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December 20, 2010
Miss Information
I found nude pictures of my boyfriend's ex on his phone. What should I do?
By Cait Robinson
Have a question? Email missinfo@nerve.com. Letters may be edited for length, content, and clarity.
Dear Miss Information,
My boyfriend and I have been together for about a year now, and I am four months pregnant with our baby. We're both in our late twenties, and we recently moved in together. We have a very physical relationship, are both very much in love with each other, and are thrilled to be starting a family. There's only one little flaw in all this beautiful love: when we met, he was living with a girlfriend he had been with off and on for about six years. Once things started happening with us, he needed space to figure it out. During this time, he went on a long vacation with the girlfriend. (To be fair, had already been booked before anything happened between us.) While he was gone, he wrote to me all the time, and ended the relationship definitely when they got back.
Anyway, a few days ago he asked me to send something from his phone while he was out drinking with some friends. I, feeling bored and pregnancy-inflated home alone, decided to look at the pictures we had taken together. As I scrolled to the pictures from the beginning of our relationship, I noticed two thumbnails of a naked woman taken in a hotel shower, and I quickly realized they were of his ex-girlfriend, taken during that last trip. I was shocked at my own stupidity but also taken aback: for some reason I figured that at this point he had been fixated only on me sexually. I guess I was wrong, and I wish I were mature enough to just handle it — it's not like I have never been attracted to anyone else before him or even after I met him. But I can't get these images out of my mind: I find it hard to accept that apparently he still has a thing for his ex, even just physically. I feel really jealous and I want to put some distance between us, and this embarasses me. To exacerbate the situation, I am having considerable trouble coming to terms with the changes in my own body. I don't really feel too desirable, and the idea of him being turned on by somebody else is driving me crazy. Please help.
— Don't Look Back in Anger
Dear DLBiA,
Before I get to your question, let me start with the lurking variables: that you're feeling "pregnancy-inflated" and "undesirable," home and bored while your boyfriend is out with friends. That's rough! But understandable. Anyone who waxes poetic about how beautiful pregnancy is probably owns Anne Geddes coffee table books and is worth avoiding at cocktail parties. Don't get me wrong: there is plenty of beauty to be found in pregnancy, but there is also day-to-day indignity and suffering along the lines of "seriously, body? Puking, again?" or "I spent the last hour crying at a Home Depot commercial. It's just that that belt sander was so efficient!" The thing is, DLBiA, you are by no means alone in feeling lost in your own body, and it sounds to me like you could use a solid female support network. Seek out friends, mothers, aunts, online communities for young moms — anything that gives you the perspective that your discomfort is temporary, completely normal, and ultimately worthwhile.
But to your boyfriend: it's really his support that you want, isn't it? It's hard for me to tell from your letter whether this is a long-running trend or not, but if he's making a habit out of raging with his friends while you're home feeling like a beached whale, there's something wrong. Once you commit to have a kid, you're a unit, and neither partner can act entirely in his or her own self-interest anymore. This isn't to say that he should be handcuffed to the bassinet, but it is to say that he should be making your comfort a priority. Somehow, between "I feel bloated and disgusting" and "I was bored at home," I imagine this isn't happening.
So, now, two paragraphs later, to the photos: I think they're kind of a red herring. I understand that they're wildly upsetting, but, as troubling as they are, I don't think they're necessarily proof of any big betrayal. I doubt he has a thing for his ex — more likely he's a dude, he likes naked chicks, and he's slow to delete things. You can only know if you bring it up. More broadly, though, I think you're overdue (pun intended?) for a talk about the shifting tides of your relationship: about your pregnancy, your body, your insecurities, and what you need to feel more stable.
