My husband secretly RECORDED me sleeping for months and sent videos to his friends [FULL STORY]

He said what he did was wrong and that he didn’t really understand how violated I must have felt until he went through his own version of it. The sleep problems and constant paranoia made him see how much control someone has over you when your own bed doesn’t feel safe anymore.

He apologized for putting me through that first, and his voice cracked a little on the last word. I watched him fidget with the cardboard sleeve on his cup and noticed his fingernails were bitten down more than usual.

He looked genuinely sorry, which should have made me feel better but somehow didn’t. I told him I didn’t know if sorry fixed anything; the trust was just gone from both directions now.

He’d filmed me for months without permission and shared those videos with his friends like I was some kind of entertainment. Then I’d tortured him psychologically until his health fell apart and his job performance tanked.

We’d both crossed lines that felt impossible to uncross. Rick nodded slowly and stared at the table between us.,

The Lavender-Scented Office

A woman at the next table laughed at something on her phone, and the normal sound felt wrong in our heavy conversation. He suggested marriage counseling after a long pause.

He said he’d do whatever it took to fix things and rebuild what we used to have. I almost laughed because counseling felt like putting a band-aid on a broken bone.

How could sitting in some office talking about our feelings erase months of betrayal and revenge? But I agreed to try one session just to see if anything was salvageable.

Maybe I was scared of being alone, or maybe some small part of me still remembered loving him before everything went bad. We scheduled an appointment for the following week with a counselor his insurance covered.

The counselor’s office smelled like lavender and had too many plants on the windowsill. She was an older woman with gray hair pulled back and these kind but serious eyes that made me feel like she’d heard every terrible thing people could do to each other.

Rick and I sat on opposite ends of a beige couch that was trying too hard to be comfortable. The counselor asked us to explain why we were there, and we both started talking at once, then stopped.

Then Rick gestured for me to go first. I laid out the whole timeline.

The phone pointing at me that first morning, finding dozens of videos, him getting sneakier with tablets and laptops and hidden cameras. The group chat where his friends rated my sleeping positions and compared me to a dead seal.

My voice stayed steady through most of it but cracked when I got to the part about being sick with the flu and still being recorded. Rick sat there looking at his hands while I talked.

Then it was his turn, and he explained his perspective, though it sounded more like excuses at first. He said he thought the videos were sweet and that watching me sleep made him feel connected.,

He admitted sending them to his friends was stupid but claimed he didn’t think it was a big deal because they were just joking around. Then he got to my revenge campaign, and his voice got quieter.

The fake choking sounds that woke him up in panic, the creepy noise app that convinced him we had mice, me standing by his bed at 3:00 in the morning staring at nothing, and the makeup video sent to his group chat. He said the sleep deprivation made him miss work and almost lose his job.

The counselor listened to everything without her expression changing much. When we finished, she was quiet for a minute.

Then she told us straight out that we were dealing with serious violations of trust and consent from both sides. Rebuilding from this point would take major work from both of us, and she wasn’t sure we were ready for that level of commitment.

She asked if we’d both be willing to do individual therapy alongside couple’s counseling. We both said yes, even though I wasn’t convinced it would help.

The Guest Room Negotiation

Rick moved back into the apartment three days later but took the guest room. We existed in this weird space where we were technically trying to fix things but couldn’t stand being near each other.,

Every interaction felt loaded with everything we’d done. Making breakfast turned into a negotiation about who got the kitchen first.

Deciding what to watch on TV became a silent standoff where we’d both just scroll on our phones instead. One night I suggested ordering pizza and Rick said he didn’t care, so I ordered what I wanted and he got mad that I didn’t ask about toppings even though he’d said he didn’t care.

We fought about pizza toppings for 20 minutes like that was the real problem instead of months of betrayal and psychological warfare. I started staying late at work just to avoid going home.

Rick did the same. We’d pass each other in the hallway and mumble hello without making eye contact.

The apartment felt smaller somehow, like the walls were closing in because we were both trying to take up as little space as possible while still existing in the same place. At night I’d hear him moving around in the guest room, probably not sleeping any better than I was.

The white noise machine was gone. So were the blackout curtains and the expensive pillow.

I wondered if he’d thrown them out or just couldn’t use them anymore without thinking about everything that happened. Rick came home early one Tuesday looking worse than usual.

He went straight to the guest room and closed the door. I gave him space for an hour, then knocked to ask if he wanted dinner.

He opened the door and told me his boss had pulled him aside that afternoon and asked if everything was okay at home because Rick’s performance had dropped way off. He’d called in sick three times in two weeks, missed a delivery deadline, and showed up late twice.

His boss didn’t say it directly, but the message was clear—one more problem and Rick might be out of a job. He’d made up some excuse about a stomach bug, but his boss didn’t look convinced.,

Rick sat on the edge of the guest bed with his head in his hands. He said he hadn’t realized how bad the sleep stuff had gotten until his boss pointed out all the ways it was affecting his work.

