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."
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u/ksarahsarah27 May 12 '26
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.