20 times someone peeked at their partner’s phone and never saw them the same again

Redditors shared their discoveries after one asked them to reveal relationship-changing finds on their partners’ phones. You might assume that there are a lot of horror stories in this thread, but instead, most of what commenters found was heartwarming to the point of nausea.

1. Practice letters

“I went through my partner’s phone after he passed away from cancer last year. I had to find contact numbers for a few friends not on the funeral list we made.”

“In his notes app, I found phrases he used in his letters to me, as we often wrote to each other when he was in hospital and visiting times were short. English was not his first language and I hadn’t realised how hard he had practised in order to say what he wanted to say. I sent myself a copy of those notes and look at them often.” —u/charlie1701

2. Wedding vows and ideas to keep them

“A few years ago, I was adding some items to the Notes app grocery list on my wife’s phone. The app opened to the most recent list, which was a copy of her wedding vows with the promises she made to me (things like supporting my dreams, being my partner in crazy adventures).”

“Besides each one was a list of ideas to match – including some things we had done recently. We were going through a rough patch at the time and seeing that list doubled my resolve to work through it.” —u/timothywilliams2017

3. Secret photos

“There was a photo album of nothing but pictures of me and our son titled, ‘My Perfect Men.’ There were pictures in there I didn’t even know about — him helping me wash my car, us laying on the couch, him teaching me Minecraft, me helping him ride a bike, etc.”

“I was a mess for a while. Ugly crying. Happy tears, but ugly crying. I had no idea I was loved so deeply by her.” —u/fameone098

4. Thousands of dogs

“Left her laptop open and I saw a folder called ‘secret stuff.’ Momentary panic followed and I couldn’t help myself. It was literally just thousands of pictures of our dogs.” —u/Tech_Noir_1984

5. Messages to mom

“His messenger chats with my mom. He jokes with my mom a lot and would always ask about me, what I was like as a kid, why am I so full of energy and how to take care of me. My mom had cancer and passed away last 2023 but their last messages to each other was him assuring her he’d take care of me the way she wants to.” —u/Chispiken

6. Happy Anniversary wishes

“A couple months into dating a girl I was sitting in the passenger seat of her car waiting for her to come back from running inside her house when I saw a text come through on her phone that said, ‘Happy anniversary, baby. Can’t wait to see you tonight!’ So, yeah, that ended.” —u/lutlowt

7. Gift ideas

“He handed me his phone when he was driving so I could text his mom for him. When I unlocked his phone it opened to a note that was just a list of everything I’ve ever mentioned that I liked and it was titled ‘gift ideas.’ Like one of the items in the list was something I had seen in the window of a shop and mentioned that I thought it was cute then we just kept walking.”

“It made me feel so loved to know that he paid attention to every tiny thing. We’re married now.” —u/eugeneugene

8. A clapback

“A year after he died, I was clearing his tablet of stuff, and saw he had a Twitter account. I was reading through his posts, and hit one that had me in tears for the rest of the day. He had responded to some thread about keeping women in their place, or some such garbage.”

“Husband had posted a long rant about how bring married for 35 years to a woman who never tired of learning, who never let things stop her, stayed interested in new things, was the best thing in his life, and that a smart, thinking woman kept his life interesting and exciting.” —u/hooyah54

9. Fight tracking

“Notes keeping track of how long since we last had a fight, when to pick the next one if we haven’t had one by then, and potential things to pick a fight about. She didn’t believe in a relationship going more than 4 weeks without a fight.”

“Also a list of my passwords she’d managed to uncover.” —u/admles

10. Diapers and feet

“Been together since ‘17. Had a gut feeling to check his phone but he always was guarded when it come to it. He fell asleep one day with YouTube open, looked through his Instagram and for the past six months he was in a group chat with two other people sending each other videos of using the restroom in diapers and exchanging feet pics.” —u/FishermanDelicious26

11. A surprise password

“My husband changed his phone password to my name within 3 months of us dating. He didn’t tell me he had – I only realised one day when I needed to unlock his phone and asked. I had trust issues going into our relationship, so it was a shock that someone would use my name for anything.”

