6 months since DDay

[lostnadrift]

Your story is even more heartbroken than mine. Just found out today that the reason we broke up wasn't just because of her falling out of love with me due to her responsibility as a mother, but that she cheated on me with another guy. I allow her to go back to her home country to visit family and stuff, but it turned out she was hooking up with a guy there and was lying to me the whole time. Saying that she's glad the relationship is over because it's so stressful and that having a relationship with anyone right now is out of the question. So I decided to spy on her and low and behold she has someone in Vietnam after just 1 month there. This is after a 4 year LTR.

 

Funny thing is she still have the audacity to say that she want to be friends with me BS after I presented to her the evidence.

 

I'm sorry to hear that.. I hope you find emotional support here. You might not find answers, but you will sure find that you're not alone.

[BetrayedH]

Try not to beat yourself up too badly. Gaslighting happened to many of us. We fell for it because we loved and trusted them. There are worse crimes in this story than yours.

 

Give yourself time to adjust (a lot of time). I'm 3 1/2 years post Dday and still adjusting. No, it won't ever be "the same" again (and yes, that's a shame) but it can still be good. I think you're smart enough to know that your view will mature over time and you'll come to a better place with all of it. There will be more balance. You will be stronger and smarter and less emotional about it. You won't necessarily hate her but you won't love her either. You'll see her more as a broken person and one you couldn't fix. And you'll even agree with many of the early posters that said you were "lucky" to have found out before marriage and children. In that regard, I'm jealous of you. (Go figure, huh?)

[happyman64]

Lost

 

You only made one mistake IMO.

 

You did not take all of their messages/texts and expose their affair to their friends and family.

 

In most cases I would normally say that you should walk away.

 

But when someone goes out if their way to lie, cheat, steal, plot to defraud property/$$$ and lay a false pregnancy claim on you then I feel you have an obligation to expose people like this to friends and family so the do not do this again.

 

People like this need consequences. Not for revenge but to what is right.

 

No matter what I think you have your head on tight and a bright future ahead of you.

 

I can relate to your story way too much. I decimated my Ex and her OM. Sadly they were good friends of mine.

 

But it needed to be done.

 

HM

[lostnadrift]

Try not to beat yourself up too badly. Gaslighting happened to many of us. We fell for it because we loved and trusted them. There are worse crimes in this story than yours.

 

Give yourself time to adjust (a lot of time). I'm 3 1/2 years post Dday and still adjusting. No, it won't ever be "the same" again (and yes, that's a shame) but it can still be good. I think you're smart enough to know that your view will mature over time and you'll come to a better place with all of it. There will be more balance. You will be stronger and smarter and less emotional about it. You won't necessarily hate her but you won't love her either. You'll see her more as a broken person and one you couldn't fix. And you'll even agree with many of the early posters that said you were "lucky" to have found out before marriage and children. In that regard, I'm jealous of you. (Go figure, huh?)

 

Can I ask how long was your relationship with her? I heard it generally takes half the length of the relationship to get over it. Thank you I do hope so.. I do agree that I'm lucky because I can totally sever all ties with her if I wish to. I hope your situation isn't too bad yourself..

[lostnadrift]

Lost

 

You only made one mistake IMO.

 

You did not take all of their messages/texts and expose their affair to their friends and family.

 

In most cases I would normally say that you should walk away.

 

But when someone goes out if their way to lie, cheat, steal, plot to defraud property/$$$ and lay a false pregnancy claim on you then I feel you have an obligation to expose people like this to friends and family so the do not do this again.

 

People like this need consequences. Not for revenge but to what is right.

 

No matter what I think you have your head on tight and a bright future ahead of you.

 

I can relate to your story way too much. I decimated my Ex and her OM. Sadly they were good friends of mine.

 

But it needed to be done.

 

HM

 

Sigh, I can't bring myself to. It will destroy her and her future.

[BetrayedH]

Can I ask how long was your relationship with her? I heard it generally takes half the length of the relationship to get over it. Thank you I do hope so.. I do agree that I'm lucky because I can totally sever all ties with her if I wish to. I hope your situation isn't too bad yourself..

