Could you walk away from a relationship, based on suspicions?

It sounds like a recipe for disaster in the future. I’d make my plans (secretly, ha!) and go, with or without an explanation.

It depends on the relationship. If it was someone I was dating and there were other things going on, I’d leave. If there weren’t any other things going on, I’d try talking to my significant other to see what’s going on. Then decide what to do from there.

Now that I’m married, if I had a suspicion about my husband, I’d talk to him about it. If everything else was going great, I wouldn’t leave. I’d try to figure out why I was feeling suspicious and go from there. If we were having other problems, we would need to figure out what was going on in our marriage and go from there.

You can leave a relationship for any reason. It is a very personal matter.

You need to weigh the issues; I don’t see how you can get on really well and be really suspicious at the same time.

I’ve been with my boyfriend for nearly 6 years. We get on great, i can probably count the arguments on one hand. He is such a private person though, and I am very suspicious about that. I’m not private, I would share anything, and not be bothered in the slightest if he went in any of my drawers, wardrobes, bags, checked my phone, couldn’t care less. Whereas he is the opposite. He always has been like that.

You asked essentially the same question a week ago and got thoughtful and detailed answers
.
http://www.fluther.com/159631/am-i-just-being-stupid-here/

You are going to hear the same suggestions here. Have you been listening?

I am no longer sure what it is you want to hear.

It may be that he will get tired of your suspicions, particularly if they are groundless, and choose to be the one to leave.

Reading through your other question, I have one question for you.

Are you happy? I mean really, truly happy?

You mention making lists of things you need to change about yourself, but why? Do you think changing who you are will make you happy? Do you think changing who you are will change him? You mention that he;s a very private person and always has been. That is who he is. If you can’t accept that side of him, it may be best for the both of you to move on.

@Seaofclouds Difficult question really. I am happy with us, he is a wonderful man, and we get in great, we are so alike and I really do love him. I don’t want to change him, I want to change me. I don’t want to be suspicious, but I don’t want to be naive either. How did I know the problem is me and that my suspicions aren’t based on something. Contradicting myself I know. I’m struggling to explain.

@Headhurts you already suspect that he is talking to his ex-girlfriend, and you are pretty certain that he was looking at pictures of her, because you found his “recent activity” with the time and date showing that someone looked at pictures of his ex (and it wasn’t you, so it must have been him unless someone else sneaked into the house and looked). Then he told you that he did not look at them. This whole situation is a problem on many fronts.

Even when people “get on great” as you have suggested, you need to figure out what that really means. In my book, people that get on great communicate well, are not secretive and have no reasons to be jealous, because the other person doesn’t do things to instill jealousy. Just because he doesn’t hit you or yell at you, doesn’t mean you get on great.

For me, it would be a huge problem if my mate was super secretive and private all the time. I would only want to be with someone who wanted to share his thoughts and feelings and possessions with me. I would need to be in a relationship where there was pretty much equal give and take. That’s not to say that relationships are always 100% equal, people are different, but there has to be a pretty good balance. Your relationship with your boyfriend does not have balance.

If the relationship started out like this, why did you continue to stay with him for 6 years? I probably would have left a long time ago. Just because you two don’t fight or have arguments, doesn’t mean that there isn’t a problem within the relationship. If there is not good communication, there’s not a good relationship, IMO.

And speaking of lack of communication, you aren’t really being honest with him about your mental illness. He only has a limited view (the tip of the iceberg if you will) about your situation. You even admitted that you didn’t want to show him these threads, so you’re not exactly sharing everything with him either. Plus, it seems like you are not taking the proper steps to help yourself either.

Re-read what you and we have discussed on your Other Question There is plenty of information about how and where you can get help, but nothing will help if you don’t actually take the steps. Otherwise, you can keep on asking basically the same question over and over and over here on Fluther and continue to get the same kinds of answers.

We all know (by now) that part of your jealousy and insecurity towards your boyfriend is being fueled by your mental illness, but part of it is actually warranted, because he probably did lie to you (but I think he only lied to you so he wouldn’t hurt your feelings) and partly due to the fact that he is so secretive. This is a bad combination.

At this point, if I were in your situation, I would ask this guy to join me in couples counseling or break up with him, because this relationship has some major problems. Neither one of you sound like bad people, but there are clear problems (at least they seem clear to those of us on the outside looking in, and that’s based purely upon what you have told us) and those problems are not being attended to. If he didn’t want to go to couples counseling, I would probably break up with him, because he would be, in essence, telling me that our relationship wasn’t worth saving or fixing.

You keep talking about needing to change yourself, what you really need to do is change how you deal with situations, with your own mental illness, with how you react to his explanations, with how you figure out whether to stay with him or to go, with whether you take steps to solve the problems rather than just agonizing over them and basking in self-loathing.

