Should You Take Someone Back After They Left You For Someone Else?

Whether you should take someone back after they left you for someone else is a difficult question to answer. It depends on each person’s ability to forgive and the quality of his or her relationship.

For example, if the relationship had been struggling for months or years and then cheating occurred, getting back together might not be the right thing to do.

That’s because it won’t just be a matter of rebuilding trust but also a matter of growing individually and as a couple (which is just as hard if not harder). The betrayal will require tons of work to overcome the damage done to the relationship prior to cheating, so it might be better to let go of it and start anew with someone else.

But if cheating happened to a couple who got along for years or decades and built a healthy life together, let’s say they cheated because they stopped bonding and took each other for granted, then the relationship might be fixable and worth the effort.

Again, this depends on their perception of cheating, regret, the time they spent together, and willingness to work on the relationship.

Cheating can happen to anyone, even to those who look happy. If couples don’t know how to deal with relationship problems such as temptations (because they lack experience, gratitude, or ability to deal with overwhelm and stressors, they may fall into temptation and betray the person who loves them the most.

This can cause immense suffering to the betrayed and destroy his or her naivety and trust for years to come. Cheating shouldn’t be taken lightly. It may be common, but it’s considered a great sin that sticks with people for life.

Once you cheat, you can’t get rid of the stigma. Admit your betrayal to your next partner and you’ll see how trustworthy he or she thinks you are. Your partner will probably trust you but not completely. There will always be a little bit of fear of history repeating itself.

So if you’re wondering if you should take someone back after they left you for someone else, know that a simple yes or no answer won’t suffice.

You need to evaluate your relationship as a whole and measure your ex’s regret and eagerness to evolve morally and emotionally. You need to think things through and ask yourself if your heart is big enough to forgive and be with someone who betrayed you.

The beginning of the new relationship will be the hardest as you’ll feel uncertain and easily replaceable. Your destroyed self-esteem will plague your mind with intrusive thoughts about your ex’s betrayal and make you afraid of another treachery.

Fear will control your mind for months and bring out your deepest insecurities.

If you take your ex back on a whim, your ex might also not put in the necessary effort to grow. He or she might revert to his or her pre-breakup cheating self and cheat or leave when you decide to give the relationship another chance.

That would make you feel used and naive for trusting a person who hurt you so badly. 

That’s why it’s important to assess your ex’s ability to reflect and grow as a human being and a partner. A good way to tell how committed your ex is to you is to measure his or her regret and willingness to give you power (put you in charge of the reconciliation).

An ex who realizes the severity of cheating will express regret very clearly and promise to do better.

He or she will tell you why the new relationship will be different and begin working on it immediately. Such a person will be completely transparent with you, delete people you’re uncomfortable with, and give you access to his or her phone if you want it.

There will be no secrets and power struggles.

These are just some of the things you need to pay attention to if you’re considering taking back someone who cheated on you. Make sure that you’re making a rational decision otherwise, you could get hurt again and regret it. 

Today’s subject is for cheatees who are contemplating reconciling with an ex who cheated on them, discarded them, and regretted it when their relationship ran its course.

Should you take someone back after they left you for someone else?

First of all, some couples deal with infidelity successfully and become stronger as a result. They give each other months to heal and work on communication, trust, and bonding. Such couples use the negative situation to their advantage and address their shortcomings and relationship flaws.

They invest in areas that need the most work and have a much healthier bond after they’ve done the work.

Other couples, though, aren’t that lucky. They get tired of going through ups and downs and become resentful or vindictive. They associate so much negativity with each other that they don’t want to work on themselves and the relationship anymore.

All they want is to distance themselves from each other (the source of pain) and find someone new to date. Someone they can start fresh with.

This isn’t about what others do, but do keep in mind that it’s perfectly acceptable to not take a cheater back. Cheating crosses most people’s relationship and self-respect boundaries.

Usually, only those who’ve been through a lot with their partner, those who were in a toxic relationship, and those who don’t love themselves take their cheating partner back.

To be cheated on is one thing, but to be left for someone else is an entirely different thing. When your partner leaves you to be with a person he or she knows nothing about, this says a lot about your partner.

It reveals your partner’s moral values and shows how little your partner values you and how little understanding of relationships and self-control he or she has. 

Think about it. Your partner is okay with hurting you as long as he or she feels validated by another person.

That’s extremely impulsive and egocentric. It’s undeserving of your attention, affection, and commitment. That’s why you need to think long and hard before you let this person back into your life. You need to respect and love yourself more than ever before and figure out what this relationship means to you.

If you’re hurt, it probably means a lot to you. Pain reminds you that you lost something important to you and that you want it back. Despite that, try not to judge your relationship only with your feelings. If you do, emotions will deceive you and cause you to make emotional/unpremeditated decisions.

