My boyfriend slept with someone else the day before our first kiss. I'm having trouble getting over it. How do I move past this?

[SashaDhawan]

My boyfriend (25M) and I (21F) have been dating for a year and three months now. We have a great relationship and we really do love each other. We get along well, and all my friends and family love him too.

My only issue is that he is prone to hiding things from me and lying to me. I recently found out from an anonymous DM on Instagram the true way his parents found out about us (he lied about this), how long his previous relationship was (also lied about this) and the fact that he slept with someone else the day before we had our first kiss (I never knew and he never tried to tell me).

I'm having trouble getting over everything, especially after finding out he was intimate with someone the day before what was an important day to me, he was my first kiss. I just feel a little used, naïve and just overall icky. The reason I feel this way is because the girl he slept with is his older sister's friend. I have met her, I went to his older sister's hens weekend and she was there. Throughout his older sister's wedding week, she was there and present. She was apart of the dance I taught his older sister and her friends, she's just around a lot. I feel like a fool, because apparently a lot of people within his sister's friend group knew and I have just been so unaware and stupid, trying my best to get along with his older sister's friends to get closer to his sisters. The worst part I believe, is that after his sister's wedding, I called her out by name to my boyfriend and I said that I didn't think she likes me and that I got weird vibes from her. But my boyfriend played it off, and even when as far as to say he'd ask his sister if I wanted, which I obviously declined. I feel a little humiliated.

When my boyfriend and I spoke about this, his reasoning behind lying was that he didn't want his ex to have any part of our relationship, or the reason he didn't tell me about the girl he slept with was because he didn't want to make me uncomfortable.

I don't know how to get over this. It took me so long to get my retroactive jealousy in check when I found out he had a recent ex (we started talking early Feb 22', he broke up with his ex late January 22'), and now to throw in a girl he had a one night stand with the day before we kissed is hurting me like crazy. I've asked to have some space away but I'm not sure if things will ever go back to normal. My trust has been broken, I am genuinely so hurt and I have little faith that he's going to change. However, on the other hand, I truly do love him, and have imagined a future with him. He even gave me a promise ring and has openly spoken about marriage. He really is a great guy, he ticks all my boxes and loves me so much. I believe in his past he's just grown up hiding and lying from his family so it has just become a habit, but I am a very understanding person by nature and he knows this too. I feel like he takes advantage of that as I have forgiven him for lying to me before.

I know I'm young and if our relationship ends, it won't be the end of the world but I really do love him with everything I have. Please help me and give me some advice as to what I should do.

Seriously if you wish a period of chasity from a partner before they kiss you for the first time, then that’s the most bizzare thing I’ve ever heard.

@SashaDhawan Lies are a complete deal breaker for me.

One can never trust someone who tells porky pies ( Lies) and it feels as if one is on shifting sands.

I was married to a man who lied about stuff, and he’s onto his third wife now- she told me his lies absolutely frustrate her, too.

You are young, OP, and there is nothing wrong in feeling as you do.

Lying in my experience is an ingrained habit .

I'd get rid tbh the lying is the concern.

I'll bet £50 there's more lies you just don't know about.

Does he lie or just not tell you things? Re the women he slept with, he was perfectly within his rights and the explanation for not telling you seems fine. I do understand why it's got to you, but if you love him you really need to find a way to move kn.

Too much lying and lying by omission.

The fucking another woman the day before our first kiss would taint things for me too.

The not saying anything while you were then around that other woman and her social group, and you even noticed her attitude and mentioned it to him.... Really shitty situation to put you in.
I'd wonder how he'd like to have been in that situation if the tables were turned.

You are very very young and you don't need to settle for a liar and sneak and low integrity person

Throw him back.

Some of the responses on here are bizarre.

You are 21 and have a boyfriend that you say you have a great relationship with apart from the continual lies.

If I said I had a great restaurant that cooked great food, it's just one meal in 10 we added a little dogshit to, would you expect anyone to eat there?

You have the right to walk away and you need to know it isn't going to get any better, you are 21 and you need to apply some boundaries and end this relationship.