 

I was with my wife for 18 years (6 dating and 12 married). Much like how you described that all of your "plans" were connected with her, every goal and action I had taken in life for the previous decade or so was centered around the family unit. To have it irreversibly nuked on Dday was overwhelming. Truth be told, I am still floundering for direction a bit. I would probably just move and start over but that's not an option when you've got kids together. I've got another decade to ride out before my youngest would be headed to college.

 

My situation was similar in terms of thinking she was incapable of such deliberate betrayal. I now tend to think that we project our own values and thought-processes onto others. We assume that they would think and act as we would. It's a natural assumption, I suppose. But it's one I try not to make anymore. What I try to do now is to watch for empathy. I look to see how they treat others, especially to those they don't need to provide respect (such as people in the service industry). It's interesting when you deliberately look at someone's interactions with others to discern if they are selfish or empathetic; in many cases, a person's true self is revealed even though you are there watching. I used to be very attracted to women who were intelligent and women who were sexual. Those are pretty secondary now.

 

As for how I am doing...hmm, I'm still a work in progress. My wife's betrayal was pretty horrific. And our children are still young (8 and 12); sharing 50/50 custody of your kids with someone like that is a special category of difficult.

[tobrieornottobrie]

I'm so sorry that you are hurting so deeply. I know you mentioned you went to individual counseling once, are you open to the idea of continuing? Just something for you to think about. Having a professional therapist or counselor could potentially prove extremely useful as you are trying to navigate everything that has happened. I really hope that things get better for you, keep your chin up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

the brie's cheese knees

[drifter777]

You wouldn't say that if you knew me IRL. I've lost jobs because I stood up and refused to take **** and unfair treatment from the boss even when it ran counter to culture. I've walked out of "friendships". Adviced friends to dump their overly demanding girlfriends because that's not wife material.

 

But when it comes to love, I had always believed it to be ever patient and giving and to have no end, no bounds. To love with all and everything. Purely and unreservedly. But now that's called codependency or being a doormat.

You think I'm being harsh - but that's sometimes appropriate. If I understand your OP, she cheated and then continued to treat you very badly. Gas-lighting you and continuing to see other guy while pretending she still wanted you. Horrible stuff. Taking advantage of a man for whom love and sex are precious. A man who has worshiped her. Men like you - and a young me - are very vulnerable in a relationship. We often choose spoiled, entitled women because - well - I don't know why. But we do and we do everything we can to keep them happy & loving us. Over time, real life intrudes on this scenario and while we still love them and want to please them, we can't keep up that initial crazy-in-love romantic thing. Then one day they meet a guy who drools over them and tells them every flattering thing they want/need to hear. They love it, it excites them, and they cant wait to see this guy again. They will happily trade sex to keep this wonderful, new man around. And their entitlement thing kicks in and helps them rationalize it all with things like "my SO just doesn't appreciate me" and/or "my SO isn't meeting my needs". Ok, does all of this sound familiar?

 

You say your tough in business & your interactions with your guy friends. But you admit that you are not this way in a love relationship. I'm saying you need to change the way you relate to women in a relationship. To not see them as an angel that God put here just for you. They are flawed people just like the rest of us, and just because they want you doesn't magically make them perfect. You can't go back and be tougher with your eX, but you can learn from it. That's why I'm urging you to get into counseling and work on this issue. You can modify the way you interact with women and give yourself a better chance at a healthy, happier relationship in the future.

[murphomatic]

I'm so sorry, friend. I've been through a marginally similar hell - though we were married for 18 months before dday rolled around.

 

It may sound harsh, but don't spend another minute being sad about that sociopathic cake-eater you were with. Like most cake eaters, she is incapable of considering that other people have valuable feelings and emotions - only hers matter and she'll take whatever she wants...and do it with a sense of justice. It's appalling and disturbing, and reflection on her with wishful thinking is just an absolute -WASTE- of your valuable mental energy.

 

Keep focusing on you, stay busy, do the things you love...eventually the right person will come along who actually believes that your feelings MATTER and have VALUE. She's out there.

