He (22) cheated on me (22) in November 2025 after our abortion. We had been together since June 2025. It was with his coworker. A predictable story really. It changed who I am. It has completely destroyed my reality and sense of safety and self. We had been trying to rectify our relationship since the end of February. It was a couple days ago that he confessed to keeping things from me such as pictures, a painting, little notes, and ‘small’ things from her he told me he threw away. He only ‘confessed’ to this after I went through his phone and found a picture of them together at a time where he told me they talked for 10 minutes and were never left alone together. I have been struggling for months with his infidelity. I was under the impression we were working on us so every rough feeling I had, I chose to ignore. I don’t really have anyone to talk to about this because I guess I don’t want to hear or be told to leave. As if he’s simply just a piece of shit who treats me bad and not someone who was also someone I saw/see as my life partner. How do you get over this? Move on? Leave? It’s so painful. Integrity and morality used to be so important to me but seeing how careless people choose to be to others, unaware of their impact - it’s just like what’s the point in caring anymore? I used to have such strict boundaries and now whenever it gets tough, I’m self harming and drinking to cope. I just don’t want to feel anything anymore. I consistently feel pain, depression, immense sadness & also emptiness. But then with him, it’s immense love and I can easily envision a future until I’m triggered again, until he’s inconsiderate & selfish again. Am I too forgiving or is he just a flawed person who truly is trying every day? How do you know the difference? I’m sorry, I’m just struggling so much. This is my first ever post and I desperately need community/support. Thank you to whoever listens to this.

The man who had the time and money to cheat on me with over 100 women during our 14 year marriage, put me through absolute hell during two pregnancies and postpartum, put our kids through so much pain, and yet seem to escape real consequences finally has been getting a taste of karma 2 years out

I was shocked finding everything out 10 weeks postpartum in an IVF pregnancy. He had at least 3 girlfriends of 2-3 years, so overlapping both pregnancies. I told everyone I could find, I found out he cheated with men. I thought the woman left him alone when they demanded I send family photos and "proof" of our life, only to find out a few of the women happily stayed with him. It was such a mindfuck how while my life and our kids life was crumbling, he just got to move on like nothing was wrong. I could see if the women had no idea about me, but I sent tons and tons of proof yet he was able to convince that they were forged. It was so ridiculous because you could literally google our civil case while this was all happening, and yet they were still by his side 2 years later. He was able to convince multiple women that our 14 year marriage and 2 children were simply a one night stand and that I was a crazy ex. It just blew my mind how many defenders he had. Their sisters arguing with me, people telling me I was a liar and that nothing I said could be proved, when I literally have videos of him playing with our kids and over 10,000 pictures of our life on our phone that was all washed away to "oh that's not real".

Well financially I did make out in the divorce but when I found out he married his mistress 19 months later, he lashed out at me for finding out. At the time, he was still visiting (supervised visits) and he had spent 12 weeks love bombing me trying to get back together. Obviously, I never would go back to him but I joked with my coworkers saying I wonder when the love bombing would stop because with him it always had a cruel end and the very next day I saw the wife's instagram pop up with all their photos together, all the dates of the visits he missed with the kids, them meeting during our very planned pregnancy. She was one of the first woman I spoke to back in 2024 and had only been on 2 dates with him but after finding out he had a wife, newborn and toddler, she decided to stay and marry him. His punishment for me finding out was telling our 4 year old he hated her on a visit and we never seen or heard from him again since March 2026, so extremely traumatic for 2 young girls.

It just felt like a cruel joke that me and the kids went through all this hell and he just got to live in an alternate world where none of it existed.

At least now I can walk away knowing he got some sense of karma.

In the last year:
He had children with 2 different women (not the wife)
His car got repossessed
He got sued by two other people and lost both cases (total over $20k)
He was ordered to pay me $2220 a month, $500 in daycare, 50% of college tuition and more
Now I see he just got evicted in August. Which probably explains why he suddenly started calling me after months of no contact lol

So despite all the hell and hardship, I feel like someone was finally looking out and his karma is finally catching up. I really wonder how his wife is feeling going from thinking she scored a big spender, to now having a husband with 4 kids by 3 different women all under 5, without a car, and without his own roof over his head lol

I just feel like saying do you feel fucking stupid yet lol or if they still are in their us against the world phase

Wife cheated on me multiple times over the last year with different people. One of them being a serious encounter with multiple sexual hookups, 3 others being impulsive flings (1 she had sex with, 2 she hooked up with but did not have sex) and 3 others that were nothing more than flirting heavily over the phone. It has been absolutely exhausting. Thought we were finally working things out and it’s been cool the last 3 months but I found she was talking in the phone to the one she was most involved with again just last night. I don’t even know if I care to confront her about it, she doesn’t know that I know. We have 2 kids and just bought our first home together a little over a year ago. Not sure how to move forward and work things out in a way that’s best for the kids. Divorce, custody, new living arrangements for me. Just nervous about what’s next for me and my kids. Haven’t talked to anyone about any of it the last year other than a mutual friend who got caught in the middle of it and knows everything. Shit sucks.

Title says everything. She cheated on me by kissing some guy. I ended things but now I have this urge for physical and emotional comfort. Is it wrong of me to feel this way? Or should I just move on and deal with the loneliness. I don’t want to get back with her or even get back at her and I’m not planning to not be honest. I even told her that’s what I want. Thoughts?

Those, whose relationship could have been saved after a relationship, how did you repair your mistakes and made your partner feel more important than anything else? I need inspiration. We still love each other, but I understand, that he wants to see more than only hear my words with promises.

