u/Exotic-Midnight-8148

I’m going to start off saying, I’m really lost right now. Please no hate comments please. I already feel like a complete idiot and fucking loser right now. I need advice. To keep a little privacy I’m not giving ages. But me and partner have been engaged for two years now. Both in our mid 20s I work full time and she’s in school and we are staying at her folks place with our two year old. We’ve been together for basically 4 years. Within a year of knowing each other, we were living together and she was pregnant. We had terrible times at the beginning of the pregnancy and even the beginning of our relationship but it quickly turned out to be the best fucking thing that’s ever happened to the both of us (I know it sounds crazy) but we both ended up getting our shit together as a whole. As one. And once our baby was here we were a team. Still a team as of right now….

But I’ve made arguably the worst decision I’ve ever made in my entire life. I’m not going to sit here and act like ANYTHING was justified. I fucked up bad. I’ve been really hyper focused on so many things the last 2-3 months that really stems from my own personal issues. I’ve been in such denial about it that I’ve legit pushed my issues onto her. I legit feel like I’m mentally at my lowest point right now when which I shouldn’t be. My partner caught me texting another girl flirting. I fucked up. I was entertaining the shit and letting it boost my head. I legit was a complete dumbass texting this girl trying to get some type of validation. Some type of attention. And then I tried lying about it. Not like I’ve LEGIT been caught in every single lie I’ve EVER told her. When I say she knows me better than anyone I mean even myself. The worst part is I froze up when she confronted me. I started sweating…literally. I started talking out of my ass. Legit. Making 0 sense. I felt like I was behind this wall that I couldn’t get past. I was in complete denial about the entire situation that I was trying to delete messages and stall the whole conversation. When in fact from the moment she knew. She knew I was lying. Then she went through my watch and found the messages. The fact she had to go that far to find them is not okay. There is no excuse for the texts let alone the communication between me and the girl. The girl doesn’t live in our city and is an old coworker of mine. There is 0 history between us and this is the first time in over 3 years that ive even did something like that. I honestly can’t even live with myself right now especially the amount of growth we’ve both done towards our relationship. Ive been in therapy for the last 3 years and was consistently going then and felt good. And everything was good. But with her being in school and me working full time all while having a two year old I stopped going. And haven’t been going. I know I’m a super dad. She tells me that. But I need to be a great partner. And I haven’t been to her. Which reflects on me as a man. Not what she deserves tbh. I know she loves me or she wouldn’t have put up with my craziness this long. I think I might have just created the last straw. Idk. She’s been taking exams and to make it worst. She caught me the day after Mother’s Day. Which was such a beautiful time. I’ve been trying to give her as much space as possible today. She’s taken off her ring and has plans tonight with her friend (who hates me.) I want this to work. And I really hope she does too. I love her more than anything but I’ve legit let my own problems onto her. And that isn’t fair especially given our circumstances. And she’s even told me that’s what I’ve been doing. I have been honest with my therapist. But I haven’t been 100% honest with her and how Ive been feeling. We haven’t talked about it yet after I acted like a complete POS with trying to lie and create a whole made up narrative. We have our baby and I am glad we haven’t had the conversation in front of our child. But I really want to talk to her. And I know it triggered her because I did that at the very beginning of our relationship and I know she never thought it would happen again because I made great progress and put in the work. And I feel as if she is expecting me to not be honest in my reasoning or when we do talk. So I feel as if she’s creating this barrier right now between us to try and protect herself. I don’t think she is avoiding the conversation but i know she is has her expectations on how I will handle it. She knows my current situation and the whole reason us living at her folks is because we legit can’t afford rent anywhere else. I know I fucked up tremendously. Like I can’t even put into words. And I know what I need to do. I truly feel that way. I’ve been talking to my friends and they’ve been a great help. I’ve been using Ai and I made an appointment with my therapist for this weekend. I know these are steps but I am very honest with myself and willing to accept everything and do what it takes. Especially for her and our family. And I already made dinner reservations at her favorite restaurant for Friday before any of this happened. I have no idea how to navigate this rather than just giving her as much space as possible right now without making her feel pressured into talking. We have no much invested in each other and I know she loves me and I love her. And I know she wants the best for our baby. But I feel like I’ve completely betrayed her trust. Obv I did. But I am willing to take accountability and be honest with her and I want her to know. And build this trust back up. Sorry for the long post, any advice will help. Thanks.

Sorry for the long post; Need the advice on anything rn.

So we currently live with her mom and have been actually so good lately despite her finishing up her first year of law school. So quick back story, I’ll try to make it quick…

We met in a group of friends back in March of 2022. We hooked up the night of 4/20 that year and literally never left each others side since. We moved in with each other in August of 22 in a small house just us. Obviously things were moving fast and we both were dealing with a lot mentally and it was just a lot of fighting and just immature bs stuff. Mostly both our pasts creeping up on us. Lot of insecurities on both parts and just “going with the flow.” Like for the longest she would tell me she didn’t know what we were even when we signed a lease together and shared each other’s locations and said we loved each others a million times a day lol. Anyways, I get in therapy she starts taking her pych meds and literally everything changed. It was amazing. We still had our petty arguments but they didn’t turn into what they used to. Fast forward to January 23 we find out she’s pregnant. Obviously at first of the initial moments we found both of us were like ? Holy shit…. What do we do? No joking, during the first 24 hours. We were deciding abortion…..but it was illegal in our state so we had to plan around that. And when I said after that second nights of rest I woke up and was like “We are keeping this baby.” And ever since then it’s been us. Both on the same page. But here’s the problem. She decided she was going to stop taking her meds because of the pregnancy. And then all hell broke loose. Legit until about the end of the July of 23. So her thing was when she was pregnant and when hormones was going crazy she wanted to leave the house and go stay at her moms. So here is what I need advice on. I get a notification on my instagram, and yk when someone likes your stuff then unlikes it? So this guy, THAT I KNOW she cheated on with her ex because she told me lol but he likes my post and unlikes it. So she’s out studying with a friend yesterday and the iPads here for our daughter because she’ll get on it occasionally. So I was like “fuck it let me see the last thing was said between them two.” So I see this text sent from July 4 2023. Basically saying “Holy motherfucking mommy that shit earlier caught me off guard that text was intense but fr.” So I had to go back to see what we were doing on July 4 2023. It was one of those times she was staying at her moms while she was pregnant and I was at the house. It was like for 2-3 days. I have the screenshots and I seriously have no idea what to do. She’s been talking about getting married and all types of things. And I feel really disconnected with her because of everything we’ve been through. I’ve been in therapy consistently for 3 years now because mainly her pushing me to do so. I love her more than anything and now we have a beautiful baby girl who we share that love for. And our daughter doesn’t know anything else but momma and daddy. We still live with her mom and she still has two years left in law school. I work full time and I’m super dad. Like no joke. If she could back me up on that she would. I cook every night besides every other Friday because I’m the only one working right now. When I say I’ve made it my mission since she started law school, that I will do everything in my power to get every bit of weight off of her. Which I’ve done. She’s done great in her first year almost Cali’d everything (which is top of her class) and making straight A’s. She has her finals next week, and now I have this information.

What do I do? I seriously cannot imagine being with someone who did that. tl;dr any advice helps.