thercottelladventures-blog

[thercottelladventures-blog]

This cheater got caught

This is a summary of my relationship with R Cottell, a man who cheated on me and wasted at the very least a year of my life. Respect, honesty and truth are the fundamentals of any form of relationship. These were lost over time and covered up by sweet words and lies. I summarise our relationship here to ensure that you never make the same mistakes as me.

The cast:

R Cottell: the liar and cheater

Me: the oblivious girlfriend, now the ex

M Vosmi: the mistress

Gabby: his next ethnic fling

Binti: a girl he is pipelining in case any of his main girls turn out to be non-goers

The timescales:

4 years - knowing each other, most of them dating

2 weeks ago - still dating

October 2016 handed in notice on our flat, still dating

today - telling my story and then deleting him from my life

If you have doubts about any of this story, I am happy to share with you the chats and texts from the last 12 months.

Last week I was ‘the most important person in the world to him apart from family’ and we were planning a holiday together. 

The beginning

We met at work. I just moved to london from Hungary. We worked at the same company. I was dating someone else and we became friends. It didn't work out with the other guy. For 6 months he tried to convince me to be his girlfriend. I wasn't convinced. My gut said he had commitment issues and was prone to a bit of lying. I ignored my gut and followed my heart.

We spent almost 4 years together. He also spent 4 years a pop with his last two girlfriends. So this is a minimum of 8 years and one pattern. Lying.

His first love was quite deep and he never spoke about her. The second girl he said was crazy. I’m sure he says the same about me now. But he calls any female who expresses an emotional option crazy. So you should take that with a pinch of salt I think the second gf was probably just frustrated with his nonsense rather than having a naturally unstable mind.

Start of the end

May 2016: A year ago I felt like we were drifting apart. This tore me up. Communication is key to any relationship. I asked what was wrong, are we ok? is he upset etc? A thousand times. I asked if there was someone else. He blamed work. He told me that he hates his sales job and wanted something else but was concerned he didn't have transferable skills.

Actually he was dating M. Vosmi. A work colleague. He was cheating on me. He spent nights away. He said with his best friend. I believed him. Sometimes I spent a night with a female friend when the journey is too long or expensive after a night out.

One day I had enough. I went through his Uber receipts. He had been going to the same house every time. Had to be a girl - right?

I confronted him.

He broke down and told me about his cocaine habit. I was devastated because I had just lent him thousands of pounds because all his cards had been frozen and he was in serious debt.

To me, this explained it. He had money problems, he had a coke problem. He was embarrassed. He was taking it daily in work and outside work. Now I knew where my money went. He told me about his friend Ian who he took coke with. A sad divorced man. Apparently they met through a mutual friend.

My first clue of this lie was that there was no proof that Ian existed. He even referred to him as Steve once, I guess it's hard to keep track of all the lies.  Ha! I should have dug deeper. But all I saw was a broken drug addicted man who needed help. So that was my focus. Yes we were drifting apart before this but I still loved him. We still lived together and shared a life.

He promised that he would stop immediately. He cried. He begged me to forgive him. Anyone who knows a drug addict or even just heard of one knows they will say anything. So I waited, knowing he would keep taking coke and hoping he would reduce it then stop.

He didn't. And turns out his coke friend was M Vosmi. The work girl. At the same time he had strategically been freezing me out of parts of his life. I wasn't invited to work drinks anymore on the business park. I was only sometimes invited to his family events that I used to go to regularly. I thought he was just embarrassed. Actually he was just cheating.

If he liked her so much then he should have ended it with me and got with her. The minute I realised he was cheating for certain  I would have ended it with him. But I didn't have definitive truth. And surely this man I shared my life with would respect me enough to let me make my life decisions based on truth?! I realise now how naive that was. People are selfish. He wanted all the options. He knew I would be there for him to talk, to lend him money, to hang out with. And he knew she would be there to take drugs with and hang out with too. So he managed us both.

I can't comprehend lying to someone's face for so long. Knowing they are in pain. Knowing that even lie causes more pain.

