Whenever I speak with someone about my long distance relationship, they bring up cheating. While I personally think that people in LDR aren’t any more prone to cheating that those who work out a short distance relationship, I admit that when it does happen it might be harder to deal with. I’m here to help you figure out what you should do if you suspect that you are being cheated on.
Ask around
If you want to be sure before you fire any accusations, ask their family and friends if they know anything. Make sure to be nice about it - it’s not worth it to turn their loved ones against you, especially if you’re not so sure if they really are cheating on you. You can ask about it subtly and usually that will give you enough information to make your own deduction, without making their family and friends too alert and worried.
If you still feel like your guts are right and you suspect they are being disloyal, it’s time to take the next step. However, if the answers you got from their family and friends reassure you that it was all made up by your imagination, wait it out.
Notice the little things
I don’t think that stalking on social media is ever a good way to deal with your relationship. However, if you think that your partner is cheating on you, it might be a good idea to keep your eyes peeled for any signs around the web that might reveal whether your thoughts are right or wrong.
Also, start paying attention to how they act around you. Are they paying zero attention to you, all the time? Are they making excuses so that they can skip the Skype date you planned on a long time ago? Do you have to reschedule the visits all the time? Something might be wrong.
All this being said, monitoring your partner religiously is contradictory and a lot of people see it unethical which is something you should consider. I personally would rather have an argument about this with my partner and be open and honest about how I feel, than do something that really violates my partner’s privacy and makes him feel insecure. Monitoring and stalking are also breaking the trust you two have bonded - is it worth taking the risk to find out if they are cheating on you? That is something I think everyone needs to think about before taking any actions that you might end up regretting, big time.
Talk to him about it, openly
Alright. Nobody likes false accusations, which is why you probably shouldn’t blurt it out and tell someone they are a big, dirty cheater. Start slowly, tell them you’re worried and ask them what’s going on between you two. You should stress that you want them to be honest with you - that is the only way to get through this.
Chances are that they will tell you, if there is someone else.
What to do if your partner truly is cheating on you?
First, talk about it. You need to have a discussion to find out whether or not you both are still in love with each other. Cheating can happen for many reasons and it doesn’t always mean that your partner doesn’t love you. Maybe their sexual needs weren’t met and they were too afraid to talk about it with you. Often times there are a bunch of reasons why the infidelity happened in the first place, but the most important question is whether or not you guys are still in love.
Then you need to talk about how you want to solve this thing. If you feel like you can’t be in a relationship with this person any longer, given how much they hurt your feelings and how you cannot trust them completely anymore, you have every right to back out and call it a day.
However, a lot of couples work through cheating and carry on their relationship, they just need to start building trust from the bottom. You need to come to a conclusion that makes you happy; there is no reason to stay in an unhappy relationship. The tricky part is, that taking therapy sessions, for instance, is much, much harder in a long distance relationship. You either need to work around that or find a therapist that is willing to do your sessions with a Skype on! (This should be a thing, right?)
Even if you feel like you need to end the relationship, I would heavily advise you to talk through the cheating part of it. Cheating often affects your next relationship negatively if it hasn’t been talked through completely. You have the right to ask the questions from your partner. You have the right to be able to start your next relationship from a clean slate.
Have you ever been cheated on? How did you find out and what did you do once you did? Share your story with us in the comment section below!
