For context, I'm someone who has always wanted to improve myself and become the best version of myself. I've always worked on things in my own way and at my own pace. My girlfriend had grown frustrated over time because she felt I wasn't being proactive enough in the relationship and hadn't worked on certain things she wanted me to address. I'll be honest, I can see where she was coming from to some extent. I was always improving, just in my own way.
What makes this harder to process is that in October 2025, just one month before everything unravelled, she told me I had been the best boyfriend she'd ever had across any year of our relationship. So I genuinely had no idea what was coming.
In November 2025 she broke up with me and gave me an ultimatum with three conditions, she wanted me to get into better shape, get into a better paying job as she was earning more, and work on getting my licence. I agreed and said that was fair and that I would put even more effort in than before. Honestly, it didn't take me long to make real progress on all three.
In December 2025, before any of what followed, I invited her on a holiday abroad. It was a hotel she had always dreamed of staying at and I wanted her to experience it. She agreed to come. At this point things felt like they could still work between us.
What I didn't know is that from the 7th of January 2026, after she had already agreed to come on the trip with me, she downloaded dating apps and started seeing someone else. She had kissed this guy multiple times. She was pursuing someone else while still planning to come on a holiday I had organised and paid for entirely.
She came on the trip with me in the first week of February 2026. I paid for everything, hotels, flights, food, experiences, all of it. She later admitted she wanted to come partly because of that specific hotel. We kissed and were intimate on the trip.
When we came back she barely replied to my messages and was almost completely silent for weeks. I was confused because the trip had been good between us.
I then spoke to close friends who had known us both for years. Every single one of them told me to walk away. Not one person vouched for her. My sister said the same.
I had been planning a big date to try and win her back, a really nice restaurant, the whole thing. But before it happened I found out the guy she'd been seeing had asked her to be his girlfriend two days prior. According to her, he earns more, is better looking, and is more proactive. He is also turning 30 next year. I cancelled the date. I just wanted to end things.
We met on the 8th of March 2026. It became clear we were both arriving at the same conclusion. We ended the relationship that day. During that conversation she kissed me and said things like maybe in a year’s time, if we are both single, we could get back together. That has been ingrained in my head ever since.
She was downloading dating apps, kissing another guy multiple times, and coming on a fully paid holiday with me simultaneously. The same person who told me in October I was the best boyfriend she had ever had.
Update: She posted a portrait of him on her story exactly 3 weeks after we broke up, and now 4 weeks later she is on a holiday with that same person, posting about it on her story, is this crazy? Especially 4 weeks after kissing me during our break up
Does this count as cheating? Or is it a grey area because of the ultimatum and the fact we were winding things down anyway? I feel completely betrayed but people keep telling me we were technically broken up.