BellaOnline Forums Relationships Relationships .Help me decide this

Hi everyone...I have read a lot of posts here to see if I could find a solution to my problem. But I will rather explain.
My boyfriend and I are in a tough situation which we have probably created for ourselves.
I m 26 n he 27..we r together since 1 and a half years. After being friends for around 4 months we got into a relationship. Now my guy never had a girlfriend in the past but I had a boyfriend with whom I had a 1 year not so good and long distance relationship. N this guy n me had slept together but the sex was not complete as we both were virgins n I was scared to carry the relationship further as we had no intention to marry especially as I considered him to be an inadequate partner for me(so I broke up with him).
Now before starting a relationship this friend of mine who is now a bf asked me about my intimacy with the previous guy n I told him all the truth word to word. He said he was tolerant of all this and dint mind as we clicked too naturally. The next day he called me to his room saying he didnt feel too well..n when I went there he hugged me n kissed me saying he loved me. I too liked being with him. Then we would study, kiss n have fun all the time n my bf tried to have sex with me but as I was really a virgin it was tough to accomodate him so he grew ANGRIER N MORE EGOISTIC THAT i DO NOT give him full love when he promises to marry me,n I slept with other guy whom I had no intention of marrying. He repeatedly questioned me about my ethics. I got so irritated that I had told him everything beforehand but he said then he was a fool to wait for me all his life when I didnt wait for him. We had similar ambitions, interests and education. So I didnt wanna let him go. Then I jokingly said that you go out n make out with someone then satisfy your male ego. He got the idea n secretly started having sex with a desperate colleague. Then I confronted him and he confessed and said he loved only me n nobody else .N he did it just to strengthen our relationship.
But he got into this habit n till we were 6 months into the relationship he carried on and off until I GAVE HIM AN ULTIMATUM.nOW HE HAS BEEN FAITHFUL N LOVING TO ME For MORE THAN A YEAR.
But every two months he gets so tense n mad that he wants an assurance from me that I didnt have complete sex with the previous guy. He says he wanted ours to be a fairy tale n I was responsible for not waiting for him.He thinks my ex will laugh at him and his male ego will be hurt.We share everything,our studies, laughter, sadness but this trouble keeps coming back after month or so.
Now I m going out of country for a year so this is going to be a long distance relationship. N first time I'd go so far from him in 1 n half year. N the way we r used to being in touch 24 hrs, we can remain so even then through internet. But the question comes Are we going to be a succesfull marriage? Being from a traditional background I wish to marry only once n so does he....so please advise n comment on all this. I will be highly obliged.

Sweetheart - run.

Let me give you my history. I too was a "technical virgin" until college. Meaning I had never had vaginal intercourse with any of my boyfriends. I lost my virginity to a date rape in college. Going out with a guy, thinking he would stop at the same place I had always said "stop" to the other guys, and they had. Well he didn't.

For a while after this I went a little wild - I had been saving myself for so lng, I felt, for nothing. So what use was it to be a "good girl" anymore? Luckily for me I soon met the man that was my first husband.

For a while things were OK, but I had never really gotten over the rape, and we had problems with sex. He thought porn might help us, then swinging. We both wound up having affairs and hurting each other very much.

I now am married again - going on 7 years. My husband now and I dated for 2 years - one strictly as friends before we even decided to become romantically involved. He already knew all this history (in much more detail) before we decided to officially start dating. We were engaged 6 months after that.

He has NEVER pushed me on any sex issue. Whereas my first husband did. I have never been made to feel guilty for anything I had done - even thte things that were my fault (but especially the parts that weren't). My husband said that those things were in my past, and we should leave them there to make a future.

You cannot have a meaningful relationship with a man who is already trying to manipulate you, and is using sex as a bargaining tool. Especially when he has gone as far as to use sex as a revenge tool against you. This will not be the only time he will do this.

This will also not be the least of the things he will do to you.

He is already showing signs of psychological abuse towards you, and a paranoia that is extremely typical of men who physically abuse their wives. This is not going to improve by you getting more involved with him.

Cut your losses now. Find a man who will accept you with all flaws and mistakes that you have made. You cannot go back and undo anything you have already done. And it is unreasonable for a man to expect you to "make up" for something you did, before you even knew he existed!

I think you are probably very lucky that this man did not force sex on you.

Please do not stay with this man. Take care of yourself.

