My boyfriend has caused me to become extremely insecure and neurotic

[Lat182]

This will be a bit long, I apologize. I’ve been with my boyfriend for over 2 years, we’re hitting our 30s, I’ve known him a huge chunk of my life and I have had some history with him. You would think that I would know “more” about him, but I don’t. I know a lot about his childhood and traumas, and I know other personal things about him that he’s shared with me over the course of our time together. I know him based on his actions and behavior. But for the most part, I know only what he chooses to share with me, things like Pokemon, Star Wars, cars, guns, video games, that sort of thing. He’ll often talk to me about these interests or hobbies of his, or other “surface” subjects and nothing deeper or more personal. 

I’ve faced a few problems in our relationship but the one that consumes my thoughts and eats at me the most is the issue of “is he cheating on me or not.” I’m so scared, and I can’t get past it. It’s gotten to the point of paranoia and obsessive thinking. Over the past couple years that we’ve been together, he has: 

• crossed certain boundaries with me, which include watching porn, following sexualized girls on Tiktok and watching their videos behind my back, and doing other activities like following “guy” pages on Facebook that usually share stories with photos of half naked women that link to an external site, usually a related article or something or another. I get that a lot of couples seem to be “fine” somehow with this behavior and it’s become normal within a relationship in modern society, but for me it feels insulting and disrespectful and for me it is cheating even if there is no extra “interaction” involved. It shows me that he lusts after and fantasizes over other women, and makes me feel not good enough. This is what started everything and led to my demise. I realize that many people don’t seem to care and that “men are going to be men,” “everybody looks,” blah blah blah, but I genuinely don’t see it that way and I feel that if you truly love and care about your significant other, you’re going to respect their boundaries and do whatever you can to not only reassure them, but do everything in your power to keep them from feeling insecure and have eyes for them or at least learn to appreciate them, instead of going out of your way to give other women your attention and desire. I just think that if you have to fantasize/drool over other people and make your partner not feel good enough and you need that novelty and aren’t willing to give that up for a real woman, then leave the relationship? I don’t know, that’s what makes sense to me and I see no justification in it. It’s caused so much pain and it’s crazy to me that it’s so controversial; to me it’s really quite simple. There are women who have physically starved themselves over insecurities of their significant other doing these types of behaviors, and the fact that even if your significant other was with a porn star that was attractive just to their liking they’d still watch porn, is crazy to me. It doesn’t make me feel any better that my man watches porn stars that are significantly UGLIER than me… this makes me feel like I’m not actually his type at all. 
• He takes his phone everywhere and I feel displays some sneaky phone behaviors. Sure, couples need their privacy, but to what extent? I know nothing about my boyfriend beyond what he shares with me. I know nothing about his online activities or who he talks to; he has friends, but they’re all online and he doesn’t hang out with his old friends anymore. This has driven me insane and it’s become a habit for me to count how long he’s in the bathroom with his phone for (and yes, I realize sometimes he’s just taking a poop.. but this doesn’t make me feel any better) and I know he’s hiding his activities due to him only using “safe” apps like Facebook and certain other apps around me, while I know he’s doing other stuff behind my back.
• He doesn’t message friends on Facebook or his Tiktok “following” feed while I’m around. I’ll see that he’s got new messages on his Messenger app while he’s using his phone next to me, but he looks at and replies to those messages when he’s not with me, or he probably responds to messages while he’s in the bathroom or something. Strange thing is, this doesn’t just apply to girls but to his guy Facebook friends as well. 
• He flirted with a bartender in the same room with me once while he was drinking, made it pretty clear he was attracted to her and (I believe) found her more interesting than he ever has me, and then told his friend (at the time) in the hotel room we were in that his friend “should have gotten her phone number” and that she had “big hoo hoo’s.” Needless to say, it made me feel terrible and he apologized to me later in private. Don’t know why he felt the need to apologize unless he knew he did something wrong (which of course he did). 
• Drunk flirted with a girl on Facebook one night and asked her out when I chose not to come over. I confronted him about this one night awhile later when I found out, and he was very apologetic, said he was drunk and that he had no recollection of doing it. I suspect that he may have “dual drunk personality disorder” and that he does things that he probably wouldn’t sober, but this doesn’t excuse him doing these behaviors drunk. He told me that he “didn’t even like this girl” and that he didn’t know why he did it, but I didn’t know how much I believed him. 
• Got on a couple dating sites several months later while I had to go with my family to my cousin’s wedding one weekend. I confronted him about a week later after I found out, and the story that he gave me was that he only did it to look for photos of his old dog and car, both of which mean very much to him and that he miss, and he I guess also wound up looking at dating profiles while he was on the sites, but only did it to “see what girls from high school are up to now.” It sounds ridiculous now, but I believe that my boyfriend is a master of deceit and was able to somehow make me believe that he didn’t have any bad intentions on these sites. He even went so far as to tell me that he ALSO messaged his ex who was on one of the dating sites, to find out about what happened with an item that he had in the other state he was in with her at the time. He also managed to make me think that he had no bad intentions talking to her, and that he could even get on and show me the messages. I declined him on it, and we continued to argue the rest of the night while he gaslighted me and made me out to be the “bad guy” for snooping. I get it, don’t get me wrong, but at this point I don’t respect his privacy anymore. He has shown me enough “cheating” behaviors that it’s become difficult for me not to snoop anymore. I don’t have any reason to trust him based on some of the things that he has done and red flags that he has shown me.

