Breaking Free from Narcissistic Abuse

Feeling the Urge to Snoop on Your Partner? Here's What It's Really Telling You

• Kerry McAvoy, Ph.D. • Season 4 • Episode 245

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0:00 | 7:27

"I found proof he was cheating—but was snooping really what I needed to finally leave?” 

This week's Fan Mail comes from a listener in Dublin, CA, who, after reading Dr. Kerry's book "Love You More," recognized her own relationship mirrored Dr. Kerry's experience, including the urge to snoop. 

In this episode, Dr. Kerry explains why the urge to snoop is actually all the evidence you need that something's wrong and why finding "proof" never actually breaks the cognitive dissonance.  

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Kerry Kerr McAvoy, Ph.D, a retired psychologist & author, is an expert on cultivating healthy relationships and deconstructing narcissism. 

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Feeling the Urge to Snoop on Your Partner_ Here's What It's Really Telling You

Dr. Kerry: [00:00:00] I didn't need to find proof of his cheating to know that I already didn't feel good, that there is something about this relationship that felt very burdensome, very uncomfortable, and risky. Here's the trap of snooping. There isn't enough evidence because everything you find, you're gonna doubt and not believe, and you're gonna try to look again.

These relationships put the body in a psychological and physiological state of alarm. We're not meant to exist in that.

So today I'm gonna do something different and instead of taking a listener's question, I'm gonna take a listener's. Thank you because I think there's important lessons that can be drawn from her letter that we can hear. Ourselves and other people's stories. So somebody wrote in and just said, Hey, I wanna just thank you for all that you do.

I've been listening to your book, which he's referring to is Love You More on Audible and it's a frightening exactly how similar my situation is with my now ex-boyfriend. [00:01:00] And what she also went on to say is that there was a certain chapter in the book, chapter 15, in which she like me, requested to look at her partner's text messages and found sickening ev evidence of him having extra relationship relationships and that it was all that she needed to leave the relationship.

For good. I wasn't so lucky. I found evidence of extramarital relationships and wasn't able to leave. But what I really love about this letter, and thank you so much for sending it in and and giving me a little look into your life, is that the power of hearing somebody else's story and impact on us.

Because when we get into these toxic relationships, there's this incredible isolation, partly because what we're experiencing is so unique and different that we feel. Awkward, maybe even ashamed to share it to other people like, like to let them know that we're experiencing that or maybe putting up with it would reflect so badly on us that we don't wanna let anybody in on it.

Or what we also often experience in these [00:02:00] relationships is that our partner starts to cut us off from other people, and as a result, we just end up not having the kind of resources that we should have in our life so that we really can't check in with other people about the normalness of what we're experiencing in these relationships.

So if you're in a relationship in which you feel like you don't have other people to talk to, and you feel like you have no safe people to sort of vent about what's happening, or maybe you don't feel safe sharing the inside of what's happening, I really wanna encourage you to not let that stop you. To make the effort, maybe you can do something small initially to reach out to other people.

What I did when I was in that relationship is I started joining Facebook groups of similar topics or themes of areas that I was struggling with. You know, I looked, for instance, for those that particularly catered to female partners of sex addicts, and that was my starting point. And I at first didn't even post anything.

I would just go in and see what other people were saying and that. The fact that I could find myself in their story [00:03:00] really broke down and diminished the shame that I was feeling about what was happening inside my relationship. I think the other thing is if you're feeling something's off, like you have this sense that you wanna check and look, you may or may not have your partners permission.

And by the way, in some states. Or in some locations, snooping is illegal, so I want you to be very, very careful that you don't break the law about it. But I, I wish now that I would've, would've known that the urge to wanna look was enough indication that was something was not feeling safe enough. I didn't need to find proof of his cheating to know that I already didn't feel good.

That there is something about this relationship that felt very burdensome, very uncomfortable, and risky, and that my urge to snoop was actually all of the indication I needed, that I wasn't feeling safe enough in this relationship. And I, looking back now, I, I would hope that if I found myself in a similar position.

