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I am having an issue with my boyfriend and I really don't know if I am the crazy, paranoid, controlling party or if I am legitimately upset.

My boyfriend and I have been together for more than a year and a half and have lived together for 5 months. Early on in our relationship, he and I had some troubles because he has an extremely low sex drive. I had a hard time not taking it personally (still do) and it made me very insecure. I think that's why, at the time, I became extremely jealous of his friendship with his very attractive intern. I'd notice them texting pretty often, he'd take her on "photo-walks" (he's a photographer) to practice her photography, and they'd regularly get lunch together at work. Regardless, I have fully owned up to my irrational jealousy, and decided on my own that it was my responsibility to overcome that. Besides, she eventually stopped working with him, so they haven't really been in contact in over sex months.

Fast-forward to the present day. On Monday night while we were having dinner, I asked my boyfriend what his plans were on Tuesday (I am currently studying for law school exams so I knew I wouldn't have time to spend with him). He told me he didn't know. Then on Tuesday, I was going to go to the store to get something to cook for dinner, so I checked in with him to see if he was planning to have his own dinner. He told me he wanted to do his own thing, which was great for me because it makes me happy when he takes time for himself, and I needed to focus on studying. Around 8:30, he texted me and asked me how my day of studying was going, and I asked him what his plans were for the evening. He told me he was going to meet an "old coworker" at a bar for birthday drinks. I didn't think twice about it and I moved on. I spent the next three hours studying, not thinking about it, and around 11:30 when I got in bed to relax, I saw on my Instagram feed that his old intern posted a photo of her birthday at the bar. I became extremely upset, because instead of being upfront and saying he was meeting HER for her birthday, he was intentionally ambiguous.

This isn't speculation. I confronted him about it when he got home and it admitted that he was ambiguous because he knew I'd become concerned and wanted to avoid a freak out. I told him that if he'd been upfront with me, I would have been jealous, but I would have also been mindful of my toxic feelings and not projected them onto him. I told him that as a result of how he handled it, I now feel worse, I feel lied to, and I feel insecure. He acted like I was being ridiculous, but I really do feel hurt. He insisted it was a last minute invite and he didn't want to cause any drama. We went to sleep and I woke up feeling refreshed and pretty much over it, but when he got into the shower I looked at his phone and saw that she had actually invited him on Monday afternoon. So he lied to me when I asked him what his plans were on Tuesday, and he lied to me again when he said it was a last minute invite. He was willfully ambiguous, and had every intention of hiding it from me. I am not upset with him for getting drinks with her—most of his friends are female and I NEVER feel jealous. I have a weird tic about this girl, but I recognize it and I own up to it. I don't want to control him. But I feel lied to, I feel like I can't trust him now and I feel like seeing her last night was SO important to him, he was willing to be dishonest with me to make it happen. Up until now, I've never once suspected him of being dishonest with me. He is one of the most honest people I know.

Am I Crazy?

Sex months? Interesting typo.

There's another way to read your boyfriend's ambiguity/obfuscation about his Tuesday night plans: being ambiguous/obfuscating was equal parts considerate and self-serving of him. Your boyfriend knew you had to study on Tuesday night, he knew his ex-intern is a sore subject and a distraction, and his being ambiguous allowed you to focus on your studies. Which you needed to do, right? So that was maybekindasorta considerate of him, no? And since one person's "mindful of my toxic feelings" and "handling it" is another person's "freak out" and "invasion of privacy," AIC, your boyfriend opted for ambiguousness/deceit-by-omission to spare himself the drama.

The best way to demonstrate to your boyfriend that there's no reason for him to lie about spending time with his ex-intern in the future? Retroactively give your blessing to Tuesday night's birthday drinks and stop raking him over the fucking coals for his thoroughly explicable actions. (Actions so explicable I just explicked them.) Yes, he lied to you. But unless you're made of purity and light, AIC, you've lied to him once or twice over the last year and half. Even the "most honest" people on earth are capable of telling the occasional harmless, white, self-serving lie. Want your relationship to survive? You roll your eyes at the odd HWSS lie, you forgive, and you move on. Want your relationship to end? Well... you do what you're doing, AIC.

Unless your boyfriend has given you some other reason(s) to believe he might be cheating on you with his ex-intern or some other woman/women, AIC, you should drop the whole Tuesday night/birthday drinks subject. You should also apologize to your boyfriend for having "looked in his phone" while he was in the shower, which is an asshole move, and you should stop following his triggering ex-intern on Instagram.