As a wife, I’m facing a challenge that I never anticipated: my husband’s ongoing struggle with retroactive jealousy. He’s constantly comparing himself to the men I was with before we met, and it’s creating a rift between us that I don’t know how to close. His insecurity about my past relationships has become a persistent issue, and sometimes I wonder if this obsession could be classified as a form of cucked behavior.
We’ve been together for several years now, and I truly believed that the love we share would be enough to overshadow my past. But it’s clear that, for him, the shadow hasn’t faded. His questions started innocently enough—curious inquiries about who I dated, what kind of people they were, and why those relationships didn’t last. I answered, not realizing that my responses would fuel a spiral of doubts and comparisons. He keeps revisiting those old stories, examining them from different angles, as if trying to find some kind of secret meaning or justification for his anxieties.
What hurts the most is that I can see how much pain this causes him. There are times when he seems lost in his thoughts, his gaze distant as if he’s replaying scenes from my past that he was never part of. In those moments, I feel helpless, like I’m watching him drown in a sea of what-ifs. It’s not about what happened between me and those other men; it’s about how he interprets those moments, using them as a yardstick to measure his own worth. He’s haunted by the idea that he’s somehow less than the men I knew before him, even though I chose to be with him, to build a life with him.
His jealousy has impacted our intimacy in ways that are hard to describe. There’s a distance now, a sense that he’s holding back, afraid that he won’t measure up. He asks for reassurance, and I give it, but it’s never enough to quiet his fears. He’s convinced that he’s living in the shadow of relationships that ended years ago, even though I’ve made it clear that those people are no longer part of my life. In his mind, the competition never stopped, and it feels like he’s willingly torturing himself, replaying my past as if to test his own value.
Sometimes, I feel angry and frustrated that he can’t let go, but mostly, I just feel sad. I want him to see himself the way I see him—as the man I love, the man I chose, the man who means more to me than anyone from my past. Yet, my reassurances fall flat, unable to reach that vulnerable part of him that feels inadequate. I’m left wondering if I’m somehow responsible, if there’s something I should have done differently, or if this is simply who he is.
It’s exhausting, trying to convince him that he’s enough, that our life together is what matters, not the ghosts of relationships gone by. His constant comparisons make me feel like I’m under a microscope, my past dissected and scrutinized until it doesn’t even feel like mine anymore. I wish he could see that he’s the one I want, that the men from my past are just that—part of the past. But his struggle with retroactive jealousy has become a constant reminder that he can’t let go, and I’m caught in the middle, trying to hold on to a relationship that’s slowly being eroded by things that should no longer matter.