So on top of all that, the last straw was last month when I got on his phone, and I found more porn on his browser history, and his Facebook messages and Snapchat conversations. I decided to get some photo proof so that I could look at them later. He keeps in contact with a girl who I’ll call “H.” I think he lied to me about her completely. I never questioned why he keeps in contact with her because what he told me about her made sense at the time. He told me one day that he used to sleep with her, but they don’t have a thing anymore and that because she has a few handicaps (mentally and physically), she doesn’t leave him alone and that she doesn’t take a “hint.” He has told me that she continued to talk to him on Facebook and that he talks to her only to be “nice” and because she’s still a friend to him. So all this time, I believed that story and didn’t feel there was anything going on between them. However, I have kept these photo proofs in my email and I found out the next day when I had another look at them, that one of the Facebook messages on his and H’s conversation was “I miss you so much.” I really had thought at first that it was sent from her and I believed this story of his, that he didn’t have anything going with her, but I found out that day that it was actually sent from HIM to her. That shocked me; she didn’t even offer a reply. This made me think that not only does HE actually have a thing for her, but that she must not quite feel the same about him; I would have thought that if she was interested in him too, she would have replied with a “I miss you too” or something like that. THAT didn’t happen. Also, I found as was I was scrolling through some of their messages that a few months back during the weekend of my cousin’s wedding, he had actually TRIED to hang out with her the one night I wasn’t with him. She declined for whatever reason, and in his message he acted so put out by the fact that she wouldn’t be hanging out with him. I know nothing more of their conversations or messages because I only skimmed through some of them, but this was a big red flag to me in that if he hasn’t cheated YET, then it’s not been for a lack of trying. It doesn’t help, either, that he had one of her Facebook photos saved on his phone and it came up when he was going to show me a photo of something, and he was SO embarrassed when it popped up. Because he’s witty and can usually pull a “good” or “believable enough” lie out of his ass when he needs to, he immediately said something about how it must be something that “Apple was doing” and that it was just an old photo of hers from way back when that he forgot to delete. Something about how Apple “pulls up old photo memories.” But do I believe that either? No, not really. I think he probably jerked off to her photo. 

So at this point, I feel like I’m psychotic, controlling and jealous (not that I let him see how crazy I’ve become), but because HE has given me reason to be while he’s doing things behind my back that I probably wouldn’t be happy about and hiding things from me. Lusting after other women and following e-girls on Tiktok, getting on dating sites, texting your ex and telling her you “miss” her (and who knows, perhaps he was drunk but I just don’t have the full story and I wouldn’t know unless I got on his phone again to investigate further), trying to hang out with your ex behind my back, I guess the signs are all there. I’m just tired of feeling not good enough, and I’m tired of feeling constantly paranoid that I’m being cheated on, if I haven’t been already. As if that weren’t bad enough, he has done all this stuff behind my back and has the audacity to tell me he wants to marry me and build a life with me and act like he’s done nothing wrong, actually seems to believe he’s done nothing wrong. At this point, I do not want to marry him and he’s going to find that out the hard way. 

