Erin1111

My boyfriend cheated. It was once it did not last and he ended it of his own accord. I have chosen to forgive him. I know him better than anyone and I believe he won't do it again. It seems as though there are a lot of synics in this forum. Everyones advice seems to convey the message once a cheater always a cheater. But the truth is that every situation is unique and regardless of what things look like on the surface only those in the relationship truly know if it has potential to work. Just because someone makes a mistake doesn't mean that they are evil and should go through life alone and never be trusted again. There are a lot of reformed cheaters posting in this forum. People can change. I would like to open up this discussion to all those who have chosen to forgive. I know myself that I have a lot of mixed feelings. I know I made the right choice, I know I love him, and in my mind I know I can trust him. I want to know how to convince my heart though. How to quiet the voice that trys to get me to snoop and check up on him. (which I have done a few times and have always found I had no reason to doubt). How do I put the betrayed feelings aside and move on. How are you dealing with getting past cheating and moving on? Any sucess stories out there? Lets help each other move forward instead of just hearing people tell us we made the wrong choice.

I feel the same way when I am single I am strong and confident. I am now in a relationship, almost 2 years now. I feel so happy and complete but also so fragile and insecure. If anything happened to "us" I would be destroyed. How do you control that feeling? How do you get past it? I, like you ,snooped on my bf while he was out one night. I too found some chat logs with a girl he works with that looked incriminating. When I found them he had long since broke off any talking with her but it still hurt to see him flirting online with her. I confronted him and he admitted talking to her was wrong but said nothing happened. I don't know what how I feel about what I found. But he says he loves me and wants to be with only me and would never cheat. And I believe him. Not just cause he says it but cause his actions show it. But I am still having a hard time dealing with the fact he kept his conversations with her private. I feel betrayed and don't know how to get past it. I feel like I am letting him off easy by forgiving him. But I truly do believe he won't ever do anything like that again. Should I be giving him a harder time of it?

All good points. I agree problems in our sex life is by no way an excuse but i think its an explanation. Either way Major change is needed! The conversations that I read did show that when we started talking about moving in together and taking it to the next level he broke it off with her. He told her he couldn't talk to her anymore, it wasn't fair to me. And that was the end of the correspondence. This happened about 2 months ago. So again, not an excuse but at least he did stop it on his own. He is back and forth between anger and sadness right now. I don't know whats going on in his head. I you may be right, he is mad that I found out. Probably because it had been done and over with and he had made the decision to move on and still got busted. I can see that anger in him. And all that is mixed with the fact that he feels violated from my very obvious intrusion on his privacy. Too many emotions, I have no idea what to do right now. As far as moving, I think we are going to give it a go, but we will be rebuilding from the ground up. We are currently living together and I have a great job here. But I have no family within 5 hours of here, and a lot of my friends have recently moved out of town for jobs as well. So I really have no where else to go. Not a good reason to move intogether but maybe it wil help us to face this and rebuild if we choose to do so. I may be naieve and stupid but people do make mistakes. And I do believe that our trust can be rebuilt. It won't be instant or easy, but I think given time and counselling we can get through this. But first we have to confront this.

As for the picture, that is the one thing I know for certain is true. She does work with him, scattered between the personal messages were technical work related stuff. Plus the username in the messenger and the email in the messenger matched that on her employee file. So I know he really wasn't physically attracted to her. And from some of the other comments he made to her i don't think he really liked or respected her that much either. (who could she is obviously a hoe!) So I don't think it was an emotional connection. What I do think though..... is that you are all right. Something happened. I am finally able to stop denying that. I was a little stressed out this summer and our sex life was well... not good. So I think thats what it was, just sex nothing more. Not that that makes it any better, but I think if he actually loved her it would hurt a lot more. Like I mentioned earlier we are set to move in together and were planning on getting engaged this winter. I do love him, and believe he is my soulmate. If there is any doubt in my mind that this may not have happened I can't give all that up, but I can't go on without certainty in my mind one way or the other. I need to hear him say it. And I'm not letting up until he does, or until he offers an explanation for all of this that is beleivable. I will not go on wondering I need to know one way or the other. The more time I have given this the more I think reality is sinking into him that he can't get out of this. His mood has changed and he is starting to act really remorsefull. He knows I am upset about this and I think he knows he has to come clean. I tried to talk to him about it last night and he said that he would like to do some thinking and go for a walk tonight so we can talk uninterrupted about this. So I am hoping that means hes ready to at least admit it. I think the only way I can ever consider continuing this relationship is if he is 100% honest with me and even then we would be starting back building this relationship from the ground up. There is definitly a long road ahead either way. I think the most importatn thing here is that I am not letting him fool me. I know in my heart that something inappropriate happened between them. Whether it was cyber sex or something more. Either way I will not stand to be treated like that. And he needs to know that. I really believe that this forum and the advice I got here has helped me get to this point. I feel so much stronger now. Thank you all

