When you fall in love, there might be a part of you that wants to share everything with your partner. You dream of building a life together, purchasing a home to share and adopting a couple of adorable dogs from the local shelter.
But even if you’re head over heels in love and married, you still deserve to have some privacy from your partner. One man recently reached out to Reddit looking for advice after he found out just how closely his wife had been monitoring him. Below, you’ll find the full story, as well as some of the replies concerned readers shared.
Everyone is entitled to privacy, even if they’re married
Image credits: 1footage / envato (not the actual photo)
This man began wondering how much he could trust his wife after realizing how closely she’s been keeping tabs on him
Image credits: Image-Source / envato (not the actual photo)
After confronting his wife, the man shared a couple of updates on his situation
Image credits: [deleted]
Spouses don’t need to monitor every single move that their partner makes
The first red flag that the man in this story noticed was that his wife had been getting notifications every time that he spent money. While this didn’t bother him, and it is important for couples to be honest about finances, it’s not necessarily the best arrangement for a married couple to have.
When it comes to how much a person needs to know about their spouse’s finances, Scott Rick, Associate Professor of Marketing at the University of Michigan, says it’s probably not necessary to know everything.
He writes for The Conversation that having a joint account can be great for couples who want to know exactly what their partner is purchasing, and it can be a great way to build trust in a relationship.
But Rick argues that too much transparency can actually be a bad thing. It can sometimes lead to arguments over inconsequential things, such as “wasting money on a $5 latte when you could have just made coffee at home.”
Many spouses also have hobbies that their partner doesn’t necessarily understand. So they might think an $80 paintbrush is a ridiculous purchase, while the painter knows that they’ll get plenty of use out of it. Instead, Rick encourages couples to be “translucent, not transparent” when it comes to money.
However, the wife in this story wasn’t only tracking finances; she also had an eye in her husband’s camera roll. While we have no way of knowing whether or not she was tracking even more of her husband’s activities, we do know that some people take monitoring their partner a step further.
Spying on your spouse is much more likely to create issues than solve them
The BBC notes that “stalkerware,” or software used to spy on a partner, is a frightening real thing. It can be installed on a person’s phone to give their partner access to their messages and screen activity, track their location and sometimes, even listen in on calls.
It’s understandable to be curious from time to time about what your partner is up to or what they might have on their phone, but spying is a huge invasion of privacy that is likely to only create more issues in the relationship. The Breeden Law Office notes that spying is problematic in relationships because it implies that you think your partner is hiding something. However, that doesn’t mean that they actually are.
If your suspicions turn out to be false and your partner catches you monitoring their phone or tracking their location, you can obliterate the trust in your relationship in an instant. And even if your partner is cheating, if you find out that information illegally by spying on them, that might destroy your case in divorce proceedings.
If you really want to know if your partner is keeping secrets or has anything suspicious on their phone, simply have a conversation with them. They might be able to quickly put your fears to rest, and the two of you can move on. But if they can’t assure you that nothing’s going on, at least you won’t have to feel guilty about how you received that information.
We would love to hear your thoughts on this situation in the comments below, pandas. How would you react if you were in this man’s shoes? Then, you can find another Bored Panda article discussing similar marital issues right here.
Readers warned the husband that his wife’s behavior is extremely concerning, and potentially even be dangerous
