About a year ago, I met a man – “Ryan” – who was on a work assignment in my town for a few months. Knowing he lived four hours away, we started what was meant to be a casual relationship but it quickly became clear we were going to try to make the long-distance relationship work. 

Due to my work and co-parenting schedule, I was able to go up to see Ryan one to two times a month and stay several days each visit. I met his friends and parents and they even came down to stay in my area — I live in a vacation town — for week-long visits. He visited me too, though not as often due to his work schedule. After six months, I introduced him to my three-year-old daughter. When he visited, he spent time with her, and when his family visited, I introduced her to them as well.

Then, in early August, we had a heated argument that I assumed was growing pains as things became more serious. The only real red flag was his social media behavior — liking and commenting on other women’s photos. I confronted him, and he apologized, saying he was drunk and stupid and that it wouldn’t happen again.

In early September, I took my daughter up to his city, rented an Airbnb, and stayed for over two weeks. We spent time with Ryan’s friends, and his mother even watched my daughter so I could work remotely. She took her to the zoo one day so Ryan and I could have a date. It was a wonderful trip and set the tone for how we hoped to make this work long-term — living between two cities, bonding as a family, buying a home, possibly trying for a child, discussing marriage.

A few weeks later, I received a text that shattered my world. He confessed that back in August, he had cheated twice with another woman, and she became pregnant. He found out about the pregnancy while my daughter and I were visiting him in September. He said he loved us, was ashamed, that he wished it hadn’t happened, and that he knew there was nothing he could say to make it better.

I found the woman’s Facebook page, which showed she was “in a relationship” with him, dated just two days after he told me about her. I messaged her — kind but firm — explaining everything. She claimed she didn’t know he was in a relationship when they hooked up but said he had since come clean, that she chose to keep the pregnancy, and denied any intent to trap him. Her tone was oddly self-righteous, and I left it at wishing her well.

I sent him a few messages in response — some angry, mostly respectful — and then stopped. He never replied again. Instead, he blocked me everywhere, even deleting Venmo transactions, as though he were erasing me and rewriting a new narrative with the other woman who has publicly posted endless photos with him, including with her son, and one with a ring on her finger.

The betrayal — the overnight discard of me and my daughter — is devastating enough. But watching them publicly celebrate a relationship built on lies has been a different level of trauma. My friends are trying to help me make sense of it, but I genuinely don’t know how to move forward and heal. I feel stuck — in disbelief, in heartbreak, in anger. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. — Blindsided

I’m so sorry for the pain you’re feeling today – a grief that many of us are familiar with. I hope you can take some comfort in the reality that because so many have been in your position and moved on to happy next chapters, so can you. Not only do I have faith – even without knowing you – that you can move on and heal, I have faith that there’s something better for you than a future with this man. The truth is, you are already living the better future, because as much as you believe the relationship he is building with this other woman is based on lies, so was the relationship he was building with you. The lie was that he was honest and worthy of your trust and love. The lie was that he was the man you wanted him to be. HE was the lie. He’s a fraud, and you are better off without him.

I know these words are cold comfort now when you’re in the fog of grief, and I know there’s no way around this fog but through it. But I promise on the other side, you will have so much more than you had with this man and what he has without you. You will have your dignity, your daughter, your loving friends who are supporting you through this. You will also have your freedom from the nonsense this man would have put you through. The red flag he showed you with his social media behavior was a warning and his follow-up behavior a foghorn signaling danger. Staying with this man would have guaranteed more heartache than you’re feeling now, and potentially an enormous headache, too, had you entangled your life with his any more. In short: you dodged a bullet.

It doesn’t really matter what his life will be like with this other woman and their baby and I encourage you to avoid any social media evidence of it. But it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this woman he’s with faces the same fate as you, but with stakes that will be much higher. I feel sorry for her and her baby. I do not feel sorry for you. YOU are going to be fine. This will be a blip on the radar – a lesson to take as you pursue dating again. When a man shows you a red flag, heed the warning. You know that now. And your future will be better because of it.