All of this would be so much easier if you just showed him these threads. You would know instantly whether or not he was willing and able to work with you to either break up (because you might not be a good match) or work with you to get you some help and change the way he communicates (he doesn’t right now) with you. Or you, yourself can continue to be secretive by not showing him these threads and your situation will just circle around and around. Fluther is a great place to get some ideas and to get a kick start, but if you don’t actually take the steps, then nothing we can say or do will be of much use.

I wish you the best of luck.

“Could you walk away from a relationship, based on suspicions?”

Oh hell yes. If there is something to it, then they’ve got problems to work out without me. If there isn’t anything to it, then I’ve got problems that I need to work out without them.

Either way, suspicions are problematic, irregardless if they are true or not.

I am just like your SO. I relish quiet, don’t respond to unnecessary conflict, am not duplicitous, have nothing in my background that I am ashamed of, and am a very, very private person. But I am also attentive and extremely affectionate, I just don’t talk a lot. I will explain myself to my SO if she needs it to feel comfortable, but I find interrogation extremely annoying. People get to know me at a speed in which I control, not them. I got this way over years of enjoying the freedom of living alone. If my SO ever searched my bags, computer, went through my phone logs, or anything like that behind my back, I would remove myself and all my things from the house without explanation while she was away and I would never feel bound to ever speak to her again. I’ve done it and it felt good when I did. This is my solution to any deep breach of trust in a relationship.

These situations are hard. I would let him know you are feeling insecure and why. Then give him the opportunity to work it out with you because he’s committed – if not, end it. If you end it, take the time to stay single and really focus on yourself, and work through your issues.

I know that I couldn’t live under the kind of suspicion that you are describing. To me, the question is, What if the worst is true? What would that mean for you, emotionally? Would it actually feel worse than the torment you are putting yourself through right now? I honestly don’t think that it would. And so, I would have to dismiss the suspicion to stay in the relationship. Really dismiss it. Let it go. Let events unfold as they will – you can’t control them anyway, and worrying about it can only do you harm. You will probably be surprised to find that he is actually faithful to you.

If you can’t let the suspicion go, and just trust your partner, perhaps it is better for both of you if you leave. You are in control of your own peace of mind, and you are in control of what you choose to do – but you simply can’t be in control of what he does. If you can’t handle that, you probably shouldn’t be in a relationship.

@figbash Thank you. I don’t want to leave him. It’s just hard to tell the difference between imagination and reality.

@Kardamom I didn’t say he’s been talking to her?

@glacial Thank you. I think maybe you are right. I don’t believe he would actually physically cheat on me. I know my head isn’t normal, I just have determine real from fiction I think.

@Headhurts that was all you took from what I and the others have said? That you didn’t say he was talking to her? I think you suspect that he has. You want to quibble with semantics? That was the only thing you took away from these conversations?

What about the other hundred or so other things we have all suggested that you try (on this question and all of the others), to help you either see things clearly, to help you get assistance with your mental health, to help you make a calm decision about whether to stay with your boyfriend or to leave him, to figure out what a good and healthy relationship is like. I don’t see you responding to those issues.

@Headhurts To be completely honest, I think maybe you should end this relationship. I don’t believe you are in a good place (mentally) to have a healthy and happy relationship right now. Perhaps you should take a break from him. Spend some time on yourself – work on those insecurity issues, otherwise they are always going to be there. You may love him, but your situation is tough and your relationship appears to have a lot of unresolved issues. I think your mental health is more important!

If you are suspicious you can’t be happy. A moment of suspicion once in while is one thing. When I say oncein a while I mean with months or years in between. If in general you feel suspicious or he has very different privacy rules for a relationship than you do, I really can’t see how you can be happy. But, I am basically saying that I know I would not be happy, and I am not you, so it is up to you to decide if you can live with someone like that for the rest of your life. I would leave. It doesn’t matter if he actually is cheating, what matters is his behavior makes me feel like he is, and that feels very unstable, lonely, and unloving to me. The symptoms for cheating are the same as the symptoms of someone who is contemplating cheating and of someone who is emtionally disconnected to some degree from their SO.

I personally could not live with someone who cared if I went into his bag to get something or logged onto his email if I needed information from it. What is on the email or in the bag that I cannot see? It’s not that my husband and I search each other’s stuff, but the once in a blue moon a circumstance comes up, it is no big deal. We tell each other we did it when it happens. Many times we tell the person ahead of time we need to do it for whatever the reason is. But, again, that is me. I think it is important the two people be matched in their privacy requirements, it is decided between the two people what the expectations are.

In all things deal with what people say and what people do. Don’t try to attribute motive because you will be wrong 87% of the time. And talk to your problem person not about them!
If you can’t get the Truth or what you want from that, walk away? some times a change occurs simply because of change.