I f**ked up, how do I fix it?

LegacyUser

I'm 29 and single 2 years out of a 4 year relationship where the love faded so we parted.

I have dated short term in the last 18 months and found it hard to meet anyone with whom I felt a genuine connection with. I met some nice girls I dated for 2-3 months at a time but in all the cases I ended it because I didn't see longterm potential with any of them.

I met a girl online in October and after chatting for a while/ with work commitments for us both we met in December. We got on extremely well and agreed to date exclusively. She was quite guarded as she was only out of a four month relationship so we agreed to take it slow.

Things have moved along nicely and we were at the point of becoming boyfriend/ girlfriend until I recently fecked things up.
I was loyal to her throughout however would have had an odd chat with one or two girls from the past, nothing romantic just them checking in as I remained friends when we realised there was no spark.

A few weeks ago, I was deleting a dating account when a girl had messaged me. I was chatting to this girl intermittently over a few months on the site, she wasn't in a good place and had a tough time with men so we were more like friends to be honest. When I was deleting the profile I gave her mu number and we stayed in touch in a friendly way.

Two weeks ago this girl started to get a bit flirty. I will admit that I was enjoying the attention and flirted back a little. I was still dating the girl of my dreams and didn't think I would be tempted.
This other from the site then asked me to meet up for a glass of wine as friends (she knew I was seeing someone) and I stupidly continued to reply to some messages when she made her intentions known. She seemed to want to pursue me despite knowing I wasn't single.
I did decide to meet her one evening for a glass of wine, and told the girl I'm seeing I was meeting a friend. I felt awful about it, and cancelled an hour before I was due to meet.
The girl continued to message and is now threatening to expose the fact we'd been messaging for so long to the girl I'm seeing.

I came clean about everything over the week to the girl I'm seeing. She didn't take it well and is basically going on like i actually cheated. I know I lied and I have taken responsbility, but she somehow saw a sexual message from this girl on my phone (I left the chat open she didn't snoop) and doesn't believe a word I am saying.

I am only dating this girl a few months but I am disraught at the thought of losing her. She was so different and I actually saw a real future with her. She is smart and beautiful and has her head screwed on. She has never brought any drama.
She gradually has reduced contact with me, and admitted last night she is disappointed and feels she can't be with me because of the trust issues I have brought on. She said she needs to stop contact now and I feel slightly powerless and know I should give her space to make up her own mind.
I really don't want to let this one slip away I know I'll regret it if I don't at least try, I said we can stop dating and in the interim I won't date anyone else, I'm not interested tbh. But she isn't really keen, I think she is done.

Is there anything I can do. I know I was an idiot etc, but I am serious about this girl and feel like we are going through a break up. I'm not good with words so even trying to explain how I feel to her makes me nervous, but I'm realising that I probably have feelings for her.

Rekop dog

Hard to have a whole lot of sympathy here, you seem to be someway blaming this other girl for perusing you but you gave her your number and enjoyed the attention.

There's an air of desperation to your post now the girl you were actually dating found out what you were doing. Where was that awareness of how great she was when you were exchanging sexual messages with another woman?

Sounds like she's gone and I'd leave her alone if I were you, but try working on your emotional intelligence and ability to be midfull of what's important to you instead of having this sorrow when things inevitably go tits up because of your poor decisions.

david75

Wrap it up and move on op. You learned a lesson here and to drag this out any further when you’ve shattered any trust, would be futile.
Turn it all around and imagine everything you did was something she did to you.
You would be out of there in seconds.

Be real and own it. Be fair to her and you. You can’t have your cake and eat it. Not if your decent.

Please be decent. Don’t be the guy.

Call it off and don’t squirm back in. She’ll never trust you now anyways.
Do the right thing.

Neyite

A lot of people make the mistake of focusing on the technicalities of the cheating dalliance - that's not what shatters the relationship, it's the lies and the knowledge that your trust in that person was abused.

What you did, the sexting and arranging to meet is often called an emotional affair and in many cases it can be easier to forgive a drunk unplanned snog or shag than an emotional encounter, because the emotional encounter is sustained and involves intimacy of a different kind.

