These guys he went with are decent guys and some have families. I’ve known them for 5+ years. My boyfriend is very trustworthy but when he came back and added her on IG, I started questioning the situation and apparently she gave him her number. He mentioned the girls were “nomads and not the hooking up type”. Apparently they just talked about places they traveled to. Either way he knew how bad it looked and thought I would even break up with him for a sec. he’s super introverted so this threw me off and I haven’t been able to shake it off.
So is your question why you were so thrown? And why you can’t shake the incident off?
You said your boyfriend is very trustworthy.
I also note that he told you up front that the girl gave him her number and he concealed nothing from you.
This reminds me of a time that my husband went shopping for groceries. When he came home, he told me that a woman came onto him in one of the aisles. She began complimenting his tie and how well the color matched his sport jacket. He told me that he replied to her, “Thank you, my wife has a great eye for color and she puts my outfits together for me.”
Why did my husband tell me what happened?
It was an affirmation of his love and devotion to me. He was letting me know how committed he is to me.
I had the same reaction when your boyfriend told you the story he did.
It’s said that when we have a disproportionately strong reaction to an event and we can’t seem to shake off the feelings after 24 hours that means that a childhood wound, what I call an Old Scar, has been awakened.
I suggest that you dig a bit into your memory bank and see what you can come up with. Did one of your parents cheat on the other one? Did a parent betray you?
There is something to be uncovered.
When you uncover the Old Scar, you will understand more about why you reacted as you did to him.
Don’t stop there. Do some work on yourself to resolve the feelings associated with the earlier event or events.
My book Kiss Your Fights Goodbye outlines how to use the relationship as the agent for healing. I detail in the book exactly how to talk about the original incidents that need healing. The key is to let your partner know what the event reminded you of. This operation helps your partner understand that your reaction isn’t all about him/her. That realization makes it easier for your partner to switch from enemy to ally so that he/she has listen, understand and help you work through the original pain.
The way you would introduce this kind of conversation would be to say, “You know, I did some soul searching and realized that my (insert the person who betrayed you) cheated on (insert the name of the person who was cheated on). I see now that it taught me that you can’t trust a loved one to be faithful. I realize that I over-reacted to that girl giving you her number and your adding her on IG because of my injury. I see that I have been programmed to expect a loved one to not be faithful. I just wanted to share this with you so that you realize why I reacted as I did. I know now that your telling me what happened was your way of letting me know that you are faithful and not keeping secrets.”
You get the idea.
Please do the soul searching and talking to him.
The talk will help to restore your relationship to high ground and will smooth any wounded feelings he may be feeling as a result of your not trusting him.
Thank you so much Dr. I will be looking into that book because that last response you mentioned sounds like something I could use.
To clarify, my boyfriend didn’t out right tell me she gave him her #. Me, being burned in my past relationships, felt the need to ask if he also has her # since he added her on IG and they interacted at the bottle service table at the club. That’s when he looked in his phone and showed me that she did but he could not remember how it happened. He has a terrible memory just in our day to day but I have a really hard time believing that he has no clue. I tried to help him remember and he said maybe she did tell him it was there because she was looking at his travel pics from Peru since that’s where her family is from. Either way, he said that he felt it would be better to hand her his phone than sit next to her looking at pictures.
Mind you, this happened a year ago and I still can’t shake it. I let it go a few months ago when I looked at her page again and saw she was gay. Sexual orientation is fluid for a lot of people so now I’m worried again. Either way, I brought it up last week to him and he seemed so disappointed.
Thanks for the additional information.I know the book will help you.
I do understand how stressful this all is for you. The issues are too complicated to handle in writing. I am happy to help you further. If you want to dive deeper and have me help you solve the problem, please schedule a private session with me.
So sorry I missed your follow-up until today. I’m new to the admin program on my new site. If you still need my help, I’m happy to offer you a private consultation in which I will help you solve the issue.
Thanks so much Dr. The thing is, the only reason I found out was because I saw the add on IG. So, my brain is programmed to dig further, so I asked “do you have her number too?” At this point he was shocked that I asked but went on to show me the number and told me he could not recollect exactly how that happened. Granted the group of guys were at a club and im sure we’re very excited to be there. Either way the stressful part to me, is that I still don’t know exactly how it happened except for they were looking over pictures from Peru because they both had recently visited and this young lady was a “nomad” as he called it. What do you think? I’m anxious and losing sleep over this, while it happened a year ago! I looked at her page recently and she’s gay but that doesn’t mean much to me, as for a lot of people sexual orientation is fluid.