He actually did end the IMing. He told her many times from the day she started messaging him that she was talking in appropriately, especially for work. (this was a work IM tool) So i guess she started messaging him on his personal MSN which I don't have the chat log for. He did admit to having dirty msn chats with her but said it was mostly for jokes cause it was funny how forward she was. Then later on in the chat log (week4 of 4) he ended the talking all together and said he wanted to end their correspondance completely cause it was inappropriate. He has admiteed to the dirty chat and said he knew that was wrong. And has been working his butt off to make up for that. But swears it was all chatting online. And after seeing her photo I really can not see him even letting her perform oral sex on him. I did some more looking at the chat log and realized the time frame of all this. it took place over the month of August. All the talking went on for about 4 weeks. one week of that she was on the other side of the coast, and the another week he was away with me accross the country. So out of all the time this went on they were only in the same region for 2 weeks. I still want to sit him down and have him explain every line of the chat. Which he offered to do. There is still a lot there that doesn't make sense to me. But I still have a VERY hard time beleiving that he would be with her. He gets disgusted by overweight girls and she is about 230 which is more than he weighs. Its her photo that really has me the most confused here! ( I know how shallow that sounds but she may as well be a man, he really does not like big girls) Why must everything be so complicated!!!

Right now he seems to be acting really betrayed. He is just sad now, not mad. Sad that I would think that of him. He keeps saying that he knows he was wrong carrying on on messenger with her, (and he apologized for that immediately when i confronted him the first time) But he says it was all a joking online flirting game, that nothing inappropriate ever happened. I read some more of the messages and one of the last ones she implied she was going to stop by his place and he got angry with her saying he told her he didn't want to play these games anymore. And asked her how she found out where he lived. She then said she didn't know she was just joking, hoping he may tell her where he lived. So I know she never came here. He even offered to introduce me to her if I wanted that. He said that would erase any ideas I had in my head. I sound so superficial when I say this but she looks really unkept, almost dirty. I honestly can't see him with her. But if it wasn't for the picture I would still be suspicious. So now I am full of mixed feelings. I think I am going to give him some time to cool off and when he is in a better mood this weekend ask him to explain some of the messages to me cause right now the pieces of this puzzle don't fit! SOOOOO CONFUSED!

Ok so I confronted him..... and am just further confused. I asked him if she thought there was something more going on with them, or if there was something more. He got irate at the mere suggestion. Said he would never do that to me. He said that she was EXTREMLY forward and flirty and has been reprimanded at work multiple times for sending inappropriate messages to coworkers. He even showed me an email from a coworker with similar comments about things she had sent him. He then showed me her photo on their company website (yes it was her no question the email address matched that in the conversation log) and not to sound absolutly horrible but she is extremely overweight and very unattractive. I thought everything seemed cut and dry till i saw that photo. I known him a long timel and I know one thing that he can't stand is girls who don't take care of themselves. (he pesters his own sisters for not watching their weight) There is no way he could have been with her like that, if we walked by her in the street he would probably have commented on her (yes not one of his redeeming qualities) But either way it just threw me for a loop. He is very attractive and in shape and i can't see him being with her ESPECIALLY if it was simply sexual which seems to be what the messages imply. I still am uncertain of what that conversation means and would love for him to sit down and explain every word to me still, but for now I have no idea what to think.

This is soo sooo hard! I need him to admit it to me to know my true feelings. Right now I just see the him I love. I can't believe this cheating side exists! I am so confused. Thank you all so much for your wonderful advice. I know have the confidence I need to confront him. I know its not just in my head. I have a legitament reason to be upset. I can't hide this anymore. I just don't know what my next move is! I am already living at his place. Well i guess its ours I have been there for 6 months. We just made the decision to get a new place together and its too late to get out of the lease. Neither of us can afford it alone, and neither of us have any family or friends in town that can take us in! I know this is all just details but it complicates things. I have no where to run to. If I want to get away tonight which I think I will I will have to get a hotel room and that gets pricey fast! HELP!

Thank you. Talking to someone about this feels good. Its amazing how you're own mid twists things. Someone elses perspective is always good. You're right I need to confront him but how.... I kinda wrote a letter this morning about how I feel. It was addressed to him, i wasn't going to give it to him more of a venting exercise but i think that may be a good way to get my feeligns accross without him being able to interject or make excuses. I thought I would give it to him when I get home.

