Snooping and break up
My (43F) boyfriend of 8 months (50M) broke up with me because he went through my phone while I was sleeping and discovered that I had friendships with other men. We had a great relationship, although a bit bumpy, due to his temper and insecurities. He also did this two days before I was to have surgery, which he promised to help me out with (and did not). We often spoke about moving in together and getting married. This came out of left field.
To clarify, I have been single for 12 years, and have friends through work and life that have been there for me, that I was not ready to cut off for a new relationship at this stage. Had we actually been engaged I would have been happy to.
In one message I was venting about my boyfriend to my friend and that obviously hurt his feelings.
My boyfriend went through my entire phone while I was sleeping, waited til I woke up and dramatically dumped me. I’m so distraught because many of the messages were misconstrued, and were really jokey and harmless. Despite explaining, he said I needed a lot of attention, accused me of emotional cheating and called me disgusting and broke up with me. What burned him up most was that I had plans with people that he swears I hid from him. I don’t know that dating someone requires them to monitor your where about at all times, nor entitle them to a full accounting of your life. For context, I have never questioned him this way or even touched his phone.
I keep telling myself this is for the best, since snooping in my phone is a huge red flag, and a harbinger of more controlling behavior to come. But I am also extremely sad. I feel like the rug was pulled out from under me.
This situation feels awful. Any advice and input is appreciated.
TL;DR my boyfriend went through my phone while I was sleeping and is now convinced I’m the worst because I have guy friends I communicate with through work and life. He’s dumped me over it. How do I move on? Is there hope? How do others deal with this?