Fickle Fiance

akitty0543

I found out yesterday that up until a couple months ago, before my fiance asked me to marry him, that he had been hardcore flirting with a girl he used to have feelings for before we started dating. Let me take a second to explain what hardcore flirting entails:

He was contacting her almost daily, spending hours talking to her via texting and IMing. He would ask her things like, "What are you wearing?", and repeatedly tell her that he thought she was beautiful and sexy, and even wrote her poems about how he wanted to have sex with her and sent them to her (one of his areas of focus in college was poetry, so no he's not writing poetry because we're fresh out of highschool).

He also told her that he was thinking about leaving me. He never cheated on me, but from what I found out it was mainly because he didn't have an opportunity to.

I confronted him about it, and he started crying, and just profusely apologized. He told me that he was scared of our relationship at the time, because he had never been in such a long and serious relationship before, and that one day he woke up and realized that he was being a pig and that he loved me and wanted to spend his life with me (which is what inspired him to propose).

Everything was so perfect between us until now. He's my best friend, and I've never loved anyone like I love him. Even my relationship with his family is awesome...

I'm so confused now. I'm scared that everything was just a lie, and I'm very angry with him. This isn't the first thing that's gone sour, as the proposal itself was disappointing to say the least. However, up until just recently everything was great between us, or at least I thought it was.

I don't know what to do. We've told all our family and friends, and breaking off the engagement is going to be awkward. I want to forgive him, but I feel like I'm starting to see this enitrely different side to his character that I never knew (and I've known him for years) and it's raising major alarms for me. The whole thing does seem completely out of character for him, so part of me believes him that he just had a lapse in sanity... It's all just really overwhelming.

6fsn

Breaking an engagement is a lot less awkward than divorcing.  It's also a lot cheaper.

At the very least postpone any planning.

akitty0543

Yeah, he wanted to get married this November, but I told him that we should wait at least a year... unfortunately, I'm glad that I did.

zsazsa-stl

Ditto 6.  Step back.  Everything was NOT perfect up until know.  It may have appeared that way to you, but he obviously did not feel the same.  Or he may have some kind of compulsion to always keep a fish on the line.  So unless you are okay with that for the rest of your lives you need to make some difficult decisions.

*Barbie*

how was the proposal underwhelming?

I would caution you against marrying this guy - he may not have slept with her, but for all intenets and purposes, he was cheating on you. do you really want to spend the rest of your life with this guy wondering if he'll do it again - or take it even further next time?

akitty0543

Barbie, I posted about it on a different board a couple days ago. Basically, he told me he wanted to get engaged, and we had been talking about it for awhile, and I had told him the things that were important to me (such as the kinds of rings I liked, and that I wanted him to be thoughtful about the way he proposed). He ignored just about all of it. EX: I told him that I didn't want a gold band, which is exactly what he bought, and the ring was very low quality. As for the proposal: after telling me he was out getting me a ring, he came home and basically just handed it to me. It upset me because I explicitly told him that when he did it I wanted it to be a surprise, and that I wanted him to do something romantic (even if it was simple) and to not just hand me over the ring.

It was really weird for me, because he's always been so thoughtful about things in the past, and he's been very good about listening to me...

tawillers

Out of curiosity, how did you find out?  Unless I'm misunderstanding, it sounds like someone told you and then you confronted him.

akitty0543

Tawillers, pretty much. I found out through a mutual friend. When I confronted him he was a little surprised, but confessed to almost all of it. He claimed that he wouldn't have actually slept with her, but from what I heard I'm very dubious of that. Also, in his "defense" it's a girl that he'd had strong feelings for for a very very long time (before even I met him), and he hasn't done anything like this with any other women.

From what I understand (and this was from sources other than him) she had basically turned down all his advances before he met me, and then when he started dating me she got jealous and started trying to contact him all the time.

Again, it was just with this one girl that he'd had history with before we even met.

That doesn't make it ok, but I think it puts it in a different context than if he was just meeting random girls and trying to hit them up.

pegasuskat

A low quality ring, nothing like you'd asked for...  I have a feeling he proposed to make her even more jealous, and not be out so much money himself.  If she was coming after him because you were dating, maybe he thought it would give him an even better chance.
I would hold off on any plans and get counseling if I decided to give him a second chance at all.

thatgrrrrl

This isn't fickle. This is blatant disregard for the woman he claims to love and major wishful thinking for something out of his grasp.

*Barbie*

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/special-topic-wedding-boards_wedding-woes_fickle-fiance?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Special Topic Wedding BoardsForum:47Discussion:4d519309-b374-423b-977b-2a446e033339Post:1a61a461-31f8-43a5-b64d-c00a18705f0e">Re: Fickle Fiance</a>:
[QUOTE]Tawillers, pretty much. I found out through a mutual friend. When I confronted him he was a little surprised, but confessed to almost all of it. He claimed that he wouldn't have actually slept with her, but from what I heard I'm very dubious of that. Also, in his "defense" it's a girl that he'd had strong feelings for for a <strong>very very long time (before even I met him),</strong> and he hasn't done anything like this with any other women. From what I understand (and this was from sources other than him) she had basically turned down all his advances before he met me, and then when he started dating me <strong>she got jealous and started trying to contact him all the time</strong>. Again, it was<strong> just with this one girl that he'd had history with before we even met</strong>. That doesn't make it ok, but <strong>I think it puts it in a different context than if he was just meeting random girls and trying to hit them up.
</strong>Posted by akitty0543[/QUOTE]

how long has he known her?
how long was this flirtation going on before the two of you met?
how long have you and your FI been together?
how long after you started dating did he start up with her again?
for how much of your relationship was he cheating with her? (we'll call this an "emotional affair" since supposedly he "never slept with her")
have you been tested for STDs in case he *did* sleep with her? (if not, you should get tested)
why would a marriage certificate prevent this girl from contacting him again?
given past events, can you trust that if he did start getting attention from this girl after the wedding that he would not fall right back into old patterns? (or fall into them with someone else)
has he cut off all contact with this girl?
how long after he stopped his relationship with her did he propose?

