This is unforgivable, right?

[HeidiSchmeidi]

I think this is probably unforgivable but just want to run it by an objective audience. This happened a year ago and my ex is trying to get me to take him back (he has been trying for a year) and I wanted to see if I am crazy for even considering it.

My boyfriend and I were long distance at the time, and I hadn't seen him in three months. His ex started working with him. She is a woman (colleague from another office) who he had a brief relationship with (a few months) and he ended it because she was in love with him and wanted more and he didn't return her feelings.

When she arrived though, she relentlessly chased after him. To the point of propositioning him for sex and telling him if he did it she would never tell me and so on. She started sending him messages and so on about how she still loved him and didn't he miss her (he did tell her to stop and eventually blocked her) but it was quite blatant she was trying to steal my man.

In his defense he did tell her to please leave him alone because he was in a relationship (she didn't respect this request) and he was also completely honest and told me everything at the time and shared any texts with me so I was in the loop.

At the time, pre-pandemic, there were a lot of boozy work nights out almost every weekend, and I know my boyfriend very well and he is one of those people who gets absolutely blotto and does and says crazy things (loves everyone), so I was very uncomfortable with him getting wasted drunk if she was around. Not so much because I thought he would sleep with her, but just because I thought a conversation would start that he would not be in control of and so on.

So we agreed he wouldn't go to events which she was at, or if he did that he'd stay sober. Which he did for three months. Then one day there was an event she wasn't meant to be at, but she showed up to and he was already completely wasted when she got there. He was drunk at this point with no boundaries so he didn't think to leave.

She started hitting on him quite blatantly, and he ended up talking to her for a while. I happened to call him, and he told me where he was and that he'd chatted to her and in his drunk state he didn't see a problem at all with it. He actually got quite belligerent with me "I am an adult I think I can make a judgement".

I was home alone, I'd had a really stressful day and I felt very threatened by how persistently this woman was trying to steal my man and so I asked him to come home and call me. So he did and left five minutes later (it was about 9.30pm). He had been drinking all day on some corporate boat trip and he was absolutely wasted.

We never argued much, but I ended up absolutely raging at him, shouting, and told him I wanted to break up with him. I then blocked him on everything. This might seem an over-reaction, but at the time we were under a lot of strain being separated, and I felt he wasn't doing enough to get this woman to stop chasing after him (maybe his ego enjoyed it a bit) and it was making me feel really uncomfortable.

I'd stress we never had ANY problems with trust before (together two years) but this woman was blatantly gunning for him in the most obvious way and I was worried after so many months apart and her constantly trying to get him alone that something might happen everyone would regret.

Anyway, I did my dumping tantrum, and he (already wasted) decided to go back to the party and carry on drinking because he was upset and said he was on a self-destruct mission. She got him talking, he told her we had split up and cut a long story short he went back to her place and slept with her.

The next day he woke up really horrified but he believed we were genuinely split up so he went home. Later that day I called him to try and patch up our fight and sort things out and he confessed what had happened.

I was absolutely devastated, and told him I could never forgive him. He cried for weeks, tried everything he could to win me back but I just could not get past it.

Here we are over a year later and he is still trying to win me back, I am the love of his life and so on, it was a drunken mistake he made when he felt I'd dumped him.

Any thoughts on this? We do still love each other, but although my behavior was bad on that night I couldn't figure out why a few hours after our breakup he went and had sex with the one woman who had been making me feel unsafe for so long.