In December, you agreed to be exclusive. You promised. And in less than two months you handed over your phone number to another woman from a dating site and continued to text her culminating in arranging a date for drinks. So the very little she knows about you is coloured by this fact. By the fact that all those dates over the past few months, all the times she wasn't with you, your mind was on cultivating some sort of relationship with another woman.

She is right to cut her losses I'm afraid. She probably feels you couldn't manage to be exclusive for two months, and saw how easily you can lie so what kind of future could she expect with you?

You say you don't want to let her slip away, but you actually don't get to choose that. She does. And she's chosen to end it. I think you need to chalk this up to a lesson learned, sorry.

Xterminator

Hi Op

you came here looking for advice.

i would advise you that your post definitely sounds like you were minimising your role in the 'affair'. So dont do that. own up that none of it would have happened if you behaved honourably.

I would advise you at this stage to give your girlfriend all the space she wants. Its not the time for grand gestures, or any of that nonsense.

If you respect this person, let them come to a decision. If the decision doesn't go the way you want, show her that you respect her wishes and behave accordingly, if she wants no contact, do that for her.

You now have a chance to reflect on your behaviour and on the kind of person you wish to be. This could be a very important time in your life. IMO it doesn't matter if you feel like your a good person. It is your actions that determine if you are a good person.

Good luck

Bambi985

I wouldn't touch you with a barge pole after that carry-on tbh.

Your post is littered with excuses and explanations and "but i didn't cheat" rhetoric but it's blatantly obvious that you weren't willing to give up the casual dating and flirting for this woman, no matter what way you look at it. Staying "friends" with previous dates and the way you try to explain away giving that other woman your number (just a "friend" too lol) to justify essentially keeping your options open is a big red flag, that would probably be the biggest for me. Yes, you f*cked up, and that means this woman will probably never give you the time of day again and rightly so. Own it, take responsibility and leave her to get on her merry way, she doesn't deserve this kind of headfcuk.

It's really hard to meet someone you connect with, you of all people seem to know this, and these dating apps are riddled with men like you who just want to line up the dates and shoot them down and if I was her I'd probably be writing you off as another one of those messers that treats Tinder like he's a kid in a candy shop and fcuk everyone else. Because that's the impression you've given with all of your actions. Hope you learn something from this.

road_high

Dear Christ, be a man and take some fckin responsibility for your actions. It's all been said by other posters here but you were exclusively dating but nonetheless you go onto a dating site, message a girl/swap numbers and even arrange to then meet up! This is outrageous behavior by any stretch and as others have said it's not the ifs and buts, its the betrayal and sneakiness of your actions. That girl had a lucky escape tbh, what a head melt.

Dixie Chick

I think you should probably let this one go and know better in future.

I know it must be hard to think of losing someone so lovely but you must look at it from her point of view. You say she was a guarded person, so obviously she let that down and while you did not actually cheat, why the hell would anyone sane and not into the dramatics carry on with a fella who has been texting and lapping up attention from a girl he met through a dating site. It wouldn't be a self protection or intelligent thing for her to do really.

The poster who said above that cheating is not about the actions but the surrounding lies etc is spot on. You have not acted in a way that would reassure her that you are worth hanging in there for.

dmm82

Op, if she was so great then why were you bothering to text other girls? Is it just the thrill of the chase for you? I think now its just a case of you wanting what you can't have because when you had her you didn't seem to care about her.

Leave the poor girl alone now, hopefully you will learn from this.

road_high

And bringing the other girls alleged mental health issues into the whole saga...pretty low.
Also making out like she was some kind of desperate slut (the “she knew I was dating someone” line...)

Katgurl

I would say you can't fix it or if I had some sort of female insight into how you could (I don't) I certainly wouldn't tell you. Two months in, you've behaved appallingly and you are not prepared to take responsibility for any of it

As you're looking for advice not criticism then here it is; figure out why you behaved as you did. Why you were continuing on with snesky chats and needed all that ego massaging. Also be honest with yourself - are you only so enthralled by your girlfriend now because you're losing her?