I dated a girl back in 2015-2016 whom I started seeing and ended up in a fwb situation. She told me at the time she had been talking with someone in California “as friends” for a while before I came along. In the beginning she told me felt like she had feelings for him, but we kept this going from May to December 2022.
Eventually she ended up being confused because we also caught feelings for each other. And she was in a situation where she technically had to pick the guy or me. It led to a lot of issues with us because she told me repeatedly that she always wished I would come back to her life one day and how she loved me and wanted to be with me, but she could never cut the guy off.
Before her and I started seeing each other, she was in a 5 yr relationship with someone. She lived with him until they broke up, but during that time her family moved to a city 8hrs away from here (Texas). After her breakup, she was living with her grandma who constantly had issues with her living there and since we had been spending a lot of time together and we had these feelings it seemed right to have her stay with me.
Some time later, she said he was coming to see her and would spend a week together at an AIRBNB AFTER telling me she had already made her mind and saying she chose me. She talked to her mom and friends and they told her it would be messed up to cut him off. She let them get in her head and decided to accept and meet him. I was very upset, but she did it anyways. I told her that if we were to work out she had to promise she wouldn’t sleep with him. But the time we spent apart and the fact she was with him, led to more arguing. And when she came back, she confessed they did in fact sleep together. I was obviously broken, but ended up giving her a chance and let her stay with me again.
She still would tell me she wanted to be with me and loved me, but she could never stop talking to the guy because she felt so invested and felt bad about cutting him off. It led to a lot more trust issues and arguing until I told her she couldn’t stay with me because it would honestly hurt a lot. Since she didn’t have any other option, she decided to “see things through” and ended up moving to California to be with him.
She could never commit to me because of this, she said she wanted to use her time out there to get her life in order. She said she wasn’t ready to get into another relationship right away, and that she wanted to find a new job, save money, and experience California since she said it was always her dream to live there. I told her if she was, to take things slow and not get into a relationship right away. I didn’t take her being there too well and was having a hard time talking to her. And I came to find out during the first two days we didn’t talk, she went and made it official with him.
She’s been there for a little bit over a month and a half, but as early as the two or three week mark she started texting me saying that she didn’t feel for him the way she felt for me. That she realized she messed up and wanted to come back. She said she loved CA and really liked it out there, but that she wants to come back because she realized she wants to be with me. She says maybe this is what needed to happen for her to realize how strong she felt for me. She has apologized over and over and swears to me that she will do everything she can to make things right and make me trust her again. But after all that’s happened I’m unsure if I want to. I love her and miss her but I know I deserved better. At the same time I don’t want to miss the opportunity because I truly feel like she’s my soulmate. I’m really torn between taking her back and telling her no. She said she wouldn’t beg me if I didn’t want to but she keeps insisting.
She calls and texts me often in an attempt to make it right but it’s hard for me to have the same energy as before. I can’t bring myself to text her first and it’s hard to talk to her over the phone.
Do you think it would be possible to fix things and make this work? Or am I being too optimistic? I know of some of the hardships some of my friends have had with their SO and they have been able to work things out or at least tried to. I would love to get someone’s unbiased opinion on the matter.
EDIT: We were both each others first big love. I was 21 and she was 19 at the time. We didn’t get to know each other well then because of the lack of self awareness. But over time she became my best friend, and vice versa. She says it was hard because she was algo good friends with him. He was there to talk to her during her break up amongst other things. I have good self awareness, and I understand her pov. I spoke with a friend of mine and she told me she was in a similar situation once where she had to choose between two people.