I think it's really easy for people who haven't been in a serious situation to answer this, without knowing what one would actually do in real life.
My background: for a very short time, I suspected my spouse of... not cheating, but I thought she was keeping something secret from me, some kind of email or emotional affair. In the back of my mind, I thought MAYBE it was an actual physical affair or had the potential to go there. In the very, very back of my mind, I thought it might be something worse that I wasn't willing to put words to.
I gave her several opportunities to come clean and finally asked straight out who she was spending so much time chatting on the computer with, and I didn't think she was telling me the truth.
I never really considered checking her email (and wouldn't have thought about anything so techy as keystrokes) because I was raised to think reading someone else's mail was unequivocally wrong. But when I googled "what do I do if I think my spouse is having an affair", many, many random links mentioned "if you have solid proof, such as emails..." Finally, I just went in her email--she knew I had the password, and she had mine, because we often said things like "hey, would you get this address off my sister's last email?"--and found what I needed to know in about ten seconds.
It might seem wrong, and some people are still going to think it's wrong because the end doesn't justify the means and yadda yadda. But if I hadn't done that, nothing would have happened, I would still be married. Because my ex was never going to admit to me, to a therapist, anyone, that she was a fucking child molester.
And I never would have left if it hadn't been something like that--I wouldn't have left over trust issues or whatever I was supposed to do when I asked my spouse a straightforward question and she lied about it--because I married for life.
Obviously I have major, major trust issues now, not just in romantic relationships but with people in general. For a long time I even had trouble trusting myself. If my spouse or significant other spied on me, I think I would get it. It wouldn't matter, because I honestly do not think I would ever do something spy-worthy. But if it was a one-time thing and not a part of an ongoing jealousy/suspicious thing, it would get a "hey, you can trust me completely, okay?" from me.
Hell, if my SO suspected me of doing something like molesting a child, I would WANT that to happen, because I would want to be stopped.
Screening your comment when I'm done because I'm not sure you actually intended to leave it on a public entry. If you want it public, let me know, and I'll unscreen.
Sounds like your line is similar to mine - if I was seriously concerned about someone's safety, I'd consider snooping. It would have to be something serious enough to be worth potentially destroying the relationship over regardless of whether I was right or wrong.
I'm sorry you went through that.
My own personal experience on the wrong end of a keylogger (for no good reason) makes me perhaps a bit on the sensitive side in the other direction. Though it seems my feelings on the matter aren't actually as unusual as it seemed based on the post ielsewhere that inspired the question.
It's sort of... funny, but not exactly... to think about how naive I was back then--I left the area so suddenly in large part because I was certain the media would be coming after me at any moment. I'd seen similar stories on the local news and in the paper in the past, some of which weren't nearly as bad as what my ex did, plus I knew this story had a particular hook in the Land of Prop 8 that they might run with. It didn't end up in the media at all for various reasons, perhaps due to my own panicked efforts.
I think it's really easy for people who haven't been in a serious situation to answer this, without knowing what one would actually do in real life.
Most people can live their entire lives in a trusting relatively simple relationship and that's great, and they can come on here and say OH NO I WOULD NEVER DO THAT we can just talk about everything, la la la. Well, as you very bravely shared here, life is not that simple. Sometimes you need to go that extra mile because just talking is not going to cut it. In the same vein I would be mad if I was the one being spied on, but because I understand the things that can happen, I would have to just get over it. I'd love the luxury of saying I would leave someone if they did X Y or Z but it is just not that simple.
That being said, I agree that keylogging etc is not to be taken lightly, is NOT a normal thing, and I don't think marriages need to be run in an entirely transparent no-expectation-of-privacy way - as in Dymphna's case, there were suspicions and other avenues had been exhausted.
If you warned the OP that her partner may react strongly to being spied on then good for you, as she could lose him in that situation, and needs to weigh that against everything else. I'm sorry you got jumped on Jess, I've had that before and it feels horrible no matter how looney the people are. But yeah just to come out and say "oh I would never do that" is too Pollyanna for my life.
Really, it was so out there that it didn't feel particularly bad. Just one of those moments of realization that there are people that have a TOTALLY different worldview than I do.
My background: for a very short time, I suspected my spouse of... not cheating, but I thought she was keeping something secret from me, some kind of email or emotional affair. In the back of my mind, I thought MAYBE it was an actual physical affair or had the potential to go there. In the very, very back of my mind, I thought it might be something worse that I wasn't willing to put words to.
I gave her several opportunities to come clean and finally asked straight out who she was spending so much time chatting on the computer with, and I didn't think she was telling me the truth.
I never really considered checking her email (and wouldn't have thought about anything so techy as keystrokes) because I was raised to think reading someone else's mail was unequivocally wrong. But when I googled "what do I do if I think my spouse is having an affair", many, many random links mentioned "if you have solid proof, such as emails..." Finally, I just went in her email--she knew I had the password, and she had mine, because we often said things like "hey, would you get this address off my sister's last email?"--and found what I needed to know in about ten seconds.
It might seem wrong, and some people are still going to think it's wrong because the end doesn't justify the means and yadda yadda. But if I hadn't done that, nothing would have happened, I would still be married. Because my ex was never going to admit to me, to a therapist, anyone, that she was a fucking child molester.
And I never would have left if it hadn't been something like that--I wouldn't have left over trust issues or whatever I was supposed to do when I asked my spouse a straightforward question and she lied about it--because I married for life.
Obviously I have major, major trust issues now, not just in romantic relationships but with people in general. For a long time I even had trouble trusting myself. If my spouse or significant other spied on me, I think I would get it. It wouldn't matter, because I honestly do not think I would ever do something spy-worthy. But if it was a one-time thing and not a part of an ongoing jealousy/suspicious thing, it would get a "hey, you can trust me completely, okay?" from me.
Hell, if my SO suspected me of doing something like molesting a child, I would WANT that to happen, because I would want to be stopped.
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Sounds like your line is similar to mine - if I was seriously concerned about someone's safety, I'd consider snooping. It would have to be something serious enough to be worth potentially destroying the relationship over regardless of whether I was right or wrong.
I'm sorry you went through that.
My own personal experience on the wrong end of a keylogger (for no good reason) makes me perhaps a bit on the sensitive side in the other direction. Though it seems my feelings on the matter aren't actually as unusual as it seemed based on the post ielsewhere that inspired the question.
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I had wondered what caused you to leave the area so suddenly.
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I think it's really easy for people who haven't been in a serious situation to answer this, without knowing what one would actually do in real life.
Most people can live their entire lives in a trusting relatively simple relationship and that's great, and they can come on here and say OH NO I WOULD NEVER DO THAT we can just talk about everything, la la la. Well, as you very bravely shared here, life is not that simple. Sometimes you need to go that extra mile because just talking is not going to cut it.
In the same vein I would be mad if I was the one being spied on, but because I understand the things that can happen, I would have to just get over it. I'd love the luxury of saying I would leave someone if they did X Y or Z but it is just not that simple.
That being said, I agree that keylogging etc is not to be taken lightly, is NOT a normal thing, and I don't think marriages need to be run in an entirely transparent no-expectation-of-privacy way - as in Dymphna's case, there were suspicions and other avenues had been exhausted.
If you warned the OP that her partner may react strongly to being spied on then good for you, as she could lose him in that situation, and needs to weigh that against everything else. I'm sorry you got jumped on Jess, I've had that before and it feels horrible no matter how looney the people are. But yeah just to come out and say "oh I would never do that" is too Pollyanna for my life.
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