Obviously I;ve been very uncomfortable

I'm also surprised at the number of people who feel it would be any of their business what someone does just after they've been dumped! Even if he'd gone out and had an orgy, it still wouldn't be cheating or betraying you. You told him it was over, you crossed that rubicon and redefined the boundaries then and there. I wouldn't take kindly to it if a man dumped me and then expected to hold me to account for what and with whom I chose to do afterwards. If you want someone to remain in an exclusive relationship with you maybe don't dump and block them? As for the 'you were on a break' thing - no, you finished with him. Whether you meant it or not. So he went off and slept with the person who was definitely not going to reject him and make him feel like shit in that moment. Not the best thing to do maybe, but pretty understandable. 🤷‍♀️

He could have kept her at more of a distance but he didn't - he'll never admit it but he loved the attention. Hence the shag...
Whatever has happened since then to you - you are wavering and thinking that maybe it would be better with him, than being single, out there hopeful of meeting someone else.
So you need to rewrite history to justify getting back with him. Hence the way you positioned this post - you want people to say 'he was on a break - its forgiveable' because you want a narrative that gives you 'permission' to get back together with him.
Even though deep down you know he's not right, just that he seems better than the alternative right now...

He could have kept her at more of a distance but he didn't - he'll never admit it but he loved the attention. Hence the shag...
Whatever has happened since then to you - you are wavering and thinking that maybe it would be better with him, than being single, out there hopeful of meeting someone else.
So you need to rewrite history to justify getting back with him. Hence the way you positioned this post - you want people to say 'he was on a break - its forgiveable' because you want a narrative that gives you 'permission' to get back together with him.
Even though deep down you know he's not right, just that he seems better than the alternative right now...

Thanks, I have read all the responses, even the harsh ones.

I think a lot of people here don't appreciate the full scale of what I was dealing with. It was very intense.

The woman has Borderline Personality Disorder and her behavior when they were in a relationship was often threatening which is why he ended it. She hit him, yes, but also a lot of tantrums, threats, demanding he not see family and friends, coercive behavior and suicide threats and so on. He felt that she was vulnerable and he was responsible for her state (she blamed the breakup for her behavior) and she was very good at making him feel like her behavior was his fault.

She would show up crying, or send suggestive messages or messages saying bad things about me and then the next day apologise, cry and say it was just be because she loved him so much. He had told her several times he loved me and wanted no contact, which she did not respect. I kept asking him to take sterner action, but he kept saying if he ignored it and kept reiterating it was over that she would lose steam and stop and he worried that doing something .

I was so upset that night about him being around her drunk, because a couple of times when that happened before, he undermined the message of "no contact" by speaking to her. The drunk version of him forgot the bad side of her and thought it would be okay to be friendly. When drunk once before, he asked how she was and if she was happy and this resulted in a whole escalation of her behaviors and messages like "if you truly don't care, why did you seem so desperate to know if I was happy?".

This would then perpetuate the cycle, and he would then feel guilty for doing something to make it worse which allowed her to then come into his office the next day to "chat about it". It was bloody hellish, and with me absent and them working closely together, I felt completely powerless and I needed him to remain sober and in control.

So it was four months away from me being home, and my reasoning was that if he refused to speak to his boss about her and take proper action (my preferred course), then the very least he could do was agree not to be drunk around her when he might say, inadvertently, which would worsen a hellish situation.

For reasons I couldn't understand, he seemed to really believe that all her behavior was his fault and a result of loving him so much. He has been to counselling since and seen he was being manipulated and he wasn't responsible but at the time he was convinced that he was.

So, I was really anxious all the time waiting for the next thing to happen and it wasn't because I thought he would sleep with her, it was because I felt she was a threat in various ways. It was obvious her objective was to eliminate me and I wasn't there to defend myself.

As for what happened after, him shagging her and then not wanting her afterwards as well as me eliminated from his life brought a close to the whole situation. I guess she finally realised he didn't secretly still love her and I was the only obstacle. She moved on to another man (married with three kids) and is likely busy destroying someone else's life.

Yes, I had a tantrum that night and I was ashamed and appalled by my behavior but as one poster said, for him to get drunk and go and sleep with the ONE person I was under threat from was really hurtful. I had been paranoid for ages that there was some emotional connection between them (her messages were insisting there was!) and he hurt me beyond measure with what he did that night.

