Expert: Don - 11/8/2007

Question
My bf and I have been together 2 years (long distance mostly). He was perfect, so trustworthy, so loving. We'd see each other every 3 weeks or so, cuz i was at college. After our one year, he met this Australian chick in Novemberish and went snowboarding with her a lot cuz she worked at the summit and gave him free passes. I got really jealous but he said nothing was happening. We then broke up in Feb. cuz i couldn't take the distance and the jealousy. We made a pact that neither of us would slept with anyone. For about 5 months I asked him if he was sleeping with anyone or if he had..except me..cuz even though we broke up, we would sleep with each other and basically ACT like bf/gf. then after I graduated from school...I came home. I was really suspicious cuz all of a sudden he was hanging out with all these like...18 year olds (We are 22), and it was odd. all the girls were obsessed with him and i got really jealous. he then told me we shouldn't get back together..things needed to change...so basically, we were STILL hanging out with each other, as friends. And I decided to be snoopy and check his phone txts. i read a text "you should come spend the night tonight," to some 18 year old chick. i asked him if he had anyone spend the night, he said no. then i told him what i had read, he flipped out and made up some lie he didn't remember writing that text. Red flag number one. obviously he did. SO THEN he admitted he had written it, but nothing happened. ok..so i have been fighting to get past that. and about 2 months ago we got back together.

Now recently...i was on his comp writing something, and I saw a word document titled "convo." i opened it...and saw this MSN convo he had written to a girl...it was very inappropriate and she said that "i was so much louder when i was with you." i had a panic attack and confronted him right then and there. he got this look of horror and was like WHY ARE YOU SNOOPING!!?? I kept asking if he slept with someone, and he kept denying it and saying he'd never do that to me. after 5 hours of crying and him telling me he didn't do it, someone else must have (even tho his name was in the messages), i tried to believe him. but im not that stupid. i looked up that screen name on MSN, and it was the aussie girl. i IMed her and asked her. finally, she admitted they had sex twice when we weren't together (feb-until she left to move to NY in May is the time span). i confronted him...and he said,,yes, I lied to you. and he wont' admit they did it twice, he says once and they were drunk, when SHE said they did it once drunk, once sober. i believe her of course.
about a week after i got the news, i told him i didn't want him talking to her again. he said ok, and of course i didn't believe him...so i checked his myspace he had left open, and saw he had emailed her. he said he didn't email her, and then i told him what i SAW the email (which was just saying they couldn't be friends anymore) and he LIED about that...then later admitted he lied. thats when we found out he had a lying problem.

so the question now is. how can i heal? i am trying to help him stop lying...but the fact is...i want to learn to be ok with him having sex with another woman when we weren't together...but were still having sex together when it happend. How can i live and love again that he did something special with another woman? is it possible that i won't be disgusted when we try to have sex again?? Please, everyone help me get past this and know that there is life and love with him after this. he is trying SO hard. i feel like this has made us stronger and he has realized his faults. he has made such a change...but i need to learn how to change and forgive.

Answer
You just get over it, he wasn't even with you when it happened. You have no right to be mad or upset about something that happened when the two of you weren't even a couple. He had every right to do whatever he wanted with whomever he wanted.

You need to learn you aren't the center of the universe and everything doesn't happen the way you want it to, the sooner you figure that out the sooner you'll get over it.