I’m sure this is a tale as old as time, but I’d really appreciate everyone’s honest opinion. My boyfriend lied to me, but blames me because of my mistrust and constant interrogations. I am in so much pain. I (35F) always had trouble trusting my boyfriend (26M) from the beginning of our relationship. The mistrust wasn’t originally based off of anything other than things he openly shared about his own past. We’ve been together for six months and met on a dating app.
He fell for me very fast and and it felt a bit like love-bombing which was my first trigger.
I’m talking flowers every week, driving me around all the time, paying for everything, telling me he loves me early on. He’s sustained this effort consistently for 6+ months now so I’m not sure it’s love-bombing or perhaps cultural. We are expats living in Europe he’s from Eastern Europe and I’m from the US. Anyway, I did fall for him hard and we even talk about marriage and kids.
The only hangup I had about him was that he still kept in touch with an ex girlfriend, an ex FWB (which was much more recent), as well as following a lot of other hookups and girls from the dating apps on Instagram. He even likes some of their sexy pics. The first few times we met, he talked about how amazing sex was with his former FWB, how he had an emotional affair on his ex gf, shared details about his sex life with his ex gf, told me he was on feeld (casual sex app), told me he once went on 6 dates in one weekend (recently and just before we met), the list goes on. Stupid me continues to date him and this is what triggered my mistrust and suspicion early on, but it was clear that he was super into me and spent almost all his free time with me.
Due to this onslaught of stories (he proactively shared this stuff mind you) I started questioning him A LOT about his ex hookups and ex FWB who he claims turned into a platonic friend. He had a six month “FWB” relationship with her that only turned “platonic” a few months prior to us meeting. He swears that he has no lingering feelings for this person, but I do find it odd and suspicious that he suddenly became platonic with this FWB and that there’s no residual attraction or romantic feelings left. The FWB also has a boyfriend so it kinda seems like she moved on first, ended their sexual relationship, and my boyfriend made an effort to maintain the friendship. Is this normal? He deleted their messages on Instagram too.
Anyway, we’ve been struggling so much because of my trust issues and the other day we had a heart-to-heart and I, for the first time, made it explicitly clear what my boundaries were. I’m not comfortable with you hanging out with your ex gf or ex FWB one-one-one or liking thirst traps of girls that you met on dating apps but have no meaningful connection with now. He agreed, told me how in love with me he is, that he will adjust his behavior, etc.
Then in the SAME convo, I pull up a girl’s Instagram and ask him how he knows her. He says he knows her from college. I let it go, but really doubt his answer since they have no mutual followers and she moved to our city very recently. Two days pass and I keep bringing up this girl. I knew it my gut he wasn’t being honest. He then says oh sorry she’s actually a friend of a college friend. But the friend he says he knows her through doesn’t follow the girl.
This is when he told me the truth. Said he panicked in the moment, was afraid of losing me, afraid of my reaction, and so he lied and had to continue the lie for several days. He then comes over to my house after I hang up on him and sobs and pleads with me and he did truly look so remorseful over it.
Am I insane for being willing to forgive him? The problem is…all his past behavior is sticking out again like deleting messages from his ex FWB etc
Someone please set me straight! I’m aware that I should probably just dump him, but I’m madly in love and want to forgive. Could my interrogations have caused him to lie out of fear?
Thanks for reading! I know I sound mental. Send help.
TLDR: My boyfriend keeps ties to several exes, including an ex gf, ex FWB, and other past hookups. This behavior made me mistrust him to the point where I interrogated him constantly and he swears up and down that he doesn’t lie. Six months in, he admits to lying about one thing. I’m so in love with him that I don’t want to end it. Please talk some sense into me. I need support and courage right now.