Accidentally Discovered My Partner’s Secret Blog: I’m (29/M) and She’s (25/F)

36 comments

1. If it’s on the internet it’s not private

2. This is tough because on one hand, you snooped purposefully on her laptop when she probably trusted you’d solely just do work and not dig around, so she would have a right to be upset about that

   On the other hand, keeping a journal is one thing, but publishing your relationship issues in a public blog is something she had to have known had the small odds of being discovered by you, if she simply wanted to just keep a journal she could’ve kept it behind a locked account

   Now the fact that it’s anonymous doesn’t have anything to do with you, if she didn’t use your name or likelihood in describing anything about you, I don’t think its reasonable for you to think YOUR private life is out in the open

   Writers take inspiration from their real life experiences, that being said, instead of confronting her about it, why don’t you bring up the topic of the ethics of a writer writing about the life of someone and getting popularity from it unbeknownst to the real life person that they’re writing about

   If she says it’s okay to do that as a writer as any one is free to gain inspiration from whatever they want, you can state that you don’t think it’s ethical, and that you have a firm belief that if a writer is writing about someone specifically they should ask permission even if they don’t use the real name

3. It depends. Personally, there have been a few moments where I’ve jumped on r/rant because there’s something I just want to complain about anonymously because I care about my partner more than I care about a particular problem/argument so it’s kind of like ranting about it in a way that gets the stress off my chest without having to have a fight/argument over something that’s really not worth the argument and I can easily live with I just want to complain as like a little personal therapy.

   Consider it like this. Right now you’re upset, and you wouldn’t have been if you didn’t know about it. She’s still with you, probably because she wants to be. But sometimes, something upsets her. She doesn’t want to break up with you over it because it’s not really a big deal, so she doesn’t talk to you about it because she knows it’s not a big deal TO HER. So she rants about it anonymously where she knows it’s not going to have any backlash. This way, she gets to talk about what’s upsetting her in a place she feels it’s not going yo have any consequences, and she gets to still have all the things in the relationship she loves without jeopardising that over a few choice problems that in the grand scheme of things aren’t actually that important to her.

   It’s an invasion of privacy because it’s intimate and involves you, but it’s also her privacy and her intimacy. If she’s not naming names, and she’s not calling you out, and she’s not doing it in a forum that people you know are going to identify you or know about your problems, isn’t that preferable to talking to her friends who are going to judge you for it, or talking to a therapist who’s going to give her advice like if youee unhappy you should break up with him when she isn’t actually unhappy?

4. People here seem to be nicer than me. I would run for the hills.

5. Says a man who is posting on Reddit about his girlfriend lol

6. How did you feel writing this post? I would try and have that mind set of why they blogged.

   Who can read it and what was the purpose of her writing it out? Have a discussion about this because as you turned to the internet for help and suggestions maybe she did the same. Once you have the answers you’ll be better prepared to make a decision of what you want to do.

7. >How should I approach this situation? Do I have a right to be upset about this blog, even though I found it by accident? I’d appreciate any advice on how to handle this.

   The cat’s out of the bag. You can’t “un-see” what you’ve seen. It’s now “out there” and you and she have to deal with it.

   You’ll have to confront her about this, and have a far-ranging conversation about why she felt the need to keep this… basically on-line diary about your relationship.

   Based on that conversation, you (plural) can decides what happens next.

   What does seem evident, though, is that she does not feel entirely secure about discussing the relationship with you, especially if there is a conflict or a difference of opinion. That might be a good place to start.

8. Rarely does the cosmos offer us an opportunity for an epic reverse uno.

   Pick up the phone, the cosmos is calling.

9. Why isn’t dumping her an option?

10. But aren’t you also anonymously venting about your relationship to strangers on the internet, right now with this post?

    You can clearly see how it can be helpful, since you’re doing it yourself.

11. Come on dude. Break up or don’t because at this point you’re wasting time crying about nothing.

12. Subscribe to her blog and write replies to her posts in the comments.

13. If you see potential in your relationship, you should talk to her. Both of you need to understand why she didn’t talk straight to you about stuff that bothered her, but felt like she needed to talk about it with strangers instead. If you find that understanding with each other she can stop doing that and hopefully your relationship evolves from that.

    It might also break apart after this because she might finally gut up to the truth and understand that she doesn’t want to be in this relationship anymore. That’s another way to evolve and you’ll also both be better off about it.