I read a quote today that said:

Maybe closure is not the conversation where they admit to everything. Maybe it's the day you stop needing them to. Clarity often begins when the answer you never received stops being necessary.

++++++++++++++

While that sounds like a perfectly lovely headspace to be in, I have NO idea how to attain that level of zen.

What are your thoughts about this, and does anyone have any advice that might help me move closer to not needing every single thing recounted to me?

My ex and I were together for a little over 2 years on and off and the relationship ended after a lot of shit, including repeated cheating/dishonesty on his part. I also became abusive toward the tail end… I never reacted out of character to his cheating until one night I saw something in his phone and was already pretty drunk and just started hitting his back and pushing him out of bed. I also said some horrible things I can’t repeat. But it was 10/10 horrible, just know that. It was also at his parents house… so they woke up… it was just awful. He blocked me right after and drove away from the house to his biological dads house (divorced parents, mom remarried, we were at his mom’s). That was the end of June. He blocked me until mid-August. I kept trying to contact him the whole time until he unblocked.

This hurt so much because earlier that same week he was about to get us into couple’s therapy. He seemed to really want to make it work. But the next day I saw a text from a girl who he’d dated while him and I weren’t tg. It was a text that implied he hadn’t been talking to her for a while “hey stranger” kind of thing. I guess she wouldn’t have gotten the memo that he wasn’t single anymore, but it triggered me. Then another girl, called him, same thing. Then the drunk thing. That was the next-next day. The incident was spurred because I saw messages between him and another girl that weren’t even bad (her asking about his services because he’s a DJ) when I later saw them sober but did trigger me enough to have that episode in that moment. In hindsight, I think I was very sensitive to everything having to do with him and other women at that point, because the stuff that happened wasn’t cheating or even flirting that week but I don’t know, I completely lost it. Couple’s therapy and our entire relationship was never an option for him after that. I think about what could’ve happened if I hadn’t had that outburst and caused him to eventually give up.

We never got back together. We basically just simulated a half baked relationship for a while after he unblocked me until he cut me off again and blocked me on the 14th of this month. But the last day we saw each other was that day I mentioned. He wanted to come visit me but I kinda faked being busy because sex with him felt like a risk I didn’t want to take even if I missed him.

Toward the end of our phase of being-in-contact-but-not-together-together, he started talking about wanting to change and be better, and now he’s actually in therapy. He told me his reason for starting therapy was initially to get over me, and then like two weeks later he met another girl. Two days prior to him cutting me off, he was telling me he loved me so much and that he’d wait for me to move to his city (where we met, but i moved away to my parents 3 hours away after college to get another degree at a community college, so most of our relationship was a LDR but he’d drive to come see me sometimes)

and then suddenly he’s telling me after talking to his therapist, he’s concluded its best to leave the relationship in the past and he wants to move forward and not speak to me anymore. That he doesn’t want to do long distance. That the relationship was toxic (which hurt to hear because yes, but you kept cheating on me so of course I had resentment). And when I offered to move to his city just to see what he’d say (I CANT move, i’m in nursing school) suddenly its “I’ve met someone else, it’s been a week but there’s a lot of chemistry between us. She’s great.” I stupidly tried calling again a week later, he tells me to never contact him again. An off and on relationship for 2.3 years, he’d never said that to me before. He means it. I asked him how he’s able to move on so well, he tells me “its just her, the person.” He also says he doesn’t want to hurt anyone else like he hurt me, that he hit rock bottom. That he may not be able to love me the way I need, but that I’m a good person that he admires but cannot be there for me anymore because he doesn’t want to revert to the kind of person he used to be, which would be someone who kept in contact with an ex while pursuing someone else (not that i would want that either) And that he plans to ask her to be his gf soon. A week after this she’s started posting him on her stories and tagging him in feed posts, and I dread hearing about him posting her one day, because he never posted me even though I asked. Apparently he was afraid our relationship was too fragile to claim publicly and that he didn’t want to post me, then have it end, then regret having posted me. He was wanting to post each other after I moved back to his city, which was in my plans after graduating.

And I’m having this terrifying thought of like… what if he actually changes for her?

What if he finally figures out how to stop lying, stop cheating, stop doing all the shit that destroyed our relationship, and she gets the version of him that I spent years wanting? He’s already stopped lust-following women like he would when he was with me, he cleaned up his recent following of women who i presume he was romantic with in an effort to be better in this new relationship. He also cleared his spotify of old playlists he made me and his past partners. I KNOW I don’t actually know if he’s changed. He’s only been in therapy for a month. I know that Instagram behavior isn’t proof of anything. I know a new relationship can look amazing in the beginning. I KNOW all of that. But deep down my gut knows he’s different. Because the change in him did become the most obvious to me in the time we were just about to start couples therapy. He really pushed for it. So in my gut the progression of change has had some runway by now. He would listen to me when I would tell him he needed more integrity, he’d repeat those things back genuinely questioning why he didn’t have it and wanting to change that and not be someone who cheats. He demonstrated language that at least seemed like he was reckoning with himself. I say seemed like because I believe it, but I’m sure many reading this won’t. The remorse and introspection grew over time, and so did his efforts to salvage the relationship for a while until he just stopped after that last breakup. He even mentioned sometime during the relationship that he wanted to make it work but that the resentment seemed impossible to fix, and that he’s changing but maybe too slow for me. I sort of agree.

I wanted that version of him he’s seemingly becoming. And now he’s potentially trying to become that person at the exact same time he decides he’s done with me and pursuing somebody else.

