For a lot of people, a partner cheating might seem like the end of a relationship. But for some couples, it's just one more hurdle they'll need to overcome. Reddit user u/Azur_3asked, "To people who took back their cheating partners, how did things go?" And people got brutally honest. Here are a few more submissions that did not hold back.
1."He cheated on me, and I forgave him, but told him, if I caught him again, he was dead to me. Well, he did it again with the same chick, so I dumped his ass. Six weeks later, he comes crying to me because she cheated on him! I laughed in his face and told him to lose my number forever."
2."I had one serious relationship where I was cheated on, gave the dude another chance, and then had another year of HIM being crazy jealous and paranoid about me cheating. Never again."
3."He cheated about six months into our relationship with his ex of 10 years and the mother of his child. It was very hard, and I contemplated leaving him since it was still early in the relationship, even though I had already known he was my person. I told him if he wanted her back, then to go back. He told me he didn't want that relationship anymore and assured me he wanted to be with me. I set guidelines and boundaries, and he followed every single one of them. It was a very hard and difficult road, but I eventually learned to trust him again. We have now been together for over 11 years and married for almost five. We bought a home and have a child and pets. In my situation, with this specific person, it worked out. But he does know if he were to ever do anything like that ever again, I would take my son and leave his ass."
4."I found myself randomly throwing up and getting sick. I was getting constant panic attacks; I had trouble sleeping. My body was rejecting him, and I didn’t put two and two together until I found out he cheated again, and I left. It’s been over a year without him, and I’m happier than ever."
5."We were together over 10 years with a 10-year age gap, me the younger. He confessed one day to cheating, and it rocked me! I threw all the pictures off the wall and quickly found a new place to live. I had the kids mostly, and he had weekends. We lived like this for three months. I had some flings to even the score (can you blame me?), and his fling was over at that point. We then couldn’t keep our hands off each other, and he moved into the new place. COVID hit; we had good family alone time, aka quarantine, and have been happy ever since. I still hate that he cheated; we talk it over periodically, and life is good. I took that shit and turned it around. Our family is the better for it. Some extended family has issues with it, but it’s my life, not theirs. This is not the norm of these stories, but I’m weird, so it’s cool."
7."I asked him to leave. Two weeks later, he came over and said he had a girlfriend. I took him to the computer and showed him all the pictures I had found on our shared Apple ID account. Girlfriend my ass. He had been sleeping with her and others for over a year. I had very graphic proof. We had been married for over a decade and had several children. Now, I’m remarried, and the happiest I’ve ever been. The ex? Miserable. Fuck around and find out, bud!"
8."It took me years to come to the realization, but when I was able to finally connect the dots on why my husband cheated with multiple women during our marriage, I felt like I could move on. The cheating started when true adult responsibility kicked into the marriage (ie: buying a house and having children). When he couldn't live up to the responsibility in a meaningful and authentic way, he sought validation through sex outside of the marriage. Looking back, it became incredibly clear that as my career flourished and I found my stride as a mother, finding an 'easy' way to 'feel like a man' started him down the cheating road. We've been separated for over five years, and I still can't bring myself to even contemplate getting into another relationship because of the vicious gaslighting I endured. Cheating is so incredibly selfish and damaging."
9."I’d Google the phone numbers on our shared phone bill (that I was paying for), and they were sex workers. Years went by before I finally kicked him out."
10."My ex cheated on me when we were engaged, and I forgave him (never forgot). I married him about a year later anyway. After a year and a half of marriage, he cheated again with a coworker and left me for her. Hands down, marrying him was the dumbest thing I’ve done."
11."He repeated to cheat. I took him back for my kid's sake. I was left pregnant. Never ever fucking again. He got remarried and cheated four times before the year was out."
12."I've been happily divorced for three years now. He never changed; he just got better at hiding it. Now, he's remarried and cheating on her."
13."I can’t 100% confirm he cheated again, but I definitely had reasons to suspect he did. Back when Facebook first introduced secret messaging, I’d sometimes get alerts on my phone that one of our devices had used it. I still don’t even understand how or why it notifies my phone when he had his own phone, and we didn’t share a Facebook account, but maybe it was because my account was logged into his phone as well and vice versa. Also, after having our child, we had bought a box of condoms for future use, and it was magically open with some missing even though we hadn’t yet resumed having sex. I’m not going to say all cheaters are repeat offenders; however, once they cheat on you specifically, it will never be the same, and it’s not worth the paranoia. Perhaps they go on to not cheat on their future partners, but it won’t change that they cheated on you, so it’s best to just leave, in my opinion."
