Dear Prudence,
About six months ago, after some friendly, industry-related chatting, a former coworker crossed the line from casual friendship to coming on to me in a very NSFW way. I shut it down hard—I’m married and have been for over a decade now—and asked this person to stop and respect my boundaries. Long story short, it happened twice more, the third time (stupid, naive me for thinking that this person actually respected me enough to listen) resulting in me blocking them and their partner (who started making accusations of their own) across all channels. I was open about the whole thing with my husband, but I will admit to omitting a few details, mainly to protect his feelings, as there have been issues with insecurity and jealousy in the past. After sharing the entire story with my sister, my husband admitted to eavesdropping on us and accused me of having an affair, which I did not do and assured him of that. We met with our couple’s therapist and resolved the issue—or so I thought.
Recently, we were watching a video on my phone together and a Snapchat alert came across the screen, which I ignored because we were in the middle of something. He flipped, asking me who I was talking to, and accused me of having another affair. The message was absolutely innocent—it was a photo of a college friend’s newborn son—but he said that if I was using Snapchat I was probably hiding something. I showed him my contact list which is mostly made up of college friends that I only interact with on social media. He still doesn’t believe me and now it’s like walking constantly on eggshells at home. I can’t breathe without him being suspicious, and I’m not sure couple’s therapy is working. He’s not violent or abusive—I adore this man with all my heart—but this is absolutely killing me. How do I convince him that I’m being honest and that he can trust me, especially when I’ve done nothing wrong?
—Truly, Madly, Deeply in Love