Facebook?!

[melissa90]

My long distance boyfriend and I (together two years, broken up 4 months) recently got back together. He refused to put our relationship status back on Facebook because he "doesn't share his personal life anymore." Ok. Then last night, I posted something calling him babe. It was definitely on his wall and then disappeared. He told me on a chat that since I keep asking him to change his status (I've asked him twice in the last two months) it was getting annoying and he would delete me as a friend if I didn't quit. Then, as a test, I posted something like "Thanks for being my boyfriend" and was instantly deleted as a friend. The post was also gone. He says he has no idea what happened and I'm being paranoid but I feel like I'm being hidden. Am I overreacting? Any suggestions? Thanks!

[Dreamless Sleep]

He refused to put our relationship status back on Facebook because he "doesn't share his personal life anymore."

 

There is your answer. He's not ready to say that yet. Maybe ever. Either be patient or move on. That is not to say that you shouldn't keep your eyes and ears open.

[melissa90]

Even though he's deleting anything I post on his page that could possibly tie him to a relationship? And then lying about doing that?

[Dreamless Sleep]

That seems troubling as a relationship builder.

 

Then again, do you think it may have been provocative? Did you think it may upset him? If so, why did you post?

[Dreamless Sleep]

He told me ...it was getting annoying and he would delete me as a friend if I didn't quit. Then, as A TEST, I posted something like "Thanks for being my boyfriend" and was instantly deleted as a friend. The post was also gone.

 

I feel like I'm being hidden.

you are

 

You'll have to interpret the test results.

 

I'm not belittling you. I'm sure it hurts. He's not being truthful. IMO

[SmileFace]

Why are you testing him?

 

Him hiding you didn't start when he deleted you but when he told you he woud.

 

However he says he rather keep his information personal, I wouldn't post my relationship status on fb either.

[melissa90]

I suppose it was a bit provocative but he insisted he didn't see the message before he deleted me. I suppose I was testing to confirm he was lying, you know? MAYBE something happened with the first post, but if two disappeared, then that meant trouble.

 

What's weird is that we did have our relationship status on FB, then we broke up for a few months, and now he doesn't want it back there.

 

I know this probably seems like a silly facebook fight, but it's beyond facebook. It's the lying and the hiding. He says he is willing to make compromises and prove that he's not hiding me but refuses to use facebook to do that. How else can he?! If it were not for the deleting posts and hiding tagged pictures, I would have no reason at all to believe something is wrong.

[PepperPotts]

1. Never, ever, ever *test* your relationship. If you need to test it, that's the answer to your question-- there's a problem.

 

2. He's told you he doesn't want to share personal information on Facebook-- if you're adults, this is likely because a LOT of employers are now looking at their employees' Facebook pages. Some are even asking for passwords at job interviews, and this hasn't been declared illegal by the courts yet. Arguably it's a violation of Title VII, the ADEA, etc, but until it's litigated we won't know for sure. Meanwhile, employers are doing it anyway.

 

3. Because he's told you "I don't like behavior X," you need to respect him by not engaging in it. You didn't "test" him, you pressured him.

 

4. I think he definitely is lying about deleting your post and deleting your account. He could refriend you right away if he wanted to and it was an accident. But I'm also guessing he doesn't feel he owes you the respect of honesty when you didn't give him respect.

 

5. The real question here is what his relationship status says. Check his information page. If he lists himself as "single," you have a problem. If, however, his profile doesn't show ANY relationship status (and a lot don't now!!!!) this is not a reflection on you-- it means he was dead serious when he told you he's not sharing that information. And it makes it even more certain that you didn't treat him with respect when you forced that information into public.

 

People have to be careful with what they put on the internet now, and other people need to learn to be more respectful of that privacy. We're in an age where we post our diaries for the world to see, and thus we often don't understand the growing (needed!!!) trend of internet privacy.

 

Respect his boundaries, and stop pushing them. Is it more important to you that he cares about you and you and your immediate circle know he's your boyfriend, or is it more important that you get to brag publicly?

