I [F32] looked at my boyfriend's phone and found flirty

I went through my boyfriend's phone. It's not the first time. We dated for about a year and then we broke up. We're back together after 3 months and I wanted to check if he has actually changed, like he says he has, or whether he is still flirting and going out for solo dinners and drinks with other women.
There's this one beautiful woman that he works with, exactly his type, that he flirts with over text and that he keeps inviting to do things with him (like go out dancing). She always seems to cancel on him at the last minute, saying that she has to work late so maybe next time.
Anyway, I saw a text about a party that he invited her to last week. She bailed on him. He invited me the day before the party to go with him. I didn't know he had invited her before he invited me. It seems like because she couldn't go, he then invited me.
On the other hand, he tells me he loves me all the time and that he wants to build a live together. He also pursued me after 3 months of being apart. But something feels off. Why can't I trust him?

Probably because he doesn't seem to want to be monogamous. He could totally love you and at the same time think you are not enough to satisfy him. Also you shouldn't stoop to doing things behind his back if you can help it. Try to approach the situation cold (with no emotion) and see what you come up with.

How would I even begin to approach the situation without emotion? Also, how will I know he's making plans with other women if I don't look at his phone? It's not like he would ever tell me ...

Hey amyyyyblack,

I don't have any great advice, just some thoughts...

In an ideal world, we would just trust others. In a realistic world, we may not trust others. If it was only that simple none of us would need to go through a security check at the airport. There would just be two lanes. Honest people go through line A, dishonest through line B. That would be much better, if it worked.

I don't know what motivated you to look through his phone, and won't judge if it was right or wrong, but for whatever reasons you found what you suspected. Maybe your intuition was telling you, something is going on? Like you wrote, he would never tell you, and you are emotionally involved now, too late to view this without emotions.

I know my ex use to flirt with many other men. I tried to ignore it, but eventually was self-honest and realized I wasn't okay with it. In the end, that's the hard thing, to figure out what you are okay with.

All that written, GlibEpiphany could be right too. The rules of dating change over time, but he might also just be a serial emotional cheater. If that's not the type of relationship you want be honest with yourself for your own sake. He might really care about you, but he might also be someone who needs or wants validation from many others, and if that's hurting you, your feelings matter every bit as much as his.

amyyyyblack wrote:How would I even begin to approach the situation without emotion? Also, how will I know he's making plans with other women if I don't look at his phone? It's not like he would ever tell me ...

You got to trust someone. You don't trust him thats why you went through his phone behind his back. You also don't trust yourself that's why you felt the need to validate you suspicions and further instead of going with your knee jerk reaction you chose to ask others for their thoughts. My suggestion is that you TRUST yourself. If you think something is going on then your relationship has caused insecurity for some reason or another. The insecurity alone should be enough to justify action (try not to be sneaky about what you want). IF you wanted to go through his phone do it with him right there infront of you. Give him an ultimatum about his phone after you clearly state your insecurities. IMO if he ain't with it you should find someone who is. As far as how to approach the situation emotionlessly.... I usually do it by parallel thoughts keeping my actions and thoughts seperate. No clue how to teach self control to others sorry

I had a real life situation like this. Specificaly to the question of how to do this emotionless? It was a good moment, I did it by (I) NOT delaying and (II) stating the facts as I saw them to her, i.e. "I noticed that....". She made some outrageous excuse. We were both tipsy and left it at that (I felt I had to in that state). It didn't work out. She had a lot of issues and I explained why it wasn't working in our breakup talk.