Hello, and thank you in advance for clicking on this topic, and for any advice you may have. The names and places in this tale have been changed, but all of the pertinent information is the same. Also, my apologies for it being very long and complicated. Here goes:

I am a happily married, 45-year-old man living outside Sacramento. My wife Ann and I have been married for 14 years, and we have two beautiful boys in grade school.

My problem, or conundrum, is with my ex-girlfriend from college, Stephanie. We met in 1991, during my senior year at college in Arizona. We had a great relationship, and at the time I was thinking “she’s the one.” But she was a year behind me at college, and after I graduated my Dad got a job in San Francisco. I was still living at home at the time and didn’t have a job that paid enough money for me to get out on my own. So I moved with my family from Arizona to SF at the end of the summer of ’92, and Stephanie and I started a long-distance relationship.

The rest of ’92 and the first few months of ’93 were miserable to say the least. I landed a pretty good job, but I really missed Stef. We would talk for hours on the phone, and she came to visit me for Spring Break. I was in heaven. My new employer goofed during the interview process, and I was able to take a week vacation to go to Arizona to visit her. But I also spent the time pounding the pavement looking for a job so I could move back. By the end of the week, an old fraternity buddy of mine and I had signed a lease for an apartment, and I landed a job working in a drug store. Not the most glamorous job for a college graduate, but I was in love and I was so happy that I would be close to Stef.

Things didn’t turn out the way I planned. I actually had to move into Stef’s house for about a month because the apartment wasn’t ready. Then, about two months after I got settled into my new place, Stef dropped a bomb on me: She broke down and cried and said she didn’t love my anymore. At the time, I was supportive and told her everything would be OK. But after she left my place that day — August 5, 1993 — it started to sink in over what a fool I was. I was completely destroyed … devastated.

I wallowed in my misery for months. And I was alone, too, because my roommate spent most of his time at his new girlfriend’s place. One day, a high school student working at the drug store asked me why I was working there, since I was a college graduate. I also missed out on a family trip to Europe. The only good thing about those days was that I had a couple college buddies nearby, and we went out to the bars to have fun. I never hooked up though, and I checked my answering machine (ha! remember those?) several times a day, hoping Stef would call. She never did.

Finally, I decided to take control of things and started looking for a better job back in California. I found one, and moved to Sacramento. I didn’t tell Stef I was leaving — in hindsight, I think I did this because I didn’t want her to try to stop me. It was only months after I was back in CA that I mustered up the nerve to call her. She was surprised that I left, but didn’t say much else about it. We had a nice conversation (my heart was in my throat) for several minutes, and then it was over.

Two years later, I landed an awesome job in San Jose. It was 1995, and I was traveling all over the country. I still thought of Stef, and called her from the road a couple of times. We had nice conversations, but they didn’t turn into anything.

That old expression that you will “meet somebody when you least expect it” is true; I met Ann while I was on the road in Kansas in 1999. We also did the long-distance relationship thing, but this time it really was meant to be. We fell in love and got married in 2001. We started our family a few years later. Total bliss.

Enter the internet, well Facebook. One day, back in either 2011 or 2012, I found Stef on Facebook and sent her a friend request. She accepted and — with Ann’s approval, of course — we started chatting with each other. Our chats were, for the most part (get back to that later), pretty pedestrian and friendly. I learned that a few years after we broke up, she was diagnosed with a chronic illness that, while it won’t kill her, will keep her from living a “normal” life. I also learned that she got married and moved to Texas, and had just moved back home to Arizona and was going through a divorce. It sounded like she married a real asshole.

Our chats were, in a word, therapeutic. They showed me that despite how devastated I was 20 years earlier, in hindsight Stef and I were really not meant to be together. We have very different interests. And Stef never wanted to have kids. My sons are beautiful, and I can’t imagine what life would be like without them. One night, Stef even apologized to me — profusely — for how “cruel” she was to me. I told her everything was fine, that life had turned out for the best. And it really was.

If you have stayed with me this far, you’re probably wondering “OK, so what the hell is the problem?” I’m getting there.

Stef and I would chat every so often (maybe once a week) until just after New Years 2014. I admit, sometimes our chats were a little flirtatious. We talked briefly about some of the outrageous, kinky things she liked to do 20 years earlier. One day she was in a particularly depressed mood and said she didn’t think she would ever meet a nice guy. I told her to get out and keep trying to meet guys — that she had a lot to offer. I reminded her that she was once a member of a sorority with about 150 girls, and I picked her. I also told her that even though we didn’t work out, I knew that I was looking for someone like her and that helped me find Ann. That seemed to brighten her mood. Maybe it was flirting, but I just wanted to lift her spirits.

