I'm new here! I want to list some red flags I experienced that I did not realize until after this ended. Last semester I met this guy on Tinder. All green flags. Good at conversation, wanted to meet for an actual dinner date, wasn't moving fast, always texted first. He once invited me over at 1AM and I was suspicious, but I went. He did not even try to kiss me, we just stayed up talking which impressed me. We officially became a couple, but I just had a feeling. Wasn't sure what it was, but I felt something was off.

We were dating for months when the other girl he was talking to, who had thought she had been exclusive with him for A YEAR, saw my Instagram with him and messaged me. He had told her I was just a friend and I did not know she even existed. She freaked out on him and he blocked her, which led to her telling me everything. Like an idiot, I took him back. We were together for about a month after everything went down. Check my posts in /r cheating_stories for the full story, but basically today he tried to break up with me because he "felt too guilty" for what'd he done to me. I said sure lets break up. He then doubled back saying he was making a "bad/not well thought-out decision" and we should take some time to think about it. I said no lol, it's ending here.

I feel so much better now, but anyways here are some red flags I overlooked and even some that I thought at the time were green flags.

-When he asked to be exclusive, the way he asked was asking me if I had a boyfriend. I said of course not, then he told me he wanted to be exclusive. Looking back on it, this was a red flag. Although I was on a hookup app and was dating him, he thought I might've had a boyfriend. And all along, he actually had another girl who was basically his girlfriend.

-I liked that he did not use social media too much. He used this to his advantage. Never posted pictures of us because he just "didn't use social media much." Didn't like being in pics on my story bc he "wasn't a picture kinda guy." But he did this smartly: he would not care if I posted one every once in a while. I think by allowing me to post pics periodically, he just hoped the other girl would not check my story that day and it kept me from being suspicious like I would've been if he never let me post one.

-He wasn't secretive about his phone at all. He let me use it and we'd always watch videos on it. Now that I know her name, several times I saw texts from his other girl pop up and didn't think anything about it. I think by not being secretive about his phone at all he lured me into a false sense of security.

-TRUST YOUR GUT!!!! There was absolutely NO REASON for me to suspect he was cheating. But I just had this feeling of something being off. I just felt like he was hiding something. Sure enough, I woke up one morning to that "I know we don't know each other but you boyfriend..." DM.