There was drama, but it was theirs and I was dragged into it unwittingly. Before that situation happened, I never cared where he was or what he did because I trusted him. I genuinely felt like I was under quite extreme attack from this person at the time though and he kept telling me not to get involved because I would make it worse.

With hindsight I think it was partly he enjoyed her attention (the constant I love you), in part he felt responsible for her being such a mess and in part he was just a bit of a coward. When we talked about this recently he admit he should have done more to protect me from the anxiety of the situation but he says he thought it was all his fault and that he owed her.

I don't think he wanted her (or he'd be with her) and he has had counselling, cut the drinking and spent the year showing me how much he loves me and how deeply he regrets it but as a lot of people have posted here it just showed me a capability to be opportunistic (both to me and to her) and really destructive and I always felt no matter how much drink was involved it wasn't constructive.

Anyway, I can see a lot of people want to slaughter me on this. Really though, the circumstances at the time were really hard on me and our relationship was brilliant before this person got involved and it was a sad situation to go through.

Cheers for the advice

There was drama, but it was theirs and I was dragged into it unwittingly

I suspect from the way that you've felt the need to go into such intricate detail, you may be prone to a little drama yourself.

Whether a thing is something you can forgive or not is not something anybody else can decide on. Some people will forgive repeated infidelity whilst in a relationship. Others won't accept a full blown affair whilst 'on a break'.

You need to have a look at your feelings and make your own decision about where your own boundaries lie.

As others have said OP, it’s up to you whether to forgive and forget, it seems like you won’t be able to as you keep going back to the betrayal and are unable to accept where people have said you had broken up, so I think that’s your answer to be honest. Until you can let it go, then you need to leave well alone.

What I will say is, although I’d be devastated in your position, I think the rational part of me, so long after, could accept that, in the aftermath of a shock break up where I’d acknowledged I’d overreacted, that it was probably that he thought ‘well f you then’. He also overreacted in that moment, just like you did. It was a butterfly effect of sorts.

My Gosh, OP. I would not want to have this man near me just because of his binge drinking, and his behaviours when drunk, never mind that there is another woman in the picture who's causing you so much anxiety.

You're so lucky to get rid of him. Please focus on your life, your future and count your blessings you are not married to him or married with children.

Don't waste your life or your energy on someone like this. He probably has a drinking problem too (as he seems to change so much from sober to drunk) ,which he wouldn't admit to in a million years. Stay away.

And if she had loved him then she wouldnt have screamed at him and dumped him for doing exactly what he had asked her to.

He did exactly what she didn't want him to do though, and exactly what he should never, ever have done. He talked to the woman while drunk and no doubt led her on to think she might have a chance. Even just talking to someone like that makes them think they have a chance. He knew that. But he still did it.

I had a drama llama ex who would pull stunts like this and I got sick of it. The last time he threw a wobbly and then called me the next day like nothing had happened, I told him that I thought he was right that we should split up. Then he went off on one, playing the victim, because I wouldnt have him back! The only thing that surprised me in this car crash is that the guy wants the OP back.

It's not like the op did this a lot, this was the first time and after everything she had been through with this ex trying desperately to get the guy back, I can see why. It goes from being funny to downright annoying after a while. The woman couldn't take a hint and just kept going for him. But he didn't help the situation by talking to her. When she arrived, he should have just left and avoided her, making it bloody obvious he wants fuck all to do with her. He could also have not gone back to the party to shag her, he did that deliberately. He knew exactly what he was doing. He also knew it would hurt op, but still did it. That's not love.

@HeidiSchmeidi

Thanks, I have read all the responses, even the harsh ones.

I think a lot of people here don't appreciate the full scale of what I was dealing with. It was very intense.

