She said, he said! You're not a spy, but is it ever okay to snoop through your lover's things?

It’s been described as a fire burning inside your heart. You know you shouldn’t do it, but something comes over you and you can’t help yourself, especially when his buzzing Blackberry is just two feet away. In relationships, can snooping ever be validated?

When the question is first thrown out there, dozens of people come back with a very stern NO, it is absolutely, 100 percent never okay to snoop.

Arizona resident Matt Trujullo says if you snoop, “The relationship has already developed some trust issues and you’ve also proven that you aren’t really an honest person.”

Sabrina Swann, also of Arizona, adds, “If you have to snoop, you already know the answer to what you are looking for and you need to be prepared for what you find out. Don’t snoop if you’re not going to commit to the results. Everyone deserves a little privacy."

Dating/Relationship Expert Lea Haben agrees that snooping is a no-go in relationships and says many times women feel the need to do it because they are imagining things in their head that “aren’t necessarily there.”

“Usually someone feels the innate need to snoop if they have been cheated on or if they are dating someone who has admitted to being a cheater in a past relationship.”

Haben says whatever fuels your temptation to sneak a peek, you need to step back and analyze the situation.

“Most times we feel the need to snoop because of fear,” she says. “Fear that there is another woman or fear that he isn’t being completely honest with you.”

However, Haben says even if that fear does begin to settle in, don’t let your guard down and follow your woman’s intuition. She says, “If certain behavior changes warrant your fears, then you have a legitimate excuse to snoop.”

For example, if your boyfriend suddenly starts taking his phone conversations outside, has his phone glued to his hip, or has changed his daily routine, like coming home later or wearing a different type of cologne or boxers; then these can all be read flags that he is hiding something from you, or worse, cheating.

We would all probably agree that there are different levels of snooping. Like reading his text messages while pretending to play Hangman on his phone probably isn’t as offensive as hacking into his bank account.

But Private Female Investigator Sandra Hope says, “If two people are in a committed relationship, there should be no secrets. The computer should always be open and phones should never be locked. Everyone wants and has the right to know where they stand in a relationship.”

One reader wrote in and wanted to share her personal experience of snooping: She says she has been dating someone for a little over six months, “really likes him and is having a great time exploring their relationship and the different sides of each other they each bring out.”

However, since the beginning of their relationship she says he has always kept in touch with his ex-girlfriends via phone, texting and the social networking site Facebook. The reader says most of the time she is okay with her guy talking to all of his ex-girlfriends. But, what “threw her over the edge and what ultimately gave her the urge to snoop” was when he started receiving text messages from his most recent ex-girlfriend late at night.

“It would be like one, two, three in the morning,” she says. “Text message after text message, the dinging would never stop.”

So, the next day, while her “popular” boyfriend was in the shower she opened his phone and found “several flirtatious almost desperate text messages” from his ex-girlfriend. The reader says as she continued to snoop it was as if “something came over her and she couldn’t stop.” That was until she found multiple nude pictures.

The reader describes feeling like she had been “punched in the gut.” She started asking herself “Why would this woman feel the need to send these types of messages? How does my boyfriend feel when he gets them? Why doesn’t he just ask her to stop and does he compare my body to her fabulous, toned and plastic one?”

The reader says when she confronted her boyfriend about the laundry list of text messages he “blew it off. He said his ex-girlfriend was crazy and he never replies to her messages.”

The last thing the reader wrote before signing off “Sincerely Snoopy,” was now, even after confronting her man every time his text message alert goes off, her heart sinks.

“I am constantly worried it’s another message from her or someone else,” she says. “I will be honest that I haven’t looked through his text messages in quite some time but it takes almost every ounce of strength in my body not to think about it.”

Both Hope and Haben say they understand what prompted the reader’s curiosity and ultimately led her to snoop. They also both agree that this type of communication (from the ex-girlfriend) has to stop or else anger and resentment will set into the relationship and they will be headed for Splitsville sooner than later.

Hope says the reader needs to remind herself that she is the one in the relationship, not the ex. “She needs to remember, it didn’t work out between them, it wasn’t wonderful, that’s why I am here and not her.”

However, she goes on to say that the “popular” boyfriend needs to also man up in this situation and tell his ex-girlfriend to stop calling him or change his phone number.

“He doesn’t need to talk to any of his ex-girlfriends, especially the one sending him explicit pictures,” she says. “They are there just to cause trouble.”

Haben says all men are “visual by nature.” They can’t help it. And getting these text messages are probably somewhat of an ego boost.

“The reason he hasn’t deleted the messages probably isn’t because he still cares about his ex-girlfriend, but doesn’t think he’s doing anything wrong and justifies it by not responding to her.” On the other hand, “This guys needs to go out of his way to make his [current] girlfriend feel secure. If he really respects her, he will do whatever he can to make her feel comfortable.”

Both women say snoopers beware! It can become an obsessive habit and run your relationship into the ground.

“People love knowledge,” Hope says. “But, if you become obsessive and it consumes your every thought, you need to look in the mirror and decide if this relationship is really for you.”