u/PracticalCategory642

Our breakup was around 2 months ago (full story in another post on my profile). In short: He was behaving strangely out of the blue, after I repeatedly asked him what is wrong, he asked me: "Can you imagine a life without kids"? Since he had cancer last year and was just done with chemo in December '25, where he was told he might become infertile through chemo, froze his sperm and was told his sperm was already not of good quality before chemo, I answered "I can imagine a life both with and without kids, I think we can be happy either way". Previously, we never had a very serious conversation about kids, it was more like we both see ourselves there but not immediately (both career driven + have been focussed on friends, traveling etc.).

He then said we need to break up because he developed an extremely strong urge to have kids immediately and if he wants to meet someone new to have that with, he'd need to be with them first for a couple of years, so it's a good time to break up. I was completely shocked, especially since this conversation took place on the couch late at night, after I just came home at 10pm from a very long day.

Fast forward 5 days later, I had a gut feeling this had something to do with his meetup with a friend from childhood/teenage years, who was widowed last December (2 kids under 5) 2 weeks prior. I went on his laptop, checked his messages and found out they "plotted" our breakup, told each other they "fell in love" during this meetup, ready to live their new life together, even plotting how they will explain this sudden relationship to others, by lying about the history of events, which is also why my ex didn't even speak to his friends about it. I also found out through our mutual friends, who are his childhood/teenage friends as well, that this woman was never really part of their inner circle (I also had never before heard of her or her friend group at all, although I know pretty much all his friends from his hometown 1.5 away from our city).

Obviously, this was all extremely traumatic. I'm good now and don't miss him. Nevertheless, I want to ask for outside perspective on the message he sent me around 2 weeks ago. 50% of my friends said "wow - does he want you back? it sounds like it's not going well with her". The other 50% say he's just feeling extremely guilty, trying to clear his conscience.

Please keep in mind this is translated to English:

"I brought up the topic of family planning several times, at least from my perspective. That's why it's hard for me to believe that you weren't aware of how much this question had been weighing on me for years. After our breakup, you told me that you do see yourself having children in general. If you had already felt that way before, I really wish you had told me. It would have taken away a large part of my uncertainty, because you must have known that this uncertainty existed.

(to add: we never had a serious conversation about children, it was more like "if we have kids one day, we'll name them xyz, they'll have to get into football etc. I have never said that I don't want kids. I do see myself having kids but in 2-3 years).

You barely engaged with my brothers son at all, and whenever there were children around us, you often seemed annoyed. Even if you had already known that you wanted children one day, you could have simply said:
"You can probably tell that I don't really connect with children yet. But I still see myself having children of my own someday." That one sentence would have meant an incredible amount to me.

(Again: He never asked me and I never said I don't see myself with kids)

You're right when you say that these issues apparently weren't yet urgent enough for me to break up or have a serious conversation. Because we enjoyed our daily life together and were happy together, I kept pushing these unanswered questions aside, even though I knew we would have to deal with them sooner or later.

At the same time, both of us should have put more effort into working on our relationship: doing more things together again, becoming closer again, and above all, communicating more openly. I believe we could have made it.

(this sentence in particular confused me - why would you say something like that to an ex while already in a serious new relationship?)

What I still don't understand to this day is why we never managed to truly discuss these topics together and openly express our wishes, fears, and expectations. This isn't meant as a reproach toward you. We both share responsibility for that.

I loved spending time with you. You are funny, intelligent, beautiful, loving, and caring. Those are all qualities I always wanted in a life partner. I miss your presence very much, and everything reminds me of you.

At the same time, I often felt like I couldn't truly reach you whenever it came to the important issues especially the ones I described above. A symbolic example of that is that you never told me about your fear of loss. I know you didn't want to burden me with it. But just as you were always there for me, I would have wanted to be there for you as well.

(He is referring to when I told him how much I cared and thought about him and his health 24/7, even after chemo was done. I obviously never told him the extent of my fears that he will have a cancer recurrence, first of all because I'm in therapy and speak with him about that and second of all, because my ex frequently broke down crying when he thought about cancer coming back).