The woman has Borderline Personality Disorder and her behavior when they were in a relationship was often threatening which is why he ended it. She hit him, yes, but also a lot of tantrums, threats, demanding he not see family and friends, coercive behavior and suicide threats and so on. He felt that she was vulnerable and he was responsible for her state (she blamed the breakup for her behavior) and she was very good at making him feel like her behavior was his fault.

She would show up crying, or send suggestive messages or messages saying bad things about me and then the next day apologise, cry and say it was just be because she loved him so much. He had told her several times he loved me and wanted no contact, which she did not respect. I kept asking him to take sterner action, but he kept saying if he ignored it and kept reiterating it was over that she would lose steam and stop and he worried that doing something .

I was so upset that night about him being around her drunk, because a couple of times when that happened before, he undermined the message of "no contact" by speaking to her. The drunk version of him forgot the bad side of her and thought it would be okay to be friendly. When drunk once before, he asked how she was and if she was happy and this resulted in a whole escalation of her behaviors and messages like "if you truly don't care, why did you seem so desperate to know if I was happy?".

This would then perpetuate the cycle, and he would then feel guilty for doing something to make it worse which allowed her to then come into his office the next day to "chat about it". It was bloody hellish, and with me absent and them working closely together, I felt completely powerless and I needed him to remain sober and in control.

So it was four months away from me being home, and my reasoning was that if he refused to speak to his boss about her and take proper action (my preferred course), then the very least he could do was agree not to be drunk around her when he might say, inadvertently, which would worsen a hellish situation.

For reasons I couldn't understand, he seemed to really believe that all her behavior was his fault and a result of loving him so much. He has been to counselling since and seen he was being manipulated and he wasn't responsible but at the time he was convinced that he was.

So, I was really anxious all the time waiting for the next thing to happen and it wasn't because I thought he would sleep with her, it was because I felt she was a threat in various ways. It was obvious her objective was to eliminate me and I wasn't there to defend myself.

As for what happened after, him shagging her and then not wanting her afterwards as well as me eliminated from his life brought a close to the whole situation. I guess she finally realised he didn't secretly still love her and I was the only obstacle. She moved on to another man (married with three kids) and is likely busy destroying someone else's life.

Yes, I had a tantrum that night and I was ashamed and appalled by my behavior but as one poster said, for him to get drunk and go and sleep with the ONE person I was under threat from was really hurtful. I had been paranoid for ages that there was some emotional connection between them (her messages were insisting there was!) and he hurt me beyond measure with what he did that night.

There was drama, but it was theirs and I was dragged into it unwittingly. Before that situation happened, I never cared where he was or what he did because I trusted him. I genuinely felt like I was under quite extreme attack from this person at the time though and he kept telling me not to get involved because I would make it worse.

With hindsight I think it was partly he enjoyed her attention (the constant I love you), in part he felt responsible for her being such a mess and in part he was just a bit of a coward. When we talked about this recently he admit he should have done more to protect me from the anxiety of the situation but he says he thought it was all his fault and that he owed her.

I don't think he wanted her (or he'd be with her) and he has had counselling, cut the drinking and spent the year showing me how much he loves me and how deeply he regrets it but as a lot of people have posted here it just showed me a capability to be opportunistic (both to me and to her) and really destructive and I always felt no matter how much drink was involved it wasn't constructive.

Anyway, I can see a lot of people want to slaughter me on this. Really though, the circumstances at the time were really hard on me and our relationship was brilliant before this person got involved and it was a sad situation to go through.

Cheers for the advice

It does sound as if it was really hard, but the crux of your post was whether or not what he did was forgivable. The back story doesn't alter the fact that you broke up with him. Do you consider what he did cheating, or can you see that he was in a bad place and thought your relationship was over? The 'one person you were under threat from was also the person who he drunkenly, foolishly felt wanted him at that moment after you'd given him his marching orders. You have to accept that whatever stress you were under, you made that choice and imo you're not really being fair if you expected him to make great choices afterwards. It would have been better if it hadn't happened, but if you still love him and want to be with him, what's to stop you putting it behind you now? It sounds positive if he's cut down the drinking and had some counselling. People with BPD can be very destructive as you have found. But a year later, you need to find a way to move on from that whether it's together or apart.

