Awweh...
reddit poster Admiral_Bison makes a very good point:
"Hi there, Female who's been through something not as bad, but similar chiming in-
I was in a similar situation, were the now love of my life met another woman and realising he wanted to be with her physically - didn't do anything, but did break up with me feeling that if he had felt that strong about being physical with someone else, it was probably already over. He was dead right.
Fast forward 10 months later, he came back telling me he'd made a horrible mistake, realised his unhappiness in our previous relationship was mostly in his head and he wanted to make another go of it - after some seriously hard conversations, and weeks of talking, I agreed to start dating again, confident that he'd understood his mistakes and why they'd happened, and never going to let them happen again...
But still, I felt haunted by this other woman he got close to. I felt so terrified it would happen again - so I talked to my therapist about it (who was treating me for something unrelated). She gave me solid advice - I needed to trust him.
When I asked how could I...? What if...? She told me; You need to decided if you're in or out - You have every reason due to everything he's now said and done to trust him. So you either trust him, and give your all to the relationship so BOTH of you can be happy... otherwise you will estrange your relationship by never fully believing in him, and his humbleness from his mistake will turn to anger... he will resent you, you him, and the relationship will ultimately fail.
She was so, so right. For a while, I was still angry and I brought it up a lot in arguments in those first weeks - but I realised I had to get over myself. Every time I was 'punishing' him - I was really punishing US. So I took a hard look at myself and made sure not to repeat my mistakes, and put all my faith in him...
I asked my therapist - what if I'm wrong? She said, if you're wrong your wrong, but if you never give him a chance, then you'll never know."
"Hi there, Female who's been through something not as bad, but similar chiming in-
I was in a similar situation, were the now love of my life met another woman and realising he wanted to be with her physically - didn't do anything, but did break up with me feeling that if he had felt that strong about being physical with someone else, it was probably already over. He was dead right.
Fast forward 10 months later, he came back telling me he'd made a horrible mistake, realised his unhappiness in our previous relationship was mostly in his head and he wanted to make another go of it - after some seriously hard conversations, and weeks of talking, I agreed to start dating again, confident that he'd understood his mistakes and why they'd happened, and never going to let them happen again...
But still, I felt haunted by this other woman he got close to. I felt so terrified it would happen again - so I talked to my therapist about it (who was treating me for something unrelated). She gave me solid advice - I needed to trust him.
When I asked how could I...? What if...? She told me; You need to decided if you're in or out - You have every reason due to everything he's now said and done to trust him. So you either trust him, and give your all to the relationship so BOTH of you can be happy... otherwise you will estrange your relationship by never fully believing in him, and his humbleness from his mistake will turn to anger... he will resent you, you him, and the relationship will ultimately fail.
She was so, so right. For a while, I was still angry and I brought it up a lot in arguments in those first weeks - but I realised I had to get over myself. Every time I was 'punishing' him - I was really punishing US. So I took a hard look at myself and made sure not to repeat my mistakes, and put all my faith in him...
I asked my therapist - what if I'm wrong? She said, if you're wrong your wrong, but if you never give him a chance, then you'll never know."