His Ex..

[CharlotteLouise]

My boyfriend and I have been going out for almost a year. Our relationship started out as friends and I knew him for a long time before we got together.

 

His previous realtionship was one with a girl who is in our group of friends. They went out for 7 mouths, but didn't get to spend much time together as her religion and fmaily and those kind of things would have been against the realtionship.

 

They broke up well before my boyfrined and I started to like each other, but they were alwasy kind of close. They used to much round and flirt with each other. She still liked him and he still liked her. But he started to like me. He told her this and this apperantly hurt her a lot.

 

When my boyfriend and I started going out they still hung around eachother a lot, flirted and mucked around. You coudl tel tehy did by littlw things, such as the gifts he still had form her, and teh way he talked about her. But I really liked him and I also knew he was a good person and wouldn't do anything stupid, so I just let it go.

 

But, becuase of all the flirting and that kind of thing, after about 6 months of going out, he thought he liked her again, he dind't want to hurt me and so thought we couldn't go out anymore because although he loved me, he didn't believe it was right fo him to have these feelings for her. It was only for a little over a day but that night and day were very painful. He realised that he dind't like her becuase of how he missed me that day and night. Any feeling he thought he had for her were deomlished in the pain of us ebing seperated.

 

They ended up having a huge fight, when he finally cofnronted her about teh flirting. She denyed she had flirted with him. They refused to talk to each other for ages. She balmed eveyrthing on him, and everynow and then woudl confront him and say things like, do you think thisnwill amke it ebtter? and tell him how mch he hurt her.

 

but you coudl tell she really wnated to talk to him, and slowly teh ignoring got less bitter. Eventually she wrote a comment on him blog, and this led to themhaving an msn convo. This, after a few fights and apoligies, led to them being friends again.

 

This is really mesisng with me. Throughout our whole realtionship there has always been somethign to do with her. I used to get along with her pretty well, now I cna't even talk to her or look at her without feeling so angry and hurt. My boyfriend asked me if i wanted them to be firneds and I had to say yes. Saying no woudn't have stoped them really, and he wanted to be friends with her. I don't want to be the kind of girlfriend who says their partner can't be friends with girls.

 

I've talked to my boyfirned about it, and he knows exactly how I feel. In one discussion I ended up crying and telling him about how hurt I was in teh beginning of teh realtionship.He said that first thing inteh morningwhen he saw her he woudl say they couldn't be firneds. But that never happened.

 

He knows how much I hate it, and how much I odn't want them to be firends. it's really making me feel horrible. I wake up eveyrmorning with a feeling of dred and I'm strating to fear going to school, whcih isn't good as I'm in my last year and can't afford to miss any. I get paranoid and when I'm not with him I think about them tlaking on msn. Which they most often are.

 

I was on my boyfirneds computer and going to sign into msn on my account, when I noticed that his passoword (he sets it to save passowrd) was shorter them his usual one. We bother know all of eachothers passowrds but he hand't told me he had changed it. This made me paranoid, but I thought, if he was changing it to hide something from me he wouldn't leave it on remmeber passowrd for msn.

 

I knwo i shoudnt' have done it, but I signed in on his account and went and looked at his emails. There was an email form her. I read it. It said things abotu how she's been feeling and such, a raelly personal email. It also said thank for teh letter, it was strange, in a good way, seeing your handwriting again after such a long time. And also, was it a good idea to be sneeking around, 'what if she finds out?'

 

I know he's not cheeting in the conventional sence, as in it's not a romantic realtionship. But this whole thing is making me feel depressed and anxious. I'm worried something will ahppen like last time, when he thought he liked her again. Or he might actaully start to like her again. I'm also hurt that he knows howmuch it's affecting me, and yet he still really wants to be friends with her, and defends her actions. Even after she hurt both him and me so much.

 

I'm also scared I'm driving him away, but I na't help how I feel. I do think they this secret communication is his way of trying not to hurt me.

 

Blagh. Sorry, this is so long. I sound like such a sob story. I have no one to talk to about this, I normally talk to my boyfirned about things that are upsetting me.

 

Does anyone have any opinions or advice..? I don't know what to do. I dont' want to end it withhim becuase we love eachother and it's woderful when I dont' think about the problem, but when I do I wonder if I can keep on living this way with him.

[MadDog]

You say he's not "cheating in the conventional sense" meaning he's not sleeping with her but you have to realize that the dishonesty that exists is still a really bad thing.

 

I mean, knowing that he talks to her behind your back, how can you ever trust him? Everytime he says he's spending time with his friends, you have to wonder whether he's hanging out with her. Everytime he's on the computer, you have to wonder if he's secretly chatting with her.

 

I'd say the best situation here is to take a break from the relationship and let him figure out what he really wants. Also, you need to evaluate whether you'd be better off finding a new guy who doesn't have the hangups your boyfriend has. Baggage free relationships can be a great thing.

[CharlotteLouise]

Thanks for your advice, painful as it was to read...

 

He can only see her at school, becuase of her situation she is not aloud to have boyfriends, and when they were going out the family sort of found out (a contributing factor to their break up) so he woulnd't be able to see her out of school. They talk on msn and this does make me paranoid...

 

The thing is, I stupidly said that they coudl be frineds as long as he doens't talk to me about her or mention her to me, becuase that was one of the things that hurt me the most before, when he used talk about her all the time. I thought that that way i'd be fine with it. But obviously I'm not.

 

So i don't know if he's doing this becuase he thinks it's what i want or what...

 

It's obvious she still likes him, even though it's beenover a year. I even aske dhim if he notices the way she actis differently around him, and he said yes. This is also hurintg him a lot.

 

I'm thinking about your advice, but I don't know..i don't want to loose him.