So, my boyfriend (28M) and I (27F) have been together for about a year now. We’ve been having a rocky time since October and this past month we have been arguing a bit more than usual. The latest argument being him accusing me of cheating because he thought a text I had sent him was meant for someone else. This was definitely not the case as I love him and would never dream of doing anything like that to him.
A few days ago, my boyfriend and I were hanging out in his truck running some errands. At one point, he had to go into a store for a bit and I decided to stay back. Something in my gut told me to check around the truck to see if I find anything. I looked in his center console and found his work phone. It was the same password as his regular phone so I was able to unlock it and immediately went into his text messages. I didn’t see anything weird until I checked his Recently Deleted folder. That’s where I saw a thread of 230 deleted messages between him and a girl.
After looking through messages, it was clearly that he was buying nudes/videos off of her and had been keeping in contact with her from mid August 2025 to beginning of September 2025. I was completely heartbroken when I saw this because, physically, the girl was the complete opposite of me. A lot of her characteristics were things my boyfriend had said he wasn’t into or saw as a turn off (i.e tattoos, piercings, dyed hair). Aside from feeling betrayed, I felt that my self-esteem took a big hit. I confronted him about this and he broke down apologizing saying it had nothing to do with me he just wanted nudes and that it should have never happened to begin with. He swore it was just that one girl and said he never came clean because he thought I would leave him and that he knew he would never make a stupid mistake like that again so there was no point in telling the truth.
I told him I needed space to think about things and wanted to go no contact for the week which he agreed to. I don’t know what to do at this point. I feel so broken and betrayed. I never thought he would do anything like this. We’ve always had a pretty active sex life, always trying different things, and we’re no strangers to sexting and sending nudes to each other often so im trying to understand why he felt the need to reach out to someone else for that. A part of me wants to give him a chance but I also feel like once the trust is broken, it’s gone forever.
TLDR: My boyfriend (28M) was buying nudes off of someone and now I (27F) don’t know if I should leave or work it out.
EDIT: Sorry I do want to clarify this was an OF creator that he was buying from which doesn’t make it any better I just realized my wording was a little vague.