My boyfriend moved to Australia without me and slept with someone else

Sarah*, then 23, had been with her boyfriend James*, 24, for a year when he made a dramatic announcement.

When my boyfriend said he wanted to ask me a question a year into our relationship, I wasn’t expecting it to be, "Would you like to move to Australia with me?"

I met James* through work when I was 23 and he was 24. We’d always had a bit of flirty banter, and then one night at a company party he made a move. Before you can say 'office romances are a terrible idea,' we became a couple.

We kept things as professional as possible at work, but behind the scenes, we were falling for each other. Naturally, when he mentioned he wanted to move to the other side of the world, I was shocked.

I was only a couple of years into my dream job and flat-sharing with three of my best friends in North West London. As far as I was concerned, I was living the dream. Would I leave all of that behind for James? Should I go with him?

A major decision

By that point, I was totally smitten. We’d even used the L word (in fact, he said it first). We had talked about moving in together and what it would be like to get married and have kids one day. He had always led the way with those kinds of conversations so I’d never had any reason to feel insecure.

I wrote a list of pros and cons about this huge potential life shift, and eventually with a very heavy heart, I told James Australia wasn’t for me. I secretly hoped he would change his mind about going, but instead, he insisted he would only go for a year and asked me to wait for him. The plan was to have a (very) long-distance relationship.

I soon realised how much I was going to miss James and decided that maybe a year of sun and fun wasn’t such a bad idea after all. Sadly, by the time I came around to the idea, he had already agreed to rent an apartment with his best mate, Rob*, in Sydney and landed some freelance work. I was too late.

Sounding suspicious

After he left, I sobbed for a week to a soundtrack of songs with 'missing' in the title. I also drank a lot of wine and had a lot of hangovers. James and I spoke every day, either over the phone or via email, professing our love and saying how much we missed each other. I stayed true to my word and didn’t date, kiss or even flirt with anyone else. I assumed James was doing the same.

Six months after James bid me adieu with the promise of an amazing future together, I got in from a very messy Friday night and decided to call him. It was 3am (2pm Australian time) so I knew he would be up.

Rob picked up the home phone and went to get James, only to return seconds later to tell me very awkwardly that he ‘wasn’t around.’ Even in my drunken state, I could tell he was lying.

Admitting defeat

I cried myself to sleep wearing all my make-up and woke up feeling dreadful. When I opened my emails, James had sent me a message admitting he had been seeing someone but claimed it meant 'nothing' and I meant 'everything'. But the trust had gone. If he’d done it once, the chances are he would do it again.

He also casually mentioned that he was going to apply for residency in Australia, so it was unlikely he would be coming back to the UK any time soon. Yet, he was still determined that we could somehow make things work, by seeing me during his infrequent trips back to London to visit relatives. He basically wanted to have his cake and eat it.

I gave him an ultimatum – it was me or Australia – and he chose the latter. We were over for good.

That was over 20 years ago and James is still living in Australia. He’s now married with two children, so it’s just as well I didn’t put my life on hold for him. Looking back, trying to keep a relationship alive on the other side of the world was never going to work.

*Names have been changed to protect identities.

Read more: All of Yahoo UK's How I was dumped stories.