I used to be a terrible person. I cheated on all my partners, ghosted my best friends even though they never did anything wrong, stole from my family to pawn their belongings so often it was basically a full-time job, threatened suicide dozens of times to get my way, was terribly verbally abusive every time anyone offended me, manipulated others with blackmail or threats to get them to do whatever I wanted, the list goes on and on.
I decided at the beginning of 2017 to turn over a new leaf due to guilt that had been forming during the previous 2-3 years, and I have. Anyone who knows me would tell you that the last bad or cruel things I did were in 2016.
Most people don't fully trust me, though. Some think it's an act. Others believe it's legit but that I can change back at any time. Will this ever go away, or did I dig my hole too deep to ever crawl out of it?
23 years old, if that helps. I was 21 at the beginning of last year whenever I changed for the better.
>or did I dig my hole too deep to ever crawl out of it? This is very likely the case for the majority of people in your life. Some may change their minds down the road if you consistently manage to not fuck things up for a while, but from what you said you already burnt too many bridges.
Leo Thomas
Yeah, it will change eventually OP but it'll take a while. It's good that you're young and haven't done this for 10 years or something. A lot of people, like addicts really destroy their lives. Not just their own, but the people around them. It'll take some time but when you're 30, most people will see you as a completely different person. Beware, even if you go back on something with one person, that trust will be destroyed.
Levi Rogers
why don’t you just move on from sex and relationships?
It doesn’t sound like that’s something for you
Robert Green
You can move on, change, and grow as a person, but you can never make your past mistakes go away. They are a part of you, just as much as your successes are.
You cant make people forget, and you can't make 100% sure that you will never relapse back into these behaviors. All you can do is continue to act like a decent person and hope that people act decent back.
Eli Watson
Once a cheater always a cheater.
OP honestly would be better off not going back into sex/relationships. It will only cause problems.
Jayden Perry
You really have a long way to go to earn the trust back. At 23 years old you still have a chance to repair some of the damage you've done. You actually have a good chance.
I'm not talking from someone in your position, but someone on the receiving end of you.
Drugs? Yeah, at 23 you still have a small window to make amends and turn shit around. But you have to stop everything you have ever done that made you a shady person. You're going to have to work to earn some trust. You can start gaining it back, but people for the next few years are always going to keep you on the back burner "don't trust him/her, they're going to rip you off".
I'm speaking from my family's point of view with my cousin. Turn your life around right now, or just be the degenerate junkie that no one trusts or wants to lend money to anymore because they're sick of your shit. Or even with your friends, no one wants to fuck with you anymore.
23 is extremely young to turn it around. Don't fuck it up. Next thing you know, you'll be 45 living in the basement of a church and asking people just to give you a chance. Like my uncle. No one gives him a chance anymore.
Xavier Reyes
This. Your positive change happened when you weren't much older than a teenager. Just keep your nose clean and eventually the past will be forgotten.
Nolan Miller
Well said. My brother is like this. He conned, stole, intimidated, did drugs, then he'd cry and use his emotional issues as an excuse to blur the lines of his responsobility. He turned over so many "new leaves," and if I treated him like I couldn't trust him, he'd get all uppity about how "I'm not the same person, blah, blah, blah..." He's in prison now and won't be out til we're in our forties, and he's tried to rope me into the shady shit he's doing in there now, which has guaranteed that I won't help him when he gets parole.
OP, do not renege on your commitment.
Grayson Harris
Except for the thieving part, I drank, drugged and fucked everything. The only time I finally drew a line what when my brothers gf crawled in my bed and wanted to fuck and I shoved her out. Otherwise I cheated, and fucked friends girls and wives.
I cold turkey stopped and was celibate for two years and stayed away from everybody not trusting myself.
To all those I hurt and fucked over I apologized for what I did but didn't speak of nor try to convince them I had changed and I didn't ask for their forgiveness and sure didn't think they would ever forget.
Only one relationship with friends and family survived, my own mother, and I'm ok with that since the shame of what I did to all of them kept me away.
