Not sure if I love him? Should I break up with him?

It's been about a year since I met this guy that I'm currently seeing. Problem is, I'm not sure if I love him, or if I've guilted myself into believing I'm in love with him. We met last year, and out of a spur of the moment sort of hang out, we ended up making out. It was supposed to be just a one time thing, but we ended up kissing and making out a few times that week. I told my male best friend back in my home state, who used to be my ex but we broke up and became just friends, and he got jealous and told me that he still loved me and wanted me back. out of guilt I said yes, and agreed to a long distance relationship. Yes, I feel like a jerk at this point, but it gets worse. So I tell the other guy it was fun, but I decided to get back with my ex, and I can tell he's disappointed. He corners me one day while walking me home and I hold my ground, telling him I've made up my mind. But, even with my long distance boyfriend, I still pined for the other guy. One day, we're alone in the office, and we end up making out again. Argh. More mistakes. please understand, I had nobody to talk to except my own raging emotions and guilt. I gave in, and I made another mistake. I lie to my long distance boyfriend, telking him I need a break. So I tell the other guy in I've broken up with my last bf, and we're together and everything was great for a while. When I went back to my home state, I met up with my ex, and we almost make love before we decide to part ways, me saying that I want to focus on my career. Later on I tell him I've gotten together with another guy, but he gets devastated again. Still, we remained friends online and things seem alright. My current boyfriend however, gets so jealous and upset seeing him among my friends and makes me unfriend him. Now the other guy gets upset too, and asks me why. Except my current bf, watching me reply makes me nervous, and I make a nonsensical reply. At this point, the guy back home hates me for breaking up with him and finding someone else so soon, and my current bf is pissed at me for keeping him as a friend. I feel upset and cry, and my bf apologizes. Still, paranoid over my behavior (because he's afraid I'll change my mind again) he currently watches me on my computer and asks me from time to time of my ec has contacted me. A few weeks of calming down after all that, I realize now that I'm not in love with my current bf, and what I was seeking for was physical intimacy and security in a new city. I love him, and I do care for him, but the longer I keep my silence about how I truly feel, the harder it gets to break up. He loves me, but often we get into arguments over small things. Not only that, my ex says he's in town for a few days, but he hasn't invited me to hang out. I don't think I should initiate though. So that was really long, and long story short, I feel guilty about all the lying and cheating back and forth that I did. I kept feeling like I had to make everyone happy, but I realize now that what I did was selfish and stupid. I want to break up with my current bf in a gentle way, but I think its impossible without making him hate me too. We also work in the same office which will make this even harder. I wish we could just stay friends, but that doesn't look possible either. Should I just try to talk myself into being with him? He's starting to talk about marriage a bit and I'm getting scared this week blow up in my face at some point.

If marriage has been thrown around and thats something that scares you or dont want, then what you have to do is pretty clear. You cant make everybody happy. Hell I try to do it everyday but at some point you have to stop and do what you want whether its going to be hard or not.

That certainly was a string of mistakes leading one to another in a rash fashion. Firstly, your current boyfriend I'd most definitely break up with. This is for a few reasons, firstly he's controlling you and watching your every move. He gets jealous at every possible interval and acts on it, this results in things in your life being taken away, needlessly hurting more people. Relationships are not about sacrifices, they should add not take away anything, ever. Second, this guys insecurities are there understandably over knowing your actions previously, however it seems all he aims to do is keep you around and not make you happy. He has little care for your feelings, privacy and respecting your individuality. Even after realizing it made you cry, he still does it. He knows now that it hurts you, he should stop. He does not let you have privacy, always watching over you shoulder. It shows extreme lack of trust. His suggestion of marriage just sounds like he's trying to tie the knot very fast so he can stick with you, so that it's harder for you to get away. It really doesn't sound like this person has intents on making you happy. Needless to say all this bouncing around in relationships has probably confused you as to what love is, and a few fundamentals of relationships. <ol> <li> You need to make yourself happy overall. This is of utmost importance, you're the most important person, you need to be happy. From decisions made in the relationship you should feel happy and content with the changes in some respect. </li> <li> You need to have equal control in the relationship. Both people are equally important and should have the same impact. You should never just accept the changes someone wants to make in a relationship without telling them your opinion, regardless of any conflict that may take place. If you don't agree, negotiate and come to a compromise, in which you are both happy with the outcome. </li> <li> <b> What is love to you? </b> You seem to bounce around these people rather easily, which implies your confused as to what defines love for you or your expectations from a partner are very low, currently. Which is bad for numerous reasons, main one being that you have the chance of jumping into toxic relationships more. </li> <li> This isn't relationship related however it's important nether the less. You said you said yes to a relationship out of guilt, obviously this is bad as you point out, but I see that guilt spread over almost all your actions and mistakes. This guilt makes you easily just accept things as they are, being scared to do anything or change anything. I think this mentality needs to change, you need to be pro-active in effecting and steering your life in the direction you want it to go, not giving the wheel to someone else every now and then. Ultimately you are responsible for your own choices, however it seems the choices you make are influenced a lot by others, which technically then isn't you making those decisions. I certainly think you need to think more before make rash decision. All the mistakes you made were emotionally driven as such they became rash, rash decisions leave you even more uncomfortable as if you don't think it through you worry if you've made the right decision. Therefore you just feel more guilty and worried effecting consecutive decisions after that primary decision and I think you can imagine how this steam rolls into, one giant pile of mistakes. </li> </ol> At this point I think breaking up is the best thing. Then take some time alone and re-define what love is to you, what your standards are and what you want out of a relationship. You state you want physical intimacy, this on its own is a very hard thing to find, securely anyway. Usually if two people in a relationship are into it just for that, then emotional support is usually out of the window. So you may find yourself getting emotionally hurt in many of those situations, I can deduce that from how much you've been effected emotionally throughout your entire story. Taking a break from being in relationships is the best thing right now. To think over all you think about love, what you want? What don't you want? How will you prevent this in future? How will you stand up to your emotions when guilt tripping into rash decisions? (That's a big important question) How do you plan to stand your ground? Not making everyone happy, but yourself happy as well? How will you plan to to force yourself back and think about a decision before being pressured into one? These are all questions you should ask and answer for yourself and employ some strategies, mindsets or even just awareness so if something like this happens you can sit back and think of the consequences. When you're in a real life situation it can be very hard to do these things, take your making out example at the beginning it can sometimes be hard to stop just going that, when the other person initiates. You need to take a firm stance and think swiftly in those situations or even think beforehand if you think it might happen. In conclusion, you need to think more about your decisions and definition of love. Some time independently would aid this greatly. Your current boyfriend does not display healthy traits for a relationship, you could try to talk him out of this behavior and negotiate, but I really don't recommend that at this point. You need to reflect and recuperate on these mistakes, so you don't make anymore. Also bottom line for deciding whether to be in a relationship or not is if you're overall happy or not, if you're not there's a problem that needs to be fixed. If you can't fix or negotiate that problem to make you happy in the relationship, then it's best to leave. I hope this helped, good luck and have a wonderful day :)

Thank you to all who replied. Thank you very much especially to Dominicwild's answer, it was so in depth, thoughtful and full of insight I never would have come up with. I'm going to give this my best shot, and try to regain control of my life again. I don't want to be scared or guilty anymore, I just want to be free. Thanks all :)