I needed to hear that. I think part of me really believed I could be exagerating. Talk about a reality check. This sucks. After the month communication I think he told her about me cause she made reference "understanding and not wanting to be in her shoes" I think I am her. Am I crazy for not wanting to kill him! I just love him too much, I can't believe he did this! I find myself making excuses for him, this summer I was a little depressed and was very distant, he commented on how i wasn't affectionate anymore and i blew it off and focused on how i was feeling. I keep thinking i was so cold no wonder when she started flirting with him he liked it. But its still not right..... AHHHHH Is this forgiveable? Will he do it again?

Oh yes one more thing.... just to complicate matters we just signed a year lease and are moving in together in two weeks. But that aside, i feel like even if he tells me he cheated I don't want to break up with him? Is that wrong? Am I being too easy on him? How do I make sure it doesn't happen again? (I'm not good at being mad, I'm too nice!)

I guess I just want to know if I am reading too much into this! The messages started out with her teasing and joking all the time about liking talking dirty on msn. Then he started telling her they are at work and can't talk like that its wrong. (note he did not say i have gf this is wrong). Nonetheless he tried to call it off. My question is from this message does it sound like they are calling off msn and text messages or something more.. (also what would you assume she means when she is talking about the "mess") [10:08:55] HER So to make sure Is clear, are you calling things off completely? Or just dont want to talk while were at work [10:31:30] HIM I think it is best to just remain friends.. sorry I don't take any chances with work. Much too important. Hope you understand.. talk to you later [10:35:04] HER that sucks... I do understand, cuz this job is really important to me too, but that doesnt make it any more fair... [10:35:07] HER Or any easier to stop the "cravings" [10:35:09] HER lol [11:06:22] HER And I just dont see how this has anything to do with work, except for the talking at work... Well, either way. Ill be free all weekend and next week, you might have other "backups" but Im really fussy, So if you change your mind... [11:09:59] HER And for the record, in case this makes for an easy excuse, I know you acted impressed yesterday, but trust me, I do better [16:02:29] HER Ok I guess thats your choice... Well, thanks, I had fun... You can always let me know if you change your mind... [16:03:16] HIM Appreciate you being so nice... just don't want to take any chances... [16:03:42] HER I understand that, but I just dont understand how this is any of their business, and why I have to "go without" because of them... [16:04:07] HIM LOL [16:04:10] HIM your too funny [16:04:36] HER Easy for you to say after yesterday! lol I barely got started! [16:04:41] HIM lol [16:05:18] HER Aww, this sucks, Im still gonna sit hoping you call... All week, so alone... waiting for you come over... [16:11:53] HER Well, Ill try to restrain from sending you perverted text messages when Im drunk, but your hard to resist! [16:13:18] HER I should be able to do whatever I want with you... And theres a list... lol [16:13:36] HIM whats the list? [16:14:19] HER Well, first of all, I really wasnt impressed with myself yesterday... And had full intentions of practicing to get better... [16:15:35] HER And plus you jerked me away, only making a mess I would have gladly cleaned up lol [16:15:51] HER hahaha Im horirble... [16:18:44] HER Dont quite know what to say to that? lol

Hi, I am new here but from what I read people here seem to be giving good advice an I could use some of that right now. So a little back ground... I have been with my guy for about 2 years now. Things have been good. We are generalyl very open with each other and share everything. He does sometimes seem a little secretive about his msn messages. I always brushed it off as joking cause he would play it that way. A few months back I saw some messages on our shared computer screen from a girl i hadn't heard of. He brushed it off said she was a coworker but was annoying and he was ignoring her. So to present day... yesterday I was home alone and had to use his computer for something and saw a chat log folder. I was too tempted although I knew it was wrong i looked inside it. I saw that girls name on some chat files so I started reading. After a good hour of reading I came to the conclusion that he may have cheated on me. The messages are so cryptic and take place over the course of about a month and a half in the summer, its hard to be sure if it was just flirting or if somethign happened. It was obvious at the very least there was inappropriate flirting. I confronted him about it, admitting to my snooping and it caused a huge fight. He felt i didn't trust him, he felt really betrayed as he should, what i did was really wrong. Once he got past that he played it off as one sided her liking him. I was waiting for an excuse for all the stuff I read but then I realized he thinks i just saw the last few messages (which were fairly innocent), but i read the whole months communication. He admitted that his secretiveness was the reason i distrusted him and that he shouldn't be like that anymore joking or not. He thinks things are ok with us now. So here I sit, He just thinks I just read a few messages and that i am angry cause she was flirty with him. I dont' know if I have enough evidence of cheating to confront him or if i should just keep my mouth shut. Help!!!