He's Following Girls You've Never Seen — Should You Ask?

Quick Answer

Most of the time, asking him about unfamiliar follows is a worse move than not asking — because the question itself reframes the relationship as "I'm watching you" and the answer rarely tells you anything you couldn't already see. The exception: a specific dated pattern (a burst on a specific night, a private account with no mutuals, a name that keeps coming up). For those, ask. For the rest, monitor or let it go. Below: three scripts that don't sound like accusations and the follow-up move if his answer felt off.

The "trust but verify" trap

The phrase sounds healthy. In practice it's a contradiction — trust is the thing you do when you can't verify, by definition. As soon as verification becomes the price of trust, the trust is already gone.

The functional version is: trust at the macro level, verify only when something specific calls for it. Don't ask about every unfamiliar follow. Ask when a pattern emerges that has a specific time, a specific account, or a specific recurrence.

When asking blows up trust vs builds it

Asking destroys trust when:

The question is vague ("you've been weird lately") rather than specific

There's no real evidence — just a feeling

The volume of questions is high (asking once is communication; asking weekly is surveillance)

He's never given you a real reason to suspect anything

Asking builds trust when:

The question is specific and dated ("you followed this private account on Thursday night")

He answers without defensiveness and the answer is verifiable

The exchange ends with both of you feeling less anxious, not more

The asymmetry: a healthy partner welcomes the specific question because it gives him a chance to actually resolve the concern. A partner with something to hide reframes the question as proof of your jealousy.

3 scripts that don't sound like accusations

Script 1 — The casual reference.

"I saw [name] in your Following — is she from [school/work/that trip]?"

Works because: it doesn't presuppose a problem, gives him an obvious neutral answer, and his comfort or discomfort with the question itself is the data point.

Script 2 — The dated specific.

"On Thursday night your Following list grew by six accounts. Curious what happened — were you on Instagram a lot that night?"

Works because: it's a fact, not an interpretation. He can explain it (group thread, a friend's recommendation, a creator he found) and the explanation is checkable. Or he can't, which is also information.

Script 3 — The boundary check.

"Hey, can I ask a thing about Instagram without it being a thing? I noticed I'm spending a lot of time wondering about who you follow and I want to figure out a rule for myself, not for you. What's your honest take on it?"

Works because: it makes the problem yours, not his. Most healthy partners will respond by giving you visibility willingly. Most unhealthy ones will get defensive about a request that didn't even ask for anything.

What his answer should and shouldn't sound like

Healthy answers:

Specific. "Oh that's my coworker's wife, she runs that bakery in [neighbourhood]"

Confirmable. Mentions a third party you can ask about or a context that checks out

Open. He shows you the profile, scrolls through it casually

Concerning answers:

Vague. "I don't know, just someone Instagram suggested"

Defensive. "Why are you checking who I follow?"

Counter-accusatory. "Are you spying on me? That's psycho."

Followed by a sudden 2-week Instagram blackout. (The blackout means he's removing the surface you've been watching, not that he's stopping the behaviour.)

The volume of follow-up questions matters here. One vague answer is fine. Three vague answers to three specific questions about three different accounts is a pattern.

The follow-up move if his answer felt off

If he gave you an answer and your gut is still itchy, three options:

Option 1 — Drop it for 30 days and watch. If the answer was honest, the pattern won't repeat. If it wasn't, more data will surface. Patience is cheaper than confrontation.

Option 2 — Bring it up once more, specifically. "Hey, the [account name] thing — I kept thinking about your answer and it didn't quite land. Can we revisit?" Healthy people don't mind the second pass. Defensive people make the second pass the fight.

Option 3 — Build a fact base before the next conversation. Real-time follow monitoring lets you replace anxiety-driven re-asking with one specific conversation when something concrete shows up. The 24-48 hour bursts that the modern cheating signs breakdown identifies are exactly what monitoring catches.

The honest framing: if you trust him fully, you don't need to watch. If you don't, watching prevents worse outcomes — either the relief of "the pattern was nothing" or the specificity of "the pattern was something." Both are better than the indefinite hovering of "I don't know."

Lurk does the watching for $1 first week, no login required, no notification on his side. The point isn't to catch him — the point is to stop having to wonder.