My SO and I have been together for a few years and we have 2 young children together. For back story: When we met, he was at one of his lowest times of his life and wasn’t really going anywhere with his life. I cam to soon find out that he was somewhat obsessed with one of his ex’s still. Not the most recent, but the girl before. They were together for about 4-5 years total, and had been broken up for like 3 years by the time we met. I didn’t think too much of it originally, but we eventually got more serious and he moved in with me after like 9 months and I learned that he still had every picture of her saved, nude and clothed, and screenshots of their convos and videos of their sex life saved on multiple SD cards and his computer. After explaining that it made me uncomfortable, he originally got upset then later talked to me & explained having the nudes & videos was innopropriate but he didn’t want to delete their pictures together. Whatever. Forward 2 years ahead, and he still has the pictures & videos of them on his new laptop. I can see in his file history that he views them on occasion, and gets mad & denies it every time but refuses to delete them or always has some excuse as to why he still has them. I’ve had issues with him watching porn and being uninterested in me sexually and all of it makes me feel so insecure. He says it’s a turnoff and I’m overreacting, but I have 2 kids with this man and he says he wants to marry me. I don’t feel comfortable marrying a man with dirty pics of his ex he lies about looking at. What do I do? How do I relay to him that this is not ok to me?
Keep in mind - I have to BEG him to take pictures of me, or me & the kids. He doesn’t save selfies or pics of me trying to be sexy that I send him, and treats our relationship more like we’re just good friends. I love him & he’s a great dad but I feel like he’s still not over her & that he doesn’t appreciate me.
I would tell him he needs to delete them or it’s over. You’ve mentioned it numerous times before hand, and it’s super disrespectful to you. Especially the convos about their sex life. If he misses her that much then he needs to go back to her and let you move on to someone who will respect you. I have never kept or even wanted to keep the photos I had of someone I was dating after we broke up. It’s bad enough he has them then he uploads them onto his laptop and wants to deny when he looks at them. I would just leave if I were you. It’s hard when you have kids but they need you happy and healthy too.
You aren’t the one who’s wrong at all. He needs to decide if he’s going to let go of the past or if you need to let go of him. Its awful that its gotten to this point but he is bringing it in himself!