To this day, I cannot explain why I suddenly left my life partner of eight years, the woman who had always been by my side. Yes, we had our issues. Yes, I was uncertain whether we could have a wonderful relationship together but perhaps not a fulfilling family life. Yes, within a short period of time, I developed feelings for someone else.

Why I then rushed into choosing something new is something I can't answer myself. I don't believe it was simply because it seemed easier, as you describe it.

Was it the fear of never having the family life I had always wanted?

Was it my feelings for the other person?

Did my illness play a role?

I don't know. And every explanation I could give feels like an excuse to me.

One thing, however, I know with certainty:

The decision was wrong.

And the way I made it was disrespectful, to you and to everything we had built together over eight years. We deserved the chance for me to express my doubts openly, for you to explain your perspective, and for us to talk about everything together. Only after that should we have decided whether and how to move forward. Instead, I took that opportunity away from us. That was thoughtless, deeply hurtful, and shameful.

You also wrote that we understand love differently. You said that if you truly love someone, you do everything you can to keep them in your life. I see that a little differently. I believe that love alone is sometimes not enough when two people ultimately want different things out of life.

What I regret more than anything is that my actions prevented us from ever finding out together whether our future might actually have been possible. I should have given us that chance. Even if it's hard to believe, I loved you. I probably still do. That makes it even harder for me to understand why I acted the way I did. I'll have to seek help to work through all of this.

I know you'll never forgive me. You were my first love, and the thought that you'll remember me as the greatest mistake of your life breaks my heart. I understand that you hate me. Those feelings are completely justified. I wish there were something I could do or say, but I can't undo what I've done. Even if these are only empty words now, all I can do is hope that you'll find happiness again."

How it came to blocking him is complicated, but basically I lost my temper when the following happened:

I moved out of our apartment but left the Alexa devices that we both owned, but were linked to my account (my email, my music apps etc.). After he had sent the above message, I was a bit overwhelmed and asked him if we should have a conversation for closure. He agreed but then I got sick so canceled. A couple days later, I see in my spotify recently listened songs "ASMR female orgasm sounds", I realized immediately it must have been played via Alexa by him. I went into my alexa app, into the history, where (I didn't know this before) you can actually play the recording of anything that was said to alexa - so there I found a recording of a female voice saying "alexa, play porn". I guess she was just on the phone on speaker, but anyways. It's his apartment now but the fact a lot of my stuff is still there, made me furious. I confronted him, he denied she was there and it was just "someone" on the phone telling Alexa to play that.

I told him it's insane to me that he's sending me a message like the above while having his new girlfriend in our apartment with all my stuff still there. I said I was overwhelmed by the length of it .He said: "The length of the message came from the fact that I wanted to write down everything that had been on my mind. There is one more thing that's important for me to say: Many of these topics were never reasons to end the relationship. They were simply things that had been on my mind and that sometimes made me feel as though I couldn't truly reach you. But everyone has their own boundaries, and those deserve to be accepted"

I wanted to provide an update on my previous post: \[https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship\\\\\\\_advice/comments/1u2ahha/my\\\\\\\_partner\\\\\\\_34m\\\\\\\_of\\\\\\\_8\\\\\\\_years\\\\\\\_left\\\\\\\_me\\\\\\\_29f\\\\\\\_for\\\\\\\_his/\\\](https://www.reddit.com/r/relationship\\\_advice/comments/1u2ahha/my\\\_partner\\\_34m\\\_of\\\_8\\\_years\\\_left\\\_me\\\_29f\\\_for\\\_his/).

\*\*In short\*\*: My partner of 8 years left me, 6 months after we had just gone through his cancer journey, abruptly in a 2 minute conversation on the couch, lied to me, I found out a couple of days after the breakup by reading his messages that he left me for a recently widowed childhood friend with 2 kids.