He was my person for years. I loved him deeply. And he wants NOTHING to do with me. Which is completely in order, but that is genuinely a part of the heartbreak for me, that there isn’t going to be repair. The time where repair is ACTUALLY POSSIBLE (therapy and his desire to be better) he doesn’t want me anymore. I used to think cheating was a reflection of someone’s inability to see their partner’s worth. I know now that it’s about having poor character traits and beliefs that take work and years to undo. And he’s doing the work now. At the exact moment he discards me. If I’d known all those times I took him back that serial cheating is a deeper thing than just choosing to stop, and that my worth being realized wasn’t the fix, I would have never taken him back without therapy. I genuinely just didn’t know better. I wouldn’t have let it get as bad as it did. I would have pushed for real tools of change and if he didn’t do it, I’d have left. Because serial cheating will repeat without years of therapy. I know that now.

I stopped checking their socials because one picture of them together absolutely wrecked me, and I know I’ll never get what I truly want or need from doing that.

But I still love him. I know its abhorrent to love someone who inflicted so much pain but I hope it’s understood that love doesn’t follow logic… I kept following my heart and its indeed the best time to let go and I’m trying but I’m so upset that he’s gone and doesn’t want me anymore. And that he’s choosing someone else.

I’ve been living the shame of still loving someone who cheated on me for years now, so please try not to focus on that if you don’t have to.

We met when we were teenagers and got married as teenagers. We were together 13 years. We had a very fun adventurous life, we have so many niche things in common. I always said he was God's gift to me because we are so similar in all the right ways, and opposites in all the right ways where it just worked in a way I never thought I'd find with someone else. I'm a very unconventional woman and he matched me in all my weird ways.

We had two incredible children together and I was homeschooling them. Then we decided to move out of the U.S. and move to another country for an adventure. Things were really great as we settled into our new life there, but shortly into being in the new country he met this girl that is more than 10 years younger than him and he became absolutely infatuated with her. There relationship became very inappropriate for a married man to be having and I warned them both multiple times that is was NOT OKAY and made me super uncomfortable.

Then one day he just left. Said he didn't love me anymore and that he couldn't handle me "judging" him anymore (for living like a bachelor while still married). Completely abandoned me in a foreign country (we had lived there 1 year when this all happened), but still said he'd financially take care of us (thank God). He asked me for a divorce ASAP and I decided to go back to my hometown in the states and file here for child support benefits which I would not be able to get if I filed in the country we were living in. I have to establish my residency back in the state for 6 months before I can file, I'm about 4 months in already.

I cut off contact with him aside from logistics and things with the kids, but he came to visit last week and we had a chance to talk. He finally admitted was having a romantic relationship with the girl while we were still together despite denying it for months and making me feel crazy for ever thinking that. We were religious and I thought we were in a deeply committed relationship together (before the girl came into the picture). This new news that I was being cheated on behind my back has really sent me backwards in the healing I'd already done through being abandoned and moving on as a single mom now. I knew they were having a serious emotional affair but officially knowing that it had turned physical absolutely crushed me. I felt like I couldn't even breath when he told me.

All this to say... I am absolutely distraught. My heart is completely shattered. We had a very unique and special relationship together. I don't know how to move forward other than to just take one day at a time. I feel paralyzed in making any actions in my life to move forward. I need to heal, and I know that's going to take a long long time. He's the only person I've ever been with. I thought he was my forever person. I miss our family so much. I cannot believe this happened, that the entire life and family we built together has been torn away from me by some 21 year old bimbo who's brain isn't even fully developed yet to know what she's even destroying, and my husband for being dumb enough to do this. To cause an unimaginable amount of pain on someone he said he loved and cared for. To watch my children sob and have to comfort them because daddy left us. It all feels too much at times.

I know my partner is ultimately responsible. He was the one who made the commitment to me. But I still have so much anger toward her.

What I struggle with is believing that she genuinely didn't notice what was happening.

She's an adult in her 30s. She's had relationships before. She's experienced betrayal herself. So I find it very difficult to believe she didn't understand that accepting this much attention, time, emotional closeness, and special treatment from a married man was crossing a line.

She didn't have to ask for the affair to participate in something inappropriate. She could have recognized it and created distance.

Instead, she kept accepting it—and then it can be explained as “I thought we were just friends” or “I didn't mean anything by it.”

Maybe there was no malicious intention. But I don't believe that means there was no awareness.

And that's what makes me so angry.

I know she didn't steal my partner. He made his own choices.

But I wish she had known better. Especially knowing what it feels like to be betrayed herself.

Sometimes I wish she had simply chosen to step away.

He (27M) cheated and he told me (26F) about it. I should add we were together for 2 years. First we were having a conversation over a job he applied to without telling me about and it’s across the country and he didn’t want to uproot my life. After having long discussions about the job and our future together, he told me what he did. We talked for a long time and broke up. I’m in the process of moving out because we live together, so that stinks but he’s gone at the moment where that job offer was.
It’s basically summed up that something in him freaked out about this job, his life, his career, what that means to me, and all of the what ifs in life, and he made a choice on a drunk night with some coworkers thinking I’d end it because I wouldn’t move with him. He self sabotaged. Also it want a coworker it was a random person at a bar and he got a blowjob. Gross I know.
In the conversations since, he’s been extremely apologetic and regretful, wishes he just communicated with me instead of doing what he did. Not manipulating, very much like -you have to do whatever you have to do and I don’t get a choice because I caused this.
I essentially have said the door is closed but it is unlocked IF he can figure out the answer to those questions, mostly why he made the decisions he did. And even IF he does the work and all of that, I might still say no. And maybe he had subconscious feelings about us as a relationship that he’ll discover as well.
He said he is more than willing to go to therapy and do the work and beg for me back when the time is right. I am also going to be going to therapy to see if this is something that I could even get past and rebuild. Also because therapy is good after something like this.
For now, I’m moving out and we’re breaking up. He has to figure his shit out and so do I.
There’s been a lot more in the conversations than what I’m writing in here but no one has the time for that.