Lying in my experience is an ingrained habit

Yep

Personally I'd prefer they weren't balls deep in another woman 24 hours before.

Dating used to be exclusive ..... What fucked up standards are we letting come into dating that we're making it perfectly acceptable to be fucking one person while dating/connecting with another and starting a relationship with him. Raise your standards, seriously.

with all due respect what he did before you officially started dating is absolutely none of your business and he has no obligation to tell you. You are being unreasonable and irrational. I think you are quite young and will see things differently as you grow up

You come across as quite intense in your posts and I thought you'd be younger than you are. The hugeness of the first kiss thing seemed more something a 16 year might say,

There's nothing wrong with having those feelings but I think you're perhaps losing a bit of perspective. It's not ideal and it's nice to start a new relationship with a clean sheet. But it seems a shame to end a relationship if there's so many positive reasons why you're well matched.

I'd explain why it's upset you and the need for honesty, however uncomfortable at times, and see if you can move past it.

But it's not even just that, it's that he then had her around the woman he fucked, unknowingly, and lied by omission when she mentioned the woman's attitude to him.

(And the fact she had an attitude also goes to prove that women are not - entirely understandably - not ok with his behaviour, him being intimate with one woman, then onto a other 24 hrs later. Only some MNers are ok with that apparently).

Without knowing what he's lied about really, difficult to comment. But your reaction to him sleeping with someone before you may be why he feels he can't be open about some things. Did a pp refer to it as "cheating"? Ludicrous.

You come across as quite intense in your posts and I thought you'd be younger than you are. The hugeness of the first kiss thing seemed more something a 16 year might say

I couldn't disagree more with this.

I know ppl of any age who'd be uncomfortable with the closeness in time of his sexual intimacy with another person, and then first physical contact/intimacy with them.

Very patronising indeed.

It's not about her age; and her misgivings and discomfort are entirely understandable.

Anyway he's a habitual liar.

Needs tossed back in the datng pool. No way should op be throwing herself away on this specimen at 21 yrs old

with all due respect what he did before you officially started dating is absolutely none of your business and he has no obligation to tell you

I would bet you a decent sum of money that if op had taken some guys dick, maybe done oral and kissed him with that same mouth 24 hrs before she kissed him for the first time; he's consider it his business, and would have a big problem with her not telling him. Especially if she then had him around the guy.

Some posters are in cloud cuckoo land.

This is a very personal thing and times have definitely changed.

I am a bit older now but the idea that you can be both sexually intimate and affectionate with someone at the same time as seeing someone else, just because you haven’t formally agreed to be exclusive, is an anathema to me. It seems to really devalue what you do and say.

In addition, he lied about it, which either makes him dishonest or a coward.

However, I know many on here would think he had done nothing wrong as you hadn’t had the ‘exclusivity’ chat while you were dating and texting.

Ultimately, you are entitled to your feelings, either way. If you follow others’ opinions on something so personal, you will end up unhappy.

If this is his good behaviour then one day you will get his worse.

He lies so it’s a non starter anyway. Trust is everything and he’s setting his stall out now. In years to come he can throw this back in your face that you knew what he was like at the start.

You don’t have to get past others bad behaviour.

he wouldn't know though would he- why would she tell him that? I don't get why we have to know these things it's not our business at all.

*I know ppl of any age who'd be uncomfortable with the closeness in time of his sexual intimacy with another person, and then first physical contact/intimacy with them.

Very patronising indeed.*

Except you omitted the part where I said there's nothing wrong with having those feelings. We've all been that age and know how it feels.

I'm not sure that the comments about retroactive jealousy about previous relationships are necessarily signs of a healthy mindset. Most people have dated other people and that's fine. Seems a shame to throw away what sounds like a good relationship because of something that happened before she started dating.

Honesty is important but I don't see it as a gross betrayal that she couldn't get past if she sees a long term future with him.

I agree.

OP, it's the lies that are the greater concern though. You say you are understanding of the fact this is probably rooted in his childhood but don't he fooled into thinking he will develop a new habit of honesty with you over time. This is deeply ingrained in him and, whilst yu might be understanding now, that will soon wear off when you are a few years down the line, more mature yourself and it starts to impact on all areas of your life. There is literally no point in talking to a liar about anything because you can't trust a word they say.

