Do you snoop on your partner? Would you take offense if he/she snoops on you?

By Chioma Gabriel - Nigeria

Do you have something you don’t want your partner to know about? Do you trust him and does he trust you? Remember, if you snoop, there are consequences. Even in a marital relationship, your spouse deserves his/her privacy. Some people believe that snooping on  one’s partner could create a bigger problem and that is the truth. It is better to discuss your fears than to snoop because you could find something that could endanger the relationship and of course, your partner would not find it funny if he/she realises you are snooping because the whole essence of snooping is to say ‘I don’t trust you, you could be cheating on me.’

Snooping also says, you have a hunch, something is going on and you want to confirm there is no such thing. Snooping according to some people portrays lack of true intimacy in a relationship. To focus one’s energy on whether there is a suspicious phone call, text message or e-mail, is tasking.
But would you do it and why?

My husband was into on-line dating; Alberta, 32.

The advent of the internet paved the way for a lot of things including increase in emotional infidelity. People have long chats on the internet with total strangers who are friends of the opposite sex. We have heard of internet sex and sometimes these relationships that started as harmless flirts balloon into something else.
My husband Fidel used to chat with a lot of people on the internet and many times, we laugh over the issues. I take these chats as nothing, but I was wrong. I have seen photos of foreigners whom he called his chat-friends, and these are females.

One of them later told him she would like to visit Nigeria from South Africa or that my husband should visit her. He sent her our photographs and the lady sent my husband a photo she took with her brother and boyfriend. She is white. I thought that was the end of the matter but one day, my husband told me he was taking an official trip to Abuja and would be on relief duty for three weeks. He said one of their senior managers was travelling abroad for a three-week course and he was going to stand-in for him and that was that. He had made such travels in the past and I had no cause to worry. If anything, I worried about the single ladies in Abuja who would want to throw themselves at my husband and I only advised him to be careful. I didn’t know that my husband had a visitor from South Africa who preferred to stay in Abuja rather than Lagos and my husband had gone to meet her. Rather than being on a relief-duty at Abuja, my husband had actually applied for his annual leave and had taken a vacation to stay with his on-line female friend who came to Nigeria to see him and to see the country.

We were communicating and he always told me he missed me and the kids and couldn’t wait to be back to Lagos and I looked forward to his return. The kids desperately needed to see him because he had never been away for too long. But three days before his return, a junior staff in his office brought a file to the house for my husband to sign. It was a weekend and I told him my husband has not returned from the official trip he made to Abuja to replace the senior manager who went on course abroad. The man who brought the documents opened his mouth to say something but shut it again.

I told him to feel free to say anything and he said my husband was actually on leave and not on relief duty to Abuja. I told him to exercise patience since my husband would soon be back but he said my husband called the office to ask for more time to enable him take care of his wife (me) who has been ill. I was shocked and I tried desperately to hide it. I told the guy my husband traveled to Abuja for a over two weeks and has not returned.
That same day, my husband called and said his stay in Abuja has been extended to another week and pleaded with me to bear with him. I managed to hold myself and carefully asked if I could visit him in Abuja,but he said the workload was too much and he would not want distraction. He promised to make up for his absence on his return and we kissed ourselves good night.

The next day, I took a flight to Abuja to surprise my husband. I went straight to the branch office of the conglomerate where my husband works. I told a Secretary my husband was expecting me and I was given the hotel address after a call made to him did not scale through.

You know something? Ordinarily, I would not embark on this trip but it was borne out of necessity. I wanted to be sure my husband was okay and I needed to solve the riddle of whether he was on annual leave or relief-duty. My husband was not on relief-duty in Abuja. He was on his annual leave and he was in his hotel room with his South African on-line girlfriend. She made the trip to Nigeria and I caught my husband red-handed.