Trust Issues...

[Liam]

Good evening everyone,

Hoping to find some help as I am in a horrible circle and getting no where. I am gay and live in Spain (But I am British) and in May 2015 I met this boy on Omegle who is from Amsterdam. The first night we met we talked for hours and got along well together after we finished speaking he asked for my KIK username which I gave him and he added me straight away. I knew he seemed very keen on me. Ever since then he was always messaging me everyday and we spoke throughout the day texting and we Skyped a few times a week for hours and hours. This continued throughout the year and in May 2016 I decided to make the big decision and fly to Amsterdam to meet him in person and stay there for a while. He is 17 (soon to be 18) and I am 19.

So exactly a year to the date we first met each other on Omegle we were about to meet each other in person for the first time! I was so excited but terribly nervous at the same time. We got on very well and there was never any form of awkwardness or silences that I was worried that could of happened being in person but it was great and I had a great time there.

Towards the end of the visit, particularly my last night there, he fell asleep and I was wide awake. Upset that in the morning I would be leaving Amsterdam and wondering if this would be a one time thing and will I ever see him again. I noticed he left his phone on the charger and yes as bad as it is.. I decided to look through it. Ever since the start of this year I have had a silly feeling that maybe he has also talked to other people.. I remember looking at how many Skype contacts he had and checking every now and then to see if it went up. Which it did by a few contacts. This got me worried but I said to myself he would never do that. Why would he put all this effort into speaking with me and sending me a letter on my birthday (which was the first psychical thing I ever got from him and was so happy with). So I simply denied it but the thought was always there. This is what led me to checking his phone to make sure.

I noticed and he previously said this to me when I first came there that he deleted KIK as we stopped talking on there a few months earlier and used Whatsapp instead. I didn't think much of it at the time. I was looking through his Whatsapp didn't find anything, a few other apps nothing but then I went on Skype and there was the answer I was looking for. A month ago conversations of him sexting / video with 2 other people (doing you know what on video). Then I checked Snapchat and the same thing (he told me he never used SC) but there was all contacts of people for sexting. I was horrified, I couldn't believe what for so long didn't believe to happen was true. I was staring at him in anger while he was asleep and woke him up immediately to confront him. He was kind of not responsive for a moment, probably the shock of getting caught with being woken up like that. I was shouting at him and he started crying and being very remorseful saying he didn't realise at the time thinking it was just simply 'porn'.

At this point I wanted to kick him out of the place I was renting and never see him again. I was so painfully hurt by this. Thinking all this effort and cost I have done to get here (£1,000) to find out he is a little slut. I didn't sleep at all that night and all I done was think what should I do next.. He took me to the airport and I made these conditions if we are to keep talking and further our relationship.

1) Delete everyone you do not know in real life from Skype - He done this infront of me
2) Delete Snapchat - Done in front of me
3) A PROMISE never to do this type of thing again as I consider it cheating / unfaithful. I wanted him to swear on his mother's life never again.

To this he agreed and I returned to Spain. At this point I was still very upset by finding out what he was doing but I was confident he meant what he said and he got the message.

The following month in June he came to Spain for a weekend which was our 2nd meeting together. Then in July he came again and stayed with me for 1 month in Spain during his holidays and while my dad was in the UK working (My father was also away most of the year leaving me home alone, divorced family).

During this time I had the urge to check his phone again. I checked his Gmail and searched for KIK out of curiosity I noticed that on the 5th of July he had an email from them for password recovery. This concerned me and I confronted him about it. He said it was for nothing else but to delete the account (at the time I didn't add 2+2). A week before we were discussing why he done it and how. He explained the KIK site he used for usernames and I asked him again there have you done it since he said no to my face. He said he was disgusted and ashamed by it.

I set a new password from his email for his KIK account on log on. I find literally 100's of contacts for simply sexting. I was absolutely horrified by the scale of it. Thinking what the hell am I dating? The scope of it all. He used KIK, Skype, Snapchat also I found him posting on a sexting forum saying this is my KIK "Slaves send me your D**k pics" (Which was posted in January this year). I yelled at him calling him a whore and slut he started crying saying it was for just that. In the end I thought it was true.

He left Spain again and he decided to make new Skype and email to get rid of his history. He gave his old Gmail to me to delete at some point. I looked through it and found an email from KIK saying you have messages waiting for you From X. which was a day after he first went on KIK to "Delete it" At this point it finally clicked and I went absolutely mad over the phone to the point where I drank myself a load of wine of hurt. He said yes he downloaded it to do that but he thinks he didn't send anything. He says he remembers asking for things but when he turned on the camera for a photo that's when he realised it was wrong and apparently didn't continue. From his Google history you can access on his gmail he also searched for Amsterdam Bi twitter..