You’re misinterpreting this. That was a fuck you screw after OP screamed at him, dumped him and blocked him - all after he’d already left the party at her behest. He was single. I can well imagine doing the same thing.

Not a screw with any random though, the woman who pursued him. There was clearly always something simmering away and he went straight to her for comfort. I think OP would have felt more ok with it had it been anyone but her.

[quote Tulipsareblooming]@Lovelydiscusfish so if you had a row and dumped your partner, you wouldn’t be hurt or feel distrust that a couple of hours later he slept with the woman you were worried about?? Okay [/quote]
Whether or not I would trust him now is a non-question, because I wouldn’t need to trust him any more (trust him about what?), because I wouldn’t expect him to be faithful to me any more, because I had dumped him. I might be hurt, sure, but he’d probably be much more hurt that I had ended our relationship, so there you go. I’d keep the hurt to myself. I’d have no right to blame him for it.....

My ex used to break up with me pretty much every time I did something he didn’t like. It felt like a form of emotional torture. But I would always go back, so in thrall was I. FINALLY he did it so horribly that I accepted it, went off, met someone else fairly quickly (not as quickly as OP’s ex, but still). My ex massively tried to slut-shame me for this, used horrible misogynistic language to describe my behaviour. Well, he can fuck right off. He shouldn’t have kept dumping me if he didn’t want me to be with someone else, should he?

I will never ever ever go back to someone who tells me it’s over again. It was shit and it wrecked my head. People shouldn’t tell you it’s over until they mean it. And when they do, they have to accept the consequences (of not being with you anymore, and no longer having any say over what you do).

That is my view. Genuinely sorry if it sounds a bit ranty, but due to the damage constantly being chucked did to my mental health, I feel quite strongly about it......

Single what for a whole hour before climbing into bed with his ex. He should of held better boundaries this is more him than her. Don't waste your time on him move on.

@LookofEvaBraun

You’re misinterpreting this. That was a fuck you screw after OP screamed at him, dumped him and blocked him - all after he’d already left the party at her behest. He was single. I can well imagine doing the same thing.

Not a screw with any random though, the woman who pursued him. There was clearly always something simmering away and he went straight to her for comfort. I think OP would have felt more ok with it had it been anyone but her.

Why would you go looking for any random when someone gagging for it was available?

Yeah. Someone who you know fancies you, know is a sure thing and you wont have to waste time trying to chat up. And.....given that she was the person that the OP totally over reacted about, and presumably he was hurting, wouldnt she be the perfect choice for a revenge shag?

I agree with PotNoodle to be honest. Personally I think you overreacted to the initial act of her simply being around him while drunk, he even came home when you demanded and you still acted like he was untrustworthy. Should he have told hr/ management? Yes, but I do understand why he was reluctant to also. And the shag was the ultimate drunken two fingers to a woman who just dumped him after he was trying to respect your boundaries and not be around her, which is really immature. Blame on both sides.

But anyway that is in the past. What is clear right now is you’re still not over what happened or this woman and I think if you did get back with your ex there would always be doubt, something niggling, you won’t trust him and that will rot and fester and ruin it. All you can do is learn from this, move on and tell him to do the same.

@misskick

Single what for a whole hour before climbing into bed with his ex. He should of held better boundaries this is more him than her. Don't waste your time on him move on.

So for how long after breaking up with some one should you expect to have any control over what they do

2 hours? A day? A week?

I want to know what he's doing now that's made you revisit this?

And isn't he doing now, what she did to him?

@HeidiSchmeidi

@BillMasen yes. Exactly.

I would (in retrospect, not then) cheerfully have fucked someone in the very eye-line of my most recent ex, ten minutes after he so brutally dumped me. (Actually I acknowledge that would have also been a bit weird.)