 

Little miss oh-so-pretty-so-I'm-allowed-to-use-and-fnck-whomever-I-choose will get hers someday. She'll wind up a used up old hag with no legacy and no life....she never bothered to think about other people, or even her own future...forever caught in the here-and-now, life will pass her by at an alarming rate. One day, she'll wake up broke and alone, and think about the guy she could've built a future with....and how she pissed it away for a simple piece of c0ck that wasn't worth half a *s h i t* in the first place.

[NateGrey]

It really is sad that the innocence of loving someone wholeheartedly ends up being labeled as "doormat" or "codependent" or "self-esteem" issues.

 

I hate to break this to you, but people are right on to label him a doormat. There is no other way, not when you consider this guy admits he became her chauffeur, etc. AFTER finding out she cheated on him. That he went so far as to convince his parents this was all his fault.

 

So no, that goes a step beyond merely loving someone wholeheartedly. If a girl cheats on you and your response is to be willing to work on the relationship that is one thing. If she cheats and your response is to begin carting her ass around in a car wherever she wants to go? You are a doormat. Just reading of the things he did for her after SHE cheated and after SHE showed resistance to giving him all the rightful info he wanted and resistance dumping the OM..it actually made me wince reading it. Sort of like as a man if you see another man get booted in the nuts you might wince.

 

I'm not trying to insult the OP, but you can't fault people for seeing this behavior and labeling it as the behavior of a doormat. The positive thing is that the OP realized eventually that he was a doormat(and that his gf was a hooker) and rightfully got rid of her. Now she is free to act as hookerish and without any morals or self respect as she wants. He can take solace in the fact he knows this woman will never be anything but a notch to the guy she cheated with.

[NateGrey]

I can relate to your story way too much. I decimated my Ex and her OM. Sadly they were good friends of mine.

 

But it needed to be done.

 

HM

 

I don't mean to veer a bit off topic, but how did you decimate your ex and her OM? Sorry, it's just reading some of these topics has made me pretty depressed, I need a pick me up and hearing about a cheater getting what they deserve is probably just what the doctor ordered, especially since the OP has said he isn't going to do the right thing and expose this women to her friends and family.

[oldshirt]

Sigh, I can't bring myself to. It will destroy her and her future.

 

She didn't blink twice about screwing you over and you were were acting in good faith.

 

Some of her acts weren't simply selfish and distasteful but were actually evil and even potentially criminal. Evil flourishes and propagates in the dark. The only way to combat it is to shine the light on it.

 

Make copies of her dialogs of plotting to say his baby was yours and her plans to defraud your property and expose them to all so all can see her for what she really is.

 

Eventually this stud is going to dump her and when he does she is going to find another naive, trusting guy and really screw him over.

 

This situation is analogous to a guy date raping a woman and the woman not wanting to report him because it will harm his image in the publics eye. If she doesn't report and expose it, it just allows him to continue to rape others.

[NateGrey]

That is an excellent point and something the OP needs to seriously consider: this woman needs to be exposed. Otherwise you are essentially saying her future happiness means more to you then the possibility she will just defraud some other poor sap in the future..because why wouldn't she try this again? Especially since she can look back at your relationship and make a checklist of everything she did that caused you to catch her..and she will know not to repeat those mistakes.

 

So not only is it likely she will repeat this behavior, but it is likely she will be better at getting away with it as well. Please expose her, don't let her get to do to another guy what she tried to do to you. Plus think of her family too: if she will defraud you and be act all hookerish, you think she would hesitate to defraud other family and friends?

 

Do the entire world a solid, do men everywhere a solid: expose her.

[road]

I don't mean to veer a bit off topic, but how did you decimate your ex and her OM? Sorry, it's just reading some of these topics has made me pretty depressed, I need a pick me up and hearing about a cheater getting what they deserve is probably just what the doctor ordered, especially since the OP has said he isn't going to do the right thing and expose this women to her friends and family.

 

Yes, but start a new thread for this subject.

[Raena]

I hate to break this to you, but people are right on to label him a doormat. There is no other way, not when you consider this guy admits he became her chauffeur, etc. AFTER finding out she cheated on him. That he went so far as to convince his parents this was all his fault.