So basically after promising me never to do that again, he had the intent to download it, recover the password, go on that kikwebsite and search by chance for people he may know online.

I hate the thoughts of what I was doing that day and other days when he was betraying on me. I go so far to look on my phone for any photos I made that day to pin point exactly what I was doing in that moment on 5th of July. There are many other dates burned into my memory from the Skype conversations I found. I hate the fact that he redownloaded KIK to do sexting a WEEK before coming to stay with me in Spain. I hate looking at photos we sent to each other and screenshots of things before all this happened and when I first started getting anxiety about him possibly speaking to others when I was alone for months since my father was away. Knowing I was right. Thinking while I was happily sleeping or watching TV or playing League he was w***king with others and sending photos.

Why did he break on this day?

Somehow I managed to forgive him again thinking he actually did think wrong and stopped. Since then I have said anytime you do "it" you do it with me. (sorry to be direct :S) you are no longer trusted to do it by yourself. No porn no nothing just me.

I caught him watching porn 2 times by some app that I can hear sound on his phone when he didn't know. I heard the noises and I asked him what are you doing? He replies "hanging out the washing". This was in September.

Now we are at December and there hasn't been any incident since... but I cannot overcome the hurt, I have these images burned into my head, imaging him doing those things with people. We are literally on the phone all day now when he is not in school or working. I cannot trust him alone in the house and I cannot go to sleep without him and me ....

I feel like he's contaminated with all that filth and vermin and one half of me hates him the other loves him greatly and I do feel he does to me too.. I have been to Amsterdam 5 times now since May and he's been to Spain 4 times. I have met his parents and he also came out to them so it would be easier to stay at his house. I plan to spend Christmas and new years with him and his family.

TLDR; What can I do to possibly trust him again? His words are no credibility anymore after the 2nd time. I cannot be off the phone with him if he's not in work or school as I go crazy thinking he will do it. Please no you have to take a leap of faith advise.. Not easy. I have extreme anxiety from this now and I had been given anxiety tablets.

[Harlequin]

If this relationship is affecting you to the point where you need to take anxiety medication, I think you need to end it. Nothing good is going to come from staying in it, because that anxiety and resentment is only going to eat at you and at him. You can't trust him, and any attempt he makes to rectify the situation isn't going to change what has been done because you can't trust him. Even reading what you wrote, there's a lot of anger and resentment that comes through that should not exist in a healthy relationship. You've called him names, and you have such little faith in him, you won't even let him watch porn.

Every relationship has its boundaries. It would appear that this one has completely crossed yours, and understandably so. However, in an attempt to fix it and soothe your mind, you're putting it in shackles. The relationship will never thrive like this. I'm sure there's a part of you that does love him dearly and a part of him that loves you dearly, but you two aren't a good match. It doesn't make either of you bad people; it just means you're wrong for each other. For your own comfort and well-being, I really think you should consider either just being friends, or cutting him out of your life completely. The trust is gone, the damage is done, and he may never change.

[Littlewhiteflower]

After reading this post, I wondered one thing, "why is he still with him?"
This man, as much as you must love him, has broken your trust, not once but twice and maybe more. You can try to reconstruct it, but that is going to be really really hard and you'll probably both end up unhappy.

I understand totally your feeling of anxiety, your feeling of "what if it all start again". I experienced it before. Once. It took me months to reconstruct my trust with my SO and even some days, it's hard.

If he did it twice, I would be worried he could do it another time. Some people are fine with acting like your partner does. They are unable to commit or to be exclusive. Sexting others is for me not being committed nor exclusive. Maybe it can change with time. Maybe he will realize you're worth it, but maybe you're just not done to be together.

I think all this is far from being healthy. It's completely unhealthy for you and possibly for him who maybe feel controlled. You feel overly anxious, you take medication. You have reached a point where you are in a toxic relationship and it's starting to destroy you.
As much as you may love him, why do you continue if the trust isn't there anymore? Trust is the most important thing in a long distance relationship. Without it, it isn't worth it. Because you're hurt and in a constant state of stress, anger. It is obvious in this thread that you wrote.

Maybe going out of this relationship won't be easy, maybe it will be really painful, maybe if you started having anxiety problems, you'll have to find way to control it and to solve your problems with professional help (there's no shame in that), because it could affect your next relationships.
Maybe all this isn't what you expected to hear or perhaps you just waited for someone to tell you "end it, it's not healthy anymore" to do the right thing.