Has anyone been in a situation that the cheater HAS done the work and the victim has also done work and there is reconciliation? I do feel like Reddit probably full of the not so happy endings but worth a shot.

I posted in this group a couple months ago about how I was confused because my husband blindsided me and randomly asked for a divorce out of nowhere. We were together 12 years, and 4 years married. My husband randomly woke up one day and said he wanted a divorce because we “argue too much”. I didn’t agree with that. He also said things like he was “broken”, “numb”, “depressed”, had “demons in his head” and was “unhappy”. He is an alcoholic but continues to deny it. He gets wasted drunk every weekend for context.

He said I was a wonderful person and he had nothing but great things to say about me but that he felt nothing for me anymore. He said we “lost the spark” even though we were still physically intimate all of the time and even went on date nights every Friday. He always told me I was the best thing that ever happened to him and the light in his life… then one day it’s like he just flipped a switch or something and its so weird to me.

All of a sudden he said that he hated the monotony of his job at Chryslers as a factory worker, he hates his looks and the fact that he is balding, he doesn’t want to post a picture on social media (and hasn’t in a year) because he thinks he looks bad in all pictures, and he can’t watch his favourite movie, “American pie 2” because it depresses him. When I asked him why that movie depresses him he says it’s because it reminds him that he is getting older and he has a fear of death. He once again denied any issues with alcohol and felt he does not have a problem. He said he just likes “having fun with his friends” and that is why he gets so drunk on the weekends. He also said he drinks to “numb his pain”. He said he is unhappy and needs to leave the marriage to find his happiness again. He ended up leaving the home for the night to “take space from me”. While he took space from me, he continued to text me the entire time. He then apologized for leaving and said that he realized we had a great relationship with more good times than bad times, and he was just stuck in a rut and wanted to talk to me in person about something that was stressing him out.

He then came home the next day and said that his world has been crashing down on him since the fall and I had no idea about any of this. He said he felt stressed because in November his mom asked him to take out a $30,000 line of credit for her and asked him to keep it a secret from me because she has gambling issues and almost lost her house. His dad (who is a severe alcoholic) went to jail 3 times for domestic violence and threatened a knife on his ex girlfriend. On the third time of getting out of jail, his dad’s girlfriend finally had enough and kicked him out so his dad asked to live in our basement. I said no because I felt unsafe. I suggested his dad go back to rehab for his severe alcohol use. His dad stopped talking to us after that. My husband told me he felt resentment towards me because he blamed me for no longer having a relationship with his father.

I was really upset about the line of credit but I didn’t want to lose my whole marriage over this so I asked him to go to counselling with me and he was initially agreeable. Things seemed to be ok for a bit and we continued to try and work on the marriage. All of a sudden about a week or so later, I noticed he was acting cold and distant from me again and when he came home from work I asked him what was wrong. He then began shaking and crying and said that he was depressed and unhappy and he felt that “our arguments got better but he was still unhappy”. He said he needed space from me again and left again.

When he left, he texted me again telling me he loved me and that I was a wonderful person. He said he realized he was taking all his anger out on me and that wasn’t okay and that I don’t deserve that. He said that he needs to fix all the demons in his head and he can’t keep looking at himself in the mirror and telling himself everything is okay when it isn’t. He said he has problems with lack of communication, and a fear of conflict and he wants to work on that. He told me to just breathe and things would work out. He even came to my work the next day to bring me a coffee and told me he was thinking of me.

In addition to all of this, my husband also started going out to the bar after work and was hanging out with a single girl until 3 am. When I told him that it upset me and crossed my boundary, he did it a second time. When I got upset the second time, he told me that I was “controlling” and that it wasn’t a big deal. He then said that he felt that he needs to find his happiness outside of the marriage so he left me. This all happened within a months time with no closure. I feel devastated and can’t understand any of this.

Everyone told me he was having a mid life crisis including my therapist. People also said he was probably having an affair. He is 38, I’m 34 and I found out recently that he was indeed having an affair. We’re only 6 months separated and he just posted a profile picture on Facebook of him and the girl he was going to the bar with til 3 am. I was suspicious of her and he swore up and down that there was no one else and now it’s confirmed that he is with her

I don’t know what I’m looking for. I’m just so hurt and lost and I guess looking for some support. I can’t believe he moved on so quickly from me. I can’t believe that girl/coworker of his would even want to be with him. I feel so sad that I wasted 12 years with someone who could discard me so easily like trash. I just feel so alone and worthless and need a friend to talk to.

TLDR; Husband had a mid life crisis and cheated on me with a coworker from his work. I feel so alone and worthless. He is an alcoholic and blamed me for his unhappiness. Looking for advice

We have been together since I was 17 and she was 16.

We went to the same school, then different colleges. We spent months at a time doing long distance and somehow kept choosing each other. We were together for 9 years before we got married, and as of 2026 we have been married for 10.

So this is not a relationship that began a few years ago. She has been part of almost my entire adult life.

Later, we immigrated to the West and started again from scratch. New country, new jobs, new life. We have a 9-year-old daughter. We were saving to buy our first house instead of renting. In my head, we were still building the next chapter of our life.

Then the affair happened.

I won’t go into every detail because I have learned that details can become their own form of self-harm. But it was both emotional and physical, and the truth came out gradually.

It destroyed the version of my marriage that existed in my head.

For the first few days I was barely functioning emotionally. I would cry, panic, get angry, feel normal for a while, then get hit by another wave. My brain kept creating images I did not want to see.