 

So no, that goes a step beyond merely loving someone wholeheartedly. If a girl cheats on you and your response is to be willing to work on the relationship that is one thing. If she cheats and your response is to begin carting her ass around in a car wherever she wants to go? You are a doormat. Just reading of the things he did for her after SHE cheated and after SHE showed resistance to giving him all the rightful info he wanted and resistance dumping the OM..it actually made me wince reading it. Sort of like as a man if you see another man get booted in the nuts you might wince.

 

I'm not trying to insult the OP, but you can't fault people for seeing this behavior and labeling it as the behavior of a doormat. The positive thing is that the OP realized eventually that he was a doormat(and that his gf was a hooker) and rightfully got rid of her. Now she is free to act as hookerish and without any morals or self respect as she wants. He can take solace in the fact he knows this woman will never be anything but a notch to the guy she cheated with.

 

Yeah, I understand your point of view. I think I wasn't just talking about this particular incidence, was speaking in more general terms. People tend to say exactly that as their first initial response to situations like this. "You're a doormat" "You must have self-esteem issues if you let someone treat you like that" "Your relationship with him/her was codependent, you should go get counseling". While it may be true, it's too easy to just slap a label on it all rather than realize that the dynamics of relationships aren't that easy and simple.

 

I will say also that it's something I keep telling myself too... it's all my fault that I was treated the way I was treated. It's mine. I own it. Why? Not because I take responsibility for my exes actions, but because I take responsibility for my own. It couldn't have happened to me if I didn't allow it. That's not taking into account the FIRST time someone treats you like crap. It's all the times after that first time that they treat you like crap. They couldn't do that if the relationship ended after the first incident.

 

None of this takes into account feelings and desires and love. It's much easier to recognize that you don't like something someone did than to just walk away from them because they did it. I never in a million years thought I'd ever put up with the crap I put up with. But I did. Why? Because the truth of the situation never smacks you right in the face all at once. That comes from hindsight. From looking BACK at the entirety of the relationship and realizing that it wasn't just one incidence, it's ALL of it. It's realizing that you didn't know the whole truth about the situation at the time. This is especially true if you are being gaslighted and lied to repeatedly. Gah, it can almost make you go crazy thinking it's your own fault that they did what they did to you.

 

In this situation described by the OP I can see why he'd go blaming himself for the problems in their relationship and then bend over backwards trying to fix it. Isn't that what you are supposed to do? Fix it? Do what you can to make the other person realize that you do in fact love them and you'd do whatever it takes to make it work? In his case, he thought driving her around would make her happier so he did it. He thought it WAS his fault that she was becoming distant so he blamed himself for it. I'm guessing that if he knew the whole truth at that moment, he wouldn't have been blaming himself and trying to change his behaviors to make her happy.

[lostnadrift]

I was with my wife for 18 years (6 dating and 12 married). Much like how you described that all of your "plans" were connected with her, every goal and action I had taken in life for the previous decade or so was centered around the family unit. To have it irreversibly nuked on Dday was overwhelming. Truth be told, I am still floundering for direction a bit. I would probably just move and start over but that's not an option when you've got kids together. I've got another decade to ride out before my youngest would be headed to college.

 

I'm sorry, my heart goes out to you..

 

My situation was similar in terms of thinking she was incapable of such deliberate betrayal. I now tend to think that we project our own values and thought-processes onto others. We assume that they would think and act as we would. It's a natural assumption, I suppose. But it's one I try not to make anymore. What I try to do now is to watch for empathy. I look to see how they treat others, especially to those they don't need to provide respect (such as people in the service industry). It's interesting when you deliberately look at someone's interactions with others to discern if they are selfish or empathetic; in many cases, a person's true self is revealed even though you are there watching. I used to be very attracted to women who were intelligent and women who were sexual. Those are pretty secondary now.

 

This is so true. It's the only working model we have because we can only truly know our own minds and even so, not all the time.

 

As for how I am doing...hmm, I'm still a work in progress. My wife's betrayal was pretty horrific. And our children are still young (8 and 12); sharing 50/50 custody of your kids with someone like that is a special category of difficult.

 

Please hang on there.. Focus on your children.

