My (M28) GF (F28) told me she was meeting a colleague from college for a coffee. I felt uncomfortable and it led to a big conversation and she missing the meetup.
Anonymous account, sorry.
For context:
High school sweethearts. We got together 12 years ago, split up after 3 years, stayed apart for 1 year, and then got back together for another 8 years until today.
We split up because she cheated with someone else. A guy she met online and talked with for over a year without telling me anything. It started as emotional cheating and then became slightly sexual through text. Broke up with me before things got actually physical.
We were teenagers though at that time, but it has obviously affected me and the relationship. I mostly feel like I trust her but I can never allow myself to trust her 100%, there is always just a little bit of fear in the background. That said, I don't consider myself a very jealous person, as she is someone quite social and I usually don't have problems with it.
Sometimes she talks with guys via text (people from college or distant friends) and doesn't tell me anything out of fear that I will feel insecure about it, which is something I don't like and I have told her repeatedly when it has been brought it conversations (just to be clear, I don't mind her talking with other people, it's the sneakyness of it, because it makes things worse when I finally find out for one reason or another).
Anyway, earlier today, she was a bit nervous and told me that she was going to meet with some guy from college, didn't give a name, just that it was a "colleague". She told me that she said in a class that she was feeling a bit lost professionally and that this guy messaged her and told her to talk about it with him over a coffee, and that maybe he could help her find herself professionally.
I didn't love this and made the classic, stupid joke of "oh, so you have a date huh?". She said no and laughed a bit but I was a bit uncomfortable after it. She noticed, especially because she had already been nervous that I might feel insecure about it, and started pressing me, asking if I was okay and whether I felt bad about it. I truly believe I wasn't doing anything. I just told her repeatedly that it was fine and that it was not a big deal, but remained more silent than normal, I guess.
After 10 minutes and her asking me 4 times, I caved in and said that I was not super happy but that it was perfectly okay, that it was just that she was nervous when telling me and that she did not give a name. She has many male "colleagues" she talks with in college but usually calls them by their name.
That led to a conversation about trust and jealousy. Mostly, she said she didn’t want me to feel bad about it and that she genuinely didn’t understand why I would feel jealous over something like this. She also said she felt this was something specific to our relationship and not something that happens to most couples.
We talked for longer than expected, and it eventually became too late for her to meet up with her colleague. That made me feel absolutely horrible, because technically she didn’t meet him because I felt jealous about it.
Now I feel terrible because I did not want this to be such a big thing. I was feeling a bit insecure, obviously, and this is a problem of mine throughout the relationship, but I really feel like it was not that big of a deal initially but it became bigger because she kept pushing for reassurance that everything was genuinely okay, and at that moment, I couldn’t honestly give it.
Is this normal? Was my reaction too much? How do other people react in situations like this? Is this the kind of thing most people are genuinely 100% okay with, and am I actually more insecure or jealous than normal?
I just don't know if, because of the past, I am more insecure than normal or if, because of the past, she worries too much and makes me feel more insecure than I would. Or maybe most people would feel insecure about it and this is normal? I don't know.
Edit because I feel that I should clarify some things:
She meets up with friends constantly lol and has many male friends. This one felt more awkward because it was not a friend, it was a random guy from her class and she was nervous about it.
"Sometimes she talks with guys via text (people from college or distant friends)...": with this I did not want to mean that she needs to tell me whenever she gets a text. I meant that, sometimes, she engages in conversations for weeks/months with guys I just don't know anything about and doesn't tell me anything. Which leads to a moment of "I have actually been talking to this guy for 2 months and I did not want to tell you anything before".