I'm a 22 year old girl very new to dating and I really need some advice. Some background: I met my current, and first, boyfriend (he's 29) a little over a year and half ago- July of 2011. We were going on dates when we first met. He moved to a city 4 hours away only 3 weeks after we first met. We agreed to keep it casual but continue hanging out after he moved. He would come to my city very often, at least every other weekend. It took a little while, but six months later I was really comfortable with him. We talked every single day by phone, text, email, facebook, skype, whatever. We were seeing each other almost every weekend and we were having unprotected sex, he started telling me that he loves me. I think I did love him at the time but I didn't say it back. All the time I knew we weren't in a real relationship, I knew it was possible that he was seeing other girls but I didn't want to ask. He was becoming my best friend. I was seeing other guys until about this time of last year, when it started to feel wrong to me. But In May of last year I left the country for 2 months. Since I knew it was coming, it was easier for me to be casual about our relationship and not have any real expectations, but he was still my best friend. While I was away, I hung out with a couple guys here and there but I wasn't looking for anything and I knew that anyone I met I would never see again after 2 months anyway. I was still talking almost daily to my current boyfriend.

When I got home, he came to visit me that weekend. I was nervous since I hadn't seen him in so long. I didn't know if I would feel the same way or if he would. But it felt perfect and great to me. Right away again, we were seeing each other nearly every weekend, talking everyday. He met my parents, I went to all of his family dinners. We had weekends away together a couple times. I told him that I loved him when it was about a year after we met and it was the first time I've said that to anyone. However, the next day I tried to end it with him. He had something the night before along the lines of "I'm not going to want a real relationship for a long time". At that point it was what I wanted and needed from him. I wanted him to not want to see other girls. I told him I think we should stop hanging out. He was very upset and ended up convincing me to change my mind. He said he didn't care about any other girls, he just wasn't ready to commit, that he hadn't had sex with anyone else in 8 months (I couldn't say the same).

So we kept hanging out, talking every day, seeing each other almost every weekend, skyping, having dinner with each others family, etc. Since i knew he was not committed me, I was actually trying not to be monogamous. I went on a couple dates with another guy, and I would meet other guys here and there but it felt really weird and wrong to me. I felt like I was being sneaky. I had the same conversation with him again in late September. This time I said, I needed to either take a step back or take a step forward. Either commit, or stop being so close, not that we had to stop being friends or talking entirely, but I couldn't stay on the level we were at knowing that he wasn't committed to me. To me it seemed like we were in a relationship, granted it was my first time doing that. He said he would commit to me. We've been together for a little over five months now and every seems almost perfect- we do fight here and there and I get really frustrated when I don't see him for a weekend.

Last week, however I was in his apartment alone and I did something really horrible that I will never forgive myself for. I read his emails. I feel so bad about it makes me sick. I really never thought I would do anything like that and I always thought people who did that were stupid, horrible people who didn't deserve to be in a relationship. Well, long story short I found out he was still hanging out with other girls, calling them "babe", going on dates, etc. until late September, basically when I had the conversation with him. He was on a dating website. I saw one exchange where he told a girl in late July that he was looking for a girlfriend, and that's why he was on the website - the same time he was telling me he wasn't interested in having a girlfriend. I know that one weekend when we went away and he was telling me that he loved me and we had a really great weekend, he went on a date with another girl the very next day. I know that I was basically his best friend the whole time and that he did care a lot about me, but I really think this is wrong.

So this was a long post, but if anyone managed to get through the whole thing I have a few questions: He's much older than me, and we're in different life stages, so is it ok for people to be doing that? Since we didn't have any rules set about seeing other people, was he not doing anything wrong last summer? But isn't it understood when you go on a first date with someone that he didn't have a weekend away with another girl, and tell the girl that he loves her, the day before? Or maybe I'm just too young to understand that this kind of thing actually is ok, and it is what people do in there late 20s. Was I being played? Should it not matter since he is committed to me now? As soon as he promised that he would stop seeing other girls, he did, but it still really hurts me that he was seeing other girls, probably texting me when he was on a date with another girl, or even texting another girl right after we had sex.

And I know it was very very wrong of me to read his emails, much worse than what I'm mad at him for. He knows I did it and I know there is a good chance he will break up with me for it, so none of this will even matter.

Thank you for any advice, especially from older people who have a lot of experience dating.