 

Additionally, it's possible that he will feel comfortable revealing this information publicly later. At this point, you've been broken up for four months, and that takes precedence over the two years you were apart. He dealt with the fallout of your break up before. The two of you have yet to prove you'll last this time, and he's probably mitigating the publicness of his possible future pain.

 

Give him reason to trust you again, OP. If you really care about your boyfriend and this relationship, stop putting unnecessary pressure on it. Work to improve your fledgling relationship, not to force it back to where it was before you broke up. You haven't been together for two years and four months-- you've been together for however long it's been this time.

 

As the Pet Shop Boys would say, "Why don't we try not to break our hearts and make it so hard for ourselves?"

[PepperPotts]

Actually, the more I think about it... #4: It's possible he deleted the post and Facebook asked if he wanted to block future posts like that and he said yes. If so, Facebook might have gone ahead and deleted you, and blocked you. If so, he may not have intended to delete you and it may be more difficult to refriend you.

 

I haven't had to do that, so I'm not 100% sure if that's how it works, but I can see that as a possibility, so I don't want say "Definitely" when I could be giving you bad information.

[Ugh1]

He obviously isn't your "boyfriend" or he is wouldn't delete your "babe" comment. Break up with him. Move on.

[melissa90]

I see what you're saying with the status. He does have nothing listed and that wasn't even the main issue until I saw that he had been hiding/deleting posts. We talked about it- I had in a relationship on my page because I'm definitely more into social networking, but he had nothing. Not a problem at all.

 

He definitely deleted me as a friend on purpose but I'm still not sure about the posts. What makes me think it wasn't an accident is that they both were there and then disappeared. If he had chosen some setting, they wouldn't have even shown up.

 

I don't care about the status on facebook, but I do care that he's lying. I've invested two years in this man and don't want to break up with him over something that has started on facebook. I'm just looking for suggestions on compromises now.

[veggirl]

He obviously isn't your "boyfriend" or he is wouldn't delete your "babe" comment. Break up with him. Move on.

 

This.

 

I cannot believe people are defending your "boyfriend" in this situation.

 

He is hiding you, period. Likely from another girl.

 

People claiming stuff like employers look at FB...whattt would him being in a R or a girl calling him boyfriend have a thing to do with work? It's not like you were posting sex pics of you and him or something.

 

He is up to no good, he is hiding you from someone and the fact that he would delete you because you left him a comment is ridiculous and he is very manipulative. Posting "babe" on your boyfriends fb is NOT pressuring him, don't let people lead you to believe so. Your boyfriend doesn't want SOMEONE to know he has a girlfriend, period.

[veggirl]

When you delete a FB friend it does NOT ask if you want to delete future postings. It does NOT ask if you want to delete previous postings.

 

He manually deleted those.

 

I have deleted LOADS of people off my fb. I have NEVER been asked if I want to delete their wall postings etc.

[justwhoiam]

I second what veggirl said. You were not together for 4 months. Most likely he met other girls during that time, and now he's keeping his doors open.

 

Do you want an open-door type of relationship? He has nothing to lose I guess, but you do. Go with NC ASAP. It's dying on its own.

[PepperPotts]

I cannot believe people are defending your "boyfriend" in this situation.

 

He is hiding you, period. Likely from another girl.

 

He probably is hiding her. But he may not be hiding her from another girl-- this is someone he's been broken up with for four months after two years together, and she's barely back in his life and *already testing how serious he is.* There's no other way to put it. Is he lying? Definitely. Put possibly just to keep the peace because she couldn't stop herself from poking the bear.

 

People claiming stuff like employers look at FB...whattt would him being in a R or a girl calling him boyfriend have a thing to do with work? It's not like you were posting sex pics of you and him or something.

 

I can think of at least two reasons why it might be wise to not put your relationship on facebook because of work.