It doesn’t help either that we seem bored or uninspired with each other, I feel like there’s a lack of intimacy in our relationship that’s been going on for I don’t know how long now… we cuddle with each other and whatnot, but when we have sex, it’s about once every weekend and because I don’t feel sexy or confident enough nor know how to be, I feel like he thinks our sex life is dull deep down and oftentimes I don’t even enjoy sex with him because I’m just thinking the whole time “is he thinking about other girls to help him get to the finish line?” He also doesn’t do anything to pleasure me sexually, we’re not great at communicating with each other sometimes and I don’t know if it’s just due to laziness or him not caring, but I give him all the pleasure and I do the best I can even though I worry that I’m not great at sex and don’t feel good enough. I don’t know. I feel like I’ve taken my thoughts too far, but it’s difficult for me not to become consumed by these worries, given his behavior and from what I’ve seen on his phone. I think I’ve been with him long enough now to determine that he’s a narcissist, but that’s a whole other story. He’s very confusing; he chased me for years but I just wasn’t ready or willing to commit to a relationship of any kind at the time so I know he wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t truly love me and think that I was worth fighting for, and shows me how much he loves me and whatnot, but his other behaviors show me otherwise. 

[Wiseman2]

35 minutes ago, Lat182 said:

I suspect that he may have “dual drunk personality disorder”

Sorry this is happening. It doesn't matter what he has. You're very unhappy so end it.

 Most of all see a physician for an evaluation of your physical and mental health and ask for a referral to a qualified therapist for ongoing support.

Invest in yourself rather than all this madness..

[Lambert]

Why are you with him? 

[Batya33]

I don't think you're acting irrationally at all. His actions are inconsistent with being in a committed exclusive serious relationship.  They'd be fine if you had an "open" relationship, or I guess if you both enjoyed watching porn together, or if you were not exclusive.  He pursues other women, he is very focused on other women's physical features and he reacts by flirting (not harmlessly) and in a way that is disrespectful to you.  It would make me crazy too.  

I strongly believe couples should have their own devices, own passwords, etc (although maybe give passwords if married and especially if there is a child involved -in case of emergency).  I don't need to check up on my husband to feel secure.  He has no need to check up on me either.  I don't relate to giving up privacy as a way to confirm trust.

[1a1a]

Assume nothing about him is going to change. How much longer do you want to date him? 3 weeks? 6 months? A year? 5?

[boltnrun]

"But I love him!" isn't going to change any of this.

Love isn't supposed to be a prison sentence or a shackle.  You can have feelings of love for someone (irrational as they may be) but not have to keep yourself in a relationship with them.

[CookiesandCandy]

If something crosses your boundaries, and you've discussed it with him, say so. He has the right to watch porn and you have the right to break up with him over it. Not all people even people in the age group who grew up with porn, watch it...if watching porn made my partner uncomfortable, I would not do it at all and I know I'm not the only one who feels that way. 

Also, a lot of guys watch whatever is in front of them...doesn't matter if the porn stars are ugly, or hairy, or have small breasts...I would bet that a lot of guys will enjoy looking at any and all sorts of "type," as long as they are not overweight.  It's not about you. 

Going on a dating site is totally grounds for break up. Also, anyone in their 30s who calls breasts "hoohoos" is probably not mature enough to be in a relationship. 

There are many fish. I know it's hard, but this guy is not a grownup.

[SooSad33]

You are obviously uncomfortable with a lot he's doing.

- Him acting out to other women, being secretive on sites & with his phone, etc.

I feel he is not as into this as you are and also doesn't respect you as he should. 😕 .

As you mentioned as a headline of your post, how Insecure you are now with him - then don't be with him.

I feel you DO know how you deserve to be treated and he's not 'giving' this to you.

