I (mid-20s F) was with my ex (“Ethan”) exclusively for about a year. During that relationship, he went through a major medical crisis and was hospitalized for a long time. I was there constantly, helping take care of him and dealing with a lot from his family during that period too.
We eventually broke up, mostly because I was emotionally exhausted and realized I had basically stepped into the role of a spouse without any real security or support myself. About 1.5 years later, we reconnected. This time, I told him I no longer believed in traditional exclusivity unless I was actually engaged/married. He agreed to that, but asked that if I started seeing anyone else, I would tell him beforehand.
Even though we technically weren’t exclusive during the last 6 months, I never actually dated or hooked up with anyone else because I still cared about him and didn’t want to hurt him. He also knew I wasn’t talking to anyone else because we talked constantly and he generally knew what I was doing most of the time.
A couple weeks ago, I found out he had been actively dating another woman (“Claire”) and had repeatedly lied to me about it when I directly asked him. He had even brought her around his family because his mom didn’t know we had rekindled things after our breakup.
Claire only found out about me shortly before I found out about her. Afterward, she and I started talking privately a lot. She told me details about their relationship, things he had said to her, ways he had lied to both of us, etc. She asked me not to repeat certain things to him.
The problem is that I eventually did confront him with a lot of what she told me because he kept trying to distort reality and i couldnt take it anymore. I had to let him know what I already knew from speaking with her so he could CUT IT OUT. Some of it was specific enough that he obviously realized it came from her.
Now things have gotten extremely messy. He’s angry at her for telling me things. She’s upset because she feels like she trusted me and I repeated things back to him. At the same time, she was also talking to him about me and sharing things I said/texted throughout this entire situation, so information was kind of flowing both ways.
She recently called me and basically implied she’s still going to keep talking to him despite everything because he’s threatening to tell her long-term partner details about their relationship if she cuts him off or keeps talking to me. (She’s in an open relationship, but I don’t know what boundaries exist there.)
She also asked me to tell her exactly what I had said to him in case they spoke again, which made me feel like we’re all stuck in this weird cycle of information-trading and emotional chaos.
I genuinely feel bad because I know she trusted me with things she didn’t expect me to repeat. But I also feel like I was emotionally overwhelmed and trying to understand a situation where I was repeatedly being lied to by someone I deeply cared about.
After everything came out, all three of us became emotionally entangled in a really unhealthy way. At one point we even had a three-way phone call where he explicitly told both of us that he wanted to be with me, which understandably hurt her a lot. Since then, he has blamed her for me refusing to continue the relationship or give him another chance, and according to her he has been extremely hostile toward her afterward.
At the same time, she and I were both also discussing each other with him throughout this situation, so information was honestly flowing in all directions.
Still, she trusted me with information she didn’t expect me to repeat, and she now feels uncomfortable continuing to talk to me because of it. I understand why she feels betrayed and why people might think I handled this badly, even if I was emotionally overwhelmed and trying to figure out what was true.
AITA?