 

1, your employer can't monitor all of your friends, but he/she *can* monitor the people you list as closest to you-- siblings, cousins, girlfriends, etc. If she's not willing to set her privacy settings high enough (and since she wasn't even willing to let *him* have his privacy, she might not be) his boss could start monitoring his activity through her posts as well. The BF might not post "Closed down three bars because that's how Saturday works" but he'd always have to worry that she *might.* My own brother wouldn't confirm a sibling relationship between the two of us or parental ones between him and our parents. Sometimes it's just safer not to take that chance.

 

2, If you're in an LDR (and they ARE), having your relationship known may make it difficult to get a job. I am job hunting in my SO's town now, and my professors have all told me to be careful how I say why I'm moving to his town. Employers will figure out that it's for a boyfriend, but there's a legitimate concern that the relationship could go poof and then you, the potential employee, either won't move out or will immediately move back home. If you're not the moving party, good luck convincing the employer that you're not going to move for this other person at any time in the future. And while the BF probably has a job now, in this economy he can't take chances. And if he connects with her on Facebook now and has to job hunt three months from now, he's gonna have a fun time explaining to her why he wants to hide a relationship he'd previously allowed to be visible.

 

We don't have to be immediately public to be committed! When my SO and I began dating --in person-- we kept it a secret and off Facebook for six weeks. We were in a small academic community, and we didn't want to put any unnecessary pressure on a new relationship. Where we were, we would have been news, and EVERYONE would have been talking about us. If we missed seeing each other in the hall, rumors would have been going around that we were fighting or he'd cheated on me or I refused to sleep with him. These two probably wouldn't have that problem because they're LDR, but I'm assuming they share some friends, and those friends might put additional pressure on the relationship. "But I thought you'd sucked it up and dumped her," "Really? But you were so much happier without him!" "Melissa, you know where this is headed... why are you doing this to yourself?" and other similar things might be said by people who knew them together, and then separately. It's easier for the relationship if you don't deal with that until you can say "I understand your concern, but it's been two months now and we're still really happy."

 

Look, none of us on here really know what happened. These two are in trouble either way if they don't work on their respect and communication. He can't lie to her, and she can't pressure him to do unnecessary things he doesn't want to do. All I'm saying is let's not immediately jump to "he's hiding her from another girl." My boyfriend had a legit reason to keep me off Facebook when we began dating, and by indulging that I later discovered how very right he was, and I'm now in a relationship that might not exist if he hadn't taken proactive measures to protect it in its infancy. Additionally, Facebook is something we talk about in my employment discrimination class A LOT. It's a real issue, Veg.

Edited September 14, 2012 by PepperPotts

[melissa90]

I definitely do NOT think he's cheating. We talked about things and he noted that he did delete the post I wrote to "test"--not the right thing to do on either end and he has no idea what happened to the other. He says he went back and there is a post from me from a few weeks ago saying "Thanks for a great week <3"...which is what makes it confusing. Some of it is there and some of it isn't.

 

He says he thinks of facebook the same way he thinks of PDA- too much is too much. Sure, I can see that but he's never deleted anything else. We're currently working to find some sort of compromise and I think he'll be making an effort to come see me next weekend. I guess if he untags pictures I post, that will be a true sign that he's hiding...

[justwhoiam]

I don't think you need any more signs to tell if he's hiding you. It's crystal clear already. What you don't know is why. Whether it is because he'd be bothered if his friends and family knew about it, or if he has romantic chats with other girls and wants his freedom, you can't really know.

 

It just looks like he set his rules, so it's take it or leave it. And you are on your knees to be with him, accepting anything not to lose him. I don't see how you can go on like that.

[veggirl]

Geez. HE can set HIS settings so that his boss and strangers cant see his FB. He can set it so they can't see anything posted about him. He can set it so they CAN'T SEE who his family members and girlfriend are. It's not a big deal, it's not difficult to do, he is hiding something. This has nothing to do with employment. How old is he anyway?

[melissa90]

He's 25, employed, totally private to anyone who is not a friend.