Dear Claudia:

You are welcome. In the beginning of your relationship with him, he told you “that there had been cheating by his ex and that how badly she treated him”. In the past, if I heard a person sharing this I assumed that he did not cheat on her, that he treated her well and that he was a victim in that relationship. And therefore, he will not cheat on me and will treat me well, because I am unlike his ex.

Such an assumption has no basis in reality, because a person who has been cheated on is not necessarily one who did not or will not cheat on a girlfriend or wife.

He may have been a victim in his marriage, she cheating, he did not. But in the relationship with you he betrayed your trust in him, he had a relationship with another woman going on without telling you about it, and then when you  found out he either denied it or minimized its significance. This is the wrong he has done to you.

In the title of your thread you wrote that he “claimed to have loved me”- I suppose he did. But what you can definitely be certain about is that he was dishonest with you for a long time. I wish it wasn’t so. I wish he had let you know what was going on when it was going on, that would have been respectful to you.

Understanding what happened is important so that when you try to move on, you know better what it is that you are leaving behind, learn all you can from the experience, and in so doing, increase by much your chances for a future healthy, loving relationship with another man.

anita