Dear Miss Information,
So I just moved to Boston for graduate school (which, for reasons having nothing to do with dating, may or may not have been all that wise), but shortly before I left (tuition paid, lease signed, job quit), I met and hit it off with someone really great
I find this frustrating. We didn't have enough time to make each other any promises, but I find that I'm thinking about her a great deal. I really like her. Is it insane to want something with someone who lives a thousand miles away? Is it possible to cultivate a relationship at this distance? A few months have passed, and I think she may be seeing someone else, and all I can think are variations on "why me?
I've been playing it cool, but I don't really know what to do, especially since by "playing it cool," I mean merely attempting to appear as though I'm playing it cool. "Cool" is not what I feel here.
— Long Distance Aspirations
Dear Long Distance Aspirations,
When you're feeling unsettled and uprooted, it's easy to find and cling to an Ideal Unattainable. And any relationship that starts and ends in a seventy-two-hour period is going to be more ideal than a real relationship, with its flaws and growing pains and "You just joined the NRA? Are you shitting me?" moments. Is it possible that your love for this girl is more a function of your loneliness than your unimpeachable compatibility? I don't say this to undermine your experience — I'm sure she's awesome and you had a great time together. But I think you'd be better served spending time and energy making friends in Boston, making your grad program work for you, and finding extra-curricular activities that fulfill you, rather than trying to chase someone long-distance — especially if she may be seeing someone else. As long as you're unsettled in your life, you're going pine for a time when things seemed easier.
To answer your question, though, you are not insane, merely human. We all go through it at some point. The key is just to commit wholly to where you are, and make the best of your situation. Pro tip: awesome girls are drawn to happy dudes like moths to a flame. It's true! Test it out.
A holiday love letter to my readers:
First, a heartfelt thanks for your patience and support while I've been finding my sea legs on this column. You guys are the best, and I am reminded of it on a near-daily basis.
I wish all of you positive, warm, totally functional times with your loved ones and/or families. Norman Rockwell scenes, all around! But should things go south, slap-fights erupt, and things get said that can not be taken back (I'm looking at you, Andrew Robinson), I'm here for you. My inbox is always open: missinfo@nerve.com.
In the words of that literary embodiment of holiday manipulation, Tiny Tim: "God bless us, every one."
Commentarium (20 Comments)
Graduate school can be really stressful and take a gigantic amount of time, so it's only natural that you're thinking about that last fling you had over and over again and not going out and meeting new people. Simply savor the memory, but don't hold out any hopes for it ever being any more. Concentrate on your studies and research, and try to schedule time (hard as that can be) to make your way out into the world where you are every now and then. It's very easy to burn out at graduate school, and it's normal to feel that way, but do what you can to be happy, and that's how you'll wind up (eventually).
Dude is saving those pics to fap to. That's what we do. He may not have fapped to them *yet*, but he may want to at some point, so he's saving them.
It is really easy for women to assign far, far too much emotional currency to naked pics or exes, or even porn in general. Fapping to naked pics is not an emotional experience for guys.
Really, DLBiA, this is not worth dealing with. It's too important to you for the wrong reasons, and he's unlikely to see it as important except through the lens of you 'being all hormonal and shit because she's pregnant." There's a chance that if you go off about this, that it will plant a seed for him of being alert for emotional blackmail from you, in the future, and you don't want to start that just because you're feeling bloated and weepy.
It would be totally different if she'd, like, sent him the pics last week, or if he had a gigabyte of posed pictures of every ex he has had since 1998, but this is seriously nothing and should stay nothing.
LDA - Cut it off. Learn from my fail, grad school is not the time to deal with the time and cost of an LDR (flights, long skype sessions, and so on). Leave it open, if you like, for quick few-strings-attached romps if you find yourself in similar geographic areas. Grad school is also a surprisingly good time to find someone who shares your level of passion.
unrelated, everyscrapofporn: " if he had a gigabyte of posed pictures of every ex he has had since 1998" -- you mean that's unwise? huh. It shows consistency and underlines the lack of emotional attachment. OTOH, I could use that free disk space.