There are no rewards for women who put up with crappy men because they 'love' him.

You feel this way because:

1. he’s proven himself a liar. So you’re not confident that he isn’t lying about your first kiss being special to him. if he can omit things, you wonder, is he capable of actively making things up?

2. no matter those trying to make you out as immature for it, it does obviously feel icky - that’s not every girls dream is it, to be in the first throws of romance, texting, calling, full of expectation but he’s still off having one night stands. In the films, Prince Charming never did that because he was too busy thinking about the princess he’d fallen in love with to look at any other girl. Now obviously, realistically, he did nothing wrong there. He also didn’t need to tell you…EXCEPT in this case the girl is someone you spend time with and who clearly has a problem with you because of it - so he actually did need to tell you not lie to your face. That shows he is definitely not on your side. He let you feel like you were imagining things even though you weren’t.

Obviously, the lying is the issue here. Some men do it because they are pathological liars. Some men do it to control you. Some men do it to feel powerful. But not all men lie. There’s 7billion people in this world. You will definitely find a man who doesn’t lie to you. And as PPs have said, things that exist in the beginning tend to continue. Especially in the case of lying - either he’s having fun lying to you or he’s going for the easy life. Either way it’s not sexy and it doesn’t make a good man. You can do better.

ps don’t want to be mean and maybe other people have had good experiences of promise rings but all I see when men give promise rings are men who are trying to keep up an image of the good guy with very little effort. Playing a fantasy. If he wanted to propose he’d propose. He doesn’t want to. The ring buys a lot of time.

There are lots of different scenarios where sleeping with someone else before we kissed might be fine by me.

The constant lying is a clear warning sign. I'd listen to that - because if he is lying so much this early, then he is never going to tell you the truth about anything.

He owes you absolutely no information about his sex life prior to going out with you, and given that you exhibited jealousy about his ex, I'm not surprised that he doesn't want to share information like this with you.

It doesn't sound like you're in a good place to be in a relationship, and I'd suggest that some therapy to work through why you think you have ownership of his past.

No….you ARE ready for a serious relationship. Just half the people on this thread that are not. One thing i’ve learned is that age is no indicator of relationship maturity.

people who say “you weren’t exclusive, he can do what he wants”

of course he can, but this woman would like to be with someone sincere, who was just pursuing and wrapped up with her, not screwing someone else 24 hrs before their first kiss after they were building up to it. What a nasty way to sully the beginning of their relationship.

he does NOT have good morals OP, the beginning of the relationship did not mean the same to you as it did to him. What people here fail to understand is that consent is a big thing. Would you have consented to that first kiss had you known he was fresh from someone else’s bed, and would you be together now? Doubtful. This is why sure, people can do what they want, but it speaks volumes to their character, and when people lie and omit it’s because they know sharing it will have an impact on whatever it is they are trying to achieve. If what he did wasn’t wrong, I’m sure he would have been happy to share it with you while you were “getting to know him”. You weren’t getting to know him, you were getting to know what he wanted you to know. If it’s like this at the beginning, he’s likely one of those guys that can’t keep it in his pants, and a compulsive liar. Even if he’s not, ask yourself would you have consented to the beginning of a relationship with him knowing what he was up to? I was with someone like this, the first year of our relationship wasn’t how I thought it was either, and I forgave it…but the guy had long term issues with commitment and numerous other women cropping up through the relationship,

please ignore the soulless and dead inside on this post, certain types belong together, and while they may be happy with this and probably doing it themselves, you are NOT, and neither would I be, and it’s unlikely you would have consented to what you thought was a budding innocent romance had you know what he was up to behind the scenes,

By the way to the poster who said “I thought you were younger, the hugeness of your first kiss is something a 16 year old would say”

I’m 40, waited almost a decade after a bad relationship and found love again. Our first kiss was deeply special to me, for people who don’t treat love and sex as a commodity, it usually is.