Women and the city

My first engagement happened because I forgave a man who invited his ex into our bed.

Sounds dramatic?

Wait until you hear the rest.

Yeah, because apparently it’s perfectly normal to send your girlfriend home so you can “spend some quality time with the boys,” only to invite your ex over later that night.

Naturally, it’s even more normal to let her post a picture of herself cuddling our dog. In our bed.

If I could go back ten years, I’d slap seventeen-year-old Sasha so hard she’d wake up before making this relationship everyone else’s problem.

But then again… if she had, we probably wouldn’t have this story.

I met him when I was seventeen. He was handsome, polite, charming—the kind of guy who looked like he’d been raised properly. There wasn’t much ex drama either. Just a high school girlfriend who, according to him, was ancient history.

Or so I thought.

He looked like the full package. A good family, a sweet little sister, actual manners… I genuinely believed he could be the one.

Then again… what did I know at seventeen?

Nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

We started fast. The kind of relationship where you spend every waking moment together until you forget what your own apartment looks like. We got together in November, and by January I was already living at his place.

My birthday was coming up, so he surprised me with a puppy.

Our puppy.

Everything became ours.

Our dog.

Our home.

Our future.

If someone had watched us from the outside, they’d have thought he was madly in love with me.

They would’ve been wrong.

One evening he casually said,

“Baby, the guys are coming over to play poker. They’ll probably stay the night. There’s not enough room for everyone… would you mind sleeping at your place tonight?”

I hated sleeping alone back then. I hated being by myself, actually.

But I said yes.

Because that’s what I did in that relationship.

I always said yes.

A few hours later, one of my friends called me sounding completely panicked.

“Uh… isn’t that your dog?”

I hadn’t even checked my phone yet.

“Or did his ex buy the exact same one?”

THE SECOND I OPENED UP WHATSAPP and saw a picture of my dog, sleeping in my bed, wrapped in his ex’s arms…

I completely lost it.

Back then, I had the emotional regulation skills of a volcano.

When he answered the phone, I introduced him to every swear word I knew.

Trust me.

It was a long conversation.

He started apologizing immediately.

“My sister invited her over! I didn’t know! I swear! It wasn’t my idea! Yada yada yada…”

And here’s the embarrassing part.

I believed him.

Not because his story made sense.

Because I desperately wanted it to.

I wanted him to be the man I had imagined in my head.

Accepting the truth would’ve meant admitting I’d built my future around someone who simply didn’t deserve it.

Looking back now… the signs were everywhere.

We had literally spent New Year’s Eve with another one of his exes—the kind who insisted they were “just friends” while shamelessly flirting with him right in front of me.

Honestly?

Seventeen-year-old Sasha deserved a wellness check.

You’d think that would’ve been enough.

Spoiler alert.

We were just getting started.

That summer I moved to Spain for a few weeks to help with my mom’s business. The plan was simple: stay for three weeks until one of our employees returned from holiday.

Since the city was full of Romanians, I quickly made friends.

One evening we were all hanging out on someone’s terrace in the middle of nowhere.

There were three teenage cousins there—fourteen, fifteen years old—the babies of the group.

One of them had a girl hopelessly obsessed with him. She literally showed up in the middle of nowhere just to stare at him from a field.

The poor kid had no idea how to get rid of her.

So, acting like the responsible older sister I clearly wasn’t, I laughed and said,

“Just hug me. Maybe she’ll leave.”

She did.

But not before messaging my boyfriend back in Romania to let him know she’d “caught me cheating.”

The next morning I woke up to dozens of messages.

Whore.

Cheater.

Don’t ever call me again.

At that point, I had exactly two emotional settings:

Calm…

…and nuclear.

So I blocked him.

Picked up my phone.

Called my mom.

“Tomorrow you’re going to my high school, collecting my documents, and enrolling me in Spain. I’m done.”

To my surprise…

She was thrilled.

Within hours we were already figuring out how to move my entire life to another country.

My mom stayed in Romania.

I stayed in Spain.

She told me someone would bring my school documents.

What I didn’t expect…

…was for him to be that person.

He showed up.

Apologized.

Cried.

Proposed.

And I said yes.

I know.

You don’t have to say it.

I hear it too.

We tried making long distance work.

He called every day.

Until one day I saw he was at the seaside.

With…

you guessed it…

THAT ex.

That was the moment I finally walked away.

Or at least I thought I did.

I stayed in Spain.

Started living my life.

Even wrote a song about him.

Honestly?

Life was pretty good.

But apparently I hadn’t learned enough yet.

A few months later I came back to Romania to visit my parents.

He saw me on TV.

Called me.

And said,

“If you really love me, you’ll come back.”

So I booked the tickets.

Because eighteen-year-old Sasha believed love was measured in sacrifices.

I told myself he had two weeks to prove he’d changed.

Turns out…

He had changed.

He changed me with somebody else.

Another piece on his chessboard.

That poor girl got hurt.

And somehow…

I still stayed for another eight months.

Those eight months weren’t particularly memorable.

Unless you count him befriending every woman with a pulse just to make me jealous.

Eventually he pulled another classic.

Apparently I was “an easy woman.”

Why?

An Instagram story he’d misunderstood.

Naturally.

That was finally enough.

We broke up for good.

And this time…

We actually stayed broken up.

Well…

Almost.

A few years later we ended up working at the same company.

One day he reached out.

He admitted he’d kept all our pictures.

Said he compared every woman to me.

And then, after years of denying everything…

He finally confessed.

Who believed potential mattered more than reality.

He had invited his ex over that night.

Not his sister.

Not an accident.

Him.

He also admitted he’d cheated on me multiple times throughout the relationship.

Funny thing is…

By then, I didn’t need the confession anymore.

I had already moved on.

But hearing the truth felt like finally closing a book I’d forgotten was still open.

People often ask whether I regret everything I did for him.

Honestly?

No.

I don’t miss him.

I miss the version of me who believed that loving someone meant constantly proving it.

The girl who confused sacrifice with commitment.

Who thought forgiveness could fix dishonesty.

She had to exist so I could become the woman writing this today.

Some people stay forever.

Some people become your biggest lesson.

And some…

Some become blog posts.

Sometimes your biggest heartbreak becomes your best story.

Until next time ⚜️