Dear Roe,
I am friends with two people who have been dating for a year. I am closer to the woman than the man and have known her for much longer. This means I know about some previous boyfriends who have treated her horribly. Several times in the past these boyfriends cheated on her, which has led her to be very suspicious of any new romantic partner. More than once in the past she has acted on these suspicions and done drastic things, the most extreme case being cloning an ex’s phone so that she saw any messages or emails they sent or received. I was aware of this but haven’t addressed it with her – partly because my loyalty was to her over these men, and partly because it was easier for me. She is now dating a common friend. It seems to be going well. They have rough patches but nothing out of the ordinary. They go on holidays together. He has kids from a previous marriage – she has met them several times and they all get along. However, she has told me she is suspicious of him. She hasn’t cloned his phone but has speculated about doing so. She knows various passwords of his (I don’t know how) and periodically uses these to snoop on his phone. She told me she once eavesdropped on a therapy session of his. I don’t know what to do. She is an old, dear friend. She has scars from past relationships – “trust issues” is an understatement. But regardless of previous behaviour I can’t excuse what she is doing now. While I was able to ignore the impact on previous boyfriends, who were strangers to me, I don’t have that convenient excuse this time. What should I do?
This situation is difficult and painful. I know you’re grappling with your conscience, your sense of loyalty, and empathy towards two different people, and because people in your situation rarely get thanked for being the one with common sense, let me be the one to tell you that I know you’re trying to approach this with as much empathy, integrity and thoughtfulness as possible, so well done.
You’re caught in a crossfire here, between pulls of loyalty and morality. On the one hand you have a long-standing friend who has been through a lot and has been deeply wounded and is acting out of pain – and a newer connection who you have less loyalty to who is having their privacy violated in very upsetting ways. This is a situation some people would just choose to stay out of, but judging by your letter, I don’t think you’re one of those people. I wouldn’t be either. To live up to your values of empathy, loyalty and integrity, let’s try to hold all of the existing truths at once.
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Your friend’s trauma is real. While I understand that life is long and complicated and that people are human and I try to extend empathy wherever I can, there’s a reason I never shy away from highlighting how much damage cheating can do. Being betrayed can really rock a person’s sense of safety in the world, their self-esteem and their ability to trust other people. It can be core-shaking, and your friend experiencing that several times has understandably left some deep wounds. In a state of vulnerability, becoming hypervigilant and fearful and paranoid is actually a pretty understandable response to having been cheated on and hurt time after time.
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However, if you’ve been deeply wounded, you have to take time to heal and process your pain before getting with somebody else, so that you don’t take the wounds of your past out on your present. We can understand the source of your friend’s feelings without condoning her actions, and by holding her accountable for the harm she is now inflicting on others. Because what she’s doing – accessing someone’s private messages, spying on them and (most egregiously) eavesdropping on their private therapy sessions – is a serious breach of trust and ethics. This is seriously controlling, manipulative, harmful behaviour. She may have been treated very badly by former partners, but she has now become the perpetrator of harm. Your compassion for her past does not mean you have to condone or be complicit in her current actions.
I know your loyalty to her runs deep and that you’ve known and loved her longer than you have her partner. But he is no longer a stranger to you. He is a person in your life, a person with his own past, his own hopes for this relationship, his own vulnerabilities, his own right to safe and respectful treatment. And now you know – even if he doesn’t – that his privacy, autonomy, trust and emotional safety are being violated. You feel torn because staying silent feels like complicity and that goes against your values – and here, I do think your values are what you should be listening to, not the weak justifications of your friend.
As for what you can actually do, you can talk to your friend, framing the conversation as one of care but also of the respect required to hold someone accountable.
You can tell your friend you love her, that you’re deeply sorry and outraged at everything she has gone through in her past and acknowledge how deeply it affected her. But then tell her that you are seriously concerned about her actions, that accessing her partner’s private information and listening in on his therapy sessions has crossed a line. Tell her that she deserves to be in a relationship where trust and respect is mutual, but that she’s not going to create that by disrespecting and violating her partner. Tell her that you love her, but that you’re watching her become the type of deceitful, controlling and harm-inflicting partner that has wounded her before, and that you know she’s better than that. Tell her that her actions are going to damage and possibly (and justifiably) end her relationship, which isn’t going to help her heal from her past at all. And tell her that if she’s unable to be in a relationship without such violating, controlling behaviour, maybe she needs to not be in a relationship and work on healing.
Speaking up about the harm someone is inflicting isn’t betrayal; it’s integrity and accountability
Let the conversation be hard. Let her react – defensively, perhaps. But hold the line. Tell her that you are not abandoning her, you are trying to protect her from her worst impulses and offer her possibility of a healthier way to love and be loved. That’s a deeper act of friendship than passive loyalty ever could be.
If she reacts with awareness and accountability, you may be able to leave it there. But if she reacts defensively or indicates that she has no desire to change her behaviour, you can decide if you want to tell her that you’re not going to keep quiet about what she’s doing, especially if you feel someone is being harmed. Speaking up about the harm someone is inflicting isn’t betrayal; it’s integrity and accountability.
I know this will be difficult. Doing the right thing here is not the easy thing. But your instinct – to refuse to look away, to try to hold empathy and accountability in the same breath – is exactly what this situation calls for. Whatever happens, you’ll know you acted with conscience and care.
