I've really fucked up - contacted ex anonymously and he figured out it was me

[WakeMeWhenThisIsDone]

Name changed for this. As everything put together would most definitely out me.

I just feel awful. I sent a jokey e-mail to him from an anonymous account and he somehow figured out it was me. I now want to crawl into a dark cave and stay there forever.

Well, not oddly enough at all.
Alcohol impairs your judgement. That's a factual statement, not a critical one.
So - if any of that wine is left, tip it away.
Productively you could spend the afternoon googling local counsellors and take this as a turning point that it's time to stop giving that arsehole headspace.

Honey, drinking won't help you. Put the bottle down and go for a walk, or a mooch round the shops, or call a friend.

Ignore him, ignore the slip up and focus on trying to stay calm yourself, honestly, no more wine. It won't help

What you did is NOT THAT BAD. It's ok to be hurt when you have been cheated on. Just focus on yourself xx

Stop fixating on whether he knows it's you or not.

He does know.

Why are you giving that part of it so much importance?

Nobody else would have the motivation to set up a fake email address just to message him about it being his ex's birthday.

It wasn't big and it wasn't clever but so fucking what? Him shagging another woman hasn't covered him in glory either.

Just let it go.

I can't just right now walter please be a bit kinder. I'm not my strongest self at the moment.

I'm not being unkind.

I'm saying that what you did is nothing in the of scheme of things. He's in no position to judge your behaviour and he doesn't deserve your worry or upset because of his own actions.

The way I see it is you let your mask slip. He knows you still think about him\have feelings (good or bad) about him, and you have let him see that.
That's what feels so awful, he has the upper hand as you don't know his feelings. Now, you can either pull the mask of and 'own the crazy', tell him it still hurts?? Or, pull it back on and front it out with denial\ radio silence.
However, please don't get drunk. Xx

Wake it wasn't a massive error of judgement.

A massive error of judgement is sending an anonymous email to your boss or the police or someone important.

That's massive.

This is a minor error of judgement. It's a bit of a weird thing to do but wine was clearly driving the bus that day.

He's a cheating arsehole. Who cares what he thinks.

And yes, although he knows it was you he can't prove it so you still have deniability. Just practice your mildly surprised face and say "what? Of course that wasn't me"

You got into this mess via wine. So put it back in the cupboard and go for a walk.

Take some deep breaths, honestly it's not the worst thing in the world.

Wake

Do you live anywhere near this guy? Any chance of you bumping into him? If not, ignore his email, de-activate your account and try not to beat yourself up about it. We've all done stupid things when drunk. He obviously hurt you with the OW situation.

He's not worth drinking over though, and he's definitely not worth stressing over a silly email. Its done now

This time two years ago at the ripe old age of over 40 I was also emailing an OW....
and texting her.. complete batshit I went over the affair.
stop beating yourself up.
If it helps I was also drinking along the lines of 'its 5 o'clock somewhere'
So forgive yourself today. But you need to try and put yourself back together.
One thing I did tell myself was that no man would ever make me lose my shit like that again. It hardened me I guess. But I needed to toughen up.

Apologies I misinterpreted the tone Walter. I sort of wish it was just so automatic. I thought I'd been doing quite well wrt moving on but pulling a stunt like this and the fall out I'm going through sends me right back to square one.

Amelia and looby I don't live near him at all (in fact different countries). So I won't bump into him as it were. He even said in the e-mail "I suppose you probably never want to see me again."

How can he be so sure it was me?

I know that the things people go through on here are far worse. I can in a logical way understand that this isn't a big deal in the big scheme of things. I know I will carry on but for moment I just need to let it out and feel shit. I'm grateful for the company tbh. I'm just browsing through threads and smoking/drinking wine.

You poor thing.

But imagine it was the other way around. An ex contacted you. You wouldn't give it that much thought would you??

Having read the thread better now, I'd just fess up and say, ''yeh, I'm not a robot, that cheating on me with OW pantomime, 99% over it now but turns out, you kinda infected my friend's birthday for me, and I try to contain that feeling but it spilled out over in to passive aggressive communication to my x. There you go Columbo"

Stop the bloody wine, woman!

Why are you so hung up on the fact he knows it was you? Why wouldn't it be you? You've already proved you're the person most likely to do it by - um, being the person that did it!

