In a bit of a mess, and don’t want to make it worse

[JustAnotherEverydayFuckup]

DH and I have been together for six years and married for three, we have a 2 year old DD. We have a very happy relationship in many ways, we have fun, we laugh a lot, he is a wonderful father.

There were some teething problems. When we first got together he lied about financial things (payday loans), he texted another woman (secretly), I found out he’d used escorts in his dim and distant past (through loneliness rather ham pure misogeny, I believe, though he’s never said it in so many words).

We don’t argue, but since finding out about the above, I’ve never wholly and fully trusted him again. This has led to a lack of sex, there’s just something stopping me fully ‘letting go’ and being vulnerable with him. Obviously having a toddler doesn’t help, as we usually fall into bed half asleep at the end of a day.

But, he treats me well (or has for the past five years since the lies above were uncovered), I have no proof that he has any three secrets and I genuinely enjoy his company every single day.

When I found out about the lying we split very briefly while I considered what to do next and I got slightly too close to a male friend of mine. Nothing happened, but I think we both know it could have happened. We went for some drinks, literally nothing out of the ordinary, but the atomosphere between us was different.

But now, five years later, I still lightly obsess about this friend, I see him occasionally, usually as part of a group. I dream about him often. I feel guilty a lot. Sometimes I feel like he knows that there is some strange chemistry between us. Sometimes I want to tell him how I feel.

I know that you when I decided to make a go of it with DH, I did so in the knowledge that we’d have to move forward from the issues that’d been raised, and it wasn’t fair on either of us to hold on to that difficult time.

And I don’t even find the friend attractive, maybe if I was getting more sexual fulfilment form DH I’d be less of a loose-list- cannon (which sounds more dramatic than it is).

This is the first time I’ve ever mentioned any of this ‘out loud’ and I guess I’m wondering what on Earth I should do.

Your husbands use of escorts was before you met it is therefore none of your business.
Before you married he took out payday loans again none of your business as it did not affect you. Lying about the loans was not cool but why should he tell you he was not married or liviing with you.
As for the sexting once again this was over 5 yars ago
In the mean time you have married your DH and are obsessing about ( in my opinion) 3 minor things he did before he married you and has done nothing wrong since.
You claim you want better sex but in the same time you are witholding sex over things that happened before your marriage.
You sound like a drama queen and a hypocrite, while allowing these three petty incidents to cloud your marriage you are infatuated with a male friend.
You need to let go of your obsession with these so called secrets and your infatuation and work on your marriage

I don’t think I could get past the escort thing tbh. Or the sexting. The financial side wouldn’t worry me as much, but I don’t think you’re over reacting.

I suppose that the question now is whether YOU can get past these 3 issues. You only have 2 options really, which are you happiest living with?

I don't think you are overreacting. He should have disclosed the financial stuff before you got married. Am assuming the sexting another women was when he was with you, that's not on. The use of escorts also should have been disclosed. These nagging doubts have left you infatuated with another man. That's just escapism, not real. It won't help you sort out your feelings for your DH. The fact you are feeling like this 5 yrs down the line is the main concern here. Maybe some couples counselling? Sorry, not much help, but I do know that jumping ship into another man's arms is not the answer.

Your obsessing over a counterfactual is a symptom, not a cause.

You know that your DH isn’t right for you. It’s a question of when you let go, not if. Although I have to say it would be a pity to give up without trying to address your problems first.

Of course you are overracting highinthesky is right your obsessing over counterfactuals
Your husband went to escorts in the "dim and distant past" because he paid for sex its bad but if had one night stands and did not pay that is ok. I repeat what I said earlier. That was long before he met you and has nothing to do with you.
The financial issue was again the past before you were together as was the sexting you have dragged up these very old issues and blown them out if proportion
I never understand why partners spill their guts and tell their OH about their past, because people like you are ready to hold it against them and make problems.
Were you so lilly white before met and married your husband? No skeletons in your cupboard?
You need to live today not in the past.

So he did some stuff in his past before he met you and as a result you have:

1. Withheld sex
2. Broken up with him before getting back with him
3. Have been fantasising about another man and toying with the idea of getting him

I would be telling your man to LTB

Your husbands use of escorts was before you met it is therefore none of your business
I disagree with this.
I could never be a man who I knew had done this, before or after we got together.
I says a lot about who he is as a person and I could never get passed that.

Paying for sex is different to having one night stands, and it is relevant information to a partner. It says something about the man's attitude to sex and women.

Taking out payday loans also says something about his financial acumen (or lack thereof), and when you're together past and present debt affects your joint resources. I mean payday loans are very foolish indeed.

And if he was after another woman while with the op, that's scarcely irrelevant.

Obviously if you are going to stay with him, you need to be able to let these things go. But it may be that in the first few years, it seemed possible to live with those things but as time goes on, you realise they are actually dealbreakers or that you partially checked out of the relationship then and what you have left isn't enough. Probably worth getting into counselling for a few sessions to talk things out, either jointly or alone.

Thanks or your thoughts, they've given me lots to think about.

For clarity:

The payday loans were both before and after we got together, but he flagrantly lied about it. I only found out by mistake and he continued to deny it until I showed him evidence.

The sexting (I think it was more flirting than sexting, but I didn't see the texts, so I don't know for sure), was when we'd been together 9 months. He later admitted to it (at the same time as he admitted to the escort thing).

The escorts were before we met - but based on his ability to lie about the loans, there will be no way for me to really know (we were both screened before we had unprotected sex). So, I just have to decide to trust him on this.

I don't actively withhold sex or anything else, I try very hard to be open and honest, and straight-forward, it's only by really assessing where we are and why we are in this position that I realised that one reasons was probably because I didn't feel fully secure in the relationship. This is only one of the reasons, others are standard: we work too hard, we have a small child, I feel fatter than I'd like post-partum... standard stuff.

For Glitter I don't think that taking a week apart a year into a relationship is a bad thing, when it transpires that one person has been bare-faced lying to the other. I think that's a pretty sane approach. While we worked out whether we thought we could make it work.

Category you're entirely right that 'part of me checked out' of the relationship at that point. I'd been hurt in the past, I try very hard never to allow myself to be hurt to that extent again, so I suppose I shut a bit of me off to DH. I want to get it back, and I want to truly be as happy as we sometimes are and certainly appear. But it's hard.

high in the sky you're entirely right that the obsessing is counterfactual, I guess my friend is just someone who I hold in good moral-regard, he has never behaved to me the way DH did in the beginning.

I know that all of this makes our relationship sound very dysfunctional, but I swear we're not. We equally parent our daughter, we work hard, we support each other, we enjoy the same things, we laugh a lot. There's just this little nugget of worry and fear, that I either need to keep under-control, or face fully (through counselling or similar) to find a solution to.