Once A Cheater...
Written By: Anonymous
How in the world did I get this wrong? I had witnessed enough examples of how being unfaithful can hurt loved ones and break-up families to know that this was something that I would NEVER do. I was "the conscious" for so many of my friends... constantly reminding them that the noble thing to do would be to break up vs. cheat or better yet, just don't cheat at all. How did I now need my own advice... how did I become a "cheater"....?
During relationships conversations, the question... "why do people feel the need to cheat"... generally comes up. My one experience with being a "cheater" was all I needed to learn one big thing...my cheating was all about me. I tried to come up with a million and one reasons to justify my actions - "he wasn't showing me enough love and attention" or "it was just physical" and even better "the devil made me do it". No matter how many excuses I made about "why" I did it, at the end of the day it didn't erase the fact that I had done it... all because I was too scared and selfish to walk away. I wanted someone to be with me even when I didn't love him or myself.
I had gotten to the point where I knew deep done inside that the relationship was over and done. My love was gone but I continued to compress these feeling because it would jeopardize my relationship status because at the time somebody was better than nobody. I was more in love with the "idea of us" than I was with him. Most of all, on paper, he was the perfect boyfriend. So why would I risk not finding anything better, even if it meant that I wasn't in love.
As my love tank creeped to empty, the need to fill the void overwhelmed me regardless of the cost. Just like that, opportunity showed up at my door and I failed... I cheated. The crushing weight of guilt forced me to come clean and and at the end of it all laid 3 hearts with varying degrees of hurt and damage all because of me. Ultimately, everyone moved on and found love and healed at their own pace but for me the biggest lesson that I learned was that I had apologized to everyone and begged for forgiveness but I had never come to terms with the fact that my cheating stemmed from not loving myself enough to be by myself. Once I figured that out, the hardest step was for me to forgive myself. In order to move on and not repeat the same mistake, I needed to start loving myself when I felt most undeserving.
I'm not condoning cheating or affairs in any way but I am saying that if you've been there and been the one to make a mistake, know that you can use this mistake to build yourself up and start again. You don't have to stay there and let your choices define who you are. Once a cheater does not mean that you have to ALWAYS be a cheater. You are allowed to learn from your poor choices, forgive yourself and move on.
During relationships conversations, the question... "why do people feel the need to cheat"... generally comes up. My one experience with being a "cheater" was all I needed to learn one big thing...my cheating was all about me. I tried to come up with a million and one reasons to justify my actions - "he wasn't showing me enough love and attention" or "it was just physical" and even better "the devil made me do it". No matter how many excuses I made about "why" I did it, at the end of the day it didn't erase the fact that I had done it... all because I was too scared and selfish to walk away. I wanted someone to be with me even when I didn't love him or myself.
I had gotten to the point where I knew deep done inside that the relationship was over and done. My love was gone but I continued to compress these feeling because it would jeopardize my relationship status because at the time somebody was better than nobody. I was more in love with the "idea of us" than I was with him. Most of all, on paper, he was the perfect boyfriend. So why would I risk not finding anything better, even if it meant that I wasn't in love.
As my love tank creeped to empty, the need to fill the void overwhelmed me regardless of the cost. Just like that, opportunity showed up at my door and I failed... I cheated. The crushing weight of guilt forced me to come clean and and at the end of it all laid 3 hearts with varying degrees of hurt and damage all because of me. Ultimately, everyone moved on and found love and healed at their own pace but for me the biggest lesson that I learned was that I had apologized to everyone and begged for forgiveness but I had never come to terms with the fact that my cheating stemmed from not loving myself enough to be by myself. Once I figured that out, the hardest step was for me to forgive myself. In order to move on and not repeat the same mistake, I needed to start loving myself when I felt most undeserving.
I'm not condoning cheating or affairs in any way but I am saying that if you've been there and been the one to make a mistake, know that you can use this mistake to build yourself up and start again. You don't have to stay there and let your choices define who you are. Once a cheater does not mean that you have to ALWAYS be a cheater. You are allowed to learn from your poor choices, forgive yourself and move on.