IslamicAnswers.com: Islamic Advice

Assalam O Alaikum,

I have been going through great difficulty over the past few weeks due to my relationship with my fiance and would really appreciate good, solid advice as well as some dua's that I can recite and special prayers I can make to solve my problem.

I met this girl over a matrimonial website about 8 months ago. We decided to talk under the pretext of marriage and hit it off instantly. After a few meetings, we decided to become exclusive (meaning we won't talk to other people with the same intention and will focus only on getting to know each other well). We had amazing mental chemistry which also translated to emotional and physical chemistry. Before I proceed, just to give you a little context about the two of us..

I am 30 yrs old. I grew back home and moved to north America a few years ago for education and have been here since. Come from a cultured, traditional family and was brought up with good Islamic morals. Initially when I came here, I was what one would consider very traditional and didn't adapt to the western life style and social norms right away. However, after a few years, as I started to make friends from other cultures and values, I became a bit more liberal to the extent that one would call me a moderate Muslim. I had been looking to find someone for marriage for a few years and after the various girls I spoke to and met up with, when nothing seemed to work, I sort of grew tired of it and decided to date for the heck of it until someone great and serious comes in front of me. And started casual "No strings attached" type dating where I, unfortunately, got physical (not to the extent of intercourse) but to the extent of kissing, fondling, getting oral sex (once only) etc. In the meantime, I kept looking for the one.

She is 29. She was born and raised here in North America into a very traditional family where the parents had continued conflicts and as a result, didn't pay attention to how to raise their kids the right way. They were super strict on them and as a result, their kids started doing things behind their backs. The lack of proper and rational Islamic education was also missing. The kids were told not to do certain things but never explained why and also the parents never really followed through on them. She was eldest and started helping the family out financially at a very early age thereby, taking on a lot of responsibility at an age where she should have instead focused on the more important things in her life. As a result, there was a sense of independence in her yet there were continuous restrictions being enforced by the parents.

She found that to be hypocrtical of her where on one hand she was asked to help out and on the other hand, she was treated with restrictions where she wasn't even allowed to go to the movies with her friends. As a result, over time, she started doing things hiding them from her parents. Eventually, she went to college and decided to live her life that she had been deprived of so far. And entered a phase where she became liberal and got into wearing short dresses and going to clubs with her female friends (all with her parents not knowing). At the age of 24, She  met a guy and started a relationship with him which turned out to be 3 years of torture. The guy was very good to her in the beginning but then became very possessive and controlling. and eventually cheated on her so she broke up with him after 3 years of an on-again, off-again relationship.

Anyways, back to after she and I met and became exclusive...

Things were going great and life seemed beautiful. She is not the same girl as she used to be. She has changed for the better Masha Allah and has understood that traditions, culture and religion do matter. In the back of my mind, I had an inkling to ask her about her past considering she was the one with a long-term relationship and long-term relationships tend to get physical. I had been saving myself for my wife all these years. She wanted to be honest with me as she believed honesty is the way to build a strong relationship and told me that she and her ex ended up getting physical where she received oral sex from him and they even went on a vacation to an Island for a few days once. I did not like what I heard as I was not comfortable with it.

But considering, I had done a few shady things in the past as well and was no saint myself either, I decided to accept that and move on. A few days later I asked her if they ever had intercourse and she said yes it happened once. It was what she called un-planned and an "accident". She was very ashamed of it and felt very guilty right after she had done it and asked Allah for forgiveness. She told me she went through hell after that act and is something she'd like to forget. She asked me to accept her for who she is today as she had changed and was not the same girl anymore. She told me that she wanted to do it for him as she thought she loved him and regrets all of it. In fact she regrets the entire relationship. I was heartbroken at this point as I was expecting that a nice, family-oriented and decent girl like her would have saved herself for her husband.

I thought about it long and hard and decided to go forward with it as I loved her too much to lose her. She is a great girl and honestly, the best thing that has happened to me.

In the meantime, our physical chemistry was such that we decided to take our relationship to the next step and get physical (no intercourse). And she told me that she and I have done things together that she never did with her ex. I know it's wrong of us to indulge in such acts before marriage but we were so sure of being together at that point that we decided to let things happen naturally.

We finally decided to get the families involved and move towards an engagement and Alhamdu Lillah, got engaged recently. However, right around the engagement time, explicit thoughts about ex and her in the act started flashing in my mind to the point where I started getting stressed, lost my appetite and just wanted to run away somewhere in agony. I tried to not think about it, but the thoughts kept coming back to me. Our love for each other is undeniable. I have been praying and making special dua asking Allah for guidance and strength so I can battle these thoughts away and focus on our past and future together.

I try to talk myself into accepting her past as a part of her and that she is not the same person and has repented and felt guilty for her acts. She, to her credit, has been extremely supportive of my stress and has been there for me trying to assure me how much she loves me and what we have is purer and real than anything she could have ever imagined and how I am her first true love, which I believe. It's just that whenever we get even a little physical, I get images of her with her ex and dirty thoughts enter my mind where I wonder if she did this with him, if he touched her there and how etc.

I really really want to be with her but am fearful these thoughts will not go away. Can someone please help me in dealing with these feelings and if there are special dua's I can make? I don't want to lose her and I don't want to keep having these thoughts as I fear they will ruin our relationship and married life going forward.

She is so good to me that it hurts me to even imagine us not being together and I can let her go. I just want to get rid of these explicit and dirty thoughts. I don't see myself without her and she doesn't either. I even had someone do Isthikhara for us and that person informed me that the Istikhara came out good Alhamdu Lillah.

Please advise what I should do. I am very depressed and saddened at not being able to get rid of this negative feeling which weren't there until a few days before the engagement.

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