*Barbie*

is your name Amanda? (i'm just wondering - i know someone that fits into a similar scenario, but they don't live in ID, and they just broke up with their LT  boyfriend in the last week.)

akitty0543

pegasuskat, yeah I've been wondering about something like counseling. 

I don't think he just asked me to make her jealous, as from what I understand he knocked the behavior/flirting off before we even started talking about getting engaged (several months ago), and then in late January/early February (close to a month before he proposed) he completely cut her out of his life (he goes out of his way to avoid contact with her). She's really intertwined in his friend group (and even his job, as he used to work with her), so the contact that he was keeping after he knocked the flirting off was either professional (his job), or because he couldn't avoid her at social gatherings with friends etc. etc.

I made it very clear to him that I'm not going to stand for things like that, and if it happens again (with anyone) I will leave him.

akitty0543

*Barbie*, that's not me. I haven't told anyone about this.

how long has he known her? 

Since he was 17 (REALLY long time)

how long was this flirtation going on before the two of you met? 

From what I understand he had written her off as a lost cause around the time we met, and way before we started dating.

how long have you and your FI been together?

We've known eachother for three years, and have been "officially" dating for over a year.

how long after you started dating did he start up with her again?

I think it was going on between Aug. and Nov... We would have been officially dating about 7 months around Aug.

has he cut off all contact with this girl?

Yeah, see above comments ^^

how long after he stopped his relationship with her did he propose?

I believe he knocked off the flirting around Nov. (it was hard to sever all contact for reasons mentioned above) and asked me in late Feb.

I know he hasn't had contact with her since January. He got increasingly colder towards her leading up to that point (in January), and then severed all contact. I knew that he was trying really hard to push her out of his life, but until yesterday I didn't fully understand why.

ReturnOfKuus

You're his second choice, the one he settled for because he couldn't get the woman he really wanted.  Before he closes the door on his true heart's desire permanently, he wanted to give what he really wanted one last shot.  This is obvious.

What's worse is that he doesn't see you as a person with feelings, not really.  If he did, he wouldn't have relegated you to the position of second best - he would have held out on getting serious with anyone until he found someone he wanted more than he did this other woman.  This is a character issue, a severe one.

I can't imagine why you'd settle for this.  Is this really the way you want your love story to go?

akitty0543

ReturnOfKuus, that's almost verbatim what I said to him when I confronted him... The only reason I didn't just end it is because of how he treats me. He is normally so sweet and thoughtful towards me. He literally wakes up every morning 20 minutes before I do so he can make me coffee and breakfast (he hates coffee, and doesn't eat breakfast), and does all of these inumerable little sweet thoughtful things for me (which is part of what made the way he proposed seem so off). And everyone that knows him has told me that I mean the world to him. In a lot of ways I do feel second place, but at the same time I honestly believe that he never loved this other girl, he just had strong feelings of lust towards her. Whether or not he genuinely loves me is what I'm wondering... I know that until yesterday I had never doubted that he loved me, which made the revelation all the more disturbing.

ReturnOfKuus

You ARE second place.

We're not down to four men in the world.  There are, quite literally, millions of other men in the world who would also make you coffee and in general not be a total jerk.  Give some of them a try.

*Barbie*

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/special-topic-wedding-boards_wedding-woes_fickle-fiance?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Special Topic Wedding BoardsForum:47Discussion:4d519309-b374-423b-977b-2a446e033339Post:3fbf6024-96d6-415f-9007-336dae6d5374">Re: Fickle Fiance</a>:
[QUOTE]You ARE second place. We're not down to four men in the world.  There are, quite literally, millions of other men in the world who would also make you coffee and in general not be a total jerk.  Give some of them a try.
Posted by ReturnOfKuus[/QUOTE]

i2i with Kuus.

so of the ~1 year you were dating, about 25% of that he was trying to get with someone else?

ReturnOfKuus

And at least 500,000 of those other men in the world won't go all f*ck-effort on the proposal and get you a cheapass ring exactly like you said you didn't want.

imoan

It'll be a lot more awkward in a year when you have to tell friends and family "We're divorcing because he's been balls-deep in his true love since before we were even engaged".

pegasuskat

This will be like the posting from a few weeks ago where the FI called his wife to be his ex-girlfriends name at the rehearsal dinner, in front of everybody.

Wzz

this sounds almost exactly like a couple i once knew. she kept harping on rings she liked and getting engaged. one night, he tossed a ring box into her hand and said, "here ya go". that was her proposal. 3 weeks before the wedding, he called it off. i saw it coming, so did a bunch of other people. she did not.

i don't know how you actually feel, but the chick i knew wanted to be married more than it mattered about who she was marrying. don't let that happen to you.

baconsmom

DTMFA. 

entropicbeauty

I think some of the PPs are possibly being a little harsh.

With the background you gave, I wouldn't call his behaviour ACCEPTABLE, but I do sort of understand it. Glad to hear you postponed things, don't plan ANYTHING till YOU are at a comfortable level with your man and his honesty.

Counselling at this point would also be a good idea. Having a third neutral party analyze the situation will more than likely help you guys either mend things OR show you both that maybe you aren't right for eachother.