The Thing About Cheating Is That It Will Completely Destroy You
As I was decluttering my phone of photos of us, they reminded me of the good times we had spent together. And I wasn’t sure if I should delete them or keep them instead.
These were good times — from all the night outs that turned into romantic sunset watching, all the nice and meaningful conversations we had and the things we both laughed about, parts of you and pieces of your life that you shared with me and vice versa.
Everything SEEMED good, we were doing just fine.
Until you stopped choosing me.
Until you chose to be that very person to break my heart and show me that I needed a lot of fixing. Because if I didn’t, you would have been happy with me. You would have been content. You would have called me out for the things I did that you didn’t like instead of cheating. You would have told me directly.
You would have been grateful, and you wouldn’t have done what you did.
It wasn’t just a one time thing. It happened too many times that I began questioning what was it about me that you couldn’t take? I wish I had known and I wish it hadn’t gotten to the point where you didn’t destroy just our relationship and my perspective on love, but also my self-esteem — something that took me years to build up. Everyone has insecurities but I wear mine on my sleeves. “What’s wrong with me?” I ask myself every single day.
From what I’ve learned, you can’t cheat grief. If someone caught his/her significant other cheating, the normal reaction would be to get mad. I wasn’t just mad. I was furious. I was enraged. What was once a pure and innocent heart became a heart filled with so much hatred. I was disgusted. I hated you. I hated myself. I was repelled by everything you did to me. It seemed at that time that you never showed any respect for me that I started to disrespect myself as well. I hated you so much because you turned me into a person I didn’t like. I became somebody I hated. I placed my worth on you that I didn’t know how to redeem myself again. How to get back up from this misery. How to wake up from this nightmare. I wish it hadn’t happened. I wish I was able to leave before it happened. I wish I saw the signs. I wish I wasn’t blind.
I wish… (the list would go on).
But I don’t have any power to go back in time and change things. Even if I did, I probably even wouldn’t take the chance. I have learned my lesson — thank you for teaching me to never ever settle for anything less than what I deserve.
The only thing and perhaps the best thing I can do is to accept things as they are even though it’s hard.
The thing about cheating is that it doesn’t only open doors for a breakup, but it also destroys a whole lot in a person. It’s self-destructive, and makes a person lose sight of who he/she really is. It makes people think irrationally and causes them to do things that will only hurt them in the long run. I know because I have experienced. The thing about cheating is that it makes you question your whole existence and will always leave you wondering if somebody else would still be able to see that glow in you when you can’t even manage to look yourself in the mirror and not loathe yourself.
Nobody deserves to be cheated on.
Don’t commit if you can’t fully invest yourself in somebody. Don’t commit if you still want to play around. Don’t destroy somebody’s perspective on love just because yours is too fucked up.
But today, after seeing photos of us, I decided that I’m letting myself miss you. Hate you. Cry over you. Feel things and not mask what I feel anymore. I’m letting myself remember you until I can’t remember what you had made me feel anymore. Until I can finally learn how to love myself again, a hundred percent. 
