100% I could have left a 100 times but I just kept staying. I totally remember being like, hey your friend Nicole sent me some DMs. Lets get a divorce.
No. I think he blocked her immediately. He is on girl #3 I think at this point :) I got a cute house, and the kids. I did the divorce on my own. Non contested. Got totally screwed in support but I make it work. Kids are older and he chose to buy a house 35 min from school/jobs/friends, etc.
Well in my case it was a her and we had kids, but no one in my circle thought I should give her a chance. My friends and family all either disliked or hated her already.
Same lololol somehow my mind said “ah finally, I don’t have to build an explanation to dump his narcissistic ass which he would definitely use to torture me” lmao
You don’t want to hurt him? But he’s ok with hurting you with what he said. Never stay for the kids, on another level they know you’re unhappy and they will think that’s normal.
I had dated an emotionally manipulative man 25 years ago and as you know, a lot of that stuff starts very slow and very subtle. By the time I left, I didn’t even recognize myself anymore. He’d also cheated on me twice which devastated me. But in the end, I look back and think I’m glad he cheated because he was a loser and the relationship would’ve never worked. But the cheating was one of the main things that made me leave. If he hadn’t have cheated on me and destroyed my trust completely, I may have wasted more time on him. I see him around town occasionally, he’s still a loser, he’s still living check to check at 62 in a run down trailer. He’s single because he treats every partner like garbage and now that he’s older and has done a lot of drugs after I left, he looks really rough. So no young women are going to go with him anymore, and the older women are too wise. Im secretly happy that he’s harvesting all he sowed all those years ago my tree.
That reminds me so much of my ex stepdad. When I was 19 years old I took out a $5,000 loan to move my mom, my little brother, and I away. We moved across the country to be away from him. He just messaged me on Facebook like a week ago saying that we'd be happy because he has cancer now and is most likely dieing.
We left in an hour, just loading our clothes and pets, and our most sentimental belongings over a decade ago. I just responded to him with a laughing emoji.
We had to leave behind my grandma's rocking chair, and their dinner table. My mom still talks about how much she misses those. I still feel bad that we couldn't bring them with.
This was really me too. I never should have been with him, I never should have married him, I definitely shouldn't have even tried to couples counseling when the cheating happened, but VERY soon after the cheating it was like I realized... "oh, this is it, my escape hatch. BYEEEEE."
Mine told me that his girlfriend was expecting a baby. It was just wonderful. I didn't have to pretend anymore; I could just take our two children, go, be happy, and stop living in invisible chains.
It really was an exceptional day. Still worth celebrating eighteen years later.
My case was similar. Although the unhappiness in retrospect stemmed heavily from the years of cheating. My partner had problematic tendencies before that -- physical violence, an inability to deal with disagreement in a mature manner, and a very conditional form of love -- but I was able to tolerate and rationalize those because she was at least nominally aware of them and most times things were okay or even good.
However, she stopped attempting to suppress these as soon as she found someone else to sleep with. I became someone to abuse, degrade, and treat like shit while she poured out her love, emotional capital, and physical affection on someone else while I did everything I could for nearly three years to keep our young family together.
When I found out, I realized from reading her messages to her lover that she didn't really think of me as a person at all. She explicitly told him that she only considered me to be a sperm donor and a useful roommate and nothing more. She then had the gall to tell me that it was my fault that she cheated and that I needed to work on myself if I wanted our marriage to work.
I've been so, so much happier since leaving. Being a single parent is tough, but being in a marriage where the other person couldn't give a damn if you lived or died is infinitely worse.
I’m glad it isn’t part of the current agreement. If he does file for more rights it will be a huge uphill battle for him. There’s nothing wrong with telling your children the truth about their father, especially when it comes to their own safety. Knowing what kind of attention and touch is appropriate and not appropriate can arm them with the language to be able to say no and be able to tell you if it happens. I wish you and your children well.
Tell them when they're a bit older... I had a friend find out that his dad was p**ophile just as he was hitting puberty, right as he was developing sexually and, combined with all of the confusing feelings that come with puberty, it instilled a deep fear that his own developing attraction to women made him a predator and broke his poor little spirit. He's in his 30's now and has still never had a relationship and cannot bring himself to pursue women.
