Think I've destroyed my marriage and family because of a lie I told 14 years ago! HELP!!

[ithinkiveruinedmymarriage]

This is a long one so apologies in advance!! My DH and I have been together for 14 happy years, the last 7 of those married. He’s the most incredible and amazing person I’ve ever met and we have had the best fun and loving relationship I could have wished for plus now our amazing little family on top of all that. But, I think something I did 14 years ago may have just completely destroyed it all…..

3 months into our relationship (almost 14 years ago) I received an email from my ex containing friendly chat and asking me to design him a tattoo. I replied with equally friendly chat and said I’d design the tattoo. My memory is failing me with some of the details surrounding the event as it’s so long ago but my DH (bf at the time) was massively unimpressed when he found out I’d emailed him back – I said I’d replied with friendly chat and told my DH that moving forward I wouldn’t design the tattoo and wouldn’t reply to my ex again, and I stuck to my word. However, and this is the hazy area but a key point, I did tell my DH that I’d mentioned him to my ex in the email and said how amazing he was. DH seemed okay. Case dropped. We moved on continuing to be loved up and happy.

Fast forward 14 years…..still loved up and happy but….DH and I have a heated conversation, jealousy kicking in over my past and previous relationships (this has happened on and off over the past 14 years but not been a real issue, just normal jealousy needing some reassurance). Said email mentioned above comes into the conversation and he’s saying how can I believe you, how do I know you didn’t reply again blah blah blah. I said I’ll see if I can find the email and show it to you because I wanted to prove to him and make him feel better. Well what a can of worms that has opened up…….we found the email trail containing the friendly chat and showing no further follow-up, but no mention of me telling my ex about my DH, in fact no mention of him at all. My DH has absolutely flipped saying that I’ve lied to him and betrayed him and been completely dishonest which I think he’s within his rights to say and that I chose my ex over him as should never have emailed in the first place. But he’s also saying that I must have still had feelings for my ex, must have wanted to re-kindle something with him, the content was far too personal and friendly. He simply will not believe that this wasn’t the case however much I try to reassure him. And let me tell you, that absolutely was not the case – my ex was controlling to the extreme and made life hellish the majority of the time however the breakup, when I finally plucked up courage to leave him, was amicable and we did exchange sporadic messages as friends on and off in the following months. My DH is interpreting it completely wrong and the daft thing is that I feel like I only replied to my ex in the first place because of my own insecurities/jealousy over my DH’s past. It just all feels like such a mess over something that isn’t significant at all in my mind (although obviously the consequences are) but is HUGE in my DH’s mind and nothing I seem to say or do is fixing it. I have honestly believed for the last 14 years (as has he) that I said that in the email but it’s clearly not there in writing – I either bare face lied or it’s in some other correspondence that I have zero trace of…?! And the thing is, I don’t know which is true and will never know now!!!

Now is also probably a good point to mentioned the other issue I’ve caused, and there is a link – that I lied to my DH when we first got together – I was intimidated by his past and felt threatened by it which led to feeling insecure and jealous. So for some ridiculous reason I bigged up my past sex life up to something fairly extreme, stupid I know, but that’s all come back to bite recently too. I have now been completely honest with him about that and explained why I felt the need to glorify things but again, and again unsurprisingly, he doesn’t believe me and can’t take my word as the truth. Understandably he’s saying I’ve lied to him over the last 14 years and what else is a lie, how can he trust me etc. etc. The problem with telling him the “honest” bit here is that the past basically boils down to sex with the ex in the email above so DH is thinking I had some amazing sex life with my ex that I was trying to rekindle in the email. Aaaarghhh!!!!

I feel so ashamed and embarrassed that I’ve done this, I can’t sleep and it’s making me feel ill. How can I ever put this right if my DH won’t believe me when I explain my feelings for him and how amazing he is and how happy and in love I am with him. I don’t want this to destroy my marriage and my family who are all perfect in every way!! What have I done!!!

You realise this is absolutely nuts, right?

Is the reason everything has been so perfect for 14 years because you have 'behaved yourself?'

You are arguing over an email sent 14 years ago. Do either of you ever get out of the house? You should try it once in a while.

This was all years ago and he's acted like everything has been absolutely fine???!!
I'd be questioning him and his actions to be honest.

He genuinely sounds unhinged….

Is this a reverse by any chance?

Not gonna lie I didn't read to the end. There's no point

It was all predictable, wasn't it? 'what can I do to placate jealous controlling husband who is dragging up trivialities from my past to abuse me?' would have saved OP all that trouble.

Your DH is a) wildly insecure, b)deeply controlling and c)needs therapy to deal with his issues over a small thing that happened 14 years ago.
This. He sounds scary to me.

I was going to write a long post, but these sentences sum up what I was going to say nicely

I'm another one saying the same thing - your DH sounds unhinged.

The fact that he is still bringing up an email you sent to an ex 14 years ago is insane. Particularly given the email wasn't sexually explicit. He's using an incredibly minor thing from over a decade ago to keep you on your toes. Jealousy over an ex isn't a "normal" thing to come up after so long, particularly when you have no contact with the ex.