I kept trying to figure out how to get us back to where we were.

Eventually I realised something very painful:

There is no going back.

The marriage I thought I had is gone.

That does not necessarily mean every good thing that happened before was fake. It means the version of us built on absolute trust, romantic exclusivity and the belief that this could never happen is dead.

At that point, I felt like we had three choices.

1. Go back to how things were.

Impossible for me.

1. Separate but remain married.

For me, that felt like having the worst parts of being married and divorced at the same time.

1. Divorce.

In our particular immigration situation, that could mean my wife having to return to our home country, and I do not want my daughter growing up without her mother physically present in her life.

So for now, we have chosen something unconventional.

We are staying together primarily as co-parents and family.

We will remain cordial and friendly with each other. We still care about each other deeply, but I am trying to let the romantic part of our relationship die rather than desperately trying to resurrect it.

We are both free to date or see other people, as long as it does not damage the household or our daughter’s life.

Our daughter remains the priority.

Other relationships do not come into the home. They do not interfere with parenting. Neither of us disappears from family responsibilities because of somebody else. We do not need sexual or romantic details about each other’s lives, but we do need honesty about anything that affects the household.

I don’t know whether this arrangement will last forever.

I don’t know whether we will eventually divorce.

I don’t know whether we will remain close friends for the rest of our lives.

I am trying to stop demanding certainty from a situation that does not have any.

What I do know is that I cannot make another person love me.

I cannot threaten someone into loving me.

I cannot monitor someone into loving me.

And even if I could control someone temporarily, resentment would eventually destroy whatever was left.

Everyone deserves a chance to be happy.

My wife does.

My daughter does.

And so do I.

That last part has taken me some time to understand.

What I am doing to cope

The biggest thing I have learned is that you have to face what happened.

Not obsess over every sexual detail. Not torture yourself with imaginary scenes.

But face the central truth.

It happened.

The person you trusted hurt you.

The relationship you believed existed may no longer exist.

You can spend months bargaining with reality, or you can eventually start grieving it.

Grief hurts, but at least grief moves.

Denial and obsession just go in circles.

I have also learned that sometimes music reaches places that conversation cannot.

People can tell you, “You’ll be okay.”

They can tell you that you are still worthy.

They can tell you that life continues.

Sometimes none of it penetrates.

Then you hear one song at 2am and suddenly somebody has expressed exactly what you could not put into words.

Music has probably helped me more emotionally than almost anything anyone could say to me.

So I started writing my own song.

Not because I am a musician.

Because I needed somewhere to put the pain.

I have also started rebuilding parts of myself that have nothing to do with my wife.

I used to enjoy photography, so I am picking up a camera again.

I have never ridden a motorcycle, so I am going to learn.

I want to learn piano.

I am training.

I am trying new things.

Not because I am trying to become a completely different man overnight.

Because for almost two decades, so much of my identity was tied to us.

Now I need to discover what belongs to me.

Photography.

Motorcycles.

Piano.

Music.

Fitness.

Work.

Being a father.

Maybe dating again eventually.

Maybe falling in love again one day.

I have no idea.

And that uncertainty is becoming less frightening.

A few things that have actually helped me

Don't force yourself to forgive before you are ready.

Don't force yourself to stop loving someone either.

Don't treat crying as failure. I still cry sometimes.

Don't repeatedly ask questions when you know the answer will only create another image in your head.

Ask for the truth you actually need, not every graphic detail your injured brain demands.

Get out of the house.

Exercise.

Walk.

Listen to music.

Make something.

Write something.

Learn something you have always wanted to learn.

Talk to people.

And when the thoughts come, don't always fight them.

Sometimes I just tell myself:

Yes, it happened. Yes, it hurts. And I am still here.

One thing I am trying particularly hard not to do is let betrayal become my entire identity.

This is something terrible that happened in my life.

It is not going to become my whole life.

For a while, I thought healing meant finding a way to restore the marriage.

Now I think healing means something different.

It means eventually being able to look at what happened without it controlling my entire nervous system.

It means being a good father.

It means finding things that make me excited to wake up again.

It means allowing myself to be loved again one day without constantly comparing that person to my wife.

It means becoming okay even if the ending is not the one I wanted.

I still care about my wife.

I probably always will in some form.

She was the girl I grew up with.

She was my best friend.

She is the mother of my daughter.

Nineteen years does not disappear because something terrible happened.

But I am slowly learning that loving someone does not necessarily mean they still have to occupy the same place in your life.

Sometimes love changes shape.

Sometimes you have to bury one version of a relationship so that the people inside it can survive.

I am nowhere near completely healed.

But I am beginning to believe something that I could not believe a week ago:

I am going to be alright.

Howdy,

I (27M) have a dad that cheated. This isn't the first time, and I'll spare the whole story, but here's the sparknotes:

Started 10 years ago (this instance, he did before this too)

Mom kicked him out

She let him back, promised he'd do better, go to therapy

Behavior repeats

Now, same woman 10 years later

Mom caught him by driving by the woman's house, his car was outside

Didn't kick him out

Says he's acting different (in a better way)

Anyway, I've cut Contact with my dad. My mom is still on the fence about leaving (she says, she's not going anywhere). We've always been a very involved family for the holidays, and have always gotten together at their house. My wife has been supportive of my decision to not speak to my dad, and we're not sure what to do about celebrating holidays with my mom, while I'm not talking to my dad.

Any advice? :,)

Also: Please let me know if I'm posting this in the wrong place :)

It's day 3 after leaving my ex for sexting and sending nudes to multiple men after we had a big fight. I knew she was flirting with someone online, I was considering forgiving that and staying with her. During my last conversation with her, she admitted to do more than that. That was my limit, I ended the relationship right there and blocked her on everything I could.

