For a long time, I’ve processed negative emotions by writing in a journal. It helps me clear my mind and sort through my feelings, especially when I’m overwhelmed. When I was a kid, it was all about my parents. After getting married, I started to keep a journal of the fights I had with my husband in a Google Doc on my phone. It’s a record of what was said during the fight and how I felt about it. The first entries are from around 2018, but I started writing in it more regularly later on with the encouragement of my personal therapist. We would talk about the journal during our sessions.
About two years ago, while I was pregnant with my second baby, the conflicts with my husband became more intense. During our couples counseling sessions, I started referring to my journal — the records of our past fights and the feelings I had written down. I did this because my husband had different memories of our experiences during my first pregnancy. He then became suspicious of what the journal contained. I told him it was private, but he stole my phone and read through it while I was sleeping.
He was devastated by what he read. He believes it was an unthinkable betrayal on my part to keep a journal of only negative things about only him for years. He says I shouldn’t have presented it during couples counseling as an accurate description of our experiences or his actions. He is upset that I left out key details of all the ways he did show up for me in our marriage and for our kids. He is also upset that I kept it on Google Docs because if our kids discover it in the future, they will see a record of negative feelings about their father.
I feel devastated for him. The journal contains intense and angry emotions toward him. It’s my id — the worst part of me. And I hate that he experienced that because it’s not all of how I feel about him. When the dust has settled after all our conflicts, I have chosen to stay with him.
It has been over a year of fighting about this, and he’s still not over it. I’ve stopped keeping the journal regularly (it feels tainted), but it keeps coming up in fights.
Was I wrong to keep a journal of only negative things about my partner, to keep it private and to bring it up during counseling sessions? — Name Withheld
From the Ethicist:
Let’s start with the obvious point. Breaking into your phone and reading this document was a very serious violation of your privacy, an act at least as indicative of marital trouble as anything you recorded there. You don’t say that he ever apologized for that invasion, while you have clearly explained to him that keeping a journal has long been how you process negative feelings.
Was keeping this document itself a betrayal, given the purposes it served? Surely not. You’re entitled to your thoughts and to your own ways of dealing with them. Nor was it wrong to keep the journal from your spouse. Privacy isn’t deception, and you don’t lose your right to an interior life when you get married.
What about bringing up the journal during counseling? There was nothing wrong with drawing on contemporaneous notes about how you felt at the time. Therapy regularly deals in subjective experience. What would have been a mistake was to present those entries as a trustworthy account of disputed events when that’s not what they were ever intended to be.
Perhaps what has upset your husband is not so much that you recorded these thoughts as that you had them. It’s true that people routinely have ugly feelings about those they love, and your journal was meant to be a way of getting past those feelings. Still, encountering a long record of concentrated resentment may have shaken his understanding of your relationship. That he obtained the record wrongfully doesn’t mean he can choose not to be affected by it. (And yes, better precautions, such as password protection, could have kept the journal private — from him as well as from your children.)
At this point you might reasonably decide that you’ll discuss the journal only in a structured setting with a counselor, rather than relitigate it in quarrel after quarrel. A further reason he keeps returning to it could be that he sees it as an instance in which you are plainly in the wrong. But insisting on winning arguments is a recipe for losing a marriage.
Readers Respond
The previous question was from a parent wondering how to handle a problem with their daughter’s close friend. They wrote:
My daughter and her best friend are entering their senior year of high school. … Lately, this friend’s behavior around alcohol has escalated into dangerous territory. While the rest of their friend group barely drinks — or doesn’t drink at all — this girl gets extremely drunk. … All of the girls in the group are deeply concerned for her safety and want her to get help. Her parents, however, are known to be very strict, and the girls fear that telling them will result in severe punishment rather than support, or that it will ruin their friend’s trust completely. … If this were my daughter, I would want to know. … But I worry about blowing up this girl’s home life or driving her behavior further underground. … Do I have a moral obligation to inform her parents, even if it might mean harsh consequences for her? — Name Withheld
In his response, the Ethicist noted:
You’re describing a situation that’s too serious for a group of teenagers to manage on their own. If you have a relationship with this girl that makes it appropriate, consider speaking with her directly and conveying your concerns. Unless she gives you reason to believe that telling her parents would itself put her in serious danger, they are the adults in the best position to get her medical or counseling support and to supervise her more closely. … Talking with the girl may also help you work out how to frame the issue for her parents so that they’ll take the proper steps. In approaching the parents, prepare yourself for the possibility that they’ll react punitively, and offer a few ideas for where they could turn for help instead.
(Reread the full question and answer here.)
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Telling the parents that the girl “has a problem with alcohol” has the potential to get everybody on the defensive. It would be better to report only what the daughter or parent has actually seen, such as, “Your daughter got very drunk last night at our house,” or “Your daughter drank so much that she fell off a chair and injured herself,” or “The poor girl was drunk and wet herself and was very embarrassed,” combined with, “I’ve seen her drunk on more than one occasion, and I think she may not realize how much is safe for her to drink.” Best to steer clear of opinions and report only what the writer has observed to be true. — Samantha
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I would urge the writer not to reach out to the parents without speaking to the girl first. There’s a reason she’s drinking to the point of oblivion, and her home life could be that reason. It is all too common for young people in abusive homes to self-medicate with alcohol or drugs. She clearly needs help, but please don’t assume her parents are the ones to give it. Ask her what’s going on. — Carly
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I agree that the parent should inform the other parents about the child’s drinking problem. However, I don’t believe this parent should then “offer a few ideas for where they should turn to help” unless the other parents request her advice. Once the parent has fulfilled her obligation to alert them to the danger, further steps are none of her business. As a parent I would want to know about the risk to my child but I would resent the other parent’s presuming that she knew better than me how to handle the situation. — Abigail
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The friends could approach a trusted school counselor and explain the whole situation. That leaves the mother out of the loop in terms of disclosing information that she doesn’t have firsthand. She could follow up with the counselor to find out how it’s going. This was a strategy we used many years ago, when I was sworn to silence about an issue with my daughter’s friend. It ended well because the parents were sympathetic, but each case is different. Nonetheless, parents will need to know and the daughter will need help. The counselor can make appropriate referrals. Unfortunately, denial is common, so establishing trust and avoiding betrayal is essential. — MJ
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The parents would not necessarily have to be involved. Alcoholics Anonymous has no age restrictions. Some states allow teenagers to receive psychotherapy without parental knowledge or consent. And there are in-person and online resources that have programs and meetings for teens. — Janine
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