Good afternoon everyone,

First and foremost, my girlfriend (F28) and I (M27) have been dating for a year, we are dating from distance, even though it is quite a bit more complex (I live with her, but spend half the month working in another city, sleeping those days at my job, as it is a professional requirement). We are planning on moving together for good in July.

Now, onwards to the issue at hand. Last year my girlfriend and I got together for the first time on the 6th of February, and since we weren't dating or mutual, having just gone through a ONS of sorts, on the 9th of February she engaged in sexual activities with this guy we'll call C (who she later on admitted to having caught feelings for in the past, back in 2023).

As February and March went by, we started growing closer, though C was always trying to get closer to her (though they haven't shared any moments apart from a coffee here and there until early June. I respected her defense of their relationship as, even though they were no longer going at it, they were still friends.

Fast forward to May (and us having begun dating in early April), my girlfriend decided, during an argument, to side with him in a difference of opinion, clearly stating in some way that his opinion was clearly as, if not more, important than mine, having scheduled a coffee with him, while being completely aware he was still trying to get back to her. As a response, I pretended to send a message to an ex of mine, took a print and unsent, showing her that I could also just set up a coffee with an ex who supposedly could still be a friend, as some sort of revenge. This backfired and we had a huge fight (I do take the blame for this one, I could have handled the situation way better than I did, but I had already told her plenty of times I didn't feel comfortable with her staying in touch with an ex that clearly still hasn't gotten over her).

Well, we did patch things over, she supposedly learned to respect that boundary and ended up understanding that she was, in fact, hurting me, since I considered it disrespectful (I had no contact with any exes of mine or ex FWB, not that I wanted, but still, never even considered it, it is too disrespectful, way I see it).

Come March, she noticed I had some leftover comments on instagram in one of my ex's pictures from 5 years ago (to be completely honest, I had no idea they existed). I went through lengths to comfort her and reassure her that I would never, in any way, do anything to hurt her the same way I did in May.

Fast forward a couple weeks (2 weeks ago), the girl that I had used to make her understand my point in May, sent me a message out of the blue... I instantly showed it to my girlfriend and told her 'look, I dont really want to reply, dont feel like it has anything to add to my life' and told her she could just reply whatever she wanted, to make her feel better, so she did (she was not rude or anything, she just said she wasn't interested in talking indirectly).

And then comes yesterday... C decided to text her about something (even though related to her work, he had been at her workplace a couple months ago trying to hit on her), and she thinks she should reply, and wants to, just to figure out how he found out about something he shouldn't know about (she does have other ways of figuring out).

Is it normal that I feel hurt that, even though he keeps hitting on her, she feels like it's okay to feed him attention just to figure out how he found out about this work thing?

I am well aware this might come out as a very small and shallow issue, compares to most things posted here. Also aware of how long the post is, let myself go in providing context.

Truly sorry and thanks for any insight you may have!