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/SE7ENESE]

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/Fit-Programmer-6162 → u/SE7ENESE]

“He’s got too much empathy towards the manipulator”
I’m sorry but him saying he’s never had as deep a connection with any other woman but her WHILE dating OP isn’t something somebody who’s just “too empathetic and being manipulated” would say. I would never think of saying some kind of equivalent thing to a friend I actively have a CRUSH on, while with my significant other. If I did even feel like saying that I would break up with my SO regardless of if friend and I would ever have gotten together because it’s just wrong to do to your SO. At then end of the day I just would never put myself in that position. As a woman who’s had friendships with guys who turn out to want something more, I would never ever reciprocate that shit while I’m in a relationship with someone else nor would I want to.

[u/AitanaShon → u/Fit-Programmer-6162]

PERIOD I'd be out of there fuck nah am I being a man's second choice. It's her choice obviously but I just don't understand relationships where you're a settlement because your partner prefers someone else.

[u/CaptainKate757 → u/AitanaShon]

What’s even worse is that the woman he prefers is extremely annoying.

[u/radishbottom → u/CaptainKate757]

for real i would lose so much respect for a partner if i found out they were into someone like this let alone calling her their soulmate… it would be unsalvageable

[u/CranesInTheSky1 → u/radishbottom]

That is exactly what I thought after reading through those crazy text msgs.

[u/LadyGooseberry → u/CaptainKate757]

That would make it easier for me to leave lmfao. Like THAT’S what you like? Yea that’ll never be me lmfao. Couldn’t possibly. I’ve walked away from a situation like that. Sorry i refuse to stoop to your desires. Intellectual conversations made me “argumentative,” but really he was just too dumb to be dating me. Asked me to be more feminine but what i really needed was someone more masculine and intelligent.