It's been a couple of years now and nothing sounds too positive.  If he's like this then you can choose to not remain around it.  Why live in a miserable situation?

[Lambert]

 

22 minutes ago, CookiesandCandy said:

Also, a lot of guys watch whatever is in front of them...doesn't matter if the porn stars are ugly, or hairy, or have small breasts...I would bet that a lot of guys will enjoy looking at any and all sorts of "type," as long as they are not overweight.  It's not about you. 

So you draw the line at overweight? 

[waffle]

10 minutes ago, Lambert said:

 

So you draw the line at overweight? 

The poster Cookies&Candy appears ignorant of the fact that there is a whole market out there for BBWs.

[Batya33]

30 minutes ago, CookiesandCandy said:

He has the right to watch porn and you have the right to break up with him over it. Not all people even people in the age group who grew up with porn, watch it...if watching porn made my partner uncomfortable, I would not do it at all and I know I'm not the only one who feels that way. 

Also, a lot of guys watch whatever is in front of them...doesn't matter if the porn stars are ugly, or hairy, or have small breasts...I would bet that a lot of guys will enjoy looking at any and all sorts of "type," as long as they are not overweight.  It's not about you. 

This is not about "rights"- it's up to the couple to discuss boundaries - what they personally want -of course people have the "right" to watch porn without let's say being arrested (with exceptions) but in a romantic relationship if you have to talk about "right" to "watch porn" it's probably time to walk away. 

I don't think "a lot of guys" are so hormone-driven and without a brain that they watch whatever is in front of them.  I treat people as individuals -some men and women enjoy watching porn, some men and women enjoy vegging in front of screens with little selectivity.  I don't think weight has to do with it.  Some people are attracted to overweight people, some are not.  

It is about her.  It's about her because she is uncomfortable with his lack of boundaries whether or not he would actually have sex with a porn star. If she is uncomfortable and he chooses porn over her comfort level that's fine -then that's his priority and they should separate. 

It's like the really cute guy I went on a few dates with until he  told me he used to go to strip clubs as part of his business(he was in sales) and got lap dances and believed that lap dances are not sexual.  So he would have been ok still going to a strip club and getting a lap dance.  That was about me not because if I dated him he might want his lap dance partner to be his romantic partner but because to me that would be cheating.  

[waffle]

2 hours ago, Lambert said:

Why are you with him? 

This is what I'm wondering too.  So many reasons to dump him, pick a few and be done with the whole mess.  There is no reason to put up with any of this unless for some reason you (you meaning OP) are one of those who needs to have a man, any man.

[MissCanuck]

This guy would have been drop-kicked out of my life ages ago. 

He doesn't love you, doesn't respect you, isn't loyal to you, and generally sounds like a complete weasel. 

What are you still doing there?

[indea08]

I’m going to come at this from a different angle here, because I think it could be really freeing for you to hear this.

This is in your hands. Not because his behavior is okay, but because you’ve tolerated it. I want you to read this from your own post:

 

“So at this point, I feel like I’m psychotic, controlling and jealous (not that I let him see how crazy I’ve become), but because HE has given me reason to be while he’s doing things behind my back that I probably wouldn’t be happy about and hiding things from me.”

Do you see how it’s YOUR actions that are your real problem, but you’ve blamed him for them? I understand why you feel that way, most people feel that way, but you’ll find SO MUCH POWER in saying “I can’t control his actions, but I can control my reaction.” Meaning, his decision to treat you poorly is on him, but staying and putting up with it, that’s on you.

You cannot take a passive role in your life, especially heading into your 30s. Your 20s, I get it. You’re not really sure who you are yet, still working on getting your career and finances right, trying to spend some time finding hobbies and maintaining friendships, raising young children. It’s hard to really take control of your life during that phase. But once that settles down, it is 100% up to you to actively work to create the life you want. If you play a passive role, and let life happen to you, you will have a hard time finding happiness. Your life is in your hands, and it’s important that you write your story the way you want. Because you’re the only one who can.

