My (28 F) boyfriend (28 M) and I have been together for 6 months. I have a mental illness and have been really agitated and on the edge for past few weeks. We have had a few fights but resolved them. We had a fight this weekend and I found that he downloaded Tinder and Bumble soon after. He says it’s just to swipe on some girls and look at them and he wouldn’t have messaged any of them. He initially lied about it and said he only downloaded coz it was some sort of bet he was having with his friends to see who gets more likes. when I asked him to prove it by showing me the chat with his friends he refused. later he admitted that it was a lie and he downloaded it because he was frustrated about our fights and just wanted to do some timepass. I feel really hurt. Is it my fault that I couldn’t control my mental illness and ended up in frequent conflicts. Is that why he decided to go on dating apps behind my back? Is this cheating? Please advise.
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Let’s be real, he either downloaded the apps right after your fight because he was intending to cheat or to hurt you.
There are 0 appropriate reasons for his actions.
If you feel it is, then it is. If not cheating, it’s at the very least a HUGE red flag, both the accounts and the lying and you should be running.
You don’t just download dating apps for no reason. His intentions were to find someone else, even if it was just in the heat of the moment.
It isn’t cheating “yet” in the sense of he hasn’t contacted anyone or anything like that, but emotionally this can be harmful and rejecting behavior to manipulate or gaslight you.
Completely unacceptable. You’re in a relationship for half a year and just because you have a fight hes downloading dating apps? For what? Seeking validation from other women or what cheating? The fact that he refuses to let you see the messages says it all. Way to sus. Girl you deserve better
if it walks and quacks…
He made the exact moves of trying to date someone else. How much does it matter that he stopped before he succeeded at it?
He tried to cheat and that is cheating.
Girl run from him.
Won’t lie these are major red flags and it would make me question his commitment in the relationship. If he is looking at girls on a dating site that could be the first step to stepping out on the relationship and cheating.
Hopefully he learns that this is horrible behaviour even if you had an argument (if you were looking at other guys I’m sure he would be mad), and you can work through it, but my gut feeling is saying he is starting the cowards way out of making you dump him…
It’s not cheating, it sounds like he was reconsidering the relationship as a whole after these fights. He could have matched with people and interacted with them, but it sounds like he was more trying to process the very real possibility that he’s about to be single and thrown back to the streets.
Just because your mental state feels out of control, does not mean he deserves to be mistreated. Take a hard look at what the origin of the fights were and how he was treated. Be honest and consider that this relationship may be ending.
He’s trying to weigh whether he should be in this relationship, and trying to imagine what it would be like to be back in the dating market. He’s lying about it too.
What he did was wrong, and it’s okay to distance yourself from someone who isn’t trustworthy. Just don’t walk away without reflecting on why the relationship is struggling.
Nothing that you said here suggests that this man is trustworthy. He started shopping for a new girlfriend while he was in a relationship with you and then he lied about it twice.
It’s only a matter of time before he has an opportunity to cheat and takes it.
I don’t know what behavior your illness caused, but I do think that you should consider taking time by yourself until you can manage your behavior in a relationship more consistently.
No, it’s not cheating… yet. But it is a sign that he’s getting fed up with the relationship and thinking about improving his life by leaving, or that he could have a partner he gets along with better, so that’s not a good sign. Maybe your fights aren’t getting as ‘resolved’ as you think, OP.
How is this even a question? Dating apps aren’t used to buy groceries, OP.
Automatic termination. There is absolutely zero reasons to be messing with a dating app.
You passed the bullet my dear
Your relationship is over. You’ve only been dating a few months but you’re already fighting a lot and he’s looking for other women. It doesn’t improve from here.
People on this website have no idea what a red flag is. A red flag is a small, subtle sign indicating thought processes or possible future behavior.
This IS the future behavior. The time for red flags has passed. He is taking unacceptable actions.
Break up and work on your issues.
Look, if I’m casually dating and non-exclusive with someone dating apps are one thing. If I’ve been with someone for months, and we are official then it is absolutely unacceptable for them to be on dating apps. That is a hard breach of trust for me and I would not stay with someone who did that.
Best case scenario, he’s on it to get an ego boost but doesn’t intend to do anything. Assuming that’s where it ends (and it almost never does), it’s kind of a shitty thing to do to other people, make them think they’re talking to someone who is actually interested in dating and then pull the rug out from under them. I would be mad about that alone. I’ll be honest, it can be difficult to be with someone who has a mental illness, and I’ve watched many of my friends (and myself) suffer through trying to support a mentally ill partner. Fights are particularly rough. But there are a million ways to do a “timepass” that don’t involve this. Fights happen in relationships, you need to be able to handle them appropriately. It may be too much for him, and that’s fine, but in that situation you need to end the relationship rather than look for validation elsewhere.
Whether it’s “cheating” is sometimes the wrong way to look at it. If we have a semantic discussion about what exactly constitutes “cheating” and decide that, technically, it isn’t will that resolve the issue? If we decide that it is then is everything over?
The issue is that you’ve had some fights and his reaction to them was to think about other options. And he took a step towards that. It doesn’t matter what we call that, it matters that it’s hurtful and greatly damages your trust in him.