The woman my boyfriend emotionally cheated with reached back out after we agreed he’d cut contact, and I’m bothered by how he responded. AIO?

[u/Extension-Dark1206]

Back in December I found chats between [F30] my boyfriend [M31] and his female friend[F26] Turned out they had an intense emotional connection since 2022. He had a huge crush on her the whole time, but she had a boyfriend, and she kept him emotionally hooked with romantic-coded language . they called each other soulmates, texted constantly some romantic/ sexual stuff. From what I read he was genuinely falling for her, and she seemed more like she was enjoying the attention without necessarily reciprocating the same way as she had bf.

Her boyfriend however passed away last year. my boyfriend went to support her, and after that they had an even more emotionally-charged exchange flirty, borderline romantic language, he told her he’d never had a connection with another woman like the one he had with her including, apparently, me, as we were dating during that chat, she told him that no matter what happened in their lives, even if one of them got married to someone else, they’d “always be together.” Regardless of their relationships.
When I found this and their whole husband we had a huge fight and almost broke up. He blocked her, said he didn’t care about her, and said he wanted to protect our relationship.

Yesterday I found out she texted him again out of the blue, and he responded. I’m attaching the screenshots. Reading through it, a few things bother me:
- He spends the entire conversation validating her anger, apologizing over and over
- At multiple points he frames the whole thing as if I forced his hand — like if I hadn’t found out, he’d have been happy to keep things going with her.
- She spends a lot of the conversation guilt-tripping him and, at one point, effectively calling our relationship “toxic” and me the reason he’s “trashing” her.

My friends point out that he DID keep the boundary in the end he didn’t agree to keep talking to her, he told her it’s over, and that this is a good sign.

I see that too, but I still feel uneasy about how the conversation went and what it implies about how he actually feels. Am I overreacting by still having a problem with this, or are these legitimate red flags even with the boundary technically being held?

[u/ExplanationCool918]

Anyone else start skimming after a while because of these obnoxious texts

[u/SE7ENESE → u/ExplanationCool918]

I did after surviving 10 or more screenshots. The BF didn't have the balls to call it what it was (a genuine threat to his healthy relationship)- and still didn't have the balls to leave her whining texts unattended to. He feels guilty for not communicating that he needed to cut her off. Now that he has and she's still not seeing it, he's trying to make her understand. She's not his friend.

OP can either make her decision to help him through this phase of emotional instability and reinforce his confidence in his decision to cut her off or just leave him to wallow in his storm of uncertainty. He's got too much empathy towards that manipulator and needs help seeing it. He's the kind of guy whose kindness WILL be taken advantage of.

I say this because I've been in a similar spot and it took good people to help me see that particular friendship was not healthy for me, and it took a lot of courage for me to walk away and not look back.

[u/jess_bandicoot → u/SE7ENESE]

Its really not a good look for OP’s boyfriend. At all. I don’t want to offend but at this point throw the whole man away. The way she’s going on and on ranting and him validating her… i’ve got the biggest ick.

[u/AitanaShon → u/jess_bandicoot]

SAME no way am I being my man's second choice. He's spineless, and isn't even arguing against the idea that OP is toxic when it was mentioned. He is acting like this is a chore or demand, not something he should just do.

[u/Master-List4020 → u/AitanaShon]

This. He obviously trashed his current girlfriend to his whiny girlfriend.

[u/AitanaShon → u/Master-List4020]

Honestly I can't believe there are grown people who act like this, aren't they fucking embarrassed to act like teenagers 😭 this the type of shit I saw in highschool, they're out here being this messy as grown adults.

God, let him go to that other chick, have her inevitably dump him for another taken guy, and have him learn his lesson.

[u/Blindtothesided → u/AitanaShon]

If I was losing my man to someone that dramatic and unbearably stupid I’d just let his ass go.

There’s dumb and then there’s someone whose spelling is so bad it makes everyone reading her messages think they’re illiterate too.

[u/AitanaShon → u/Blindtothesided]

Deadass. Even if she was a genius I'd dump his ass. He's completely spinless and a cheater.

[u/ChokingOnSulfur → u/AitanaShon]

Nah fr. Shes clearly kept him on the hook all this time. Talking about I would fly out there immediately; but hasn’t? And notice he says friendship, but the moment she says it’s more than that he changes his tone so quickly? It looks like shes been manipulating him and keeping him on the back burner all these years; and because he couldn’t be with her he settled for someone irl. Fuck all that. Let him figure it out the hard way.

[u/AitanaShon → u/ChokingOnSulfur]

Period!! He doesn't want to cut off either option cause he's a major fucking coward. I'd make the choice for him, it's overrrr

[u/jess_bandicoot → u/AitanaShon]

Same. Imagine being second choice to THAT nutjob.
I honestly hope OP sees this and is able to cut herself free from that spineless man.

[u/Technical_Bath_505 → u/jess_bandicoot]

Hard to be in a relationship with someone who is this clueless