Follow your heart. Do what you think is right, but if I was you, I wouldn't have gave him a third chance. That is for sure.

Best of luck to you and merry Christmas !

[Lion_Sam]

Hello everyone,

I am Liam's boyfriend and we both thought that it would be good if i put my thoughts on this topic so you can perhaps get a better understanding of me. Obivously i have made terrible mistakes, and broke the trust of the one person i love. But I have changed since then.

I will never do again what i done, i have realised it isnt just porn. I have realised that was i done was terrible and disgusting even. Looking back at what i done i can understand why he called me a whore, and that is not what i want to be. I want to be in a happy and healthy relationship with Liam and i have been doing my best effort to make that happen.

There is a lot of things that i have tried to do to make our situation better although none of these seem to really work. As Liam said hes verry anxious what i do at every time of the day, unless we're on the phone or when im at work. Even when im at school he does not feel completely save.
In attempt from us to minamilise his worry we have established bounderies.

I also try to reassure him whenever this is needed, and listen to him. We have tried to come up with plans for him to slowly trust me more and give me more space but this hasnt really helped.

There is other things that i have tried to do to show him my dedication to him and how badly i want him to be happy.
For his birthday I suprised him by coming over to Spain without him knowing, i managed to lure him to come out with help of one of his friends and he didnt expect me there at all when i showed up. We had a great weekend without any worry and he said this was the best birthday gift he had ever gotten. For Three days our relationship was how it is meant to be.
After the three days, when i had to leave however we went back to same bounderies as i mentioned above.

We are currently seeing eachother in person every month of which the next time is in only 11 days

I really love him and want to be with him, i hope to have given you a better understanding of me and i am curious wheter you have any advice on how to support my boyfriend in his moments of anxiety and how to help him rebuild his trust in me.

[Littlewhiteflower]

As much as you can love each other, It will take A LOT of work to reconstruct this trust. You have to be both ready to do it. We cannot really give you advices about what is best to do or not. I think every person as their way to construct trust. Controlling is not an healthy way. Preventing someone to go out, to see friends aren't healthy ways either as one partner is controling and the other is controlled.
It's normal to go out (and STAY faithful). It's normal to have friends, to chat with other boys/girls (as long as you don't sext nor cheat). It's totally normal and HEALTHY. Controlling isn't healthy.

I can understand you both want to reconstruct your trust, but I doubt that is the healtiest way to function. Maybe you'd need external or professional help, to solve your problems, because even if I tell you ''do that or that thing'', it doesn't mean it will work. I reconstruct the trust with my boyfriend with time, without trying to control him. I realized I didn't belong to him and he realized I was worth it. He started to prioritize me and stopped looking to find someone else.

Watching pornography isn't a bad thing either unless it becomes an addiction or a necessity. Lot of men do it. My SO does it and that is not something that bother me as it is not cheating. Boys have a way to pleasure themselves that can be different from girls and it's not cheating. When you're both away, you have to find ways to do your stuff differently. What is cheating (for me) is sexting and even thinking about being unfaithful. if you are unfaithful, you will excuse me, but you have NO respect for your partner and for yourself. It's just disgusting.

Now, I'm adressing myself to Liam, I think that checking your partner cellphone, applications and so on, demonstrate that you didn't trust him at the very beginning. If you didn't have trust for your partner at first, it will be really difficult to reconstruct it now that it is completely broken. I don't want to be negative or pessimist, I just think that you will have to make a lot of work on yourself.

Give yourself time, try to see if you can both work together. I still continue to think all this is unhealthy, but it is just my opinion.

[hmrambling]

Liam & Lion_Sam,

We teach others how to treat us. Liam, you have taught Lion_Sam how to treat you. Lion_Sam, you have taken advantage of the fact that Liam accepts poor treatment. To hover over someone to make sure that online accounts are deleted is an example of control and mistrust. To check someone's phone without permission is also control, mistrust, and an invasion of privacy. Lion_Sam, you say that you want Liam to be happy, but do you really think that your actions result in happiness?

Both of you need to autopsy this relationship and look at how each of you have contributed to where the relationship is now. When a person starts accepting unacceptable behavior, that unacceptable behavior is sure to progress. Both of you have demonstrated poor boundaries. At some point, your own mental health and your own wellbeing has to be a priority, even before this relationship.

Focus on your own self care and take care of your mental health and wellbeing.