To start, I want to say I am not proud of what I did. I regret doing it and should have taken the high road.
About 11 years ago I dated a woman, let's call her "Sophie". We met on a dating site and it was mostly just a physical relationship. Sophie was in a bad spot at the time, trying to find work, trying to support her young daughter for whom she did not have full custody over. Sophie was a bit of a mess. She wasn't into hardcore drugs, but had to be high all the time. She smoked weed all day, snorting Adderall, even to the point of shooting up Adderall. I didn't know all the details until months after we first met.
I treated her well, brought her flowers at random times, she called me a few times because she was downtown but didn't have money for lunch, so I'd talk to someone at the restaurant and pay for her meal over the phone, I'd give her rides to and from work; normal boyfriend type things. I was not making much money at all back then, but I still would help her out. I didn't consider it a serious relationship, but I still treated her well. We "dated" for around 3-4 months.
One day my boss let me go early, so I decided to stop by Sophie's to surprise her. It was a beautiful day, so I figured we could go do something together. As I was walking her up apartment building steps (she was on the third floor), I could hear loud giggling and "other" noises coming from her apartment. I stood outside the door for a few seconds listening, and it was clear she had a guy in there. I knocked, she didn't answer, I knocked again, no answer. I said, "Sophie, I know you're home, I could hear you giggling". She finally opened the door, and I rushed in and started looking for the guy. I went to the kitchen, which had a backdoor with fire escape stairs, and saw a guy running down the stairs and into the parking lot. I ran back outside to the front, stood in the middle of the road, and threw my hands up at the guy starting to drive off, looking for a fight. He sped off, squealing his tires. It's not especially relevant, but at the time I was ripped. Most of my free time was spent lifting weights. I was benching 340lbs , weighing 165lbs, with 10% body fat. I can imagine I probably looked like a maniac standing in the middle of the road with my shirt off yelling for this dude to face me. No, I didn't take of my shirt for this, I took it off in my car on the way to Sophie's because my AC didn't work.
Sophie caught up to me, tried insisting it was "not what it looks like", but I didn't buy it. I asked why the guy ran, and she said something like, "look at you. I told the guy you could probably kill him". I told her right then and there that it's over and never looked back.
Sophie continued to try calling and texting me, but I ignored her. When we were together, I talked a lot about moving across the country to be closer to my sister, who now had two young children. I didn't want to watch them grow up from 2200 miles away. Sophie would always ask me to take her with me if I went (even though it meant being away from her daughter, who she only got every other weekend). She seemed to be more focused on weed being legal in the state I wanted to go to, more than being with her daughter, or me. I kept ignoring her calls, until one day...
I responded to a text from Sophie, we chatted a bit, and I told her I decided to move like I had talked about (I was not moving). I played along with her asking for forgiveness, and her asking to go with me. I told her I was leaving in two days, was only packing what I could fit in my car, and couldn't take her or her things. I also said that was the reason we couldn't meet up, I was busy packing and selling some of my things. We got around to the idea of her selling her stuff on Craigslist so she could come, which was the plan for revenge all along. She started listing and selling stuff. I kept asking for updated pictures of what she had left to decide what she could bring, and she'd tell me how much she got for items: tv, clothes, household items, those sorts of things. When she didn't have many things left, I texted her back something like, "I decided not to move. That's for cheating on me", then blocked her.
I feel pretty bad about it to this day. She didn't have a lot to begin with, and was struggling. I should have just let it go. If it redeems me at all, about 3 months later a cop knocks on my door and explained that Sophie had been caught stealing some jewelry from a house she had a steady gig babysitting at. This was something she did before we met, and during. The cop said that the homeowners agreed if she returned the things she stole, they wouldn't press charges, but Sophie had pawned the items. Sophie was in the backseat of the cruiser, with her 5 year old daughter. The cop said she didn't have any money, had already stopped at several of her friend's houses, but nobody was willing to help her out. I agreed to help, and drove in the front seat of the cruiser to my bank. I talked to the cop during the short drive, ignoring Sophie in the back. I didn't ignore her little girl though. I pulled out the amount the cop said she needed to buy back the items and gave it to him. After he dropped me off, he was going to the pawn shop.
We drove back to my place, I said goodbye to the cop and Sophie's daughter, continued to ignore Sophie, got out of the car and started walking back to my house. I guess Sophie asked the cop if she could get out and talk to me for a minute, and he agreed. She got out and ran up to me, saying thank you, and sorry for cheating on me. I told her, "I'm not doing this for you, I'm doing it so your daughter doesn't have to see her mom taken away in handcuffs". She asked for a hug, I said no, then she started begging for one. I refused, told her I wished her the best, turned around and went back inside my house. That was the last I saw Sophie.
I just realized how long this is, so thank you if you read it all. I felt like I couldn't leave out these details so you could get the full picture. I did eventually move to the state I had planned on. I've only told one person this since it happened, my best friend from the state I moved from.