u/Glittering-Pomelo978

Four months ago, I ended my relationship with the most perfect guy I could have ever had in my life. I come from a very conservative and patriarchal family, where love marriage is a huge issue. From the beginning, it was clear that I wouldn’t be able to marry for love, and my boyfriend was well aware that we couldn’t end up together.
Recently, my parents have started looking for rishtas, and since the process will likely begin by the end of this year, I decided to break up with him. We were in a relationship for three years, and I loved him deeply. He was the most wonderful person I had ever met.
Today, I found out from a mutual friend that he’s not the person I thought he was. When I asked what happened, she told me that he and some other mutual friends have been speaking badly about me. She said he’s mad that I couldn’t tell my parents about him. At first, I felt hurt that he was talking about me behind my back, because I never expected that from him as he was the last person I thought would go against me. Still, I tried to understand. I thought maybe it was just his way of coping with the breakup. But then she told me that whenever we used to fight, he would rant about me to his friends. That hurt me deeply. He even shared personal details about my family—things only he knew. Not even my best friend knows those things. That broke me completely. And it wasn’t out of concern—he was actually speaking badly about me and my family to his friends.
At first, I didn’t believe her. I kept thinking, “No, he wouldn’t do that to me.” But then she started saying the exact things I had told him during our relationship. That was the most heartbreaking thing I’ve ever heard. He broke my trust, and I haven’t been able to stop crying since. He was my safest place in the world—the one person I could be completely unfiltered with. I don’t share my secrets easily, especially about my family, because it’s a very vulnerable topic for me. And he told everything to his friends.
Whenever we fought, he would tell me he was going for a walk, but apparently he would go to his friend’s place to rant about me. I could have understood if he had only shared what we argued about, but he revealed my secrets, things that took me years to open up about—just because we had a fight.
I don’t know what to do. I just needed to vent. I feel extremely betrayed, and I’ve started questioning my entire relationship.