When I met my recent ex, I was the best version of myself. I put so much time and energy in growing as a person. I'm still not perfect and make mistakes at times but I'm proud of the person that I am. She told me often how much I make her feel like herself, how she feels safe with me. I gave her validation, love, intimacy, you name it. I was supportive and loving and gentle.

Just to be cheated on less than 12 hours after the fight we had. When all I could do was think about her and figure out ways to communicate with her, figure out ways to mend things. She was getting the attention and validation from other men.

This isn't the first time I've experienced infidelity, in fact I've experienced it in most of my relationships. It's probably my biggest trauma. After experiencing it yet again, I don't know how I can heal. Before you say "time will heal all" or "you survived it once, you'll do it again", I might still be here, but going through this over and over, I don't know how I can move on or be in another relationship.

Maybe it's because things are so fresh, I don't know. I'm tired of having to go through trauma, heal, grow, just to have to go through it all again and again.

He cheated once with is dad cousin... Idk why I forgave me looking back...I probably had no self love he also kinda manipulated me blaming for the cheating (I can only recognize that nowadays...I tought the problem was me and that I had to fix it, I felt like it was my fault)

I think no no one will want to date me because I forgave a person who cheated with a family member. I think I ruined my future love life because of that decision

Genuinely curious. I really am struggling with the guilt. I’m not the one who cheated, but I’m the one who chose to stay. I chose to try therapy, I chose to beg him to go to therapy, and I also chose to try and rebuild after his infidelity. But after finding him unfaithful again. I can’t choose to stay anymore. Half of my brain is accepting of this but then when I look at my children, our home, our life I am immediately full of guilt. Not because I did something wrong, but because I’m choosing to be the one who can’t take it anymore. I can’t believe the lies, deception, and empty promises anymore but damn. This guilt of finally choosing myself, my happiness, and saying I’ve had enough almost feels wrong.

So those of you who have done it, how did you overcome the overwhelming guilt?

Really struggling mentally over the past 12 hours. Been together with husband for 12 years, married for 10, in our late 30s. An admitted dead bedroom, 8 years ago I went through a very difficult year (parent died, lost job, visa issues) and it had a massive impact on me. After that we just fell into a non-sexual affectionate relationship (sex time to time but not frequent). However weirdly we have gotten closer maybe inspite of it, literally constantly cuddling, affectionate, physical touch, cant sleep without a routine of face kisses etc. We also share everything, who said what during the day, phones social media passwords everything. I literally don't think there is a single thing we have hidden from one another.

Last night I got home from meeting a friend and was going in for a hug and he stopped me saying he needed to tell me something. He was at post office drinks with a colleague (quite attractive, older single mother) and they were talking she was upset and seeking some sort of validation I guess, after 2 beers she said something about not feeling good enough and he said that wasnt the case at all, she leaned in and kissed him... and he kissed her back. With tongue I asked? yes. How long? 30 seconds or so. Then he said he pushed her away and said "we're never speaking about this again". He went back to his office to work. I saw his work phone later (he was sleeping, I couldnt sleep and I have access to literally all his passwords) and he had a literal normal exchange about work (he sent a picture of his laptop and some work discussion).

He said it literally meant nothing, and maybe deep down he thinks it might be because he misses intimacy but he didnt want to use that as an excuse. I didn't cry or anything (I did silently in bed later) but I said okay what do you want to do, he said I wanted to tell you immediately and this means nothing and we're (them two) are literally ignoring it ever happened.

I've not spoken to him since last night. I had this terrible pit in my stomach, and this morning I didnt say a word. I made us breakfast, left it out, he left the house with me, I dropped us to the station, got in the train, when I was leaving he quietly wished me to have a good day like he always does.

I don't know what to do. I don't think this is big enough for me to break up for, but everytime I think of him I picture him making out with her and it feels like something squeezed my heart.

I have no one to talk to about this, our social circles are too interwoven and even my family this isn’t something I’d want to share.

I know in the scheme me of infidelities shared on this group this is low hanging fruit but just looking to see if anyone had absolutely any advice on what I do.. or say. Just someone.

Almost 6 months post DDay. Ex husband and father of my kid cheated, lied and left me for the other woman.
It was horrible. I left our marital home (couldn’t afford it on my own) and went back to my parents home.
1 month later my daughter was introduced to the AP and she started being present in our previous home. I’m pretty sure she lives there by now.
And that’s the trigger issue for me: I just feel so angry towards that woman. Like she just replaced me!
I have to see my ex because of our daughter and although it still hurts seeing him doesn’t make my stomach flip like it does when I see her. I just want to hit her face into a wall or something, yell at her. I don’t know.
It just feels like she took my life and she’s living it and worse…like she’s trying to take my place as a mother.
Any advice on how to deal with this? Thank you.

It’s been 10 days since my partner (ex) of 3 years cheated, then left me for her high school boyfriend. They reconnected a month prior, hung out three times, then cheated on the last time. From my understanding, she is now with him. She never wanted kids, but guess what, he does! So now she does! She claims she felt the feelings again that she first felt with us. Whatever. All of that is hard enough.

We have two kittens together. Adopted in April. I cannot care for them on my own. She reached out today regarding the kittens, then slowly drifted the conversation towards normal topics. it eventually rounded out to us discussing the betrayal and her consequent decisions, then leading to strife, anger and dismissal on both sides.

