I've been with my boyfriend a little over 2 years. It's my first serious relationship, i lost my virginity to this guy and it's the most serious relationship i've had. He's an amazing person, he's always there for me. He told me that he sees us married with kids and growing old together- we're young but it feels real and i can't imagine my life without anyone else. Everything was great however the closer we got, the more my insecurities grew and the more he realised and knew that I wasn't this confident, secure girl i made myself out to be when we first met and got together. He was one of those guys that insisted he didn't check out other girls or really even notice other girls because when he's in a relationship he tends not to look or want to for that matter. I think it's important to state that i did not ask, he came out with these things out of the blue or if i made a joke about something that included these things.

I didn't believe him. I mean he's a man, he's human, he's going to look. I confronted him yet he still denied & insisted that he didn't. I "caught" him twice & he said he didn't even realise he was doing it. He states that even though he can & does still judge whether a girl is pretty/attractive or not, he doesn't check her out or think of her in a sexual way. Checking out to him means looking them up & down, imagining what they would be like during sex & in a relationship. I told him numerous times that i'd rather know the truth than be lied to to make me feel better, that i wasn't going to get mad if he did or ask him to stop or anything. Yet he still insisted each time i asked him about it & even got annoyed one time telling me that i didn't trust him & that i needed to start believing what he was saying. He's lied to make me feel better before & he knows that I am quite insecure so really it's not that hard to believe that he's lying.

He still insists that he doesn't check out other girls however he does admit that in certain situations he may notice a girl more than usual, eg, a girl on the beach in her bikini. Though he says that he wouldn't look because he has self control. My rational mind tells me there's no problem, he's human of course he's going to get turned on & like another women's body. My irrational mind however can't stand the thought of it. He always told me that I'm the hottest girl he knows because not only do my looks beat most girls but my personality does too, therefore he really does only have eyes for me (i've never believed the whole i only have eyes for you thing but he's pretty damn convincing) but surely if he did, he wouldn't feel tempted to check out other women. The thought of him looking or thinking of another women sexually eats away & makes me feel horrible about myself.

His hearts in the right place I know that, but that very fact he could be lying to me makes my insecurities that much worse. I would rather know the truth & be able to move than have the constant uncertainty & people laughing at how "delusional" i am.

The funny thing is i have no issue with porn, watching tv or movies with him that include sex scenes or naked girls. He has a ton of female friends & i don't feel threatened at all. It's just the thought of him looking at a real girl (so not an airbrushed model or pornstar) & thinking what she'd be like in bed or what she'd look like naked, if she was better looking than me, had better/bigger boobs, a better *** etc. I just have these images of him looking & being so tempted to look that he's straining his neck not to. He's going to look at them and get so turned on that he's going to picture them when we have sex or compare them with me & think they're better.

I'm a chronic over-thinker and am trying to get help for it but I have all these different emotions I'm not comfortable with feeling any of them. I want to be okay with it and not have to rely on him for my self-worth but at the same time the thought of him doing it makes me feel bad.

Nothing traumtic has happened for me to feel this way, i've never been bullied per se but I've been called ugly more than once in the past and have even had someone ask me out as a joke. I've never been the 'hot' girl that l the guys want and it hurts to hear that all his friends say how lucky one of thier friends is because they're girl is so hot, but my boyfriend gets nothing. My friends got all the attention, I was the "plain jane", the funny one.. so i've always had self-esteem issues but because i'm with someone who could do real damage to the way i think of myself, they're a lot worse.

a) Is it possible he's telling the truth? He admits to still judging whether a girl is attractive but as far as sexual thoughts and looking at them sexually, that's a no.

b) Even if he is lying how can i feel less bothered by the fact he's probably only doing it to make me feel better?

c) How do i sop obsessing over it? We're going on holiday next month and i don't want to have my holiday ruined by my constant worrying that he's thinking about that girl with the great *** on the beach.

I've posted on so many forums about this issue but always get the same response of "get over it" or "stop being so insecure" or "men are visual" "they're hardwired this way" "it's natural" etc etc but that doesn't help me feel any better at all. I feel like i'm not normal.

People have tried to reverse the issue on me and ask if i do it. No, i really don't. I'm not blind i can judge whether another man (or woman for that matter) is good looking/attractive, it's an automatic thing my brain seems to do. I can even judge whether they have an attractive body/good muscles etc but never have i looked at a guy and thought "wow he's sexy as hell" or thought what he'd look like naked/in bed. There's nothing sexual about it, purely a judgement on attractiveness. But because I don't seem to think that "normal" people, i feel weird and as if something wrong with me.

Thanks for reading.