“We’ve now been together for 7 years, and I’m still his password.” —u/sunset_bean

12. Confusing complaints

“She left a facebook messenger conversation between her and her friend open on her computer. I’d use her computer when was at class but it was her complaining how much time I spent at her apartment and that I was smothering her by always being around.”

“I was surprised by this as she’d have a breakdown and accuse me of abandoning her when I’d leave to stay at my own place for a few days.” —u/spookycamphero

13. Engagement rings

“I was asking about something and he said look it up and passed his phone. I went to google and it opened his last tab … he was looking at engagement rings. I clicked on another tab and searched on that instead to try to hide that I’d seen it. I never confessed I’d seen it but Christ.”

“I knew pretty early on I wanted to spend my life with him and we’d had casual conversations but I’m a natural sceptic. To see that just really solidified in my little worried brain that he wasn’t lying when he said he loved me.” —u/Bubbly_North_2180

14. Full-throated defense

“Seeing her defend me in her family group threatening to break contact with her entire family if they keep bad mouthing me all the time. Telling them how happy she’s with me and how much I helped her gain self confidence, which they always try to destroy.”

“Love that woman, never gonna let her go. Cried a bit when I’ve accidentally read all of it.” —u/NewMEmeNew

“I was using his phone when mine had died and I have a habit of closing apps (he had a million open and it was driving me nuts) and his Reddit was open.”

“He doesn’t post most much, just follows and likes a bunch of wood working and bush crafting subreddits, but the few posts he commented on were about me.”

“It made my heart feel so happy I wanted to vomit lol. My favorite comment was about someone planning Valentine’s Day for their partner and he said something like ‘one Valentine’s Day my wife surprised me with a giant blanket fort. She had her parents watch our daughter, bought all my favorite snacks and sushi for dinner, had lord of the rings ready to play and made a pillow nest on the floor inside the fort. Best. Wife. Ever.’” —u/Main-Ladder-5663

16. Argument notes

“Notes app with a title ‘MUST READ.’ It is a long list of things he should do when we have an argument as if talking to himself, and it’s always followed by a compliment about me. Like one is ‘Ask her for a couple minutes to compose and calm down because you might say bad things you don’t mean out of frustration. She’s very sweet, understanding, caring, your baby doesn’t deserve to cry.’”

“It might be bare minimum to others but he has always been mentally struggling with dealing with negative emotions, altho we’re adults, we’re each other’s firsts.. so it’s a constant learning, and he’s improving a lot, but sometimes he beats himself up for it. Writing this just makes me cry, but I’m so proud of him for going beyond his limits and comfort zone.” —u/fanxyhigh

17. Hurtful texts

“After a year of remaining moderately stoic, I confided in her about some emotional torment I was experiencing and broke down and cried in front of her. I found texts to her friend a few hours later of how psycho and emotional I was. That was the last time I ever showed any feeling and broke up with her 6 months later.” —u/Intergalactic_Lion

18. Breakup debates

“Multiple texts to his brother stating he was debating breaking up with me, at different times throughout the past year. I had no inkling he was feeling that way. Instantly lost faith in the relationship, broke up shortly after.” —u/Bongofromouterspace

19. Cash money

“Not me but my Sister In Law. Said her then boyfriend (now husband). Handed her his phone to check the weather or an order status or something menial like that. Said when he handed it to her he accidentally left it open in his investing app.”

“And she didn’t poke around too much but saw the obvious 3-4 million in his account. At about 35 years old. And that was just one app probably not his entire portfolio.” —u/Nastynugget

20. Ex emails

“One time, an ex let me read his emails to provide context to how crazy and mean his ex wife was to him. He wanted me to read them.”

“I found several exchanges between him and a few of his exes. Turns out HE was the a**hole. He played victim in every disagreement. Called them b*tches and then wondered why they didn’t want to ever see him again. He contacted one of his ex’s family members after she blocked him, trying to reach out to her. Absolutely insane he volunteered that to me.” —u/the-big-meowski