While I have blocked him 1.5 weeks ago, moved out of our apartment and am feeling fine and never would take him back, I am still confused about the message he sent me 2 weeks ago. My friends say he's just trying to clear his conscience but I would appreciate outside perspective.

Please keep in mind this is translated to English:

"I brought up the topic of family planning several times, at least from my perspective. That's why it's hard for me to believe that you weren't aware of how much this question had been weighing on me for years. After our breakup, you told me that you do see yourself having children in general. If you had already felt that way before, I really wish you had told me. It would have taken away a large part of my uncertainty, because you must have known that this uncertainty existed.

\*(to add: we never had a serious conversation about children, it was more like "if we have kids one day, we'll name them xyz, they'll have to get into football etc. I have never said that I don't want kids. I do see myself having kids but in 2-3 years).\*

You barely engaged with my brothers son at all, and whenever there were children around us, you often seemed annoyed. Even if you had already known that you wanted children one day, you could have simply said:
"You can probably tell that I don't really connect with children yet. But I still see myself having children of my own someday." That one sentence would have meant an incredible amount to me.

\*(Again: He never asked me and I never said I don't see myself with kids)\*

You're right when you say that these issues apparently weren't yet urgent enough for me to break up or have a serious conversation. Because we enjoyed our daily life together and were happy together, I kept pushing these unanswered questions aside, even though I knew we would have to deal with them sooner or later.

At the same time, both of us should have put more effort into working on our relationship: doing more things together again, becoming closer again, and above all, communicating more openly. I believe we could have made it.

\*(this sentence in particular confused me - why would you say something like that to an ex while already in a serious new relationship?)\*

What I still don't understand to this day is why we never managed to truly discuss these topics together and openly express our wishes, fears, and expectations. This isn't meant as a reproach toward you. We both share responsibility for that.

I loved spending time with you. You are funny, intelligent, beautiful, loving, and caring. Those are all qualities I always wanted in a life partner. I miss your presence very much, and everything reminds me of you.

At the same time, I often felt like I couldn't truly reach you whenever it came to the important issues especially the ones I described above. A symbolic example of that is that you never told me about your fear of loss. I know you didn't want to burden me with it. But just as you were always there for me, I would have wanted to be there for you as well.

\*(He is referring to when I told him how much I cared and thought about him and his health 24/7, even after chemo was done. I obviously never told him the extent of my fears that he will have a cancer recurrence, first of all because I'm in therapy and speak with him about that and second of all, because my ex frequently broke down crying when he thought about cancer coming back).\*

To this day, I cannot explain why I suddenly left my life partner of eight years, the woman who had always been by my side. Yes, we had our issues. Yes, I was uncertain whether we could have a wonderful relationship together but perhaps not a fulfilling family life. Yes, within a short period of time, I developed feelings for someone else.

Why I then rushed into choosing something new is something I can't answer myself. I don't believe it was simply because it seemed easier, as you describe it.

Was it the fear of never having the family life I had always wanted?

Was it my feelings for the other person?

Did my illness play a role?

I don't know. And every explanation I could give feels like an excuse to me.

One thing, however, I know with certainty:

The decision was wrong.

And the way I made it was disrespectful, to you and to everything we had built together over eight years. We deserved the chance for me to express my doubts openly, for you to explain your perspective, and for us to talk about everything together. Only after that should we have decided whether and how to move forward. Instead, I took that opportunity away from us. That was thoughtless, deeply hurtful, and shameful.

You also wrote that we understand love differently. You said that if you truly love someone, you do everything you can to keep them in your life. I see that a little differently. I believe that love alone is sometimes not enough when two people ultimately want different things out of life.

What I regret more than anything is that my actions prevented us from ever finding out together whether our future might actually have been possible. I should have given us that chance. Even if it's hard to believe, I loved you. I probably still do. That makes it even harder for me to understand why I acted the way I did. I'll have to seek help to work through all of this.

I know you'll never forgive me. You were my first love, and the thought that you'll remember me as the greatest mistake of your life breaks my heart. I understand that you hate me. Those feelings are completely justified. I wish there were something I could do or say, but I can't undo what I've done. Even if these are only empty words now, all I can do is hope that you'll find happiness again."