As someone who was cheated on and monkey-branched, you need to be prudent and remember how the relationship functioned and how you felt when you were still with your partner.

Was your relationship fulfilling, happy, and stable, or did it consist of competition, nasty arguments, lying, stonewalling, and other unhealthy behaviors?

Feel free to make a list of positives and negatives. It will help you remember your relationship problems and see that things weren’t as perfect as they may currently seem. By seeing things differently (realistically), you’ll be able to make rational decisions.

Decisions that are right rather than feel right.

To think rationally, ask yourself the following questions.

1. Is my ex going to or willing to put in the effort?
2. Am I ready to forgive my ex and start a new relationship with him/her?

If you’re not willing to stop feeling victimized and forgive your ex even after your ex has gained your trust back, getting back with your ex would be a huge waste of time. Sooner than later, you’d encounter another emotional disconnection and break up again.

So know that a healthy reconciliation doesn’t depend entirely on your ex. Yes, your ex must want you back and apologize for destroying trust, but you must also do your part. You must be willing to trust your ex again and treat him or her as someone who deserves another opportunity.

This is necessary for the relationship to develop a strong foundation.

I’m not saying you need to immediately take your ex back and act as if nothing happened. That will likely lead to a loss of respect and eventually attraction. But I am saying that the relationship will require love to flourish. It will need you to accept the past and be the individual your ex fell in love with.

Don’t expect your ex to tolerate anything you throw at him or her. Don’t expect your ex to do that forever. If you’re mean on purpose and withhold affection, your ex will eventually get tired of feeling neglected and unfulfilled and give up.

To make things work, you’ll need to find a healthy balance between loving yourself and loving your ex.

This means you’ll need to stay in control of the breakup and exude high self-esteem while bonding with your ex and gradually letting him or her back into your heart. It will take a while to trust your ex fully. But if you love your ex and truly want to be with your ex, it’s the price you’ll have to pay.

Trust takes weeks, months, and sometimes even years to rebuild. How long it takes depends on a person’s self-esteem, pain, mental health (problems), attachment style, childhood (issues), and the way his or her partner behaves.

If his or her partner does or did horrible things after the breakup, it can take a long time to process negative behavior and be vulnerable.

The relationship may even end permanently if they find certain behaviors unforgivable and unacceptable.

So keep in mind that some (or many) exes don’t get back together simply because they can’t disassociate negativity from each other. They may forgive each other, but because they suffered so much, they aren’t willing to pretend bad things never happened.

Such couples can’t fix things anymore. Even therapy can’t help them because it’s too late for them to get over injustice and be willing to get hurt again.

It’s not that they’re afraid of pain but that they’re convinced their partner isn’t the right person for them. In their mind, he or she is someone they developed a negative opinion of and needed to get away from.

Exes develop emotional walls (negative associations) that shield them from unhappiness and let them be happy.

Always remember that your time to shine is during the relationship, not after. You can show your partner your abilities and preparedness to change when you’re still together. When a breakup occurs (a real breakup), it’s too late because your ex will become emotionally unreceptive and refuse to let you back in.

So if you’re contemplating taking someone back after they left you for someone else, make sure you can forgive and start a new relationship. If you hold on to grudges and keep reminding your partner what he or she did, your relationship won’t last because old and new problems will trigger you badly and make it tempting for you to quit.

That said, here’s when you should consider taking someone back after they left you for someone else.

It’s okay to move on!

Always forgive people for hurting you. Do it a little bit for them, but mainly for yourself. Forgiveness will give you closure and prevent you from feeling bitter and fixated on someone who doesn’t deserve you.

Personally, I wouldn’t take a cheater back. If I did, it would mean that all the time, effort, and commitment I’d put into the relationship was taken for granted and that I was okay with it.

All the bonding and relationship trials would be forgotten by my ex and forgiven by me, so taking a monkey-brancher back would imply that I lowered my relationship standards and that I love my ex so much I’m willing to ignore it and live with it.

As I mentioned, what you do is up to you. But do keep in mind that you don’t have to be with this or any person forever. You may be attached and emotionally, financially, or physically dependent on him or her, but this is a sign things need to change.

It’s a sign that you need to become independent and live for yourself.

Most cheatees initially feel desperate to be with their ex because they’re hungry for validation. But when they spend some time away from their ex, they start to heal and notice their ex’s flaws.

That’s when they often change their opinion of their ex and the relationship and begin to enjoy their post-breakup life.

It may be best to wait a bit before you get back into a relationship with your ex. Give it at least a few months to see the relationship from a different perspective. I guarantee you won’t think and feel about your ex as strongly as you did when you got cheated on and replaced with someone else.

Do you think you should take someone back after they left you for someone else? When do you think getting back with a cheater and a leaver is a good idea? Let me know in the comments below. We’ll get back to you soon.

And if your situation is unique and you want to talk to us about it, visit our coaching page for more information.