 

Fortune is capricious, I guess we have to learn to relinquish the desire to have control over the things we can't control (things that happen to us) and focus on the things we can control (our responses and actions).

 

Hard to do but requires practice and patience.

[lostnadrift]

I'm so sorry that you are hurting so deeply. I know you mentioned you went to individual counseling once, are you open to the idea of continuing? Just something for you to think about. Having a professional therapist or counselor could potentially prove extremely useful as you are trying to navigate everything that has happened. I really hope that things get better for you, keep your chin up.

 

the brie's cheese knees

 

Thank you for your sympathy.. I went to see a counsellor during the immediate period because I was emotionally draining my parents.. It's not a cultural norm here to go for counseling, there's a stigma attached to it and it's costly also..

 

That being said I'm taking proactive steps to recover, for example sharing my story here and reading about the stories of others. I guess what I needed was a sense that I wasn't alone in this traumatic experience and life changing for me as it may be, there are many others who have struggled through worst. Puts things in perspective.

 

Thank you, Im sure with time it will..

[lostnadrift]

You think I'm being harsh - but that's sometimes appropriate. If I understand your OP, she cheated and then continued to treat you very badly. Gas-lighting you and continuing to see other guy while pretending she still wanted you. Horrible stuff. Taking advantage of a man for whom love and sex are precious. A man who has worshiped her. Men like you - and a young me - are very vulnerable in a relationship. We often choose spoiled, entitled women because - well - I don't know why. But we do and we do everything we can to keep them happy & loving us. Over time, real life intrudes on this scenario and while we still love them and want to please them, we can't keep up that initial crazy-in-love romantic thing. Then one day they meet a guy who drools over them and tells them every flattering thing they want/need to hear. They love it, it excites them, and they cant wait to see this guy again. They will happily trade sex to keep this wonderful, new man around. And their entitlement thing kicks in and helps them rationalize it all with things like "my SO just doesn't appreciate me" and/or "my SO isn't meeting my needs". Ok, does all of this sound familiar?

 

I can take tough advice don't worry about. That is true but only on hindsight knowing what I know now. And that point in time in between ddays I didn't know about the continued interactions with OM. I wasn't deliberately being a doormat. When dday2 happened I let her go. Of course you could say I should've have kicked her to the kerb after dday1. I didn't have it in me to do so I loved her so much. I understand how that can be seen as doormat behavior.

 

Girls like these have low self esteem and generally rely heavily on external validation to keep their moods up. My ex had low self esteem. So when the validation from us gets tripped up for whatever reason, they fall prey to honeyed words. Yes very familiar.

 

You say your tough in business & your interactions with your guy friends. But you admit that you are not this way in a love relationship. I'm saying you need to change the way you relate to women in a relationship. To not see them as an angel that God put here just for you. They are flawed people just like the rest of us, and just because they want you doesn't magically make them perfect. You can't go back and be tougher with your eX, but you can learn from it. That's why I'm urging you to get into counseling and work on this issue. You can modify the way you interact with women and give yourself a better chance at a healthy, happier relationship in the future.

 

I had very firm boundaries with my rebound. Dblebetrayal got it on the nose- every little infraction sets off the spider sense. In fact one of the reasons I dumped her was because she kept testing those boundaries to further her own agenda which really pissed me off.

 

About seeing the counsellor to change the way I relate to women- I dont know if it's something that has to be learnt didactically from a counsellor or an automatic response developed as a result of the trauma.

 

My mind was clearer with the new girl. Maybe it's just because I wasn't so souped up on dopamine with the new girl compared to the oxytocin fog I had with my ex.

 

Funny thing though, now that I'm single, I actually still care more about the ex than the new girl. Even though the new girl just irritated me while my ex destroyed me. Funny thing emotions.

Edited December 13, 2014 by lostnadrift

[lostnadrift]

I'm so sorry, friend. I've been through a marginally similar hell - though we were married for 18 months before dday rolled around.

 

I'm so sorry to hear.. Must've been messier since you were married..

 

It may sound harsh, but don't spend another minute being sad about that sociopathic cake-eater you were with. Like most cake eaters, she is incapable of considering that other people have valuable feelings and emotions - only hers matter and she'll take whatever she wants...and do it with a sense of justice. It's appalling and disturbing, and reflection on her with wishful thinking is just an absolute -WASTE- of your valuable mental energy.

