough.... and he didn't understand that he didn't. He really thought it was enough love what he felt for me.
What ended up happening for us was I met a man (my now husband) and my ex husband could not cope with my having a friend on the side... it was not about sex and he learned that emotional cheating hurts worse than physical cheating. At least in my book. We were in an open marriage but that was about sex not emotional cheating and he was emotionally cheating and could not see that.
He ended up leaving me because he was truly not happy and used my being friends with the other guy as a reason.
A
female
reader, Audry09 +, writes (15 January 2013):
For once I don't think your over reacting. I mean yeah you did ask him to show you his phone so you had to be prepared for something like this. But one thing that everyone needs to understand is that when you are in a relationship you need to set some boundaries. There's a difference between being nice to someone and disrespecting your partner. I'm sure you have complimented other guys. So ask yourself how would he react if he found a text on your phone to some random guy say he was the most handsome guy you had ever met? He wouldn't feel too happy would he? Talk to him. Tell him that if he wants to be exclusive (which like you said was his idea) he needs to learn that there are boundaries that come along with being in a relationship. There's nothing wrong with complimenting others but as long as is in a friendly matter. To a girl is really important to feel like she's everything the guy always wanted so it's hurtful when you see such things. He needs to respect you and your relationship.
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A
female
reader, kirra07  +, writes (14 January 2013):
Yup, when I met my now husband, he was a flirt. He had many female friends and would tell them exaggerated things to make them feel good, calling them sexy goddess and hot stuff, etc, even if they were not. I explained that 1) that is unnecessary to be telling others - there's a difference between a nice friendly genuine comment like "that's a nice haircut" or "I really like your dress" to telling a stranger she is the most beautiful person he has ever seen. That just seems like something aimed at getting her to like him and date him. Also, 2) it shows extreme disrespect to one's partner when someone does this. When they go around complimenting other girls, it makes others think and wonder whether this person is a faithful partner and respects their partner.
Being in a monogamous relationship doesn't mean that you need to shut off cultivating relationships with others. It just means that you need to be aware of and respectful of boundaries with others. Like not going on one-on-one dates with other men, not leading others on, etc.
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