Me (M21) and my ex-girlfriend (F20) were together for almost 3 years, most of the time it was a virtual relationship, even though she lives close to me (about a 2-hour distance)
I always wanted to see her, even for just one minute, but she never agreed to that because her family wouldn’t like it, or something like that. However, I always thought, “If she really wanted to see me, she would make an effort.”
Even though I didn’t like that, I really loved her. I made every effort possible to make her happy, to make her feel loved, but I feel like she didn’t do the same for me.
I ended up going to her house to spend the holidays. I stayed there for 2 weeks. It was good. After that, I went 5 more times to her house for 3 days max, and while I was there, there were a few days that she would just ignore me and not say a word to me, just because she got mad at me for something really stupid, like when I wanted to go out with her, but she didn’t.
I started getting really angry at her behavior, because it was the only time we could see each other, and she was acting like a kid… Even though that was happening, I always showed up at her house with gifts and food that she would like. But I wasn’t happy with this relationship anymore, because she didn’t make any effort to make it work, I was the only one trying…
So at the end of the year, I decided to go travelling with some friends. I decided that it was better than going to my girlfriend’s house because she would probably act like that again, and I was tired of being the only one making efforts in this relationship. Basically, she let our relationship die…
During the trip, I decided that I was gonna break up with her when I got home because I noticed that I didn’t have to be stuck in this bad relationship, I could just be “free” and travel more, do things on my own. But I wasn’t thinking about cheating on her at all. I had just decided that I was gonna break up with her.
The thing is, one day before I went back home, I was with another friend (girl), and we were talking about our relationships and how we couldn’t take it anymore, and that we were going to break up. Something was happening between us, and I thought, “Why not? I’m gonna break up with my girlfriend anyway, and our relationship was kind of dead.” so I kissed this girl, and just when I got home, I broke up with my ex-girlfriend.
I know the right thing to do was to break up with her before I did that, but the thing is, I didn’t break up with her because of that kiss; I broke up with her because of our shitty relationship, and I also told her about this kiss.
At first, I didn’t feel so guilty because I thought, “How can you cheat on someone who never makes an effort for you and doesn’t care about your relationship?” “How can you cheat on a dead relationship?”
But I feel really guilty, I regret it, and I intend not to do this ever again, not without acting like a man and breaking up before doing anything, even if my relationship is going down the drain.
TLDR: I cheated on my girlfriend, and I feel guilty about it, even though we had a “dead” relationship
Comments
This is pretty tenuously defined as cheating. It would be better to officially end things first, but honestly it sounds like you were hardly in a relationship anyway. She was actively holding you at arm’s length. Other people may feel differently, but I wouldn’t feel any guilt over this personally. And I say that as someone staunchly against cheating
I’m not going to diminish what you had with the ex but what happened happened and you broke up and moved on. The ex- wasn’t a good match. Just let the kiss go; learn from it and move forward.
Never an excuse to cheat. If the relationship is ‘dead’ then tell the person its time to take a break until things change. Cheating is an excuse for cowards that can’t be grown up enough to end things first.
I dont know if you really needed to tell her about the cheating. It sounds like a guilty conscience type of thing, which unnecessarily puts the stuff you did onto other people.
I’m not saying its bad to tell someone you cheated on them, just not sure it is best to tell them when you break up with them or immediately after the break up. The break up already hurts enough usually, and this is just rubbing salt in the wound.
Sure, your conscience probably feels better, yes, but at what cost.
Note: obviously, this girl is definitely not great at controlling their response to things, so it is good that you got out of it and decided to find someone else. I’m very glad you found a way out, even if you cheated on them. What happened with you is unfortunately common to a lot of relationships.
You didn’t cheat, you broke up with your GF. You just didn’t tell her until later.