 

You know the thing is that she has always been a very sweet and sensitive person. I'm not defending or minimizing her actions but that's really who she is/was. Her emotional intelligence is high as opposed to my brutish and insensitive ways where I just cut to the chase and dispense with pleasantries.

 

What you just said, she has said about me before. That I always belittle her and don't take her opinions seriously. That we've always been doing things my way.

 

Looking back, I've always been the decision maker when it comes to the important things like whether to buy a car or not (I'll be one paying after all) or what type of property to buy (it made more sense to buy a cheaper one as we were just starting out in life). I didn't treat her like an equal. I always felt I had to hold her hand when it came to the important stuff because I am older than her. I had to take care of her and protect her. I didn't want us to make bad decisions which would land us in trouble next time. So she didn't felt heard.

 

I guess that amount of resentment gave her enough ammunition to treat me with such cruelty. Till today she still hates me. Maybe that's why.

 

Keep focusing on you, stay busy, do the things you love...eventually the right person will come along who actually believes that your feelings MATTER and have VALUE. She's out there.

 

Little miss oh-so-pretty-so-I'm-allowed-to-use-and-fnck-whomever-I-choose will get hers someday. She'll wind up a used up old hag with no legacy and no life....she never bothered to think about other people, or even her own future...forever caught in the here-and-now, life will pass her by at an alarming rate. One day, she'll wake up broke and alone, and think about the guy she could've built a future with....and how she pissed it away for a simple piece of c0ck that wasn't worth half a *s h i t* in the first place.

 

Thank you dear friend for your angry support.. But I do hope that doesn't happen to her.. I hope she recovers and heals from this ordeal. I hope she learns and never repeats the same mistakes again. I sincerely hope she finds happiness and a satisfying life. I hope she learns to value and to internally validate herself. I still love her though we can't be together. Sigh. I sound stupid and naive. But that's how I feel..

[lostnadrift]

I hate to break this to you, but people are right on to label him a doormat. There is no other way, not when you consider this guy admits he became her chauffeur, etc. AFTER finding out she cheated on him. That he went so far as to convince his parents this was all his fault.

 

I would label me a doormat too looking at myself from outside my situation.

 

I pedestalized her, "this isn't what I know her to be! she must've suffered so much with me to have resorted to this, circumstantially, it's got to be my fault! I've got to right this wrong. If it doesn't work out, at least I know I've tried my best.." This was roughly the rationale for my actions after dday1. Doormatish? Maybe yes retrospectively.

 

After dday2 however. I was just filled with anger, and I immediately broke it off with her. It made it clear for me. I had done my best after I found out. I was generous with R but she had spurned it. 6 months later there are no ifs or buts about my decision in my rational mind, painful though it is emotionally for me.

 

So no, that goes a step beyond merely loving someone wholeheartedly. If a girl cheats on you and your response is to be willing to work on the relationship that is one thing. If she cheats and your response is to begin carting her ass around in a car wherever she wants to go? You are a doormat. Just reading of the things he did for her after SHE cheated and after SHE showed resistance to giving him all the rightful info he wanted and resistance dumping the OM..it actually made me wince reading it. Sort of like as a man if you see another man get booted in the nuts you might wince.

 

In my mind I was making up to her. I can't control her actions. But I sure could control mine and I tried my best to save the relationship. It made it very clear what I had to do next after dday2.

 

I'm not trying to insult the OP, but you can't fault people for seeing this behavior and labeling it as the behavior of a doormat. The positive thing is that the OP realized eventually that he was a doormat(and that his gf was a hooker) and rightfully got rid of her. Now she is free to act as hookerish and without any morals or self respect as she wants. He can take solace in the fact he knows this woman will never be anything but a notch to the guy she cheated with.

 

It's ok I don't see it as an insult.

 

Reading the guy's side of the dialogue, I found out that he had been getting her to break up with me. Eventually she told him she did but she couldn't bear to break up with me so she just avoided the situation altogether and just basically 2-timed us. It was only after dday1 that he found out she didn't really break up with me.