    My point is, there is something going on that makes you really uncomfortable, and there’s also stuff going on that makes her uncomfortable, you should address it immediately. It doesn’t matter if it feels like snooping cos it wasn’t.

14. So you anonymously venting on the internet is okay but her doing it isn’t 🤔?

15. First, I don’t think you “accidentally” discovered anything. You were snooping while using her computer. Stop being disingenuous. Second, it is hard to imagine who frequently reads a blog about what essentially seems like a person’s diary. What is the purpose of the blog? Do people engage with her? And are you sure it is publicly published or is it behind a wall of some sort?

16. End this. There’s nothing worth fixing

17. This is incredible.

    I have a very similar story. But I won’t burden your post with it.

    Like you, I struggle with the same moral quandary between feeling like I invaded their privacy, but also what I learned was revelatory and a seismic shift for our dynamic. In my case, that shift was a net-positive as it gave me clarity and understanding about so much. And like another poster said – if it’s all publicly available on the internet then it’s not private at all.

    I do think that you have a right to be upset because in a healthy dynamic we’d expect our partners to be able to discuss their issues with us. I always would go to my partner and speak up if something was *really* bothering me. But also, we need to try to understand their reasoning for why they chose to handle things the way they did.

    I am not sure how you should approach the situation, I’m sorry to say. I never figured that out for myself. I am just here to say that you are not alone and that I think you have a right to be upset.

18. babes, you’re doing the same here tbh

19. Huge yikes bud

20. Take screenshots and save them somewhere safe.

    Then sit down and ask her if she has anything to tell you about your relationship and quote back some of the lines she wrote. See how long it takes her to pickup on it.

    She made it public by putting it on a blog.

21. More info: Did you see comments/ what makes you think it was a public blog?
    If it was, that’s fucked up- BUT that being said there are a lot of ‘blog sites’ that have a privacy settings so that (theoretically) only you can see it; with the idea of it acting like a journal/diary.
    That being said, even if it was private I would still worry as to the ‘why’ as I know the only time I have seen this is when a person didn’t feel safe in the relationship. That has been as easily conquerable as ‘ I just feel like my feelings are dismissed’ to as serious as ‘they break/take my possessions and/or abuse me.’

22. she’s using journaling to work through normal life issues. Isn’t this recommended by mental health workers?

    If your relationship is overall healthy, then the journaling is working for her.

    You should have stopped reading when you realized what it was if you didn’t want to know because people don’t journal how great their day was.

    If she isn’t using names or identifying information then I don’t see a problem with it. I mean, you’re here on reddit talking about Iolanda and I’m sure she isn’t aware of it.

    all in all, this sounds like a personal problem. (yours)

23. I am with if it is a blog it is not private. Frankly I agree with you. The issues should be discussed with you, not the entire world. So do it talk to her, tell her you found her blog and know it is about you. Take it from there.

24. I already know what the comments will say, anyway…

    It makes sense you are feeling you breached her privacy. Given your story, you had permission to use the computer and then found this, you didn’t know about it, you had no intention to find it, you did nothing wrong. She may try to turn it against you (the fact you found it) when you confront her, but she really has no leg to stand on, it would just be her trying to make what she did not look as bad.

    You feel your privacy has been violated because it has been. This could be an outlet for her, but it still violates you in a certain way that someone in a relationship shouldn’t do imo.

    I always think communication is healthy, at this point, she clearly hasn’t been communicating with you, while also communicating with the internet. It it is anonymous I am sure she will use that to downplay this too but the issue is that she had/has issues, and never brought them up. She could also decide to out you, you just don’t know.

    I think this is a breakup worthy thing, that being said, we are reddit, we do not know the ins and outs of your relationship, or what you value. Maybe this is enough for you to end it, maybe her response once confronted will tell you if you should break up or not. Maybe she breaks up with you.

25. Yet you’ve posted about your relationship on Reddit. What’s the difference?

26. Oh boy. So I have a relevant, doozy of a story – (and strap in, because it’s a long one)

    I had a memoir I’d published online (changed names and everything) circulate back the friends I’d written about — and I’m not exaggerating when I say that had this not happened, the whole trajectory of my life would have been completely different.

    Anywho, the memoir in question — it was about high school, and specifically some friend group drama (+a boyfriend at the time of a close friend of mine). Basically, it revealed my deepest darkest secret (at least in high school), which was that my best friend — who was in a relationship with someone I’d met first, and developed feelings for first, and she’d met him through me, knowing full well I’d initially had a thing for him before they met, when I was 15 — was dating the guy I was into, and I repressed the shit out of whatever feelings I’d had for years.