Who knows, exactly why. Maybe he mostly uses another email address these days. I changed mine 3 years ago - if something went to my old one now, I could pinpoint maybe 20 people that had that but wouldn't have new one. Then there's your writing. I can tell my XH in a single sentence because he always put a space before a comma, e.g. I am a wanker , a total wanker.

As others have said - knowing both the birthdays and having any motivation to mention them puts you in a pool of suspects of... one?!

He knows it was you. He's in another sodding country, so it especially doesn't matter! He is the last person on earth that you need to care for the opinion of.

Don't sweat this.
Wine down, go get some air.

And imagine starting a thread in Chat next year "so what's the most cringeworthy post break up thing you ever did?" and reading far worse replies!

How can he be so sure it was me?

I think the question is, how wouldn't he know? Wouldnt it be too much of a coincidence that someone else would know they shared birthdays? Without seeing the joke, it's really hard to guess though

Glad you live in diff countries ... I'd just ignore the email and close the account. I'm worried you're 3 years down the line though and it's still affecting you Have you though about getting counselling?

When I say wine down: that means glass down or wine down the sink. Not down the wine

Wakeme, it's not that big a deal imo.

So often women are expected to maintain their dignity no matter what, and you're human, an emotion bubbled out over the top and had nowhere to go cos all of that dignity is so restrictive!

An ex who was a twin dumped me many years ago. (Early 20s I was) They lived together too, but weren't identical, his twin was not only taller but also a bit better looking. I had really loved the guy I was goinng out with though as he was easier and more interesting to talk to, funnier, more focused with career etc.. However, after he dumped me, I got two women in my office to send valentine cards to his twin. LOL.

I'm sure my x wondered if it was me. Fuck it. If I bumped in to him on the street now Id admit it.

It feels like square 1 but it isn't really - all the other progress isn't negated, and it won't take the same amount of time to get back to where you left off.

I wonder if something blindsided you a bit this week? Some association with him you didn't notice at the time but it came out in this? Presumably this date has gone by in the calendar 2/3 times already without you being tempted to send an email. Any ideas?

Everything Amelia says is true, as well, you haven't sent slanderous allegations to his boss, it's not that bad.

VirginQueen, I like that answer, that's where I got to in the end. Really, what's so bad about being openly a hurting loose cannon once in a while? As long as nobody gets damaged or consistently stalked. We're so shamed about this (not just women) imo. Yes, this man is an utter cheating dickweed to the point that he has put the OP in this place and now he's got to hear about it, if he really wants to feel smug about that (which we don't know, to be fair) WELL DONE HIM.

I like the company

He was very emotionally and mentally abusive. He used to abandon me over everything. I tried my hardest to show that I had moved on but I actually haven't.

I can't cope with the thought that he'd know.

Well that explains everything about why you're finding it tough. Dicks are harder to get over because they are so awful.

He hurt you, and you're still thinking about him. So you wanted to hurt him and ensure that he's still thinking about you?

The problem with that is that he is an abusive, cheating arsehole. He's inherently selfish and self absorbed. So you probably can't hurt him in the way he hurt you.

And I'm pretty sure he didn't give you another thought after he closed the email.

But the lack is in him. Not in you.

If he lives abroad there are no day to day consequences to your little mistake. You can set it aside as a mad moment.

You need to start taking some responsibility for looking after yourself and your mental and physical well being.

He was abusive but he's gone now - don't perpetuate the cycle yourself.

Stop the drinking. Close MN and go find someone in RL to talk this through with you.

Take care.

Amelia I don't know. I don't have anyone in RL that I can talk to at this very minute. I'm hoping to gather myself back into one piece before talking to my friends. I will otherwise seem pathetic. Which I know I do. I just don't really get why he'd ask me if it was me. Imagine if it wasn't and he'd said that.

You need to accept that he knows it was you before you can move on from this. Who on earth else would send it?

There's 7 odd-billion people on the Earth. It can't have been that obvious it was me.

And why would anyone else send the message, which had personal info, that the 7 odd billion of us don't know.

How would the 7 odd billion know his name or email address?

Unless it was a very generic email like ' check out our new members' or one of those need v1agra' emails- then it's a safe bet it's you.

If you tried denying ... it would be even more obvious it was you.

Just delete the email account.