 

So I think he really did think they had a shot at an LTR together at least.

 

He's still a scumbag though. He cheated on his girlfriend with my ex.

[lostnadrift]

She didn't blink twice about screwing you over and you were were acting in good faith.

 

Some of her acts weren't simply selfish and distasteful but were actually evil and even potentially criminal. Evil flourishes and propagates in the dark. The only way to combat it is to shine the light on it.

 

Make copies of her dialogs of plotting to say his baby was yours and her plans to defraud your property and expose them to all so all can see her for what she really is.

 

Eventually this stud is going to dump her and when he does she is going to find another naive, trusting guy and really screw him over.

 

This situation is analogous to a guy date raping a woman and the woman not wanting to report him because it will harm his image in the publics eye. If she doesn't report and expose it, it just allows him to continue to rape others.

 

She didn't explicitly say she wanted to pin the potential baby on me.. I remembered right about that month during the pregnancy scare she told me she might be pregnant and wanted to know what my reaction would be. I told her I would be happy with the results either way because I knew I wanted to spend my life with her. She was very happy with my answer. I never suspected the paternity of the potential baby.

 

She did mention to OM that if she chose him, that I would pay for the downpayment of the property. I however told her that since we're canceling the purchase, we would forfeit our downpayment and I would reimburse her her share of the downpayment since it was "my fault she cheated".

 

Circumstantially, it looked like she would accept the money from me, tell me some how that property has been cancelled, then replace my name with OM's name. But it's not possible at all as I would need to sign for the replacement and I would know.

 

You are right. It is the right thing to do. But I can't bring myself to do it even though I know it is the right thing to do. It will destroy her. She has a history of depression and has expressed a wish to die before. I don't want to push her over the edge. Sigh.

[chimpanA-2-chimpanZ]

First things first: get counseling. I assure you there's a stigma about counseling everywhere; our society still thinks getting counseling is for people who are weak or crazy. It's not. A good therapist can save you decades of tears, anguish and misery, just by giving you the tools you need to take care of yourself. Most employers offer at least six free sessions through their EAPs. Also, if you live in the United States, you or your insurer may be able to find a provider who offers a sliding scale. If you live near a university you should be able to find free professional assistance in their counseling department. Make some phone calls.

 

It sounds like you are both very young, possibly still in college. Unfortunately, most people are at their craziest or worst at this age because they're old enough to be very cruel, but too young to understand the consequences. The good news is that people change dramatically throughout their 20s. Your ex may well grow out of it, recover, and become a decent person. But she'll probably need the help of a good therapist too.

 

My boyfriend met his first love in high school. They fell madly for each other, went to college together, and really made it work. At 21 he proposed. They were engaged for nearly a year until one night she called him, sobbing. "I can't do this anymore. I cheated on you."

 

Needless to say, he was devastated. After trying to work it out for several months they both agreed it was impossible and went their separate ways. He didn't get help and fell into a depression so bleak it came to define him. He eventually settled into this twisted philosophy: some people get to be happy, and some people have to make others happy even if they aren't happy themselves. This is how he ended up in a long-term relationship with a friend who loved him dearly but he didn't reciprocate. He was afraid of being alone and thought he couldn't be happy anymore, but knew she was happy, so he stuck with it. When I first met him he was introduced to me as "the guy who's brilliant but miserable."

 

Is that the future you want for yourself? You have to get ahead of this before it consumes you completely. I won't lie; the next few years of your life are going to be incredibly tough no matter what you do. But getting the help of a professional and practicing cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) will make a huge difference. Your friends can listen to your problems, but they can't help you in an objective, unbiased way, and they don't have the experience to know what you need. If one therapist really isn't working for you don't be afraid to see another. Buy a CBT workbook off Amazon or even look into some CBT phone apps. Make an effort to work on yourself every day.

 

There are precious few certainties in life, but here's one of them: awful things happen. Awful things are guaranteed to happen no matter who or where you are. Your only hope is to learn how to take care of yourself so you can cope with the worst when it comes. What you went through is obviously traumatizing, but you can lessen the degree of that trauma if you're proactive in good self-care.

