Just going to preface this by saying these events happened 7 years ago when I was 18. I have never spoken about it to anyone, but it’s been on my mind lately and I need to share it.

To all the future comments telling me I should have ended it, you are so right and I know. This is more about how creeped out I was from this interaction.

At the time, I was dating my (now ex) girlfriend in what I would call an extremely unhappy relationship towards the end. Things started off great, and the first 16 months of the relationship were bliss. Then, she cheated on me with a long-time friend of hers and after a waterworks apology, I took her back and forgave her. At that age, I was not as confident in myself either emotionally or physically. My then girlfriend was also miles out of my league (think cheerleader starts dating the computer nerd) so I convinced myself that I would never have another girlfriend like her, so I had to stay.

The truth is, I was angry and resentful. It was my first real relationship and I was so happy, and my fragile state of being allowed these events to make me do things I am ashamed of now.

I was sitting in a PS4 party chat with my best friend at 2:30am on a Saturday lamenting how shitty my life was and he brought up the idea of “getting even”. I was so angry and wanting to do something reckless, so of course I downloaded tinder.

We made my account picked some photos and a bio and then I put my phone down to play a round of CoD. The round ended and I saw I had a match with a girl from a local university. We chatted back and forth about stupid things and it was generally a nice conversation. I asked for her number and we moved it over to text. “She” told me she was cramming for exams and needed a break and after both agreeing we were too disheveled for a ft, we agreed to voice call.

When “she” called me a deep electronic voice, probably someone using a voice modulator, read out my full government name (I only used my middle name for the account) and told me that they had caught me cheating on my girlfriend, that they were going to tell her everything, and also send it to my parents to show what a dirty cheater I am.

They followed through.

My girlfriend and I ended things mutually because of it although we were both interested in who could have pulled this off. My parents were more shocked that some random got their phone numbers. Although, my dad and I had a life changing conversation about integrity and self-worth above revenge and anger.

One of the weirdest/scariest things thats ever happened to me that I needed to vocalize to someone outside the other three people who know.