A letter to my cheating ex
By: Georgia Rey
Tags: Love Letters, Cheating, Breakups, Love, Relationships

I’m depleted.

Photo by Gregory Pappas on Unsplash

I don’t even know what to say anymore. I’ve already said everything. I have no strength to fight left. I have to walk away. This is about me. I can’t live with the constant anxiety and heartbreak, the lies and manipulations, the gaslighting and deception. I don’t deserve it. There was a time when I may have believed that I did, but now I know that I don’t. I am worthy of unfailing love.

I’m done with the excuses and lies. The thing that hurts most is the pathological nature of this, how you can look me in the eyes and tell me you love me and want to be with my forever and then turn around and record yourself fucking someone else the same day. I’m done with your begging and apologies and tears and promises to change. I know now that you never will, and I’m not sticking around to watch you try.

I am scared and I feel unsafe. While I provided you with a sense of security, you stripped me of mine. Nothing was real or true. I loved you and you discarded my love over and over and over again. I blame myself for staying in this position this long and allowing myself to become deeply hurt. I knew in my gut that something was off. Even your closest friends warned me and advised me against this. I asked for clear signs and they were provided to me time after time. And I ignored it all. I thought we would be a success story: the fuckboy who wasn’t anymore. I honestly didn’t even think things like this existed. I thought the women in these situations must have been stupid or in denial. I judged their willingness to stay, yet here I am, allowing you to tread on me while I was building you up. I was gentle and kind and understanding of you, all the while I was being handled without care or remorse.

As I sit here now, I am not surprised, but I am beyond disappointment. There is a physical ache in my heart. My eyes are holding in the tears, not allowing myself to feel the deep betrayal that I have endured. The anxiety in my stomach and chest has consumed me. My thoughts race and I find no peace. I am not sure where to go to allow myself time to process this loss. I am lost. Perhaps I am not allowing myself to feel through this because of my immense shame and embarrassment. I am now one of those women. I feel foolish and insecure. I distrusted my gut and continued on this path, all the while knowing I was walking dangerously. People are not interested in my hurt. I am the girl who “cried wolf.” I let you back in so many times and eroded my own integrity.

This will take time. I know that the healing will be slow. This is a new hurt. I’ve not experienced this before. I need to be more careful in guarding my heart, more self-assured, trust my gut, listen to the warnings, and be uncompromising in my nonacceptance of certain behaviors. It is not too much to ask. It is not too much to seek a partner who is honest, transparent, and willing to work for the love we deserve. I gave my all to this relationship and ended up getting hurt more than I’d like to admit. I needed my love to be reciprocated, and despite the potential that we had, you have depleted me of all I had left.

I don’t know where to go from here. I don’t know how to express my hurt, and I don’t believe you deserve to hear it. You are sick with secrets. You live a double life and are a slave to it, squandering the good things and leaving a path of destruction. You can’t keep up with the messes you create. Your life is unmanageable. And you have directed your chaos into my world. I pity the fool who tries to help you now. All I know is that I can’t. I need to help myself, to heal, and to be set free from your tornado of pain. I want off the ride. I would love to believe that you will still have a place in my life and that we will find some way to move past this and care for each other as friends, but my expectations are not high. I don’t know how to let go, and I don’t want to. But I know that I must walk away and release myself from this bondage of my mind and the devaluation of my worth. I will love you always. But I need to love myself more.