The warehouse job wasn’t fancy but it paid decent and had good benefits. Losing it would mess up everything, especially now with counseling costs and potentially splitting up.

I stood in the doorway not knowing what to say. Part of me felt guilty because I’d caused the sleep problems that led to this, but another part remembered all those videos and the group chat and felt like maybe he deserved some consequences.

I settled on telling him I was sorry his job was at risk and left him alone.

Rumors and Breaking Points

The next day at work, Alina pulled me into the break room during lunch. She had this look on her face that meant she knew something I didn’t want to hear.

“Does Rick’s sister, Mercedes, know anyone at our office?”

She asked.

“Maybe, why?”

I replied.

Alina explained that apparently Mercedes had mentioned something about trouble in my marriage to someone who knew someone who worked in billing. Now people were talking.,

Nothing specific, thank God, but enough that co-workers were giving me sympathetic looks and asking careful questions about how I was doing. I wanted to disappear under my desk.

The idea of people at work knowing anything about my personal disaster made my skin crawl. I asked Alina what exactly people were saying.

She said just that my marriage was going through a rough patch and I might be separating from my husband. It could be worse, but it still felt horrible having my private life become office gossip.

I spent the rest of the day avoiding eye contact with everyone and eating lunch at my desk instead of the breakroom. When Janet from accounts receivable asked if I was okay, I said I was fine with a smile that probably looked more like a grimace.

The second counseling session the following week went worse than the first. The counselor wanted to focus on communication and boundaries, which sounded good in theory.

But every time Rick tried to explain his side it came out wrong. He kept calling the recording thing a mistake in judgment, like he’d accidentally filmed me instead of doing it deliberately for months.,

I got defensive about the revenge tactics, saying he deserved to know how it felt. We talked in circles for 40 minutes, getting nowhere.

Finally the counselor held up her hand and interrupted us. She said we weren’t ready for reconciliation work yet because neither of us could take full responsibility for what we’d done.

We were both still too focused on justifying our actions and blaming the other person. She suggested we each do two weeks of individual therapy before coming back for another couple’s session.

Maybe working through our own stuff separately would help us actually hear each other. Rick agreed immediately.

I nodded, but inside I was thinking this whole thing was pointless. You can’t therapy your way out of broken trust.

Another Call from the Chat

My phone rang while I was making dinner that Thursday. It was an unknown number but a local area code, so I answered.,

The voice on the other end said his name was Corbin and he was one of Rick’s friends from the group chat. I recognized the name as the guy who’d called me a dead seal.

My first instinct was to hang up, but curiosity kept me on the line. Corbin started apologizing before I could say anything.

He said he’d heard about everything that went down with the makeup video and the sleep revenge stuff. He wanted me to know he felt bad about the comments he’d made in the group chat.

He explained that Rick always made the videos seem innocent and sweet, like he was just an adoring husband who thought I was cute when I slept. None of them realized Rick was filming without my knowledge or consent.

They thought I knew about it and was okay with it, which obviously made the joke seem less awful at the time. Hearing that I had no idea changed how Corbin saw the whole situation.

He said what Rick did was creepy and wrong and he was sorry for being part of it. I thanked him for calling because it did mean something to hear an actual apology from one of them.

After we hung up, I stood in the kitchen thinking about how Rick had presented the videos to his friends. Of course he’d made it seem harmless.

He probably convinced himself it was harmless too.

Crying in a Bathroom Stall

Work got overwhelming the next week. A patient called to dispute a bill for a procedure their insurance should have covered.

I pulled up their account and saw the claim had been denied for some technical reason that wasn’t their fault or ours—just insurance company nonsense. The patient was upset, and I tried to explain the situation, but they kept talking over me and getting louder.

I felt tears starting and excused myself quickly, practically running to the bathroom. I locked myself in a stall and just cried.

Everything felt too big and wrong. The marriage falling apart, Rick’s job problems, office gossip, the counseling sessions that weren’t helping.

The patient’s angry voice echoed in my head, mixed with memories of finding those videos and Rick’s friends laughing about my snoring. I couldn’t stop crying even though I knew I needed to pull myself together and get back to work.,

Alina found me 10 minutes later. She must have noticed me leave and came to check.

She talked me into taking a personal day, saying she’d cover for me with our supervisor. She drove me home, even though it was the middle of her shift, and made me tea in my own kitchen while I sat on the couch feeling empty.

I admitted out loud for the first time that I didn’t think the marriage could be saved. The words felt huge and scary.

Alina sat next to me and said that was okay, that sometimes things break too badly to fix. She stayed for two hours just keeping me company until I felt steady enough to be alone.