 

- Go to the gym. (I'm a powerlifter so I'm biased towards this answer, but still!)

- Watch your diet.

- Sleep as much as possible.

- Motivate yourself. Even if it's just "I won't let this break me" written on an index card in your wallet.

- Read a new book on something you know nothing about.

- Find something really ridiculous on Netflix to keep in your back pocket for the hardest times.

- Grab your friends and go places you used to go with her. Try to reclaim these places in your mind.

- Don't try to ignore the horrible thoughts. Instead, set aside 15-30 minutes a day to think about it. When you catch yourself thinking about it just remember that you can deal with it later during that designated time. Eventually you'll discover you're just thinking of the same things, over and over, and it's kind of boring. Shorten that interval until you don't want to think about it at all anymore. Yeah, it takes months.

- GET HELP.

 

You'll make it, I promise. But if you want to avoid years of unhappiness, low self-esteem and failed relationships, you need to start setting the groundwork for a healthy self today.

 

And in case you're wondering what happened to my boyfriend, well, he got help. He ended his painful long-term relationship, moved out and started pursuing his hobbies again. We began dating. He turned into a total rockstar at work. A few months after we began dating, he tearfully confessed it was his first ex's wedding night, but he hadn't thought about it much because he was with me, and how he felt like he was finally capable of being happy in a relationship again. So...nearly six years after being crushed into pieces, he's back and better than ever. But he didn't do it alone. And neither should you.

[lostnadrift]

That is an excellent point and something the OP needs to seriously consider: this woman needs to be exposed. Otherwise you are essentially saying her future happiness means more to you then the possibility she will just defraud some other poor sap in the future..because why wouldn't she try this again? Especially since she can look back at your relationship and make a checklist of everything she did that caused you to catch her..and she will know not to repeat those mistakes.

 

So not only is it likely she will repeat this behavior, but it is likely she will be better at getting away with it as well. Please expose her, don't let her get to do to another guy what she tried to do to you. Plus think of her family too: if she will defraud you and be act all hookerish, you think she would hesitate to defraud other family and friends?

 

Do the entire world a solid, do men everywhere a solid: expose her.

 

I can't do it.. She will kill herself. I don't want her blood on my hands. I can't bear to hurt her.

[lostnadrift]

In this situation described by the OP I can see why he'd go blaming himself for the problems in their relationship and then bend over backwards trying to fix it. Isn't that what you are supposed to do? Fix it? Do what you can to make the other person realize that you do in fact love them and you'd do whatever it takes to make it work? In his case, he thought driving her around would make her happier so he did it. He thought it WAS his fault that she was becoming distant so he blamed himself for it. I'm guessing that if he knew the whole truth at that moment, he wouldn't have been blaming himself and trying to change his behaviors to make her happy.

 

That was exactly what I was trying to do, put in a last ditch effort to fix it as much as I could. do whatever was within my power.

[chimpanA-2-chimpanZ]

it is the right thing to do. It will destroy her.

 

"Destroying" someone is never the right thing to do. Unless you have documented, incontrovertible evidence of her committing a crime, you're wasting your time. Being a horrible person isn't a criminal offense. If we all tried to expose everyone who ever hurt us we'd never get anything done. In this case it would just look terrible for you both. The outside world will not be very interested in who wronged whom, just that you're both making a huge deal out of it and can't deal with your feelings appropriately. If anything she'll just paint you to look like a deranged stalker who can't let go.

 

It is extremely unlikely that she'd kill herself over this---you're both young enough that in a few years none of this will even matter---but it would indeed be devastating. It will devastate you, too, because it'll drag her back into your life and you'll spend even more time thinking, worrying, and obsessing over her every move. You don't need that right now, you need to heal.

 

You don't have to forgive her. Forgiveness is a nice thing to do for yourself, but you don't have to do it if you don't feel it. You can hate her or be angry at her for the rest of your life if you want. If you focus on healing yourself, though, you will hopefully reach a point where you won't be dominated by those negative feelings. I have an ex who really annihilated my life and I will never forgive him for it, but I have no desire to hurt him either. I just don't want anything to do with him ever again. That's all.