A Small World #2
Now I'm okay and remarried. I learned cheating is a choice.
Being cheated on is not your fault. Sometimes we hang onto the things that hurt us the most realizing there are better things coming on the horizon.
I've forgiven the ex. I simply do not care.
That to me is the best feeling from heartbreak. The heartbreak has no power over you.
Feralkarma My dad was a more prolific cheater than we could imagine as I have 4 half siblings that no one knew about until high school years. This happened about 5 years after my parents divorce was final, due to his infidelity.
I went to a small HS, 50 kids per class max, so when you played other schools in sports, they were equally small.
I was a freshman in high school, playing volleyball, and we were playing at a school we hadn't played before, from about 1 hour away.
Long story short, at the end of the matches myself and a girl from the other team were the MVPs for the night, so the newspaper wanted a picture of us together.
The guy stood us by each other and remarked that we could be twins.
We looked at each other and it was true, it was like looking in a mirror.
And I look just like my father...and so did she. I am 1 month older than her.
And that's how the road to discovering more of his lies began. And I was “daddy's little girl” growing up, he was my person as a kid. So over 20s later it's still hard to remember that dad and then the person he became are the same person.
Anonymoususer236789 I'll start by saying I stayed with my husband.
He'd been laid off from a job he planned on retiring from, so his self-esteem was in the dumps.
So he started sending and receiving nudes and sexting with women, some were mutual friends, women I entertained in my own home, women I introduced to him because I wanted him to be friends with my friends.
All of this boosted his confidence. Then he decided that one of his former co-workers was his soulmate.
They traded emails, saying how much he wished he was single with no kids so he could divorce me and run away with her.
He would take our kids out and ‘run into his friend.’ My kids would later tell me how ‘daddy and his friend’ were funny.
It came to a head on my birthday when he left me at home to ‘rescue her’ because she was too drunk to drive home.
He was out until 5 the next morning. I would have left him that night if we didn't have kids.
He came home and we talked. And talked. I cried, yelled, told him how much I hated how he made me doubt everything about myself.
I told him about the emails. How his friends were also sending me emails, saying how I didn't deserve him, how my kids would be better off with her and him as a couple.
I almost ended myself twice. But then something changed.
We kept talking, he went to therapy. He cut off all of them.
His ‘soulmate’ ended up being a drug user, and would call him while she was stoned/tweaking/whatever, which changed how he saw her.
In any case, we're celebrating 21 years happily married (one year unhappily).
He earned back my trust but it took a lot.
I love him, but sometimes I still wonder what was so wrong with me that this happened.
Anonymoususer221530 My boyfriend and I were together for five years.
He cheated on me with my sister. I was traveling with some friends, and we came back two days early because one friend got hurt.
When we arrived, the first thing I did was go to his house.
He didn't answer my calls I was worried. I missed him so much.
His father let me in. I went upstairs and I found him with my sister.
They were kissing. She had no shirt. They both said sorry, said it happened only the day before.
But I found out they had been together since the night after I left at a party, and all time I was away.
He said he missed me, that he was jealous I traveled without him.
My sister said she loved me, that it was a mistake.
I couldn't forgive him or her, and I lost my family too because she was always the golden child.
Now I am happy again. I have a husband, eight years together, and our beautiful children.
I never regret not staying with him, not for one second.
Anonymoususer183902 My ex cheated on me with two of my friends.
, one being my best friend. It went on for months, they were meeting behind my back.
They were fucking in his car, I wondered why he would never pick me up.
My ex best friend’s cousin told me. They had hooked up at her birthday party after I left.
It came out and they acted like it was no big deal.
They rubbed it in my face for a year before I moved.
To this day he still cheats on his wife with my ex friend.
..it's disgusting! He cheated when his daughter had cancer. He's a piece of shit!
KeenReader65 I'll never forget how I felt the night I discovered that my now ex husband had been not only cheating on me but planning a whole new life with the OW.
He had been gone for weeks in Europe “on business” and had seemed more and more cold and emotionally distant.
I was busy with our young kids and was used to him traveling a lot so I didn't over think it.
When he came back to our home, he went out for a business dinner that same night (having not seen our kids in weeks) and came home drunk.
He left his usually password protected cell on the counter and went to bed.
Something compelled me to grab it right then while it was still unlocked.
I had never even tried to access his phone before then.
It hadn't occurred to me. I found start to finish emails showing how his relationship with her started, them quoting poetry to each other, her mentioning how she hoped MY children someday would understand how much she loved him and would love them, too, to design plans for an apartment together.
My life hasn't been the same since and that kind of betrayal causes never ending reverberations affecting not just the spouse but the children as well.
Good luck out there. The cliche indicators of an affair are cliches because they are so common & true in real life.
They were almost all there in my husband's case but hindsight is 20-20.
Trust but verify, ladies. Even the last guy you might imagine cheating, even the guy who always makes a point of saying that men who cheat are despicable and have no honor, is capable of being the same one who will stab you in the back.
Knowing my ex as I do, I have no doubt that had I not found this proof of his affair, he would have never admitted to it and just pretended he met his wh0re after our marriage broke down.
He was and probably still is a dedicated gaslighter and who knows what else he got up to over the years when friends would actually joke (and he would laugh heartily) that he could have a whole other family out there, given how much he was gone. ..
SVMJSF9034 Cheating wounds the person who trusted you with their heart. And that says far more about the cheater than the one who was betrayed.
Knmirv38 Questioning your own worth is a hard thing to contend with. You also begin to wonder if your perception of others is valid at all.
Anonymoususer411235 I moved across the world to Colorado because my best friend invited me too.
I met a man there and fell in love. She was jealous of that love and constantly tried to tell me he wasn't good enough, years after I married him I found years worth of receipts of her and him.
They hid it by emailing instead of texting.
My best friend had been sleeping with my husband.
She was there for me when I left my abusive ex.
She actually witnessed the abuse and helped me by offering me the chance to move with her across the states.
She was there when I met my future husband.
She was there when we got married. She was there when I had my twins. The betrayal was the worst I have ever experienced and because of it I don't have any close friends anymore because I'm terrified to trust someone like that again. it's been 10 years.
Anonymoususer239135 A real man doesn't destroy the person who loved him just to feed his ego.
TaxiGirl1 Whoever is still on the other side of that Bridge over the River Betrayal: The first steps over it are the hardest, but we are over here on the other side cheering you on. We've got cookies and hugs. Can't wait for you to join our party.
wendyc890 Love it
Anonymoususer4235 I know it hurts right now, deeper than words can say. But please remember, you did nothing to deserve this. Their choices are not a reflection of your worth.
AlexaLowell43 Betrayal cuts deep, but it never destroys what's real inside you, your kindness, your honesty, your capacity to love again. Those things are still yours.
LouisZMKIF78 Only cowards cheat. It's easier to lie than to face your own unhappiness and have an honest conversation.
MarthaJTL098 People who cheat have no idea of the damage they cause. It's not just love that dies, it's trust, safety, and the way the other person sees the world.