"for some reason I figured that at this point he had been fixated only on me sexually"
This woman sounds like she's got a good head on her shoulders, which is good, because being pregnant ain't easy. With that said, isn't it clear that, regardless of how good any relationship might be, and of its details, nobody is ever sexually "fixated only" on their partner? To attempt to quote Dan Savage, loving someone doesn't mean you never want to fuck other people, loving someone often means refraining from fucking other people.
With the respect and honor pregnant a pregnant woman is due, it may be unrealistic to expect your partner not to look at other women, be they ex or not, and be you pregnant or not. Some of us are young and pretty, and not pregnant, and have to accept this as well. He's allowed to look, and he can be expected to look, and that does nothing to lessen his attraction to you, or the depth of your connection. Good luck!
Maybe this is me using the 'lens of all hormonal and shit,' but pregnancy is the wrong time to be considering anything. ANYTHING. I've watched hormonal fluctuation take my moderately energetic, caring, and charming wife, and absolutely DESTROY her with nausea, fatigue, and generic "where did THAT come from" insanity. Stress on me is increased as I take on more and more of the running of our lives while she's essentially incapacitated. Stress on her is increased as she knows I'm doing this, wishes it wasn't so, and continues to be swamped by endocrine-based suckitude from the parasi^H^H^H^H^Hchild. I can't swear that your relationship is like ours, or your pregnancy like hers, but if there are any similarities, please accept that you are insane to a degree that you haven't been since you were a teen, and to some degree that insanity HAS to have radiated to your boyfriend. Unless you are incredibly positive that there's something wrong - now just isn't the time. Heck, I'm looking forward to sleepless night with a crying baby, just because it means that life has given me my wife back...
Stupid liberals always ragging in the NRA...
DLBiA could tell her husband that she ran across them and that of COURSE it's OK that he has them, it's just that she kinda wishes he didn't. And then just let it go. Guys like to look at picture of naked women. It really doesn't mean anything.
And Cait, I've been reading this column for years. You are definitely a worthy successor. Keep it up!
DLBIA, maybe he took the pics without her knowing, maybe he took them as a momento, maybe he did have 1 last fling with a person he was with for 6 years, not to mention you and he hadn't started a relationship yet, but regardless you are over reacting. If you and he were together foe awhile and he said she was gone, or if he told you he hadn't seen her and lied, both reasons to kick his cheating ass to the curb, but you knew she was going and it would be naive to expect they wouldn't have sex, they probably had the most awesome sex they ever had together, a final bang before he was with you and she was without him, let it go. I understand why you are upset, but he really didn't do anything wrong. Hope you and the baby are well
Miss I. did a great job of picking out the real issue in the naked pics letter, which is really not the naked pics at all, but her feeling insecure in this (relatively new) relationship and this manifesting itself as pregnancy-related body issues.
DLBiA, I sympathize entirely with your discomfort over the pics. You're not overreacting. You're understandably upset, and dealing with a variety of upsetting circumstances.
One thing other commenters are getting right is that he didn't do anything wrong -- BUT that doesn't mean you're not allowed to be distressed, or that he can avoid his obligation to reassure you. As long as you're not accusing him of doing something wrong, I think you have every right to ask him to please delete those photos and then spend some time reassuring you that he finds you sexy and attractive and that there is nothing between him and the ex anymore.
And, seriously, people: We KNOW guys like to look at other women, we KNOW that they look at porn, and we're generally FINE with it. However, naked pics of an ex, especially taken by the boyfriend, especially taken immediately pre- or post-sex, are NOT in the same league as an anonymous porn starlet. Being upset about this is NOT overreacting. Lashing out in anger at the boyfriend, or accusing him of something heinous, might be going too far. But DLBiA's emotions on this are totally valid.
Dear Grammar Police: You might want to spend a bit of time with your colleagues, the spelling police. I think you meant "Stupid liberals always ragging *on* the NRA..."
"I, feeling bored and pregnancy-inflated home alone, decided to look at the pictures we had taken together."
