Woman exposes cheater only to discover her best friend was his mistress. AITA? + UPDATE
"My best friend thinks I ruined a relationship and now she won't talk to me."
After high school I moved out of state for college. I always kept in touch with my best friend Anna and we kept each other informed about guys we were seeing and all that stuff.
After college (about 6 months ago) I moved back to my home state but an hour away from my hometown. About a month ago I decided, since I was settled finally, to start getting back into the dating game so I joined Tinder.
Instantly I met this really awesome guy named John. It turns out that John was up in my part of the state for work but that he actually lives in my hometown. I started to realize that he looked familiar and ask if we went to elementary school together or if he attended my church as a kid. He said he just moved to the state a couple years ago and I chalked it up as him having "one of those" faces.
We started chatting and hit it off pretty quickly. I told him I wasn't big into social media and he said he wasn't either so we exchanged numbers and started texting to communicate.
Even though he lived an hour away he commutes to my town a lot for work and since neither of us were looking for anything serious we figured this was a pretty awesome set up.
After a while our conversations turned a bit sexual with some sexy pics being sent from his side and comments about hooking up when he came back. We set up a date to have lunch and meet when he got back.
During this time I had told Anna all about him and when I finally told her we were going to meet up she asked for a picture. I sent her one (not one of the sexy ones, obviously) and was surprised to find out that she had dated him for a short time (couple of weeks) a few years back.
I asked if she was okay with me seeing him and she said she didn't care but that she was positive he had a girlfriend. She sent me his full name so I could find him on Facebook and sure enough he was in a relationship. I was pissed.
I instantly sent him a message confronting him. He apologized and profusely and said it was a mistake to talk to me on Tinder. I told him he should be apologizing to his girlfriend which he begged me not to tell. I told him to eff off and blocked his number.
After that I screenshot all the messages we had sent including him admitting to his guilt and sent his girlfriend a Facebook message. I told her I felt awful for having even a small role in his potential infidelity and that I thought she should know. I haven't gotten a message back and I don't think I will. But I felt what I did was the right thing to do.
Fast forward to a couple days ago when I came back home and went out for lunch with Anna. She asked me what ending up happening with John and I told her. She instantly got furious and started saying stuff like I had "no business interfering with another person's relationship" and "how could I destroy a relationship I wasn't part of."
I got really defensive and told her that he made me part of their relationship when he tried to cheat on his girlfriend with me. She told me I was disgusting and an awful person for what I did and that I had no business messaging John's girlfriend then paid and left. She hasn't talked to me since.
I feel like I did the right thing but the way Anna reacted and how she refuses to talk to me anymore is making me question everything. Was I right to get involved and message his girlfriend? How can I get Anna to talk to me again?
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s initial post:
Is it possible that she knows the girlfriend, and she's afraid that she's gonna get dragged into it? Maybe he was in the same relationship when he and Anna dated, and she's afraid of being found out.
Or maybe she knew about his infidelity and didn't say anything, and she thinks the girlfriend is going to be pissed when she finds out? I don't know, but it's pretty clear there's some backstory here, and I bet it's the (non-romantic) relationship between Anna and the girlfriend.
tindergonewrong (OP)
That's a good shout. I never thought she could have a relationship with the girlfriend. I remember her vaguely talking about John and seeing his pictures, which is why he looked so familiar, but I don't ever remember hearing more about him. I know she's adamantly against cheating so it'd be really surprising if she was hooking up with him while he was with his girlfriend...
You did the right thing. Has Anna been involved with a guy in a relationship before? Could it be that she doesn't have the same set of moral values that you do?
I’m not sure what Anna is so mad about. It’s probably something to do with her being jealous. If she’s a good friend she’ll get over it soon enough and apologize for her knee-jerk reaction.
If that happens and this isn’t a regular occurrence I’d let it go. However, I just wanted to add I really admire how you handled the situation. You most certainly did the right thing. You sound like a badass honestly.
tindergonewrong (OP)
I'm hoping she'll realize how outlandish her reaction was because I really miss her. But I do feel like it needed to be done. And thanks, I'm not a badass, just girl looking out for my fellow girl about AH.
