is online chatting cheating?

True Apo, however we live in an instant age,coffee, credit, even love both you and I have heard lots, yup lots of tales over the years of people meeting the lust of their lives online

If I felt I needed to have full access to my wife's accounts and phone, then I'd have to consider parting ways. We all deserve privacy, and we deserve to be trusted. I sincerely hope you don't think it's appropriate to log on to your wife's Facebook, Twitter etc just to check up on her. That, to me, means you do not trust her. And, if you don't trust her, that's more likely to be your problem than hers.

I feel quite sick when I see a husband and wife joint account on Facebook. Nearly always it's because one or the other is insecure.

There is no way I'd want to log onto my wife's phone or online accounts, that is brutal.

i see you disagreed with my reply from ages ago. Do you read all through these old threads?

I was reading through this one, and I disagreed with what you said. Don't worry, I'm not singling you out. I also disagreed with other posts on the subject, and agreed with others.

I'm fairly sure I haven't broken any rules, but this topic did interest me and yes, I am reading old topics because maybe there is information on those topics that interests me. I make no apologies for disagreeing with people, and I sincerely hope this is not a forum where people crave likes because, in my opinion, that makes advice and information less wholesome.

My wife has full access to my social media accounts, so she is more than welcome to read all the nonsense posted on it, other than the informative stuff she posts to me of course which she is welcome to read,equally she can look at my bank account to see how much she has in my (ours/ hers predominantly) left!
All said tongue in cheek!!!

I don't think it is healthy, in a relationship, to let the other party see what is in your private accounts. My wife has never asked me, and I've never asked her. If she did ask, the answer would be NO CHANCE. And, if I asked her (not that I ever would, I am quite secure in the knowledge I can trust her) I would also hope that her answer would be NO CHANCE.

It's the start of a slippery slope.

As an example, my step daughter had a boyfriend who was deeply insecure in their relationship. To be frank, he was punching above his weight if we were judging their relationship purely on looks but, thankfully, I brought her up to not be that shallow. He is an intelligent lad, has a good job, bit of a mummy's boy.

Anyway, one night we sat to watch a movie as a family. He just picked her phone up, read some messages and kicked off. I ignored them, it was their business, and they are both adults. But, when he called my step daughter a "B***H" I stepped right in, grabbed him by the throat and told him to never, ever, abuse my daughter again.

At that stage he started crying, "She's talking to another guy". "Yeah, and the fact that she lets you look at her PERSONAL account means she clearly has NOTHING to hide - but even with that information you STILL mistrust her". The girl had swapped jobs to please him, so that she wasn't working with quite so many men. The girl would go straight to his house after work, and he would drive her home. He was CONTROLLING. As is anyone who insists, or even asks, to check on a partner's personal social media account. My step daughter had a large circle of friends, female and male, and that circle became a semi-circle as she dumped male friends to make him settled. Then it became a quarter circle as she dumped female friends who were gay, or female friends who were friends with her ex-male friends, or female friends with brothers - seriously, even after all that he was still checking up on it. Now, some here think that may be healthy - to share each other's private lives and there should always be private lives in any marriage. If I put £3 on a horse, and don't want to tell my wife, that's my business. If I am not paying bills, or not buying food - that's OUR business. If I am chatting to an old school friend, who is female, about some memories from school that is also my business. If I start flirting with said lady, or start behaving coldly to my wife because I suddenly find the other lady attractive - then that is OUR business.

Now, I wouldn't give in to my wife's mistrust if she suddenly started to ask. Why would anyone? Even if she found nothing, and she would find nothing because I am not cheating on her in any way, the fact would be that by merely asking to see my stuff that she no longer trusts me. I would ask her why she had lost trust, and address that, but giving a partner access to your phone/social media/ e-mails. Christ alive, no. It is a slippery slope.

Some may assume that, because I am not willing to share my social media details with my wife I have something to hide. And, I would say that those people jumping to that conclusion are more liable to be the sorts who would make the same conclusions if their wives also refused them access to their social media/phones etc. But, for me, it would quickly become an avalanche of intrusion into some personal and private matters. I love, respect and cherish my wife, and she feels the same. Part of that respect is respecting each others personal space, understanding that occasionally she may talk to her ex boyfriends or old school friends who are male. Why ever would a husband or wife want to deprive the person they love those opportunities and friendships just because of their own insecurities? Maybe because, if roles were reversed, they would be up to no good themselves? Which brings me to the final point - do not project yourself onto other people.

One other thing - I don't share a bank account with my wife. We share bills, proportionately as I earn more than her, and at times when she is out of work I will pay all the bills and vice-versa if it ever happened to me. If I showed her my accounts, then I know that I would end up spending a chunk of my life savings on something pointless, or would get nagged to invest in her brother's latest money making scheme. That's not a criticism of her, more a criticism of me because I have been too weak to refuse in the past (help out the brother - see him spend most of it on Red Horse, watch business not even take off). So, to avoid that, and to avoid potentially explosive arguments, we both agree to keep finances separate BUT the most important thing is that bills are paid before anything else. I appreciate this arrangement probably won't work for the majority of marriages, but it works for us and positively avoids arguments like the ones that were spawned from her brother taking £1500 as an investment from me, and seeing the money quickly disappear as he serviced his own debts, had a good 2 weeks on Red Horse, then needed some extra investment to get premises for a business that he couldn't even describe.

Horses for courses as they say...

A very well thought-out post and similar to how I see relationships.
Working together as husband and wife takes patience and a lot of compromise and that isn't always easy for people to do. The same goes with couples who are not married, of course.
When we share life with someone else, the practicalities of life mostly overwhelm everything else, especially when there are children from the relationship.
For me, there must be private things alongside all the things that are freely discussed. We must all make decisions about financial privacy.
Relationships have "ups and downs" and overcoming any difficulties that arise and these can be big or small.
Holding hands whilst skipping merrily through fields with pretty flowers is all well and good but the bills keep dropping through the letterbox or into our email inboxes.

Yeah, I get that. I just think even asking about getting access is a red flag. I'd say it shows someone with controlling behaviours, or a lack of trust. The one thing to add to this is that, let's say you and your wife share each other's online accounts and phone details. Great, she knows that you are being "faithful" and you know she is too.

But, let's just say, you are having an affair or are chatting online with another woman. It's very likely you are doing it using an account to which she has no knowledge. So, in sharing this access you are achieving the square root of zero. In fact, you'd be delving into the mathematically wonderful world of imaginary numbers as you would be achieving the square root of a negative number.

You'd both be exhibiting signs of either controlling, coersive, or mistrusting behavior which is a definite negative. And, if the other partner was so inclined, any misdemeanors would be well covered up anyway.