Struggling with my (26m) relationship of 18 months with my girlfriend (31f)

[swilliams92]

I am really struggling in my own head to come to a decision of what to do with my current relationship. I am 26m and my girlfriend is 31f.

 

I have been with my girlfriend for around 18 months and love her to bits. She is the first person that I have ever imagined settling down and having children with. When before I would normally get bored of girls, not see a real future and (I hate myself for saying this), used them to pass the time or until something better came along. Prior to this relationship I have only had 1 other girlfriend, between the age of 18-20 and I was heartbroken when it ended.

 

I worked as a teacher in London for a year before deciding that I wasn’t enjoying life and need to go and see and explore the world. The opportunity came up for me to continue to do the same job at an international school in Thailand and I jumped at the chance. I moved across the world, totally on my own and happy for a new start, a new change and to be happy with new people. I felt confident and so excited for the change. I was even the one that organised a lot of social gatherings for all the new staff at my work.

 

When work started I met, now girlfriend at our first social night out on the first Friday of work and we have been together pretty much ever since. I was infatuated with her, she’s stunning and I fancy the pants off her. She is extremely outgoing, friendly and can talk to anyone about anything. I have never known a girl to have more friends than my girlfriend and as a result she is constantly on her phone messaging them. She appears to be the best friend and literally everyone loves her and wants her to be their friend.

 

My girlfriend has had 3 serious boyfriends prior to me. The first one she cheated on regularly with 4 different guys and cites the reason as her being young and immature, however she doesn’t seem to regret her actions and when we have spoken about this she has said ‘well he still doesn’t know so it doesn’t hurt him, so I don’t regret it’. Her second boyfriend had a lot of baggage and shortly before they got together he got my girlfriends ‘worst enemy’ pregnant and my girlfriend has said that she resented him their whole relationship as a result. Treating him badly and not giving him the attention needed in a relationship. She found out that he had sent a picture of his dick to someone and ended the relationship. Her last relationship seems to be the one that she has the most issues with. She was with him for nearly 2 years and they spoke of children and marriage. He was involved in dealing drugs and was investigated by the police. My girlfriend decided that she wanted to go and teach abroad and then applied for a job in Thailand and got it, (My girlfriend moved here 2 years prior to me). This is where I am not 100% sure on details and timings as she has never been quite clear, but what I do know is that she was trying to get it to work and wanted him to move out to Thailand and live with her, and he never did. She said she would go months at a time without hearing from him but still loved him. When she went back for Christmas they had a massive argument and he went missing for days. She was then, at a later time, in bed with him when she got a Facebook message from her worst enemy asking if she was still with him. She said yes and this girl proceeded to tell her that she had been sleeping with him. My girlfriend ended the relationship and left him. She then later found out that her ex had actually got this girl pregnant and they now have a baby together. My girlfriend doesn’t seem like she’s over this and is still hurting from what happened.

 

Aside from my girlfriends serious relationships, she has ‘dated’ quite a lot of people from the sounds of it. Whilst we were first getting together she made out that she was a ‘relationship type girl’ who didn’t do one night stands, had been single for a bit and was ready for something new to develop. Since then there have been a number of revelations that have made me question things and not being able to trust her. Including her sleeping with a colleague in the year prior to meeting me, keeping it from me totally even though she had many chances to say about it, and then flipping out when a mutual friend let it slip in conversation.

 

She has a guy who she says that she has been friends with for over 10 years. During this time their relationship has been sexual. He visited her for a month whilst she was living in Thailand and she got pregnant. He was really supportive of her and paid for her to fly home for a termination as well as emotionally support her. This was a few months and she met me later the same year. She kept in contact with him for a lot of our relationship and insisted that they were just friends. I said it made me feel uncomfortable and she called me insecure and paranoid out her still being in contact with him. She said that she’s known him for a long time and he was there for her when no-one else was so she couldn’t just cut him out her life. We argued about this several times, and she even at one point told me that she had deleted him and they were no longer in contact. She then randomly asked me to take a picture of her on a night out and saw that they were once again best friends on Snapchat. I should of ended things then because that’s the moment when the trust had totally gone, but she talked me round and said that he had messaged her friend asking her to accept him as he needed to talk to her. He did and said that they have been friends for years and it would be a shame to throw that all away. As all of these messages were on Snapchat I have no idea if this is true and only have her at her word for it. I previously asked her if she was going to meet him in the summer and after the summer I asked if she had met him, to which she replied no. A recent turn of events has happened where I saw a screenshot on her phone of him telling him that he loves her and a quoted message from her saying ‘sometimes I think I could be happily with you properly’. As the message is quoted I can’t see when it was said and have confronted her about this. She has said that she said that before she even met me and when emotions were mixed because of what they both went to. She went on to say that he doesn’t actually love her and that they have had plenty of opportunities to be together but neither of them wanted that and that’s why they have never been in a relationship. During this argument I asked if she had seen him in the summer, again, to which she now says that she saw him on a night out and said hello but that was pretty much it. We had been on very rocky terms for a few months as I am so scared of getting hurt and have probably been distancing myself from her and she moved out for a couple of days after this was said.

 

She has ‘another’ guy on her snapchat who she says is gay, but she left her Facebook logged in on my laptop a while ago and I saw her chatting to him, calling him babe and wishing him Happy Valentines Day, before we got together.

 

She doesn’t seem able to cut ties with her past and it leaves me feeling **** with how things are and like I am not enough for her, or as if she needs a security blanket to fall back on to.

 

She has since come back and said that she wants to give things a go and get back together. I do want to do this so I told her that this is what I wanted too. I told her that she doesn’t make me feel wanted and she put this down as me being insecure and needing attention and she just isn’t that type of person. She has reiterated that she wants to be with me and doesn’t want any issues going forward and that’s what I want but I am so scared of getting hurt and not being able to get better. Maybe I am being stupid but I don’t see why she would want to give things another go if her intention was to cheat and be with someone else, or am I just being to naive about people and her in general?

 

All of this is coupled with the fact that I am not her type, which does bother me to some extent. Her type is black guys (all of her exes) and I am not white.

 

I love this girl to bits and want to be happy with her, but I don’t know how or if this can even proceed from here. I feel any other issues and she’s gonna walk out the door and not come back, but I need to sort my own head out.

 

TLDR; I (26m) have trust issues with girlfriend and not sure how to proceed forward.

[ExpatInItaly]

You two don't sound compatible at all. You have very different boundaries and expectations in a relationship, and this is likely going to cause significant issues in the future again. You're already feeling like you need to walk on eggshells at the risk of upsetting her - this is no way to have a healthy relationship.

 

I would not recommend going back for more.

[amaysngrace]

Calling you insecure and paranoid is affirmation that your feelings just don’t matter to her.

 

It’s probably why you’re talking about them here.