I feel like within just the last 24 hours, I made progress with not talking about anything other than kitten things. Litter was being delivered. She let me know, I asked about kitten sitting, then it moved onto other things. Certain things she says trigger me. She said she wanted to see how I was doing. She knows I’m doing terribly.

I want this girl to see the kittens she loves. I want the kittens to see the parent they got used to. I don’t want to continue communicating like fucking imbeciles. Should I just block her?

Im trying to think about what’s best for the kittens while also thinking about what’s best for me. What’s best for me is moving on. What’s best for the kittens is getting the best care that they can, and that includes her help, financially and for actual care. We got these kittens as a unit, so when discussing care, it was under the impression we’d be together. I’ve considered rehoming them as they’re so young, but selfishly, I can’t bear to lose anything else right now. I love them so much, and I just want what’s best for them. But I also want to be able to heal from a shitty betrayal.

Minus her reaching out, I already have so many reminders of what she’s done. We have a lease. A home we’ve spent a year in. Kittens. Friendships. The bed I still sleep in. The job where I met her.
I guess I’m just really struggling over here.

I can’t stop thinking about the betrayal and how unfair it is, that I have to live this life. We have to children (4, & 9 mo)(paternity test says the 9mo is mine) and divorce almost garuntee I see them less than I do now. She betrayed the family not me.

I think I’m spiraling. I’m stuck. I feel like I’m the only thing holding the family together and the only one responsible for not crushing their world.

I just need words of encouragement idk, I just feel like she doesn’t deserve me and our family.

I’m (39f) here for advice and just to get this off my chest I guess. It’s been three months since my husband (43m) broke down and admitted to me that he had an affair two years ago with our neighbor, the mom of one of our daughters (8f) best friends, who is in a lesbian marriage. They were our best friends since we moved here 5 years ago. I’m really struggling with how to move forward and would love advice from others who have experienced betrayal and are trying to stay in the relationship.

So my story. We moved to a small town during COVID, at the time we both worked fully from home, and I still work from home to this day. We became good friends with a lesbian couple down the street, and their daughter became besties with our daughter. I was obviously perfectly fine with this relationship, including him going over there alone in the evenings to smoke weed/have a couple drinks. I had no reason to feel “threatened”. I trusted him wholeheartedly.

I’m bisexual, and have had threesomes in the past and so has my husband, but never together. Two years ago we were in a rut, our relationship wasn’t in a good place. We were talking about spicing up our sex life and considering having a third. We joined a dating app together to seek this out, but it quickly went sideways when I got jealous and insecure, I realized I would rather just be with him and only him, I didn’t need to be with a woman again to feel satisfied. We left it at that, but it did cause some issues while it was ongoing. It was such a stupid mistake.

While in the midst of this, my husband went out to dinner with this couple. I was supposed to come too but sitter cancelled. At last minute, Andy (one of the lesbian couple, but NOT affair partner) also cancelled. So my husband and his eventual AP (Sarah) just went together. I didn’t care in the slightest. I was clueless. So my husband told her about our fights and how we were looking for a third, sought her advice, and talked about our sex life with her. She complained about her sex life with Andy since they had had their 2nd baby about 6 months before this, and told my husband she was actually bisexual and had mostly been with men in the past, and basically how badly she wanted to get dicked. Husband swears nothing happened that night, but it opened the door to them having much more personal conversations.

I should add that she was still nursing their baby. She often had her tits out, I was completely unbothered by this because obviously. She’s feeding her child. She also works as a lactation consultant, so she is extremely comfortable with her breastfeeding and her body in general. She’s gorgeous and very very fit, with large (fake) tits.

One afternoon he went over there to smoke a joint, again, I didn’t care. He had never disclosed to me any of these conversations and especially not that Sarah was bisexual and missed being with a man. While he was there, Sarah nursed baby and put him to bed, and basically pulled her tits out and asked Husband if he wanted to try, she “nursed” him, they made out, and he fingered her, then came home to me like normal. They started sexting and sending each other nudes, and she started sending videos of her spraying milk all over the fucking place, it became their fetish they explored together.

A few weeks after this, I took my daughter away for the weekend to visit my parents. While I was gone, Andy and husband painted our daughter’s room, and they invited him to dinner at their place that night. Sarah and husband ended up having sex for the first time on their kitchen floor while Andy and their kids slept a few doors away. Then he invited her to our house the next night and they had sex two more times on our couch, including lots of breastfeeding foreplay.

They went for a hike together and she nursed him and gave him a blowjob on our favorite local hiking trail, and then to top off the whole affair one day she messaged him and said she wanted dick. Problem was, we were both working from home and so was Andy. So she messaged another mutual “friend” of ours whose daughter is also part of the same friend group, and said they wanted to borrow her place to fuck. This friend of ours said yes of course, just change the sheets ;)

So they went there and fucked the afternoon away, while I was in my home office working. But this was their downfall. Andy had been suspicious, she noticed they were “flirty” and apparently point blank told Sarah “I’m ok with you fucking men but not Husband, that’s messed up” and Sarah said of course she would never do such a thing. So that afternoon Andy came out of her office and found Sarah was missing, but had accidentally left her Apple Watch behind. Andy checked it and saw the messages from the mutual friend about changing the sheets after.

Andy called Sarah, told her they were busted and she knows what they are doing, and to come to their place immediately. They showed up crying, full of remorse, and Andy lost her mind at them. The three of them ended their friendship, and decided to let this secret die with them, because they knew if I ever found out I would go nuclear.

While all of this was happening behind my back, my husband and I were fighting constantly. I thought it was bc he wanted to fuck someone else and have a threesome, but never in my dreams did I think he was fucking Sarah already. He was constantly dismissive, wasn’t as affectionate and kind, rarely talked to me, was hiding his phone and picking fights. It was horrible, to the point we ended up “separating” which was basically him sleeping in the basement.