But. Dump someone - expect them to do as they will. Don’t like it? Probably shouldn’t have chucked them in the first place then.....

@PolPotNoodle

Honestly I think you were completely obsessive about this woman, controlling and overbearing despite him doing what he could to distance himself from her, and then you dumped him after he promptly came home from a work function as per your demand.

He probably had sex with her as a big 'fuck you' to you while really drunk, and I'm not sure I blame him. He did everything you wanted and it wasn't enough.

I agree with this I’m afraid.

And would be looking to give him another chance.

Congratulate yourself on saving yourself from years of misery with this drama lama and move on.

What is your point of posting? Do you want to get back with him or are you trying to let him know over is over it'll never happen.

You ended it, he went and did what you argued about, likely as a reaction to it.
Then you contacted him again like you didn't really mean to end it and gave a light that you were still an option hence his chasing after you. If you give a message it's over and final he wouldn't keep chasing. The fact your posting suggests you're not doing that and considering taking him back

A year on and it's still ongoing. I would end this for the reasons you specified. He shagged someone who he knew he didn't want, a person who is unbalanced, the worst person he could of gone off with. Point being, he's a person who is untrustworthy when drunk, but is likely to have many occasions when drunk in the future, so if he'll do this with someone he doesn't even like, it shows it won't take much if he comes across someone he does like when drunk. Do you want to be living under that fear in the future?
You've pondered, entertained his sorrys ( and passing of blame to you) for a year now. Time to let go of the his and move on, too much damage and headspace. You will feel better sooner after cutting ties with him.

he would have found it too embarrasing (who wouldn't?) to tell his boss. Like, 'please rescue me boss from this woman who is after me' cringe cringe!

Don't get this attitude. If a woman was receiving unsolicited nude pictures, being harassed and had a bloke turning up at her house to proposition her despite being asked to stop would you say 'cringe cringe' at her reporting it to her boss, the man's employers?

To those saying it’s ok to have sex with this woman an hour after being dumped because it’s a ‘fuck you’ to his girlfriend, who would actually want to be with someone so immature to do that? I hope that whenever I split with someone, no matter how it happens ( as splitting can be fiery sometimes) the person isn’t so pathetic they sleep with someone that night. Especially a woman I worried about. I would not be taking back someone like that and hope op you have enough self esteem not to accept this either. I don’t expect to have timescales of what people do when I break up with them - as I never get back with them so don’t know, HOWEVER, if I did know an ex had slept with someone an hour after we broke up for whatever reason - anger, heartbreak etc - id think he had very little respect for the relationship, a very frail ego, was too impulsive and unpredictable in bad times, couldn’t handle his drink and a myriad of other negative things and would not be accepting him back. People split and reconcile all the time and don’t have to have sex immediately after splitting! Those justifying crap behaviour need to raise their standards

the only thing that has stood out for me from this thread is that the woman relentlessly pursued your man...no she didnt..well yes she did but I think shes not that stupid and its not that simple,She carried on trying to get him because she had been given an indication somewhere by him that it was ok to do so.If a man or woman is catagorically determined that he/she is not interested they would have said back off love it aint ever happening your wasting your time here and they would mean it.no ifs an d buts its clearly understood. He didnt do that maybe she was flattering him and he quite liked it? who knows? You can forgive and move of if you want OP its your choice and thats fine. The trust issue is more important though going forward than the incicent itself.If you were to get back together it has to be put to bed totally,Clean fresh start never to be mentioned again and never to be thrown up in an argument,You bury it and you live. Only you know if you can do that,Good luck either way but you either do it together or leave well alone ,You need ot decide as its stopping both of you from living your lives just existing in this misery,As my dad would say shit or get off the pot!!! Make a decision and go with it in other words,,get off the roundabout of indecision.If you want him have him and move on if you dont let him go once and for all.