It is so hard to control the need to snoop. I was the opposite of you - I woke up every day with snoop assignments for the day that I had to complete but needed to schedule around H - I did not want him to know where or when I was carrying out my investigation because I, like you, thought that open access meant that he could control the communication and continue to fool me.
It was exhausting and made me crazy and anxious, always afraid of what I would find. So, in many ways, I envy your perspective and the dignity it represents. We each need to find our own way to some kind of peace. It looks that you have figured out what can work for you.
If you think it is healthier and more peaceful for you to stop snooping, then I wish you all the strength you need to get there. But, if you can't stop yourself, know that you are not weak, just doing what most of us are reduced to following betrayal.
Boy, ain't it the truth! For me, I even was "vigilant" during the night hours! I'd pull his briefcase into a quieter part of the house and go through it paper by paper, look on-line at his office email, get his work cell phone and scroll through incoming, outgoing, address books. Anything that didn't look familiar was a possible freaking out place for me. And because I was doing this on an almost round-the-clock way, the sleep deprivation was a killer. It definitely was demeaning and something I felt "reduced to". But I forgive myself for all the crazy behavior, all the paranoia. H's A taught me in one swift moment that the only one I could trust during that time was me. What a horrible, lonely place.
Its taken a lot of time and a lot of talking, but it is better now. I don't think I'll ever let myself be unaware again, but instead of feeling the compulsion minute by minute...not just of looking for information, but for safeguarding the marriage...checking has now become for me something on the week's agenda: take in dry cleaning, clean toilets, check H's work email.
For marriages that never were tainted by an A, is that transparency and awareness something thats existed for both spouses as part of their married life? Guess I'll never know, but it makes me wonder. BlueIris
"We cannot wait for the storm to pass; we must learn to walk in the rain."
I know exactly what you mean. I feel like that about so many other things too. I have had similar thoughts and have even conveyed some to my W. I told her that is pretty sad that when you don’t trust your W (spouse). It’s pretty sad when you don’t feel safe with the one person you should feel safe with. I also know what you mean with the snooping. I feel the need to constantly check for things, check her phone, check her email and ask questions. Luckily she has been an open book and said she encourages me to look because that is the only way she can proof to me that she is good because she knows her word means nothing at the moment. I do have to wonder though if this needs to check up ever stop. I mean is has to because at some point if your spouse has EARNED back your trust, then they “deserve” to be trusted which means not snooping and questioning everything. Trust is also needed for a healthy marriage to exist. It's hard for me to think that there will be a time when I will truly trust her and NEVER feel the need to check up on her but maybe its just to soon for me and I just can’t see it.
Snooping is simply an action borne from a lack of trust
It exists to help us find the sanity.
I found that I snooped a lot after/during every D-day, and I don't regret it. It's what eventually gave us the 3rd DD, and finally, some honesty and my H's ability to clear his fog.
Now, I no longer feel the need to snoop. Not snooping is a warm, cozy feeling and I'm glad for it, BUT I don't regret the days I felt it necessary to snoop, either. It had its purpose, and an eventual positive outcome.
Peace is not just the absence of war; it's an exercise in compassion. -Dalai Lama
Coming to you from JJ
For me, the compulsion/obsession to investigate lessened considerably after about 2 years. Now, I just spot check the e-mail, and every now and then, do a quick briefcase examination. Sickening that I have to do this and I absolutely do not tell H what I am doing, though I think he has an idea.
As I have said before, H was really, really stupid to choose to have A's but I don't think he is so stupid that he would give me access to accounts where OW communication could turn up. I don't want the condoned access - would just make me worried that he would be using them as decoys and setting up new accounts for the dirty business. If he was devious enough to carry on with young girls behind my back, he could easily try to trick me into a sense of safety that doesn't exist.
It is very sad that his behavior "requires" this on my part. And, of course I know that it is not required and if I had a shred of dignity left, I would not be sneaking around his computer when he is in the shower or running upstairs to hide/review his Blackberry when he is not looking or just like Blue, rifling through his briefcase when he is sleeping. But, I have been robbed of dignity along with so much else and I will do anything to avoid being fooled again. If I had been a detective during the A years, I would have found out so much earlier and saved myself so many years of degradation. So this lack of dignity? It's nothng compared to what the years prior to what D Day were like.
But I started this post on a postive note and want to end there - it REALLY has gotten so much better. I wouldn't say that I trust him but I believe that the past encounters are over and that it is unlikley that he will have any new ones. That, in this sad post-A world, is progress.
Or as my H's IC told him last week, "It will take a long, LONG time, if ever, for trust to return. Right now it is very fragile."
I don't think of snooping as lacking in dignity; rather, I think of it as protection for the BS, and a way for the BS to confirm that WS is, indeed, trying to regain trust by not giving the BS a reason to be upset. Initially, my H resented my wanting and needing to snoop, but he came to understand that if I checked and found nothing, then I could see for myself (without his direct input) that he was no longer giving me a reason to doubt him. He not only tolerates my checking, but has given me a green light to check whatever, whenever I need to check.