How it came to blocking him is complicated, but basically I lost my temper when the following happened:

I moved out of our apartment but left the Alexa devices that we both owned, but were linked to my account (my email, my music apps etc.). After he had sent the above message, I was a bit overwhelmed and asked him if we should have a conversation for closure. He agreed but then I got sick so canceled. A couple days later, I see in my spotify recently listened songs "ASMR female orgasm sounds", I realized immediately it must have been played via Alexa by him. I went into my alexa app, into the history, where (I didn't know this before) you can actually play the recording of anything that was said to alexa - so there I found a recording of a female voice saying "alexa, play porn". I guess she was just on the phone on speaker, but anyways. It's his apartment now but the fact a lot of my stuff is still there, made me furious. I confronted him, he denied she was there and it was just "someone" on the phone telling Alexa to play that.

I told him it's insane to me that he's sending me a message like the above while having his new girlfriend in our apartment with all my stuff still there. I said I was overwhelmed by the length of it .He said: "The length of the message came from the fact that I wanted to write down everything that had been on my mind. There is one more thing that's important for me to say: Many of these topics were never reasons to end the relationship. They were simply things that had been on my mind and that sometimes made me feel as though I couldn't truly reach you. But everyone has their own boundaries, and those deserve to be accepted"

I (29F) was with my partner (34M) for 8 years. 2 weeks ago, I came home at 10pm from a long day and he was behaving strangely (was talking on the phone when I came in and he immediately hung up). We wanted to watch TV for 30 minutes before bed, however he was behaving so strange that I kept asking what's wrong and suddenly, out of nowhere, he asked me: "Could you imagine a life without kids?". I said to be honest I can imagine both a life with and without kids, it is not really on top of my mind and never has been (and we had discussed this hundreds of times before, he had no concern). He then said he had developed an extremely strong urge to have children immediately. He then said that he thinks we need to break up because I'm not sure and if he wants kids, he needs to meet someone new, be with them for a couple of years before having children with them so it's a good time to break up. I was at a loss for words to be honest. I didn't argue. I didn't cry. I was in a state of complete shock that our relationship was over within 5 minutes, on a random Thursday night on the couch. There was no preparation, no "we need to talk". He did seem very sad, and he told me he's confused why I don't want kids because I'm "so in love with animals" and can show so much love to dogs but he hasn't seen me be very excited around kids ever (which is true but that's what I have always been like).

Some backstory: Last year he was diagnosed with cancer. I stayed by his side through everything: the fear, the treatment, the uncertainty, the conversations about fertility, the possibility that life might never look the same again. I genuinely prioritized his wellbeing above my own. The sickness left me with wounds of my own forever, including fear of recurrence for him and a fear of getting cancer myself.

Therefore, I felt extremely sorry for him when he told me he wants kids and I couldn't give him that. The weekend after the breakup, I stayed with a friend and cried my eyes out, sad to lose him but also feeling guilty that I can't give him what he wants.

Well, was I in for a shock. I was already suspicious that something was going on in the background that I didn't know. This is because some weeks prior to this, he had met up with a former childhood friend (who I had never heard of, that he had no contact with for 10 years) in his hometown 1.5 hours away from where we live, who has lost her husband in December of last year and already has 2 kids under 5. They met to reconnect and talk about what had happened to both of them last year. After the breakup, I saw something strange in the chat gpt account we share (because I pay the premium subscription and he didn't want to pay as well): He was searching for cars to buy for the specific route from our city to his hometown. I asked him about it and he just claimed his colleague told him that they get a discount on cars at work as of recently so he wanted to check out if it made sense financially. I already didn't believe him, so a day after the breakup I went on his laptop, opened his messages, searched for the girls name and nothing showed up, so I immediately knew he must have deleted the chat with her. Nevertheless, I still wasn't sure what was going on. 5 days after the breakup, I was back home after having stayed with a friend. He left, so I locked the door from the inside, opened his messages on his laptop again and there it was: The naked pictures, the vacations booked with her, the hotels booked, the conversations about sex, the conversations about "this is the craziest thing I have ever done"; "I fell head over heels in love and had to turn my life upside down", "I'm so glad we're going all in on this"; "I'm looking forward to everything the future brings with you".