    I’ll spare you the gory details (namely, because it’s literally too long — reddit wouldn’t me post the whole saga, lmao), but basically, I wrote the memoir for a creative writing class in college, didn’t have time to get it peer-reviewed before the final portfolio was due, so I published it to a very very saturated site for online writers that I’d previously had success with, got the feedback I needed for the class, and then completely forgot about it. Best friend had it send to her, she read it, her and the ex bf dated again, she cheated on him repeatedly (her MO), yadda yadda, it’s a very long story.

    BUT — six years after that memoir was outed, five years after him and her broke up for a second time, and eleven years after him and I first met, we finally went on our first date. The memoir gave me the space to ask for her blessing, five years later, which I got — and that’s how my bf and I wound up getting together.

    (fwiw — once I told her that we’d gone out and were going to give a relationship a shot, she very quickly changed her tune, and called in the ultimate betrayal and said I was picking her ex bf over her. but again — very long story).

    We’ve been together for over a year, we signed a lease together about six months ago + live in an apartment with our two pets, and we just celebrated with the holidays with my mom across the country + I went to his grandma’s 90th bday party. We’ve already talked about getting engaged and what our timeframes/next steps look like, and this is easily the healthiest relationship I’ve ever been in, and he’s everything I could’ve ever asked for in a partner.

    The moral of the story? Sometimes, for the person on the receiving end of this sort of thing (aka the person who’s creative outlet/blogging/writing is seen by the person it’s written about) — how the other party reacts to whatever you’d written (no matter how scathing) is VERY telling of who they are.

    In my case, I’m very grateful that I owned up to what I’d written *immediately* once I’d been outed, and if anything, I’m so grateful it happened to me — I was going to tell her regardless, but it gave me the push I needed to really open up the floodgates, and get everything I needed to off my chest. And then there was nothing left to hide ~5.5 years later, once that ex and I reconnected, because she already knew everything.

    thank god that happened to me– thank god some random girl I went to high school with found my very private diary entry of a memoir, and sent it to my best friend. because had that not happened, I would still call this girl my best friend, and I wouldn’t be with the love of my life.

27. Can someone explain to me why people do this? Same with Tik Tok story times that basically just result in women bashing their boyfriends for thousands of strangers.

    So odd.

28. Alright, first of all, you have some very important questions you need to answer:

    Most importantly, is Iolanda a time traveler who still writes a blog, and if so, has she trapped you in your timeline?

29. You snooped and didn’t like what you saw and now you’re doing the same thing she’s doing. How in any of this any better?

30. My big burning question is; are the posts actually published so that others could see them? Or is it set to private, like she’s just using it as a diary?

31. Dump her. Tell her to blog about it.

32. Question – if this is a Tumblr blog (as I’m assuming based on the fact that I know of no other functioning ‘blig’ sites these days) – did her posts have any notes? We’re they tagged at all and ‘findable’? If not, she may just simply be using the blog as a way to journal/write out feelings without turning anger on you. If it’s on Tumblr it’s possible the blog could even be password protected, meaning that only those with the password could see the posts at all.

    Obviously ignore all of this if you could clearly see others interacting with her posts, but there are other angles to consider other than those posed by other commenters.

33. “Its one thing to have doubts and issues, but another to broadcast them anonymously without trying to work them out with me first”

    Ahem…

    Oh the irony

34. Make a final post on the blog: “my boyfriend found this and broke up with me” then ride off into the sunset

35. People are allowed to have a space to vent out all the thoughts they’re having regardless of whether those thoughts are accurate or not. Some folks rant to their friends, some folks blog, some folks hop on Reddit. They need to get all those thoughts out of their heads and spread out before them so they can figure out their next course of action. If you stumbled upon this blog in the wild, would you read it and know it’s about your relationship, or would it be more of a “Huh. This kinda hits close to home.” situation? Would you have felt your privacy had somehow been violated by this anonymous blog if you didn’t know it was written by her?

    This is why you don’t snoop. Let people have their space to dump all their complicated, jumbled, shitty thoughts about you so they can sort through them to figure out which ones are the ones that matter. You’re just going to hurt your own feelings and have no one but yourself to blame.

36. I’d break up and get the hell away from her. She chose not only to hide her feelings from you and refuse to communicate but also to *publicly shame, criticize, and humiliate you* by posting it on the internet. That’s insane. You can’t trust her. She’s betrayed your trust and vulnerability and used it against you.