I made a mistake and cheated on my bf; I want to gain back his trust

Hey Rosie,

First of all, I love the advice that you give on a weekly basis; but here’s my problem. I was in love with this guy and before we broke up, he started hitting me, so that gave me all the more reason to leave. After mending what was left of my heart, I fell in love with this other guy. I would admit I made a mistake and cheated on him, but he forgave me and we worked it out. Now, of late, I’ve begun to hate myself, because I know I hurt him really bad. How can I reassure him that I love him, because I want to spend the rest of my life with him.{{more}}

Desperately in need of answers

Dear Desperately in need of answers,

Thank you so much for your kind words. The first thing I have to say to you is: forgive yourself; this is truly a burden that you are carrying around and it is definitely preventing you from moving on and finding peace.

You were so, so smart to leave your old abusive relationship. You know that you aren’t deserving of that treatment right? But it seems like you have residual side effects from going through that nonsense and this is why you have possibly made this mistake with your current boyfriend. Let me tell you something: it is wonderful that he is willing to forgive you and is trying to work at saving this relationship; however, you are carrying around this shame almost as if you are not worthy and that is not good enough; you need some healing.

So, what do you do? You have taken the first step and reached out and asked for help. Now the second step would be to go to counselling. Maybe from your church, community or health centre etc. The bottom line is that you need to release your pain, guilt and doubts. You should also let your current boyfriend know that you are trying your best to work on you first, so that you can be a better person for him in the long run. It seems as though he’s a decent person and may very well work with you through this. In fact, when you are in a better place emotionally, maybe you both can have couples counselling, so you can hash out those trust issues and then start on a clean page.

You are very worthy, my girl; you just made a few mistakes and that is very forgivable. What is not forgivable is to keep punishing yourself and not getting the support and help that you need to get past this rough patch. I have a lot of faith in you and you CAN do this!

Rosie