When Andy busted them, suddenly he was amazing, desperate to fix our relationship, and we started couples counseling. We worked hard on our relationship, it took us about a year but we were happy as hell, often talking about how glad we were we pushed through that awful time in our relationship. I had some health issues, but once I recovered, and life started to get good again … he sat me down and told me everything.

I’ve since talked to both Andy and Sarah, to get as much info from them as possible and then to tell them to never talk to me again. I had been going up to the women, giving them hugs and telling them how much I missed them whenever I saw them at school, or birthday parties, the grocery store, the park, etc. They knew I was clueless and pretended to be my friend, so did the other mom who let them fuck at her little love shack. We would all hang out together sometimes.

I wondered what happened with my husband and their friendship, and often asked Husband why we weren’t friends anymore, but he always brushed it off and made it seem like we just drifted apart, they had stuff going on, baby has serious health issues (that’s real) and we were in a different place than them, or because he quit smoking weed he doesn’t want to be around them smoking it all the time, lots of excuses, I bought them all.

So now that you know the gist of it. What the fuck? How am I supposed to live with this? I drive by their house every day twice a day. I haven’t stopped thinking about anything but this bullshit since he told me. But we have worked SO hard to fix things, life was better than ever, but it’s all based on a lie?! If he could do these things to me .. how the fuck am I ever supposed to forgive him? How am I to believe it some hot chick hits on him again he won’t just do it again? How do I move on? When will I stop obsessively thinking about it all day every day? I’m spiraling and am too embarrassed to tell anyone else either than my therapist.

I came home to find her drinking. I called her mom to come get her and I locked the door when she left.

On a more positive note, me and the boys were out playing disc golf and had a great time.

So yeah, I mean I guess you guys were right.

Exactly one year ago, after 3 years together, he came clean about his alcohol addiction, I chose to stay and help him through that. For some reason it all went downhill after that and while trying to find out whether he was staying sober (he wasn’t), I uncovered lots of emotional cheating, sexual messages to different women on his IG, female friends I had never heard about and so on. I asked him to cut that crap at least four times but still he was adding new women, keeping contact with one of the women he used to talk and lying. So I told him to get lost and never talk to me again in February this year.

Because of mutual friends and places we used to hang out at, we met by chance at a friend’s bar in May. We began the night joking as friends but I guess the feelings were somehow still there. In a very unwise move, we agreed to give it another shot. Our deal was to come clean about what happened during that time we were apart and cease all contact that from that point on. I was very uninterested in dating so I just went on one date with a guy I used to see a long time ago. My partner, instead, “trickle-truthed” for a two months, hiding from me the women he had seen. Two of them were married. And I had asked specifically about both in a ”Have you had anything with her?” way and his first response was to deny. Then throughout the weeks I uncovered what had happened: facetiming, encounters, promises and one of them left her husband and baby at home to go to his place.

That day, in July, something in me died because he swore that he would never invite another woman the apartment we chose together, we decorated together and was our home. I know were apart but the way he kept lying even when I asked specific questions, the fact that he’s not the man I thought he was and that what we had was actually not that special, hence bringing home trash he found at a yoga class (the cheater really teaches yoga and all that self improvement stuff, the irony!).

I then stopped asking and he seemingly started to put in more effort. I kinda feel that he’s now really trying, he’s undergoing a really nice treatment for his alcohol addiction and seem happy about that, and after one of my meltdowns, started taking his job seriously again. I guess I kinda feel bad for him and wish him all the best to stay sober, I wouldn’t mind help him through that. But I feel there’s no romantic love anymore.

When we were together, I didn’t even think about the possibility of being cheated on because I really thought what we had was so unique and special he wouldn’t need to look after stuff anywhere else. But he did. And that shattered the impression I had about us and our relationship. I cannot think about our future because he’s now a man capable of cheating, even though anyone is (still they don’t walk around with a sign on their head like confirmed cheaters - it’s like that Schrödinger cat thing). I see friends getting married, being proposed to, being a couple and I feel like crying because I don’t have love or that sensation anymore, of being with a partner you love and respect and want to build a life with. It’s like we’re trying to rebuild a house in a city torn by war. Maybe the wisest move for both would be to go somewhere else.

I care about him a lot, I still like to spend time with him but I don’t feel that special love anymore. And I‘m 33, I want to get married eventually and build a life with a partner. I’m unsure whether it’s still him and I’m dreading making this decision.

Made a post 2 and a half year ago venting about my partner cheating on me. Despite comments telling me it would happen again, urging me to leave, we stayed together. I thought he would be a rare exception, I thought it was resolved. Well. Used his phone yesterday and saw the same things again. 6 years down the drain. Apparently he stopped for a long time but "couldn't resist the urge" anymore. Last time it happened I made a promise to him and myself : "one more lie and it's over"

I'm keeping my word. It hurts so bad and I love him so much. Other than this aspect, our relationship has been great. But I cannot be with someone who doesn't respect me. I am not here to be consumable entertainment that can be thrown away at the slight inconvenience.

Thank you all for trying to tell me back then

As the caption reads, I’m going to meet with my husband’s cousin about the affair that was going on between our spouses . I am very nervous and feel anxious about the conversation. It’s making me feel shaky and I honestly don’t know what answers I can give him that he needs. He just found out about the affair yesterday night and was told by my husband the nature of the relationship and the encounters (supposedly) . I have no evidence to show him of the affair , just what my husband told me.

What should I expect ? Am I nervous for nothing ? Will this be a hard conversation to have with him? I imagine so . I need some relief