14."We had both had the two worst years of our lives for different reasons, which damaged us as individuals and our relationship. We were so happy and in love before our lives fell apart, and the cheating was a snap back to reality for both of us. Things have been even better than they were before, and I have zero insecurity or doubt in our relationship now."
15."Don’t do it. You’ll drive yourself crazy with insecurity, then they’ll blame you for being that way and won’t accept they hurt you. Overall, it's just better to leave before the gaslighting and blame comes into play by your partner. I think that sums up my experience."
16."It didn't go well. No trust was built back, and I'm sure he'd kept at it. In my opinion, if you take a cheater back, it's just showing them how little you value yourself and how you don't have any boundaries. Cheating is not okay, and you shouldn't take back someone who can't be trusted. I wish I'd understood that when I was younger, would have saved a whole lot of heartache."
17."I took him back; he did it again a few months later, in an even more public and embarrassing way. We broke up for real after the second time, and I got occasional texts from him about how he was so sorry and wanted another try for years, including times when he was in serious relationships with other women. Bullet dodged."
18."We were semi-open and swinging, but he cheated on me anyway because I 'neglected him' while trying to write my dissertation and my father was dying 1,000 miles away. He confessed a few months later and almost immediately wanted to try polyamory. I’d met someone interesting at work, so I agreed. He did his thing, freaked out when I did mine, and I broke up with him. So, there is an 11-day overlap between my two relationships, and my new partner was fully aware of my situation."
19."I found out seven weeks ago today. There have been lots of ups and downs, but the changes we both made to address the reasons why it happened have made our lives better. I’m not over it yet, we haven’t fully recovered, but we’re committed to making it work. It’s fucking difficult, though."
20."He took that time to navigate out of the relationship with me and into a relationship with the affair partner. So, he just used the time to his benefit."
21."We went for therapy together and separately; he never really owned up to it and then did it, again and again. I finally left when I had a daughter of my own and decided I didn’t want her to think this is a healthy relationship."
22."Badly. She confessed a month later that her feelings for me were gone ever since the start of the cheating but thought she still loved me romantically (realized she only loved the affection and time I'd mindlessly put into the relationship, despite her never really thanking for it in any way)."
23."We put it past us. The next month, his mate told me he had three girlfriends on the side. I went to the doctor, and it turned out he had given me chlamydia and an infection in my vagina. We broke up that day."
24."We tried to make it work for years for my kid's sake, and things just got worse. I finally left her seven years later when she had totally devolved into nothing but a worthless, destructive menace. It was never going to work again."
25."Fabulous. I am confident it won’t happen again. I’m also confident if it did, I would be okay and able to move on, thanks to personal and couples therapy. It’s been eight years, and we've been together for 15 years. We got married on our 10th anniversary and are still in our honeymoon phase. We both learned a lot about ourselves from the whole ordeal. To this day, he puts our relationship as his first priority (it’s really obvious he does this, it’s not just words). The tools we learned in therapy, that we started doing because of his cheating, are tools I use in everyday life that I didn’t have because of my upbringing. I know it sounds weird, but I’m thankful it happened. I wouldn’t be as strong as I am now if it didn’t. Before everything, I thought I couldn’t live without him (codependent much?). Because of therapy, I know that I can; I just chose not to. I used to be a doormat out of fear of losing him. I am confident I will never be a doormat again."
26."Things are okay. As with most long-term relationships, we’ve had our ups and downs, but I can confidently say he’s the love of my life. I’m not entirely excusing what he did, but there was a lot going on at the time, and he’s regretted it every day since. It's been about three years since, and he hasn’t cheated again, and I’m confident he won’t. Despite this, we still both have significant trust issues and have had to implement pretty strict boundaries with one another."
27."I found out about the affair and told him I would forgive him if he ended it and truly wanted our marriage and if he fessed up to anything else he had done. I was genuinely going to forgive him and move forward. He said that he wanted the marriage and there was nothing else he needed to tell me. I ended up finding out about more cheating over almost a decade of our relationship. I ended things. He’s now with his affair partner. My trust is completely broken in romantic relationships now. I’m with a guy who seems to treat me really well, but I’ll never be able to trust him completely and definitely have major walls up. I actually don’t even want to put my trust in someone like that again."
28."It was toxic, and we ended up cheating on each other. We still decided to pursue our relationship. Later on, we decided to live together, and now, we're living two years in peace together. The fact that we're with each other 24/7 kind of stabilized the toxicity we had before, or maybe because we're just getting older. I don't really know."
Did any of these stories surprise you? Would take your partner back if they cheated? If you already have, how did your relationship turn out? Let us know in the comments below.
