Should You Give A Cheater A Second Chance?

Sometimes, cheaters can change. But most of the time, they never will. Here are some real stories about what happens when you give a cheater a second chance:

“The relationship is over. I wanted to work it out, but I just never got it right in my mind, and turned into a jealous douche. It was awful, and she left. Thank god because I was just stupid back then. No regrets because I am in a good place now, but I would never do that again. It never goes away.” — Cookedbait

“Over. I really did forgive her, but she had so much internal guilt over it she couldn’t be happy around me. She hated herself. So after four months of that, she just moved out one day. The whole idea of that relationship was a mindfuck.” — NeedMoarCowbell

“Still together. I’ve forgiven, but I’ve never forgotten. Things are much, much better now, but we had to pull our shit together in the face of something much bigger than our marriage (taking sudden custody of my step-son). It’s taken a long time, but the trust has been rebuilt. Still, there is a small part of me that will never get over it. Which I have been open about with him.” — [deleted]

“I am no longer with her. But I did try to give her another chance. It just doesn’t work. Once that initial trust has been broken, it’s impossible to keep your mind from wandering and thinking she’s out with some other dude whenever you haven’t heard from her in a while.” — therealmaxipadd

“She cheated on me with one of my best friends. I actually figured it out rather quickly. I gave her a second chance, even paid for couples counseling and tried to open up the lines of communication. In the end, though, turns out that she never stopped seeing him, and I broke things off after she tried to convince me that it was a polyamorous relationship and I was being ‘polyphobic.’ She still sees nothing wrong with what she did and I haven’t talked to her since.” — hotchocletylesbian

“We both cheated while he was doing a study abroad. We both confessed when he got home. We were both hurt, but not as mad as we would have expected. We started discussing nonmonogamy and eight years later are polyamorous.” — laidymondegreen

“Over. We were fucking miserable for another three months then it ended. We’re now sort of friends when we can be bothered. He tried to cheat on me with his ex, but she turned him down. I found out when I found texts from her basically telling him he needed to sort himself out and stop dicking me around. I never met his ex but if there’s some sort of general sisterhood solidarity type award she fucking deserves it.” — whyhellotharpie

“She cheated on me two more times and left me. Had another failed marriage after me and, according to mutual friends, is now married to the guy I caught her cheating with about 20 years ago.” — Aerron

“Cheated on me again! Lied to me about why she wanted a divorce. Left me for some older washed up dude at her work.” — [deleted]

“Nonexistent. I ended up breaking up with him several months later for narcissistic tendencies, anger issues, and inability to communicate. I wish I had dumped him the second I found out he cheated, would have saved me a lot of heartache.” — nosuchthingasunique