I (32M) lost my fiancée's (31F) trust by hiding something stupid and lying about it when confronted.

To give some backstory, we have known eachother for 9 years and have dated off and on through several periods of that time. We went through phases where we dated eachother, dated others and really didn't have contact, talked casually, and met up occasionally. Early on when we first started dating, we had the typical ups and downs of two young, hard-headed people (alphas, I would say) in a relationship. We were madly in love one minute and fighting the next. Many mistakes were made and as stated above we ended up going our separate ways but always found a way to reconnect in some way, even if it was months in between contact. Both of us always still loved eachother deep down, and I for one always had that lingering hope our paths might cross again in love.

...Fast forward to last year, I happened to be in town for work and reached out to her and we met up while I was there. It was a fun time and we were able to just let loose hang out without worrying about any baggage or subconscious negative feelings from our deep past. Well...fast forward a little more and I receive a phone call from her letting me know that she is pregnant from that time. Immediately upon hearing those words I realized that my lingering hope had come true in a most unexpected way. I knew right then that, if she wanted it, I wanted to have this life and family with her. But I knew it would be a challenging road ahead.

...More fast forwarding puts us living together (I moved cities and moved in) all through the pregnancy, the birth, and when the baby was 2 months old, I proposed! The whole time had pretty much been nothing but laughter and happiness. No longer did we fight like we used to, and the little arguments we did have didn't spiral out of control. I think this is due to us both having matured over the years, and having a very serious reason to make this work, and of course both knowing we really do love each other. We split expenses, bought a bigger vehicle together, and pretty much lived like a happily married couple.

My backstory: I don't have a huge social circle, and previous to all this I was living alone in a small town where I had moved fairly recently for work. I pretty much lived a somewhat lonely bachelor life, working and keeping myself occupied however I could. I had very few new friends in town, so really the only social life I had was trying to stay connected with my old friends in other cities, usually via the phone and what little social media I had (i.e. getting on Snapchat occasionally). One of the people I communicated with here and there is my old ex girlfriend from HS/university. (This is the gf I was with just before first meeting my current fiancée. In all honestly I wasn't over the breakup back when we met, and she could tell, so that caused a few ripples way back then.) But now it was a platonic friendship where we talked about random stuff, shared pics of our cats, etc. The affectionate feelings either of us had for each other in the past were long gone, but since we were from the same hometown and had some of the same interests, we talked sometimes. No big deal.

Well...this is where my fuckup comes in and (potentially) ruins everything.

For the first few months after moving in, I was pretty much focused on transitioning at work, looking after my pregnant lady, doing improvements around the house, and just generally preparing for having a baby. I really didn't have time or energy for any social life. During this time our relationship got stronger and we re-learned this new adult version of ourselves, with eyes on the bright future. We got into a nice routine and at some point I decided to check up on my Snapchat. I'm sure there were a couple friend stories posted, and a few snaps shared with me, and I'm sure one of those people was the ex. I really don't remember. It's not like there was a turning point where I started using Snapchat again. But long story short, from time to time when I was bored, I would check Snap. And like before, the person I would most frequently talk to was the ex. I knew my fiancée probably wouldn't be too happy about this, but I justified it as being "harmless", as it was completely platonic. Even so, I did keep this activity hidden from her.

One day recently, my fiancée asked if I had Snapchat, and I said no. Which was obviously a lie. I did not want to upset her because I knew she would probably have some jealous feelings knowing I still had contact with an ex without her knowledge. The next night, after we had both had some drinks, she very calmly and respectfully confronted me and told me she knew I had a Snapchat, and asked me to explain myself. Feeling put on the spot, I lied again and said I do have one that I get on infrequently (which was for the most part true) to get caught up with a few old friends and a family member in the military. She asked to see, and of course found that my top contact was the ex.

This of course upset her for the obvious reason that it was my ex, someone I had been involved with in the past and at one time had a very hard time getting over. It brought back painful feelings of insecurity from the past. But I think what hurt her even more was that I tried to hide it and so nonchalantly lied about it when asked. Of course, both feelings are completely justified. I was absolutely in the wrong.

So this puts me where I am now. She is very hurt and I have betrayed her trust. She thought we had the perfect relationship going (which we did), and can't believe that I was giving some of my focus to someone else, especially an ex, and hiding it, and then lied about it. She is completely unsure whether she can trust me at all, and I don't blame her. And of course she naturally suspects that the relationship I still have with the ex is more than platonic, which it is not. But I can't really prove that. I completely messed up. At this point I feel absolutely horrible that I let my stupid actions hurt the person I love so badly, and put my relationship and my new family at risk. And I know the blame lies totally with me.

What can I do to regain her trust and prove to her that she really is the only person I love, that I love her 110%, and that I will never let anything like this happen again. Is there hope for our relationship getting back to where it was? Is there a chance this can make us stronger? I know the burden is on me to make all of the above happen if it is possible. Any advice or perspective would be much appreciated. Any additional questions, please ask.

TL;DR - Lied to my fiancee about communicating with an ex. Don't know what to do...

Submitted February 23, 2020 at 02:54PM by Rude-Mammoth https://ift.tt/2v9qf0z