For what it’s worth, you are not a crazy/insecure/jealous person. You are just in a relationship that’s not meeting your needs. Find the power within yourself to walk away from what’s no longer working, and seek to build something that does. You can do better.

You can be happier.

[indea08]

I’d like to go on and add to that too….it’s not only to do with relationships. It’s a mindset, an approach to life.

For example:

My husband is a builder. He often comes home with a bunch of nails in his pockets, or pencils, a bunch of stuff left over from the day….and it DROVE ME NUTS that he’d dump it all on top of our dresser.

Passive approach: the clutter bothers me, I gripe at husband for it, he doesn’t know what else to do with it, we’re both grumpy.

Active approach: I got rid of that stupid dresser, got a narrow, taller dresser to replace it, and then got him a desk with a top that opens up so all his stuff is hidden. Clutters gone, works for husband, we’re both happy.

My point is, you have the power to change the circumstances…if you have the mindset to see it that way.

This realization will change. your. life.

[catfeeder]

Nobody can fault us for who we love, but some people are best loved from far away.

You don't need to defend against what makes you unhappy. You don't need to build a 'case'. You simply need to ask yourself whether or not YOU want to live like this.

It's not up to you to change him--you won't.

So decide whether you're giving your SELF what you need by staying in this relationship.

Whenever you decide that that answer is no, you can stop analyzing HIM and shift your focus, instead, onto what your next steps can be to do something about THAT.

Head high, and write more if it helps.

[smackie9]

Ever hear of the Peter Pan syndrome? This guy has a mind of an adolescent. Get rid of your worries by getting rid of this man child, and find yourself a nice mature gent. 

[LotusBlack]

On 2/25/2022 at 7:05 AM, Lat182 said:

This will be a bit long, I apologize. I’ve been with my boyfriend for over 2 years, we’re hitting our 30s, I’ve known him a huge chunk of my life and I have had some history with him. You would think that I would know “more” about him, but I don’t. I know a lot about his childhood and traumas, and I know other personal things about him that he’s shared with me over the course of our time together. I know him based on his actions and behavior. But for the most part, I know only what he chooses to share with me, things like Pokemon, Star Wars, cars, guns, video games, that sort of thing. He’ll often talk to me about these interests or hobbies of his, or other “surface” subjects and nothing deeper or more personal. 

I’ve faced a few problems in our relationship but the one that consumes my thoughts and eats at me the most is the issue of “is he cheating on me or not.” I’m so scared, and I can’t get past it. It’s gotten to the point of paranoia and obsessive thinking. Over the past couple years that we’ve been together, he has: 

