Read This Before You Snoop On Your Boyfriend

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Maybe you’re wondering who your boyfriend or girlfriend could possibly be texting from bed at 2 a.m. on a Tuesday night or why they always take their phone with them to the bathroom. Sneaky sneaky! Or maybe you’re using his computer really quickly to look up a recipe for tonight’s dinner and you’re like super tempted to read her Facebook messages when he runs to the bathroom — the ones from other girls, anyway. You want to snoop so bad just so you can find something, anything, about your partner you didn’t know about before.

But don’t do it — don’t do this to yourself.

Whether you’re just being nosy or even if you do think something is up it’s all too easy to feel like you’ll get to the bottom of “it” by snooping. But guess what? People have secrets, like maybe your boyfriend is really into feet and he hasn’t told you yet because he’s afraid you’ll think it’s weird or whatever, so when you snoop the only thing you discover is his entire search history is full of “hot feet” and “sexy feet” Tumblrs.

But actually, worse than discovering a secret foot fetish is the fact that you’re basically opening Pandora’s Box. You snoop because you want to find something juicy. You go in there because you’re hoping to find any kind of incriminating evidence. You are looking for the TEA.

You snoop because you want to find something juicy.

I’ve never snooped on anyone I’ve dated because I know there are things you say to your friends, things you talk about with them, personal thoughts you have — whatever — that are yours. I don’t need to know everything.

Welp, my non-snoop policy changed when I discovered the guy I’d been seeing for almost a year was still on Grindr. We were at a party at my house, having a good time, and I was dancing his way to hand him another shot and there he was, in the same room as me, scrolling through Grindr. Face crack of the century.

We stayed together about a month longer after that and, in retrospect, I should have realized things were going to end after Grindr-gate. I knew it was over. But he promised me he wanted to be with me and I believed him. He told me he’d delete Grindr and I believed him. Still, I was super tempted to create an anonymous profile to try to “catch” him on Grindr.

But even if I caught him, then what?

And here’s why you don’t snoop. You don’t snoop because the second something about your relationship bothers you or when you feel that things aren’t right you should either talk about it or trust your gut and end it. Talk before you pry through emails, Facebook messages or unlock codes. When you snoop you’re the only one suffering from all the emotional stress of waiting for the perfect time to go through their stuff, the adrenaline rush of knowing you have a limited amount of time to find what you’re looking for and then ravenously searching for something, anything.

If you feel the need to snoop in your relationship it means you’re losing yourself. Boyfriends can come and go, but no relationship is worth losing yourself over.