Twelve days later, the OP returned with an update.
I didn't think I would need to update especially after hearing nothing from John's girlfriend after the first couple of days but, here I am. First off, thanks for the comments and PMs. I know I did the right thing and I was confused by Anna's reaction. But the support that poured in helped so much. Thank you.
Now, Anna still wasn't talking to me when my trip home came to an end so I just drove back to my city and went on about my life. She ended up calling me middle of last week and said she wanted to talk about what happened.
She still believed that what I did was messed up and she didn't approve. I asked her if she would ever tell me if she found out a future boyfriend of mine was cheating on me and she said "Of course. But that's because I know you."
I told her I didn't see the friendship/stranger status as an excuse to let a guy be awful to his girlfriend. After a while of back and forth with the same arguments I told her that we can agree to disagree and leave it at that. She said okay and we hung up.
After we hung up I decided to check my Facebook and low and behold there was a message from John's girlfriend in my inbox from two days before. I was kind of nervous to read it but it just said "Are you in ________ right now?"
I replied that I wasn't and an hour later I got another message asking if I could call her and her number. I was super nervous because I had no idea what I was going to be walking into but I figured if it got too bad I could hang up and block her number.
I called her and it was a very awkward greeting and then she asked me to tell her everything that happened. I obliged and told her exactly what happened. I could tell she was crying on the other end which broke my heart and I started apologizing but she told me not to.
She was grateful that I told her. Apparently John and her have been together for close to 4 years and he cheated on her a lot during the first year of being together until she found out. He promised he'd never do it again and she took him back. She said she was always really paranoid he would cheat again but he never showed signs or anything out of the ordinary.
I apologized for being the spotlight on what an ass he was. We kind of got to chatting for a while after that and after a while she switched from the depression to the anger stage and I let her vent.
At the end of it all she said she was finally going to leave him, which I agreed with, and then said that if I'm ever back in town that she'd like to buy me a coffee. Which I thought was a nice gesture and I might take her up on the offer.
After the phone call I was really relieved and happy about how things turned out. I went to go text Anna to tell her but then I remembered that John's girlfriend said they were dating for 4 years. So I texted Anna and asked her when she dated John.
It was two years ago. She must have known that he was dating another girl and that's why she was so freaking pissed. So a lot of you guessed right that she was his mistress for a while.
I'm not going to tell John's girlfriend since she's done with him (hopefully) and doesn't need anymore heart ache. But I'm definitely going to cut Anna out of my life. And when she asks why I'll just tell her that I know about her and John. All in all, it turned out okay for pretty much everyone involved except for John. Which is good because eff that dude.
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s update:
In your original post, you said that Anna and this guy only dated a couple of weeks. Do you think that it’s possible that she didn’t know, and when she found out she dumped him? I mean the reason why she snapped at you could be because she was ashamed of herself for not having the courage that you did, and ended up taking it out on you.
I’m not saying that you shouldn’t dump her as a friend, but instead of straight up accusing of her of knowingly being a mistress, talk to her before you make any rash decisions. But at the end of day you do know what kind of person she is more than any of us ever could.
tindergonewrong (OP)
You're right. She could have not known and then found out and dumped him. But I feel like if that's what happened she would have told me when she warned me that he had a girlfriend. So, I don't know. But, you're right, I can't accuse her.
"How dare you do exactly what I did and feel bad about it! Now I look like a terrible person!"
Given she only went on a few dates before ending things and felt the need to alert OP about the girlfriend, it's possible Anna didn't knowingly cheat and dumped him when she realized he was seeing someone, but didn't bother telling the girlfriend about it and now feels guilty about that aspect.
Anna says she can’t stand OP dating guy because “he has a girlfriend…”
But reality is Anna has no problem with the cheating as long as it’s with her.