• crossed certain boundaries with me, which include watching porn, following sexualized girls on Tiktok and watching their videos behind my back, and doing other activities like following “guy” pages on Facebook that usually share stories with photos of half naked women that link to an external site, usually a related article or something or another. I get that a lot of couples seem to be “fine” somehow with this behavior and it’s become normal within a relationship in modern society, but for me it feels insulting and disrespectful and for me it is cheating even if there is no extra “interaction” involved. It shows me that he lusts after and fantasizes over other women, and makes me feel not good enough. This is what started everything and led to my demise. I realize that many people don’t seem to care and that “men are going to be men,” “everybody looks,” blah blah blah, but I genuinely don’t see it that way and I feel that if you truly love and care about your significant other, you’re going to respect their boundaries and do whatever you can to not only reassure them, but do everything in your power to keep them from feeling insecure and have eyes for them or at least learn to appreciate them, instead of going out of your way to give other women your attention and desire. I just think that if you have to fantasize/drool over other people and make your partner not feel good enough and you need that novelty and aren’t willing to give that up for a real woman, then leave the relationship? I don’t know, that’s what makes sense to me and I see no justification in it. It’s caused so much pain and it’s crazy to me that it’s so controversial; to me it’s really quite simple. There are women who have physically starved themselves over insecurities of their significant other doing these types of behaviors, and the fact that even if your significant other was with a porn star that was attractive just to their liking they’d still watch porn, is crazy to me. It doesn’t make me feel any better that my man watches porn stars that are significantly UGLIER than me… this makes me feel like I’m not actually his type at all. 
• He takes his phone everywhere and I feel displays some sneaky phone behaviors. Sure, couples need their privacy, but to what extent? I know nothing about my boyfriend beyond what he shares with me. I know nothing about his online activities or who he talks to; he has friends, but they’re all online and he doesn’t hang out with his old friends anymore. This has driven me insane and it’s become a habit for me to count how long he’s in the bathroom with his phone for (and yes, I realize sometimes he’s just taking a poop.. but this doesn’t make me feel any better) and I know he’s hiding his activities due to him only using “safe” apps like Facebook and certain other apps around me, while I know he’s doing other stuff behind my back.
• He doesn’t message friends on Facebook or his Tiktok “following” feed while I’m around. I’ll see that he’s got new messages on his Messenger app while he’s using his phone next to me, but he looks at and replies to those messages when he’s not with me, or he probably responds to messages while he’s in the bathroom or something. Strange thing is, this doesn’t just apply to girls but to his guy Facebook friends as well. 
• He flirted with a bartender in the same room with me once while he was drinking, made it pretty clear he was attracted to her and (I believe) found her more interesting than he ever has me, and then told his friend (at the time) in the hotel room we were in that his friend “should have gotten her phone number” and that she had “big hoo hoo’s.” Needless to say, it made me feel terrible and he apologized to me later in private. Don’t know why he felt the need to apologize unless he knew he did something wrong (which of course he did). 
• Drunk flirted with a girl on Facebook one night and asked her out when I chose not to come over. I confronted him about this one night awhile later when I found out, and he was very apologetic, said he was drunk and that he had no recollection of doing it. I suspect that he may have “dual drunk personality disorder” and that he does things that he probably wouldn’t sober, but this doesn’t excuse him doing these behaviors drunk. He told me that he “didn’t even like this girl” and that he didn’t know why he did it, but I didn’t know how much I believed him. 
• Got on a couple dating sites several months later while I had to go with my family to my cousin’s wedding one weekend. I confronted him about a week later after I found out, and the story that he gave me was that he only did it to look for photos of his old dog and car, both of which mean very much to him and that he miss, and he I guess also wound up looking at dating profiles while he was on the sites, but only did it to “see what girls from high school are up to now.” It sounds ridiculous now, but I believe that my boyfriend is a master of deceit and was able to somehow make me believe that he didn’t have any bad intentions on these sites. He even went so far as to tell me that he ALSO messaged his ex who was on one of the dating sites, to find out about what happened with an item that he had in the other state he was in with her at the time. He also managed to make me think that he had no bad intentions talking to her, and that he could even get on and show me the messages. I declined him on it, and we continued to argue the rest of the night while he gaslighted me and made me out to be the “bad guy” for snooping. I get it, don’t get me wrong, but at this point I don’t respect his privacy anymore. He has shown me enough “cheating” behaviors that it’s become difficult for me not to snoop anymore. I don’t have any reason to trust him based on some of the things that he has done and red flags that he has shown me.

So on top of all that, the last straw was last month when I got on his phone, and I found more porn on his browser history, and his Facebook messages and Snapchat conversations. I decided to get some photo proof so that I could look at them later. He keeps in contact with a girl who I’ll call “H.” I think he lied to me about her completely. I never questioned why he keeps in contact with her because what he told me about her made sense at the time. He told me one day that he used to sleep with her, but they don’t have a thing anymore and that because she has a few handicaps (mentally and physically), she doesn’t leave him alone and that she doesn’t take a “hint.” He has told me that she continued to talk to him on Facebook and that he talks to her only to be “nice” and because she’s still a friend to him. So all this time, I believed that story and didn’t feel there was anything going on between them. However, I have kept these photo proofs in my email and I found out the next day when I had another look at them, that one of the Facebook messages on his and H’s conversation was “I miss you so much.” I really had thought at first that it was sent from her and I believed this story of his, that he didn’t have anything going with her, but I found out that day that it was actually sent from HIM to her. That shocked me; she didn’t even offer a reply. This made me think that not only does HE actually have a thing for her, but that she must not quite feel the same about him; I would have thought that if she was interested in him too, she would have replied with a “I miss you too” or something like that. THAT didn’t happen. Also, I found as was I was scrolling through some of their messages that a few months back during the weekend of my cousin’s wedding, he had actually TRIED to hang out with her the one night I wasn’t with him. She declined for whatever reason, and in his message he acted so put out by the fact that she wouldn’t be hanging out with him. I know nothing more of their conversations or messages because I only skimmed through some of them, but this was a big red flag to me in that if he hasn’t cheated YET, then it’s not been for a lack of trying. It doesn’t help, either, that he had one of her Facebook photos saved on his phone and it came up when he was going to show me a photo of something, and he was SO embarrassed when it popped up. Because he’s witty and can usually pull a “good” or “believable enough” lie out of his ass when he needs to, he immediately said something about how it must be something that “Apple was doing” and that it was just an old photo of hers from way back when that he forgot to delete. Something about how Apple “pulls up old photo memories.” But do I believe that either? No, not really. I think he probably jerked off to her photo. 