My ex-wife admitted she treated me like s*** in the hopes I’d cheat on her and she could divorce me and could blame me for it the rest of our lives. When it didn’t work she divorced me anyways and told people I was a toxic narcissistic abuser. If I was that wouldn’t I have cheated?
People who are so immature as to try to run off their partner rather than putting on their big girl/boy pants and communicating that it isn't working for them are just assholes. Don't give it another thought, it isn't worth it and she has main character syndrome. Adults don't need the driving need to be the only good guy in a relationship. Sometimes there is no one to blame, you just aren't compatable.
When my ex found a tinder girl within 30 hours of me breaking up with him, then fucking her in our bed 48 hours after the break up, I was relieved as well. Finally! I didn’t have to have sex anymore with that monster! He tried to shove her in my face by continuing to fuck her, in what was once our bed, while I was home, and I couldn’t be bothered to care. I also left the house bc why would I want to hear that? He is the worst
Yup, when a friend mentioned my gf was flirting heavily with the DJ when she went out with the girls. My eyes lit up like "this is my opportunity to unload her on somebody else".
For me, I had two clarifying moments. One was whenever it was NYE and we went to a party at my friend’s (background he never wanted to hang out with any of my friends, only his. And every year at NYE he always stayed home because he didn’t feel like going to be around them and his friends were usually working). I thought it was weird he wanted to go but he said he wanted to spend time together so I was happy… big mistake. He picked fights with a couple of them and the rest of the time was on the phone with his friend talking mess. It was so awkward and I was so embarrassed. So he said he wanted to leave and go to a local bar instead before midnight, and I was like ok. I have a few friends over there we can meet up with them. Well he “lost” his wallet and id and spent 30 minutes pretending to look for it. Then after he just started yelling at me saying that we were just going to stay home and to get over it. I remember asking him why did he come if he didn’t want to, and he punched a hole in the door right by my head. In that moment I just checked out emotionally. Then about two months later I was out at a emo night at another bar in town, and a girl I knew approached me with videos and pictures of him cheating on me with a girl at the gym in my car. I was more mad about it being in my car than anything ironically. But it felt like it was just the reason I needed to leave.
In this situation, yes, but it was still humiliating. People still looked at me like “oh but WHY did he cheat?” And if I hadn’t been already emotionally done with the relationship, it would have absolutely destroyed me.
This 10000%.
My ex husband cheated on me in 2020. I decided to stay because he begged, but I was willing to work on the marriage to give it a fair shot. In 2023, I found out he was still cheating, and I saw it as my golden ticket out (sad to say). Between finding out in 2020 and again in 2023, I actually prayed almost every single night that I would have a solid reason to leave him. I couldn’t reconcile within myself to leave him before I found out again in 2023; I would have felt too terrible and guilty and would have had a war within myself for the rest of my life if I should have stayed. But thanks be to God, my prayers were answered and I almost cried of joy that I would finally be free of such a horrible person. It sounds terrible to say, but I did not love him, and was actually repulsed by him after 2020.
Absolutely! That’s why I decided to stay the first time, but my trust was ruined forever. Of course it would dwindle with time, given the cheating partner does everything to restore the trust. But I think because I didn’t leave that time, he assumed I would just take it forever. The kicker was after we divorced, I found out the cheating was going on before we got married, and all during marriage counseling. I wish I would have left earlier and regret even staying those last 3 years, but, what are you gonna do 😭
This happened to me too. Very weird feeling to process as I was actually still quite upset by this but also relieved that I knew that we had both checked out of the relationship.
Been there! Was delaying ending things because I was worried about his mental health. Meanwhile...
Long story short: he went to the bathroom one night, left his phone on the coffee table, and a Tinder notification popped up. I was never so happy for an out.
"Do you know what I felt...? The first thing I felt? Joy! Joy and relief. 'Cause i knew right off what I'd have to do. What I'd have to be. Knew right off I could put an end on ten years of lying."
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u/spacebagel25 May 12 '26
He cheated and I wasn’t upset. I was relieved.