My boyfriend and I have been together for five years now, and for the most part things have been really good. But lately I’ve been noticing some stuff that’s got me really confused and frustrated. First of all, he’s been really distant, like he’s always got something on his mind but won’t tell me. And when I try to talk to him about it, he brushes it off like it’s nothing. Plus, he’s been cancelling plans at the last minute, which is not like him. It’s like he’s avoiding spending time with me.
But here’s the real issue: I caught him red-handed flirting with some other girl on social media! I trust him, but this is making me second-guess everything. I don’t know whether to confront him about it or just keep quiet and hope it blows over. I just can’t decide between wanting to salvage what we have and not wanting to be played for a fool. And to top it all off, I’m scared that if I bring it up, it’ll just lead to a huge fight and make things worse. So please help, what should I do?
Eleanor says: There’s this problem with whether to trust your gut, which is that an accurate gut feeling is almost totally indistinguishable, feelings-wise, from an overreaction.
Mistrust, suspicion, the sense that something isn’t right: these are powerful things to be able to listen to when they’re right. But sometimes we find ourselves cocking an eyebrow when in fact there’s nothing there. From the inside, we’re not always in a position to tell whether our intuition instruments are reliable, and when you aren’t sure whether your instruments are reliable, it’s very hard to feel confident using them to steer.
I’ll say this, though: if your gut is getting this wrong, there’s usually a reason why it’s getting it wrong. Here’s one classic way people wind up with malfunctioning intuitions: we can get paranoid and over-vigilant after being lied to once. Being cheated on or betrayed in a big way can bring a sceptical lens down over the world, putting you in touch with the possibility that whatever you’re looking at might be false.
Do you have any reason to mistrust your gut? Is there something like that that bit you, that might now be making you twice shy?
If not, I’m inclined to listen to your gut. There aren’t many worse feelings in the world than chasing engagement or approval from someone who no longer cherishes you. If you trust your gut here and something is actually wrong, you’ll discover it. And if there isn’t anything wrong, at least he’ll find out that you’re feeling afraid and worried, and that ought to matter in your relationship, too. You’re allowed to want reassurance or reliability five years into a relationship; those things shouldn’t feel like requests so burdensome they might tip the balance into making you a nuisance.
As to your concerns about starting a fight, I’ve always felt that “talking about it might make it worse” is a bit like “it’s rude to share information about your salary” – a politeness rule that benefits the already powerful. If silence about something that matters to you is the best way to keep the peace, how much is that peace really worth keeping?
There should be ways to talk about these things without “making it worse”. That doesn’t mean there won’t be a fight – there might be – but not all conflicts necessarily make things worse.
In talking about it, you might find that he’s flirting because he wants to feel some excitement, or because he really does have feelings for someone else. In that case, you’ll need to be grown-up and brave enough to face that either together or on your own. “Talking about it” can’t just mean launching attacks. But it can mean saying, “Hey, these things you’re doing lately are making me feel like you don’t value me in the way that I need and want to be valued in a relationship.”
It sounds as though that’s already true, whether you choose to share it with him or not. The question is how you want to handle the fact. And the answer to that question isn’t just a matter of how he’ll react, it’s also about what will make you feel most proud of yourself.
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