OH PLEASE. You were snooping. Plain and simple. You knew what you were doing. And it's snooping no matter how you try to spin it. You were feeling insecure and lonely and maybe resenting that your husband was out with his friend while you got to sit at home being pregnant and you snooped. The naked pictures just served to exasperate your feelings of insecurity and resentment. Talk about that with him. And then apologize for snooping, and ask him to kindly delete them.
@Linda ... he gave her permission to send something through his phone while he was out and then she looked through his photos on his phone. She has nothing to apologize for. My husband and I have a pretty open relationship communication-wise, and if I told him to use my phone while I was out and he ended up going through our pictures I wouldn't care (and if he picked up my phone one day for no particular reason and went through it I still wouldn't care).
Damn iPhone keyboard... :(
LDA- Last year, I was in your place. Just moved to a new city, where I did not know anyone, after having a summer fling with someone in my old city. We had been friends for a few years and decided to have some no-strings sex before I left. Three semesters later, we have a pretty strong long-distance relationship, and she's going to move here over the coming year. Now, my situation sounds different in some major ways. We were pretty good friends before sex, so adding that to the mix really just created a strong bond. Also, we kept up with frequent phone calls and e-mails about how we missed each other and felt like there was something between us. I guess that I would say reconnect with her and see what's going on. You say that she might be seeing someone, so she might have moved on. At least you would then know. If she hasn't moved on and seems still interested in you, well, it's complicated. LDR's can be very frustrating and time consuming, but they can also be very intimate and fulfilling. All the time and work that it takes really does pay off in those ways. Also, just be sure to build friendships and roots where you are. It will make school easier, and you never know who you might meet and find interesting.
I will never understand anyone who thinks it's not hurtful to keep nude pics of an ex long into a new relationship. "Fapping off (what?)" is one thing; ex-girlfriends are another. Not cool, definitely worth talking about with no shame on your part, pregnant or not. Dude needs to figure out some boundaries.
Kari and L are right.
I love these airtcles. How many words can a wordsmith smith?
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My boyfriend of over a year is currently getting a divorce. I felt awful, Like I tore them apart. I tried to leave him so many times. Things are ok on that front now...they are happy separated. Even his ex wife is happier. However, about 3 months, maybe 4, ago...He started texting his ex girlfriend, the one before his wife. I found out she was coming onto him, offering to be his f**k buddy and such. They both referred to me as his "roommate." I confronted him and we fought. It got better....kind of...But it never stopped. I recently found naked pictures of her on his phone, and also saved on his email (so he could delete them from the phone).
I got angry and we fought again...I ask him why they were on his phone, his reply: "I couldn't open them as an attachment, I had to email them to myself to even see them."
We have the same phone and I know what kind of phone she has, and therefore know that is a lie. I told him to choose, and he claims to have stopped talking to her.
She told me, as I found the emailed pictures that when I thought he was staying with family, he stayed with her. When I thought he was with the guys, he was with her. All of her dated added up...BUT she also knew when he was where because they texted so often.
I may be pregnant with his child, not sure yet.
I feel overwhelmed. I graduate soon, and have all of this stress. Am I stupid for staying? What should I do? I really really need help. I've thought about leaving, but I can't and the thought of being the "other woman" again makes me sick.
Even if he isn't talking to her anymore, I can't trust him. I wonder who will be next?
He keeps his phone on lock-down, but claims all I have to do is ask to see it. He also says that he hates I don't trust him though.
He claims to want to marry me on day...blah blah blah....But I feel like I'm stupid and being walked on, and that I will always be the other girl.
I know how awful I was for seeing him when he was married. I talked to a minister and a priest about it. I was in panic and tears constantly for falling for a married man...so please...no one respond telling me I'm a home-wrecker...I already feel that and I already feel I must deserve this.
Just someone please...offer me good advice, the kind I can take and feel good about.