Needless to say, me entire body was shaking. I was enraged. I was heartbroken. The betrayal went beyond everything I thought was possible. It did read like they had not slept with each other yet. But the messages before the breakup were all deleted and the messages were clear: They fell in love when they met a couple of weeks ago and he was ready to leave me behind for her.

I gave him some hints that I knew what was going on (said I saw that he kept asking chat gpt for car recommendations, he even created a secret sub folder in chat GPT, thinking I wouldn't see it) and he DENIED it, claiming he just wants to play a bigger role in this families life which I KEPT HIM FROM because I "never seemed excited to be there". Only when I revealed that I had read all of their chats, he sent me a long message acknowledging that he handled everything terribly. He admitted he emotionally betrayed me, lied, and didn't give our relationship a fair ending before moving on. He says he will regret hurting me for the rest of his life. he said he was "overwhelmed" and had to make a quick decision due to the feelings for her.

But what I'm struggling with isn't only the betrayal.

It's the feeling of being replaced so easily.

He told me our years together were the happiest of his life in the first breakup conversation. He told me he had loved me as a person but we would never be happy together because of the difference in our visions for our future - which is fair but all of this just seems so unfair and quick.

What hurts even more is that this new woman seems to represent everything he now says he wants: she already has 2 kids, she probably wants more children given that her husband died, she's from the same hometown, they share mutual friends from years ago (though he hasn't seen them in a decade), and she entered his life right when he was questioning everything after cancer. They were also talking about their strong bond because they both experienced how quickly life can end (I was there with him during diagnosis, treatment, remission so I know this too!). I just feel like absolute shit. They're planning their family life together, barbecues with former friends, he invited her to OUR city to meet his friends that I have known for 8 years too. I just can't comprehend that he just replaced me and doesn't care at all?

At the same time I feel guilty. She experienced trauma, as did he. Should I just be happy they found each other at the right place, right time?

I keep asking myself:

• Why wasn't I worth fighting for?
• Why didn't he talk to me openly before emotionally investing in someone else?
• Why does it feel like I carried him through the hardest period of his life only for someone else to get the version of him that is excited about the future?

I know our relationship wasn't perfect. We had communication issues, intimacy issues, and unresolved conversations about children. I'm not claiming I was a perfect partner.

But I can't get over the fact that I never got the chance to work on those issues together. He made the decision while already emotionally connected to someone else.

For people who have been through something similar:

How did you stop feeling replaced?

How did you stop comparing yourself to the new partner?

How do you deal with the unfairness that you're going through heartbreak and the cheating partner is happy?

And how do you make peace with the fact that someone can love you deeply, yet still leave?

Should I ask him for one last conversation? After I found the chats, I kicked him out and we've only talked via text which feels weird. I want to look him in the eyes and tell him how much I hate him.

Edit: I want to thank every single person that has commented. I was hesitant to post this as I was afraid that one day he would find this post and think I went completely insane to share ‚our story‘ on the internet, although it’s anonymous anyways. I’ve learned from this situation and from your comments that I didn’t deserve this, should move on immediately, live my best life and never again put someone else’s needs above my own. I would have loved to keep this relationship in good memory after all these years, all the challenges, different life phases (college, first jobs, building a career, his sickness, my own struggles with my own family history etc), I’m sad that I have to keep him in my memory as a cheater. But I will move on now and try to keep my dignity. I’ll definitely update this thread if anything new happens. So far, he has unfollowed me on instagram last week when I kicked him out but he’s still watching my stories so I guess at least I can laugh about the fact he seems to think I don’t see that (this is where the age gap really shows 😂).
Sending love to you all