On New Years Day that year, I wished her a Happy New Year. She reciprocated, and said “maybe this could be the year that we see each other in person after all of these years.” I was surprised, but excited. I said I would be OK with doing that. She asked if I could come to Arizona, and I told her I would try. But then about 30 minutes later or so, I messaged her back and said I would probably have a difficult time getting to Arizona, and that if we were to meet she should come to Sacramento. She agreed.

At the time, I was upstairs chatting with Stef on my iPhone. I did not know that at the very same time, my iPad was downstairs in my son’s room, with me still logged in on Facebook. Ann was laying in bed with my son, and watched silently in the dark as the messages between Stef and I went by.

The next morning, after Ann had left for work and I was getting my son ready for school, I saw the iPad. I looked at it, and quickly deduced that Ann had seen everything. I asked my son if his Mommy was looking at the iPad last night and he said yes.

Even though the idea of having an affair with Stef was the absolute last thing from my mind, I knew I was in trouble. The chat messages did not look good. I was terrified. So I decided to “come clean” and took several actions that, at the time, seemed necessary to save my marriage and remove and sense of impropriety: (1) I sent Stef a message saying that it would be inappropriate for us to meet, (2) I de-friended her and, I would find out later, I blocked her from contacting me, and (3) I also de-friended a couple of other ex-girlfriends on Facebook, none of whom I chatted with as much.

When Ann came home that night, I told her that I knew about the chats with Stef and apologized profusely. I told her about what I had done to help make amends, but she told me that none of it was necessary.

After a few days had passed, I thought about what I had done and felt that I had overreacted. I tried calling Stef at her office, but every time I called I got someone else. Each time, I declined to leave a message. Finally, after about a month of this, one of her co-workers asked if this was (my name), and I said yes. The co-worker asked if there was a phone number Stef could reach me at, and I said I would prefer to do email. Later that day, Stef gave me her cell phone number and I called her. I told her about Ann seeing the text messages, and explained that that was why I cut off our online friendship so abruptly. She said she understood, we said goodbye, and that was it.

A year passed. There was no communication, except for an email I sent Stef the day before her birthday, wishing her a happy one, and on New Years 2015. She did not reply.

Finally, at the end of February I decided to attempt to re-establish our friendship on Facebook. I sent Stef an email, a few paragraphs long, apologizing for what happened. I told her I overreacted, promised not to be flirty in the future, told her I cared about her as a friend and that her friendship meant a lot to me. But, I made a mistake: I also told her that if she was interested in re-establishing ties, I would ask Ann first. If Ann said she didn’t have a problem with it, then we could move forward.

Stef went ballistic. Some parts of her angry chats back include “how dare you, Ann’s trust is misplaced, knowing that you’re going behind her back infuriates me, you disgust me, don’t ever contact me again.” I was stunned. So, thinking that full disclosure at this point was the way to go, I told Ann everything — that I tried to re-establish ties with Stef, the email I sent her, and the angry chat messages Stef sent back. Ann looked everything over, and said she was “surprised” at how angry Stef was. She thought it was strange, but she also indicated that she (Ann) really had no problem with it. I tried chatting again with Stef about it, told her that Ann had no problem, but there was just silence.

I saw a chat message between Ann and one of her friends. She told her friend all about what happened. The friend thought Stef’s reaction was odd, too. My wife said “he isn’t one to let things go.” She’s right. I hate that this misunderstanding is out there. I really just want to “clear my name” and get our friendship back on track.

It’s funny, because when I did chat with Stef, she was sad that she wouldn’t meet a guy. I encouraged her to go out and find one. And it looks like she took my advice; I think she has a boyfriend now, about 10 years her senior (she’s 45) with grown kids. I think that’s great, he seems nice.

Things are bad, but they could be worse. Stef and I have 8 mutual friends on Facebook, and Stef hasn’t blocked me. She is also still a fan of a page I run on Facebook. But I’m worried that another attempt to reconnect will push her farther away.

So … what should I do? I really just want to get things back to the way they were before this misunderstanding happened. I miss Stef’s friendship. I don’t have any interest in anything more than that. I want to clear my name and reputation. And if you’ve read this far, I want to buy you a beer. =)