Yes So do I think but my decisions have not been able to be firm as I do not know how to go about this, I leave this guy and find another man. N now I m with a burden of telling about two guys and make him accept me, well OK may be he is not the same n has his share of gfs then its fine, but this is like its getting mind boggling, Thanks bellaharmony for sharing your story with me, you are lucky to have emerged out with a nice n loving husband. I am seriously thinking now!!!!

HELLO,
I would leave him. He mentioned that he wanted your relationship to be a fairytale. No relationship is a fairytale. People have problems. People make mistakes. This man is very immature, controlling & as Bellaharmony said abusive. Then he had the nerve to tell you he fooled around to strengthen your relationshp! Oh please! You dont' need to find another man right away. You don't have to tell anyone, anything until you are ready to do so.

It will only get worse with him. You deserve to be with a man who treats you very well & accepts the good & bad without judgment. Your boyfriend has serious problems & he needs to get help. But you dont' have to stand by him when he treats you this way. I don't know how you would go about leaving him. I dont' know if you both pay rent at the same place etc. But you can leave. You can ask him to leave too. Well, if you allow anyone to treat you this bad, they will keep doing it.

OH, I do see that you are going out of the country for a yr. or so. Perfect! Don't tell him where you go. I would stop all contact with him. He sounds like a man who could get very dangerous with you. He is controlling & very jealous. Who knows when you do leave it is possible that you will meet a good man. But you have to leave this sick person behind. I hope that you find it in yourself to be able to let him go. Good luck & the very best of wishes to you. Judy K. Chicago.

I think this may be part of the problem right here...

you can't "make" someone accept you. All you can do is offer yourself, and the other person either will or won't accept you. If they don't, move on.

You have not made any mistakes in life that are unforgiveable. But I think you seem to feel they are. So the first thing you have to do is forgive yourself. What you have done in the past is past. There is no changing it or "making up" for it. All you can do is learn from it, and live your life in a better way.

Please learn to value yourself. Then you will be able to go into a relationship that's healthy. But not this one, I don't see any help for this one other than to get out.

Dear Bella and Silver..I m grateful to you both.
Yes Bella I have not committed anything unforgivable but these thoughts of his that I spoiled the fairytale and all disturb me and I feel guilty that he may be right though I confront him fully.
And Silver50 yeah he is sort of immature as he accepts that since high school he has never felt a harmony in his head, and remains tense. He might need help.But I dont knw if he is abusive cos he claims to love me, takes care of me and is nice when he is not arguing with me on those issues. No we have never lived together except for the three months when we had to go out of country n share rents. Now we are back to where we were. Also immediately after coming back from the overseas trip he called me to meet him to sort the same old issue again. I though to myself that I did so much for this guy, right from trip planning to cooking, finding room and making him study, still after 3 months of ataying together he asked me the same reassurances and I was shocked. I DID NOT EXPECT IT. I thought we had a wonderful time and past was past.
Now I m trying to reduce the time on phone with him as we rarely meet for I m in a different city but he is planning my farewell from this country with a date and a gift and I am not quite enthusiastic about it.But saying No is really tough for me.
I am just afraid that Will I ever meet a guy who can actually accept me, not see my past as a fault but as a part of my growing up as everyone normally goes through.
Being from a conservative country it sure is difficult but I see my other friends coping well with much more serious pasts and have a happy present. Dont know how they managed.
One more thing our relationship is very much a secret , my friends do not know the intensity(anyways they are all busy married and doing postgrads) and my family n his family do not even know the existence so for me its not a social issue....completely emotional and ethical.
LOVE XXOOXX

You are a good person. Life is a learning experience for all of us. You wanted these relationships to work out, but they just couldn't. You didn't know that, though, when you started to be with them. It is better to recognize that a relationship is not going to work (as you have) and end it than it is to keep going in a relationship that you know will not make you or the other person happy.

When you meet the right person, the love will be strong enough that they will love you and accept you as you are, and likewise you will love and accept them as they are. You will feel much more in harmony with this person than you have felt with your previous boyfriends.

Your boyfriend now, is very insecure. His uncertainty says more about him than it does about you. If he has not become comfortable with your history by now, he's never going to be happy about it, and it would come up again and again if you stayed with him.

You are an honest, warm, caring person who would like to fall in love and marry your love and be faithful ever after. That's a wonderful thing! Be kind to yourself and go find your true love.