So at this point, I feel like I’m psychotic, controlling and jealous (not that I let him see how crazy I’ve become), but because HE has given me reason to be while he’s doing things behind my back that I probably wouldn’t be happy about and hiding things from me. Lusting after other women and following e-girls on Tiktok, getting on dating sites, texting your ex and telling her you “miss” her (and who knows, perhaps he was drunk but I just don’t have the full story and I wouldn’t know unless I got on his phone again to investigate further), trying to hang out with your ex behind my back, I guess the signs are all there. I’m just tired of feeling not good enough, and I’m tired of feeling constantly paranoid that I’m being cheated on, if I haven’t been already. As if that weren’t bad enough, he has done all this stuff behind my back and has the audacity to tell me he wants to marry me and build a life with me and act like he’s done nothing wrong, actually seems to believe he’s done nothing wrong. At this point, I do not want to marry him and he’s going to find that out the hard way. 

It doesn’t help either that we seem bored or uninspired with each other, I feel like there’s a lack of intimacy in our relationship that’s been going on for I don’t know how long now… we cuddle with each other and whatnot, but when we have sex, it’s about once every weekend and because I don’t feel sexy or confident enough nor know how to be, I feel like he thinks our sex life is dull deep down and oftentimes I don’t even enjoy sex with him because I’m just thinking the whole time “is he thinking about other girls to help him get to the finish line?” He also doesn’t do anything to pleasure me sexually, we’re not great at communicating with each other sometimes and I don’t know if it’s just due to laziness or him not caring, but I give him all the pleasure and I do the best I can even though I worry that I’m not great at sex and don’t feel good enough. I don’t know. I feel like I’ve taken my thoughts too far, but it’s difficult for me not to become consumed by these worries, given his behavior and from what I’ve seen on his phone. I think I’ve been with him long enough now to determine that he’s a narcissist, but that’s a whole other story. He’s very confusing; he chased me for years but I just wasn’t ready or willing to commit to a relationship of any kind at the time so I know he wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t truly love me and think that I was worth fighting for, and shows me how much he loves me and whatnot, but his other behaviors show me otherwise. 

I only got a fraction of the way down when I concluded that the rest really didn’t matter because the first issue of porn and looking at other women’s pictures is a dealbreaker for you, so break the deal. He doesn’t meet your needs and you are asking him to respect and care for you, but it is a two way street and you are not respecting his values in turn. I’m not saying your values are wrong either or that it’s wrong to feel how you feel - they are your feelings and your are entitled to them, but his boundaries are his boundaries and you also don’t have a right to impose yours on him. You can either reach a compromise together and set a new set of boundaries together as a couple or leave the relationship.

So, I strongly suggest that instead of making him the villain (in this isolated instance - he may well be not a great catch or decent in the following points you made, but it is irrelevant when the first is enough to go your separate ways) for what is quite natural and acceptable for many people and couples, find someone whose values are aligned with yours and respect your bf enough not to try to change him or make him feel bad for what he enjoys. You’re incompatible in ways that cannot be overcome because they are your dealbreakers.