My boyfriend (21M) has a pattern of lying about what he is doing, especially related to gaming at night. I (20F) found multiple inconsistencies in his explanations and match history, and it has caused trust issues.
I’m 20F and my boyfriend is 21M. We’ve been together for 2 and a half years. We’ve been through a lot already, especially because of his lying habits. There was never another girl involved, but he lies a lot for his self-image or over small unnecessary things. It became a huge issue in our relationship because even if the lies were “small,” they kept happening over and over again.
There was a point where I completely lost patience and wanted to break up with him because I was emotionally exhausted. He promised he would change, and to be fair, things did improve for a few months. We still argued sometimes, but not as bad as before.
Then finals season came around (end of March to April), so both of us were super busy and sleep deprived. I usually slept earlier around 12–1 AM, so I’d say goodnight first in chats. Whenever I slept, he would also say he was sleeping too.
I’m also a Valorant gamer, but I completely stopped playing during finals. Recently, since school ended and we’re on vacation now, I opened my Valorant account again and checked his match history.
That’s when I got shocked. He had so many late-night matches, always duoing with the same person, his male cousin (22M). The reason this bothers me is because I genuinely don’t trust that cousin. He’s the type who constantly seeks female validation and acts arrogant.
Here are the dates that bothered me: April 19, around 12:10 AM - 4 matches. The whole day before that (April 18), I had a severe migraine and slept early because I felt terrible. He knew how sick I was, but apparently he still stayed up late playing. April 18, around 12:55 AM - 2 matches. He told me “I’ll still be working” while I was also working on research, but he was actually just playing Valorant. What makes this worse is that earlier that day, after his birthday celebration buffet, he even apologized because I noticed he seemed tired and “too full” to even talk properly. He acted exhausted… then suddenly had energy to play late at night. April 15, around 12:05 AM - 3 matches. I told him I was going to sleep, and he said he was coding (he’s an IT student). Turns out he played instead.There were also matches on March 23 and March 20, but I can’t find our chats anymore for those dates.
What makes this even stranger is that ALL those matches were with the same cousin, but when I checked their chats, there were no messages inviting each other to play. He said it was “just coincidence” and they happened to queue at the same time. And, that feels hard to believe because there were barely any solo matches at all. It genuinely looked like he was waiting for his cousin to get online so they could duo together. What also made me suspicious is that there were previous situations involving that same cousin that he hid from me too, like not telling me they went to the gym together before.
Another thing that bothered me when I opened his account, his team voice chat was ON. Ever since we got together, he NEVER turned team voice chat on because he knew I was uncomfortable with random girls talking in-game. But suddenly now it’s enabled. He also hid his Riot name outside the party even though his username literally includes “Ilove(my name).” And the first thing he said when I confronted him was: “We were fighting during those times.” But I checked our chats again and we literally were not fighting during those dates.
The thing is, I never stopped him from gaming. In fact, on April 17, I even gifted him a mechanical keyboard for his birthday because I know how much he enjoys playing, and I even told him to try Valorant solo. But he said he didn’t feel like it and that he had no “energy” at the time. Then later around midnight of April 18, I found out he was actually playing Valorant secretly.
I’m usually the one encouraging him to game because I know it’s one of his hobbies, so it doesn’t make sense to me why he felt the need to hide it and lie instead of just being honest.
At this point, I don’t know if I’m overthinking or if this is genuinely suspicious. He keeps making excuses and changing explanations. What would you think in this situation?