Monday was a tough day. It started with an emotional flashback that hit me unexpectedly, and then, out of nowhere, my ex sent me a message that was full of anger, resentment, and utter nastiness. She opened with the line, “Apart from ‘cheating’ on you, what have I actually done?”

The use of quotation marks around “cheating” is significant here. She’s admitted to messaging someone intimately for two weeks but still can’t bring herself to refer to it as cheating. It’s a clear example of how she downplays her actions. Meanwhile, she got paranoid about me receiving TikTok’s from a coworker, accusing me of “messaging other women” to anyone who would listen as though I had been unfaithful—but her own behaviour? That’s somehow different.

The exchange continued with a lot of back and forth, but I didn’t rise to it. I kept my cool because, frankly, I don’t want the drama. She brought up some old messages I’d sent, calling them passive-aggressive. What she doesn’t seem to understand is that when emotions are running high, people lash out. When someone breaks your heart in the way she did, there’s a natural instinct to hurt back. At least I had the foresight to retract those messages.

One of her bigger complaints was that I was writing blogs about her. Don’t read them, I said. She has the choice not to. But she chooses to. And yet, I’ve never named her or anyone else in those blogs. I write for myself, to process this pain, because she’s not here to help me with that. She’s distracting herself from it. It’s easier for her to bury herself in someone else than to face what she’s done.

What she doesn’t seem to realise is that she hasn’t just destroyed a marriage of four years. She’s also destroyed a friendship of many years. She was my wife, yes, but she was also my best friend. When we broke up, I lost that friendship too. I lost everything. And that’s been incredibly hard to accept.

She accused me of wanting to argue with her, simply because I was reaching out about practical matters—like the sale of the property so we could both move on. Or because I asked her not to message my daughter, who wants nothing to do with her after everything that’s happened. Setting boundaries doesn’t equate to starting an argument. I’ve gone through each message and at no point did I try to initiate any conflict.

Then she said, “It’s obvious my lack of response is bothering you.” But that’s not the case at all. I wasn’t sitting around waiting for her reply. Once I’d said everything that needed to be said about the caravan sale, there was nothing else to discuss. I wasn’t obsessing over her lack of response. She was, in fact, the one looking for an argument.

I have a guess as to what triggered her anger, but in the end, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I didn’t rise to the bait. After all the conflict, I had an anxiety attack that lasted several hours, and that’s not something I’d wish on anyone, least of all myself. I don’t want arguments. I don’t want conflict. I just want peace and closure.

Yesterday felt like a setback, but I’m not going to label it as such. I didn’t lash out. I didn’t react. I stayed calm, said what needed to be said, and walked away. I have nothing left to prove. I’ve laid out the truth of everything, and I don’t need to create a narrative or tell lies to validate my side. The truth is enough.

We broke up for a lot of reasons. I had become distant, yes. There were times I got angry, and we argued. But I stayed and I fought because I thought we were worth fighting for. When she first told me it wasn’t working, my reaction was awful. I went into fight or flight mode, and I chose flight. But then I came back, apologised, and told her I wanted us to work. The truth, though, is that emotionally, she had already moved on—and with someone else. I just hadn’t realised it yet.

We broke up because when I became distant, she chose to seek comfort elsewhere. She didn’t fight for us. She chose flight. And she’s still doing it now. The difference is, she’ll never have the emotional intelligence to admit it to herself or anyone else.

I have to accept the choices she made. I have no say in that. But I won’t let her control me or rewrite the narrative. I won’t let her paint herself as the victim when the opposite is true. I’ll continue to write as I please because that’s my right—to process my pain, my journey, and my healing. I don’t owe her, or anyone else, any protection of their emotions. Only mine.

From Google –

Emotional cheating is considered a form of cheating and can be just as damaging to a relationship as physical cheating. It involves developing an emotional bond with someone outside the primary relationship, which can undermine the trust and intimacy between the partners. While it may not involve physical intimacy, emotional infidelity can lead to secrecy, deception, and a redirection of emotional energy away from the primary relationship. 

Here’s why emotional cheating is considered cheating:

• Undermines trust and intimacy: Emotional affairs erode the trust and emotional connection within the primary relationship, as the individual is seeking emotional fulfilment from someone else. 
• Secretive and deceptive: Emotional affairs often involve secrecy and deception, as the individual may hide the extent of their emotional connection with the third party. 
• Redirection of emotional energy: Emotional cheating involves diverting emotional energy and attention away from the primary partner and towards the other person, which can leave the primary partner feeling neglected and unfulfilled. 
• Potential for physical affairs: Emotional affairs can act as a gateway to physical affairs, as the emotional bond may eventually lead to a desire for physical intimacy. 

While boundaries vary from relationship to relationship, most experts agree that emotional cheating involves a significant breach of trust and can be as hurtful as physical infidelity.