[BrokenDown]

I love my wife dearly, I have done since the day I laid eyes on her. All of a sudden I feel like I'm having a nervous breakdown as I keep going over the past and can't let it go. For a bit of background - We started seeing each other while I was going through a divorce. We would see each other in a group as we had mutual friends, my plan being to get together properly when the divorce was finalised (about 6 months away). She would play hot and cold throughout but always gave me enough to think that she was interested, (we would kiss at the end of the night, hold hands and that type of thing).

About 5 months in we went away with a friend of hers and a friend on mine for a weekend, we both ended up getting drunk and suddenly found ourselves in bed together on the first night then again on the second. We came back and I didn't see her for around two months, she didn't seem fussed on meeting up at all. Finally she agreed and we went out for about 4 weeks and then split up when we had a row about her flirting with a guy at a party. I was gutted and soon started seeing someone else having given up chasing her. But as we mixed in the same circles we ended up bumping into each other and started going on a couple of dates, just the two of us. Things were different this time, I felt more relaxed around her and we soon got serious.

She fell pregnant and things got a bit weird. Her ex boyfriend would phone her quite often, one night he rang and I heard her say to him something about being 'there in 10 minutes?' She then jumped in the car and drove off, I phoned to confront her that she was meeting him but she said she just wanted time on her own and needed space. She has always maintained she never met him that night and needed a break from the two of us. A couple of other things happened but I put them down to her emotional state and worry (she still lived at home, father would kick her out). She ended up losing the baby but we ended up stronger than ever.

A couple of things still bothered me and I wanted to know more about her and her ex. I found out they got together while he was living with someone else (they worked at the same place), told her it was more of a convenience situation than anything else, so she was just his bit on the side. He also took her virginity. I also found out that while we were seeing each other before the divorce came through, about two/three months in, she started seeing him again. She slept with him a number of times, before the weekend we ended up in bed, and after. I found out the whole story after we got engaged and then called it all off, heartbroken. We got back together after she went to New Zealand for 8 months to get over us and then later got married.

Now all of a sudden (this is nearly 7 years later!), everything feels like it happened yesterday.

I've lost all perspective of the situation having buried my feelings for so long. I've been thinking non stop about it for the last 3 weeks. I've brought it up twice in the 7 days which resulted in a lot of anger on her part, she says we should never of married if it still bothered me and she knows she acted like a little slut (her words). When asking her any details she says, rightly, that it was so long ago she can't remember.

I'm not sure how I should feel to be honest. The thing that bothers me the most was whether she slept with him when we got serious. I even accused her that the baby was his and she had an abortion, to my eternal shame. I still can't really understand why she kept in contact with him while we were together (she would continue to have phone calls and texts months into our serious relationship).

She says she stopped sleeping with him not long (2 months) after the weekend we went away, which kind of explained why she didn't want to see me when we got back. It's like I want to keep asking her the same questions secretly wanting her to change her answer just to be proven right. Part of me is convinced she must of slept with him after that, but she has always maintained she didn't.

Its really hurting our relationship and I've thought about leaving her, knowing that I may never get over the black mark in the past. Part of me doesn't want anything to do with her because of the way she treated me before we properly got together. Even writing that it seems absurd that its still an issue as I'm deeply in love with her.

I sort of can understand that I felt a lot more towards her in the beginning than she did for me - her still having feelings for her ex an all. From my point of view she was the one and only, obviously she didn't feel the same way at the time. Now I know with out doubt that she loves me unreservedly and if we started like that things would be fantastic. I also hate the fact that her and her ex had none of this baggage yet she says that she didn't care for him a fraction of what she feels for me now. Just plain jealous of him I suppose.

Which brings me here - Basically I want to know what to think and feel about her sleeping with her ex while showing an interest in us AND whether its an issue that she may or may not of slept with her ex when we were getting serious?

PS. I've written this post 3 times and apologise about the length - one of which is three times as long and goes into massive detail! I has been hugely therapeutic to get it down on paper, it's a real healing process that I would recommend to anyone with hang ups on the past.

[talaniman]

You seem to have accepted her back every time you had past glitches in faith and trust. Why not again?