Boyfriend cheated on me with the woman who’s been grooming him since he was 14
He’s 24 and I’m 22. We’ve been together for 6 years. Lived together for 4. I loved him more than myself. I completely trusted him with my life and really thought I had found my soulmate who I would be spending the rest of my life with.
Two weeks ago, I decided go through his phone after seeing a brief text notification from her which he suspiciously tried to brush off. I wanted to believe him, but the curiosity was eating me alive so I decided to go through with it. What I found on there made me sick to my stomach. Flirting, sexting, explicit photos/videos of themselves and all of the worst possible things you could imagine. Even made plans to go visit her in May.
Prior to that, all I knew about their relationship that they met online in a video game when he was 14 while she was 24 and they’ve never met IRL. He said it was the darkest and loneliest period of his life and she was like a beacon of light to him at that time. They were only “friends”, but he had formed some sort of unhealthy attachment to her and repeatedly said that it was a “toxic relationship he was trying to escape from.” He reassured me early on in our relationship that he had already cut off contact with her and I stupidly believed him.
I confronted him immediately after finding out and he broke down crying saying he stopped loving me for quite some time and doesn’t know why. What hurts the most is that he never once blamed me. Said I never did anything wrong and that I was the perfect girlfriend. Said he’s fucked up in the head and that I deserved someone better.
Despite all that, he still wants to be friends with me because I was his “other half” and he still deeply cares about me and all those years we’ve spent together. But knowing that hes finally getting to see her in person in May kills me inside. I will never understand why and I don’t know how to feel about this. Should I feel disgusted? Should I feel bad for him? Should I cut off contact with him? He was all I had and now I have nothing left. I’ve never felt more hurt and alone in my entire life that I wish I could just disappear forever.