Dear HOLLYELISE thanks for taking your time to write. Actually I want to be honest completely, as in India arranged marriages are common so my family was looking for a groom for me,I belong to a highly orthodox culture where you are supposed to marry in your own caste. Now it is really difficult for my parents to find me a groom of same caste, similar education, interests etc..so I knew they will take a long time and frankly they still are looking and 3 years after they could not find anyone(this is the culture here I m sorry if you guys cant understand this).
But as my final exams were darawing near I felt emotionally unstable to go through exams(toughest exams with 14 practical face to face interviews..oof) whatever the excuses were and I was 24, never been kissed, and this past boyfriend of mine proposed me(my senior in college) out of blues. Day one I knew this is not who I WANT To be with but I got into it for I thought I needed to pass and I needed emotional support(I LIVED AWAY FROM HOME IN HOSTEL)He was a nice guy but he too needed support as he had flunked n was giving exams with us juniors and all his friends had moved ahead. Now I thought that this is a nice, simple, dependable guy so why not let this symbiosis go on n help each other. But then I cleared my exams easily n this ex bf flunked AGAIN. It was a shock to him, I wanted to leave n not continue the relationship in my head but his plight made me stay. I moved to my hometown to do an internship after exams but he stayed back in college for he had exams. Gradually he cleared his exams too but he got demanding on me, he used to visit me and we would kiss n hug but then once after a year I got a job n moved to dfferent place from my hometown where I got an apartment of my own. Now this boyfriend of mine visited me there twice or thrice and we tried to make out but actually he was too inexperienced and I was too guilt conscious things cudnt work out and soon I broke with him(gradually ,MY family had had two young deaths and I didnt have time to attend to his calls for around a month and then I talked out n asked him that I was not willing for a sexual relation and we parted ways).
So this way I actually knew this wont work out but I needed this relation for whatever it had to offer and this irks this now bf till now even after that he has had his 'Revenge'.
But now after 15 days of turmoil things are again getting back to normal, still moreso because he feels I m going far and I may not get a new man, so he keeps reminding me that I need to remember him n all.And with all this emotional pampering I m finding it extremely difficult to avoid him. I want to talk to him, share things. Like more I want to avoid, more I want to talk. Sorry guys for boring you with this detailed life history of mine. Excuse me if I really got away from the topic or anything. Love you guys.

Hello, imgood. I had to chime in on this thread. I am the Domestic VIolence editor here on BellaOnline.com (you can go directly to my section by clicking hte link at the bottom of this message and I HIGHLY recommend you do so and read my articles!)

I think you have answered your own question of whether or not he is abusive. Manipulating you or trying to coherce you into having any type of sexual relations to me would be a HUGE red flag! Your history is your history. You can not go back and change it, you can't sugar coat it, it happened. He needs to deal with it or move on. And like Silver or Michelle stated, there is no fairytale relationship. Yes, we can live happily ever after but every relationship has it's bumps and disruptions. He is blaming you for breaking his idea of a fairytale, yet he cheated on you?? There are many red flags in your posts. You say you are leaving the country for a year...there is your chance to get away.



Some people do enjoy taking care of their partners this way, but I personally have no tolerance for a man who wants me to be his mother.



Like I said above, this could be your way of getting away from him. I honestly do not think he will remain faithful to you while you are away. He has already proven that if you do not want to engage in sex with him, he will seek it else where.



Yes you can and yes you will. It took me 15 years to find a man who despite what I have been through, where I have been, and what I have done is behind me 100%. I am very happy now. Sure we have disagreements but if we were exactly like our partners, life would be boring. We have a lot in common yet we have our own interests that we don't share. I always ask someone I am helping through a tough relationship whether or not they should stay: "Can you live like this the rest of your life?" Can you live with someone who doubts you? Can you live with someone who wants to control your every move? Can you live with someone who if you tell them no I don't want to have sex with you, going cheating on you??



Why is it a secret? That would bug me as well.

I hope you make the decision that is right for you and hede all of the advice you are given here. I think you know what is best and you have answered all of your own questions and you just need reassurance from an outside source that leaving is what is best. While I can't make you leave, I would advise you to do so before it gets any worse. Keep in touch!

Thank you so much dear Jeanette, I am grateful to all of you for taking out time and energy for me. I undertand and I sure will not allow myself to be taken for granted like that.I am sure I can do it.THANK YOU AGAIN. And of course I am gonna be around.
Love XXOOXX