In September 2016 set up a webcam in my house and went on holiday. He brought M Vosmi to our house. I should have put the cam in the bedroom. But I was trying to check if he was taking drugs. Not if he was cheating. So I put it in the living room. Big flaw. They watched tv on the sofa. My cam only showed him, not her so maybe they were making out. I don't know. I came back and found her hair in my bed. That should have been enough to end it. But the hair could have got there in any way. And surely he would never do that. I'd never been cheated on and I've never deceived anyone in any way remotely similar so that wasn't my biggest fear.

I confronted him. We fought for weeks. I accused him of lying and also cheating. He was offended and adamant that he hadn't. He knew I had found something out but wasn't sure what. So he knew his time was up. He suggested moving out. I was devastated. He cited all sorts of ‘problems’ that he had never mentioned before, but none of them added up to a break up. Clearly he just didn’t love me. But he didn’t admit there was a girl which was the source of the argument. But he did get defensive and nasty in response. I just needed answers so I could move on. I demanded real answers. He gave me nothing. Back and forth. With one simple admission I would have dropped him in a heartbeat. I would be gone. Just as I am now. And he knew it. He changed all his passwords and he was very careful at this this stage. He said we could work on our ‘problems’ and try to make it work.

I had to know what was really going on. There was more to the story. Was he selling drugs? Was it an affair? Did he owe money to some bad people? All entirely possible. I decided to stick it out. To find out. In some ways we were closer than ever. In other ways not at all. Eventually we 'broke up' but only in name. Everything was the exact same. We had dinner, went out, spent weekends together. I was happy about it because before we were a mess and it seemed like things were getting better. He got a new job in the same company outside of sales. Maybe we would take this as a break and work it out. And I knew he was still lying but I thought it was just about the cocaine. He looked a lot healthier. He was taking a lot less so I wasn't worried anymore. I thought he just didn't want to let me know in case I got concerned again.

I moved to London wanting to be single and explore and I found him straight away. So this new 'single life' although in practise was just in name, I enjoyed it. And I enjoyed him too. Actually it was my picture of a normal relationship. Which demonstrates how out of hand our relationship got before. I had no one to ban me from clubs anymore, no one checking my outfits were appropriate, no one judging my friendships.

During this new style of relationship I got suspicious again. Now I was sure drugs weren't really an issue I realised it was women. I asked him. Technically now we were single so it was entirely fine to date. He told me that he couldn’t see me if I was dating and he told me he wasn’t dating anyone else. He swore blind that there had only been me. He hasn't been on any dates. He hadn't kissed anyone, he had only me. I asked him quite a few times because he was shifty. I'm quite open minded and I didn't mind if he dated but I believe in equality in all things. If he wanted to date then I would date. If he promised there was only me then I would stay with him. As long as I knew what was going on then I could make appropriate decisions.

Finally I did what I should have done months ago and read his messages. One sure way to catch a liar in 2017 is to check his emails. He might delete his texts or lockdown his Facebook but people always forget the emails. I also checked all the things his mistress has tagged him in on instagram. I'm sure he won't forget all of this when he finds his next victim.

And so I found the truth. He cheated, he lied. He wasted my time.

And he was definitely telling people that I was the needy and clingy ex that he couldn't get rid of.

All he had to do was tell me about her. I would have left him in a heartbeat. And now I have. Entirely. So M Vosmi you can have him. He is also dating an actress called Gabby and is flirting hard with a girl called Binti. You can all share him if you like haha! I’ll be honest though, I don’t think it’s worth it.

Ladies, respect yourself and only accept truth.

lessons learned:

if someone calls another person crazy, then always ask why, what caused it, most people aren’t born crazy and they generally don’t magically become crazy after 3 or 4 years. Why would anyone date a crazy person for so long?

if you gut says something is up, it probably is, don’t accept half answers

people are selfish, never assume that someone cares about you just because they say they do, if there are inconsistencies in their behaviour then check your facts

if he lies to some people and lets you know then he probably lies to you too