Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
With all of the talk about dating, cheating, gold digging, etc., sometimes I think a background check or private investigator on a prospective mate may be a good idea, but on the other hand, I think it is very invasive and calculating. But then I think if I'm even considering it, then something must be terribly wrong, and I can't put my finger on it.
Anyone have any experience with this kind of thing when they were dating? PS: Not married folks who suspect infidelity and are getting positive documentation for a divorce or something.
Also, suppose you had one done on a person you liked and ended up in a very committed relationship or married to them. Is that the kind of thing you disclose to them or does it fall in the same category as NOT talking about past lovers?
Could be considered paranoid! Could be considered cautious!
I would never have thought of it years ago, but with all the crazy stuff that goes on these days, I might consider directly asking more and different questions than I would have 10-15-20 years ago.
Using a detective may be extreme but if I did resort to using a professional for a background check, I do think it would be best to let the person/potential partner know you did it.
Anyone who is a tad older and in the market for a SO, probably is carrying baggage that involves some kind of mistrust of the opposite sex. Just listen to the stories here! Anyway, it leads to a lot of suspicions and paranoia.
I have a friend who was dating a very nice man who worked a lot. 80 to 100 hours a week. Well her EX had been a real slacker and barely managed to work so this was a new experience for her. OTOH, this man really had no life outside of work and he thought 100 hours a week was normal. It wasn't long till my friend thought there was a chance he was either married or living with someone. Here's the other side of the story. My friend owns a home she is responsible for selling per her divorce decree. She doesn't live there because of threats made by her EX and an ugly problem with one of the neighbors reporting back to her EX on all her comings and goings. But she has to maintain the home and yard so she does spend time there. So, this man also came to the conclusion my friend must still be married or with someone else. Why else would you have a house you didn't live in?
So they break up over this. I know my friend wasn't lying. Maybe the guy wasn't either. Maybe it would have been better if they had just paid an independent 3rd party to do backround checks?
A background investigation is a bit much. Why waste your time proving the person is all wrong? If u believe something is not right then have the courage to talk about it or end it. Better to grieve now than later. However if u have already done a background check u may want to keep the matter to yourself or u run the risk of alienating the person. If u couldn't tell them about the background check up front those same reassons are probably why u should not mention it after the fact.
If the person has been married before or in a significant prior relationship, and they wouldn't mind you calling and talking to that person, that might be a good idea. I've done that before at their suggestion.
Background checks can be done rather easily these days. But unless you are upfront about doing one then your potential mate might be offended if he finds out. Has your potential mate said or done something to make you suspicious? Either way, go with your gut.
I have to admit, I can see a day in the not to distant future where almost everyone does a background check before they get serious with someone. You can't be too careful these days. There are a lot of guys out there who have criminal records or a history of violence and you would never know about it just by looking at them. Many are very adept at hiding it.
I have a good friend, who lives in another city, who was dating a judge who did a background check on him. He had no idea till she gave him a copy of a photo of him that I'd posted on Flickr (with his name in the title) for his birthday. We figured that the only way she could have found it was to have been intensively searching for info on him. It was the sort of thing that did not just pop up with a general google search.
There was nothing incriminating about the photo, but things didn't work out between them for other reasons.
Last edited by ellie; 06-14-2007 at 04:30 AM..
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
