Sitting on my own tonight, thinking back over going through this a few years ago. Sort of accepting the profound ways it changed me and my life. Irritated a bit that films and TV never seem to reflect the reality of it. So wondered if people wanted to share?
I'm not talking about the "he was a bastard and was playing me" kind of things. I was cheated on once or twice by boyfriends. I'm thinking more of the life changing infidelity when someone you completely love does it.
Have you been cheated on or been the cheater?
How did you find out?
Did you stay or go?
How did it change you and your life?
For me, I found out when the woman phoned to tell me. I told her several times she must have the wrong number and remember laughing because I was so certain it couldn't be him
It was a few months of affair. It wasn't love. Just your run of the mill cheap affair. I was in Australia at the time for a 12 month work contract.
I stayed for a while, but in the end he was too sucked into shame and probably didn't have what it took to repair the damage. He still misses me he says, and send letters. I left six months ago. He's in therapy "fixing himself".
My life was changed forever by it. I remember the first few months it hurting so badly and I didn't really have a clue that it was only the beginning. That the trauma would make me ill. That I'd go through depression for the first time in my life.
It felt like a natural disaster. Life before vs life after. I think if he were here, he'd say he ruined his life for a bit of company and drunken sex, and that the shame of what he'd done changed him forever too.
So how was it for you?