IMO you would benefit from doing the Freedom Programme to get over the issues relating to your controlling ex and how you expect to be treated in relationships. And you might be surprised how much of the same controlling behaviour your DH exhibits.

This is what my mum would call a storm in a teacup. Why is making such a big deal about absolutely nothing. Off these are the only 2 'lies' you've told over 14 years then I'm not sure why he can't trust you. He needs to grow up. A lot.

this has to be the most bizarre thing that I have ever read on here. totally, totally bonkers and you know that right??? you do know that? 14 years and he is still going on about it. why? so what the past is a different country. what you did or did not do or say then is totally irrelevant. its as if he is saying that one thing has wiped out your 14 good years together. you didnt sleep with the other guy, or have his child or anything else its just a bloody email. You arent in a relationship with an amazing man. you are being controlled by an abuser.

He’s making a lot of nothing at all - there’s something else going on with him. Controlling? Guilty conscience?

I don’t know - but get yourself away from him.

He's unhinged. What a weird man.

This is gonna get deleted and the deletion message will say, ‘Thanks to those who have replied in good faith but this is causing the OP quite a bit of stress. We’re not here to make anyone’s life difficult so we’ve agreed to delete it.’

He's picking a fight for the sake of it.
It sounds like he's up to something and has found the one thing he can pick an argument with you.
My guess is that there's an OW.

Oh OP.

Your current DH is controlling, too. Never mind the ex-BF.

You need to stop blaming yourself for things which are insignificant. How can you love and respect a man who makes you feel so terrible about something unimportant like this?

Maybe the two of you would benefit from some counselling. If your DH is as excellent a DH as you say, he will agree to go, so that the two of you can iron out these issues.

Your husband doesn’t sound amazing, OP, he sounds nuts.

My ex is one of my best friends, and if my husband had anything to say about it he’d be out on his ear. As it happens, my husband is also good friends with him, because he’s not nuts.

So let me get this straight, when you were barely 3 months into dating your now DH, you had a friendly email exchange with an ex. Your at-the-time boyfriend kicked up a massive fuss and behaved like a complete plonker, causing you to feel you had to ghost the ex on the spot and never speak to him again.

Then 14 years later, because you MAY have told your DH that you had mentioned your at-the-time boyfriend to your ex but it turns out that you did not, he is accusing you of dishonesty and you are now running around trying to prove you are honest?

You do realise that even if you WERE dishonest with him 14 years ago, you were BARELY dating. You were not obligated at that point to put all your cards on the table at all times.

BATSHIT.

In the past, has your DH displayed other controlling behaviours. You say, "normal jealously and insecurity" stuff. Well, I've never found any jealously and insecurity to be normal or something anyone should have to accommodate. What does it look like? I 'm guessing you have never been allowed any contact with any exes? Possibly also discouraged from being friendly with mutual friends or with certain women your DH thinks are/were a bad influence?

And what does he want you to do now to "prove" your honestly? Allow him to monitor all comms? I'm guessing you definitely aren't allowed to go out anywhere?

If your DH is this insecure then HE is the one with the issue.

Your husband is being ridiculous, I would not be entertaining this bullshit!

I think you have lost sight of what ‘normal’ jealousy looks like and what a normal relationship is like, to be honest.

Your husband is behaving completely insanely. And you are so gaslighted by this man that you actually believe that it is your behaviour, not his, that is the problem.

I really hope this is a troll post. If not, OP, you need support to see none of this is normal or healthy and you need to leave this man.

My guess is that there's an OW

I did wonder about that too, to be honest. I wondered if the DH was creating this drama so that he would have a good reason to tell the OP that he'd met someone wonderful "who didn't lie to him all the time."

Your DH is the problem here. He's jealous and controlling.... his behaviour is inexcusable. He has no right to use a 14 year old email to beat you up with - you did nothing wrong!

Your DH is a nutter - a controlling, insecure nutter. You have done nothing wrong - this is him, not you. Stop apologising and stressing over this and tell him to get a grip.

This was my take too. Sounds like he's shifting the guilt. If I was the OP, I'd be asking him questions - not defending myself over an email I replied to 14 years ago, that I couldn't even recall the exact content of.

First off, why how the hell did you still have the email from 14 years ago?? We keep good records but there's no way I could find an email that old without professional help.

Secondly, I am seriously worried about how your husband has reacted. This happened 14 years ago. Over a decade. Yes, you told some porkies. Everybody does. People reduce / increase the number of partners, gloss over bits they would rather forget- and as they build a relationship, these either get sorted, forgotten or laughed about as the current relationship is obviously strong. To still be jealous after all this time is definitely not normal. As others have said, is he controlling / overly jealous in other ways?

I don't think you have 'just' blown up the relationship; a strong one would survive this. I think it goes deeper - and is only going to be salvaged with help. You need to ask yourself if this reaction, which seems to be part of a pattern, is one you can live with, and, crucially - allow your children to experience. It is not normal, and not something they should see normalised.

Hopefully you can find a way to sort this, but unfortunately, I think it might take counselling, for your DH to work out why he is so jealous/insecure and for you to understand whether you can live with this.

Good luck xx