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Debbie Wood, known as “the most jealous woman in the world,” made her husband Steve take lie detector tests every single day.
Debbie later admitted she was shaped by a toxic earlier relationship that left her scarred and mistrusting. (Representational Image: AI)
Some couples fight over chores. Some over money. Debbie Wood, though, made headlines around the world for something else entirely; she made her husband take a lie detector test every single day.
Debbie, once dubbed “the most jealous woman in the world”, didn’t just have trust issues; she institutionalised them. Every time her husband Steve came home, she hooked him up to a polygraph machine. And that was just the start.
How Did It Get This Extreme?
It started, strangely enough, as a joke. Steve once quipped that he’d happily take a lie detector test to prove he was faithful. Debbie didn’t laugh. She took him up on it. Bought the machine. Set the rules.
What triggered it? A mix of long-distance anxiety and baggage from a painful past. When Debbie and Steve began dating, they lived in different cities. Steve had once briefly dated someone else before he and Debbie became official, and even though that wasn’t technically betrayal, Debbie never let it go.
She began monitoring everything – his bank statements, his phone records, even his reactions to women on TV. If a lingerie ad made him blink wrong, Debbie would interrogate him.
What Was Behind Her Jealousy?
Debbie later admitted she was shaped by a toxic earlier relationship that left her scarred and mistrusting. “When you find a good man, you don’t let him go,” she said, except in her case, that meant controlling him obsessively. Her jealousy, she now realises, was less about Steve and more about her own fear of being abandoned again.
Her behaviour grew so extreme that it pushed their relationship to the edge. But instead of walking away, Steve stuck around.
Why Steve Stayed
Steve’s calm, patient approach played a big part in holding things together. He says that when Debbie isn’t caught in her spiral of suspicion, they laugh a lot. They genuinely enjoy each other. He also admitted that things got much better once the lie detector tests became “occasional” instead of daily.
By 2014, the couple had reportedly made real progress. Debbie was working on her trust issues. Steve had proven he wasn’t going anywhere. The polygraph became a rarely used backup instead of a daily ritual.
Debbie now acknowledges that jealousy nearly destroyed what they had, but also says her marriage has happiness in it. The lie detector may be a symptom of the past, but it no longer controls their future.
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