That I would take [00:04:00] that sense, that urge and say to myself, if I'm having the urge, then there is something that my body, my intuition's picking up on, and that that's all that I really need to take action, that I need to see that as the evidence, not actually the text message. Because here's the, also the trap of snooping.

There isn't enough evidence because everything you find, you're going to. Doubt and not believe, and you're gonna try to look again. So I really want to urge you that if you feel like you should look like there's, somehow you're gonna find whatever it is that you think that's gonna help you make the decision, that's not a break.

Cognitive dissonance, you will only. Add to the confusion and increase the urge to look. It's really the fact that you don't have the confidence that you feel unsafe, that you wanna look. That's the evidence that you're not feeling like that this environment is creating a situation of safety for you. She also in, in this note, talks about the cost, not only the psychological cost, but also the [00:05:00] physical costs of being in a toxic relationship.

These relationships put the body in a psychological and physiological state of alarm, and it we're not meant to exist in that it actually over time causes inflammation and it has ramifications that could be a physical tension. It increased inflammation markers, increased pain, maybe even affecting the way in which you move and relate to the world physically could even bring on illnesses.

I've heard people talk about getting inflammatory diseases that. That are as a, we can't ever say that they're due to those relationships, but living in a chronically unsafe environment has consequences to our body. So it's really important that we protect ourselves and watch out for ourselves and realize that again, that lack of safety is a big indicator that something's essentially wrong.

Because these relationships, often the people in these relationships often will create enough self-doubt. That [00:06:00] they will start to make us question ourselves and our perceptions and our memories and our emotions and make us feel like that what we're experiencing is really a, a me problem when it's actually something that's being created around us.

So if you are experiencing something where you just feel like something doesn't add up or you. You're feeling unsafe or you're feeling like there's something that you don't know. You just have that sense. I really want to urge you to break the isolation, reach out, connect to somebody, start to validate what you're experiencing and find out that you're not alone.

And it's often really helpful to join a community so that you can find others who've gone through something similar that can give you not only the validation that what you're going through. Is not right, but also can give you the, the courage to know that what you're sensing is accurate, but that also that you're not alone.

So thank you so much for this listener who sent me in this thank you letter. I deeply appreciate it. But if you have a question you'd like to have me answer [00:07:00] on fan mail, please send it to either email it to clients. At Kerry McAvoy PhD, that's C-L-I-E-N-T s@kerrymcavoyphd.com, or use the link in the show notes to be able to submit your question.

And I would love to answer your question on air. And thank you so much for the trust that you show me by sharing these very vulnerable things. I deeply appreciate it. It is 2:00 AM again, and you're replaying that whole conversation over and you're wondering yourself, was it really that bad? Or maybe I'm just being dramatic.

So you start to draft that, I'm sorry, text again, because the guilt that you're feeling or the confusion you're experiencing is just unbearable. And you know this loop because you've been there before. But I want you to know that you're not alone. I'm Dr. Kerry McAvoy. I'm a retired psychologist and for 25 years I've been helping people untangle exactly what toxic relationships do to your mind, how they create the confusion, the self-doubt, and that trauma bond that keeps [00:08:00] pulling you back in.

Here's the truth. Recovery isn't about getting more information. It's about having the right support in the exact moment you need it. That's why I've created Reclaim You. It's a private, always available coaching app built from my work and my content organized into an extensive library that you can actually use when you're triggered inside it.

You'll get five minute lessons when your brain can't handle a deep dive. Check-ins that meet you exactly where you are. Whether you're feeling strong, shattered or numb boundary scripts that help you say no without overexplaining grounding tools that work fast when you're activated and progress tracking so you can see proof you're healing even on days when it feels like you're not.

There's no appointments, no waiting, no judgment, just practical support right when you need it. Reclaim you real hope in real time, right in your pocket. And it's a coaching support, not therapy or. Emergency care. Learn more@studio.com slash [00:09:00] Dr. Carey. So start your healing today and reclaim you.

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