All I could do and did was without telling anyone right whatever wrong and any new friendships or romantic relationships got the new me.
Takes time OP but it can be done but you have to accept you won't be forgiven nor should be by some and stop trying to convince them you've done a 180..
Austin Hernandez
>Will this ever change? Yes, when you're about 28 or 29 and have a proven track record of not fucking people over. >Did I did my hole too deep? No, you didn't dig it too deep, but expecting everyone to just jump on the bandwagon of accepting you as a "changed" person is just stupid only 18-24 months after the last time you screwed someone over. Anyone with an iota of common sense or brains will stay away from you like the plague. What you're going to do is form new relationships, new contacts, etc. that you don't just screw over and that circle of people will be your new social circle. Those older friends have probably written you completely off and for good reason. You fucked up bad. Very bad. And you put their well-being, financial security, posessions, and everything else in jeopardy. Use some common sense. You can SAY you'd just forgive and forget something like that if you were in their shoes, but you'd be a complete hypocrite because from your own admission you're nothing but a backstabbing manipulator.
Caleb Kelly
You will never change.
The sinful, blissful feeling of everything you have done will never leave you.
Everyone that you know, everyone that you have known, and everyone that you will know will see right through you if they haven't already done so.
Escaping to a Cambodian wood logging board will never redeem you from all of the horrible things you've done to us, nor will it save you.
Zachary Bell
Been here, OP. You fucked up. The only thing you could possibly do is to change the social circle completely, erase the social media and ties which could lead to you, not fuck up later on and be sure your new and old circles do not cross. People do forgive, but never forget.
Also I do agree to the certain extent to . I started to receive a great pleasure from hurting people even when I got caught up, ostracized, hated and/or beaten. The guilt, feeling of burning cheeks and pleasure mixed together is insane.
I also want to receive the advice how to minimize the damage. I never stole, never did drugs, never cheated. But my mouth can't be shut. I am the re-translator of people's secrets, and I give the very good impression of guy who can be trusted. I don't know how many secrets I were told.
There’s a price to pay for being a degenerate child, one nobody can escape... learn to cope if you must, or grab a rope and chair.
Jacob Taylor
I'm on a situation like this, OP. I've done harm and got caught recently, but Im past feeling like shit and started to makes things change for myself. My advice is get help, go to a psychotherapist, start meditating, do yoga, try to focus on yourself and as other anons say, dont think about showing the others you changed but to change for yourself.
Charles Diaz
Cool story, become Catholic. Fag
Jaxon Peterson
The thing you have to remember is that real trust is hard to earn and easy to lose.
You can certainly crawl out of the hole, but you just have to keep on the straight and narrow for a longer time for people to be like "Oh wow this is for real, no one is going to put up an act for this long".
Honestly, IMO, you need at least a few people who you can lean on to keep you on the right path whenever you feel the temptation to fall back into bad habits. That shit isn't a meme, it really makes a difference.
Josiah Myers
Dexter reference?
Brandon Scott
I've been in a very similar situation, OP. Started around 13, and began fixing myself around 20. Things were difficult at first, but now, 8 years later, I have much better relationships with the people in my life. My advice to you, is not to expect other people to forgive you, and don't improve yourself with that as your goal. If your only reason is validation from other people, you won't stick to it once any of them disappoints you. Anyway, it's a long road, but absolutely worth it!
Alexander Morales
You’re still a kid. Of course you can change. Not sure if you can mend the bridges you burned or that u deserve forgivenesses. But of course you can change for the better. People who have done way worse than you have turned out fine.
Colton Gray
Oh, and just a warning: you probably won't really forgive yourself for a lot of it. Sometimes you'll go years without thinking of the "thing", whatever the worst thing you did was, and then it'll pop into your head out of nowhere, and you'll feel awful about it. It really helped me to admit it to another person (in my case, to my priest).
Adrian Richardson
You sound like my little sister. She’s 29 and trying to apologize and make amends for all the bullshit she did in the past.
Personally, I’m not having it. 2 “good” years do not make up for almost 2 decades of bullshit.
You won’t ever be trusted. You don’t deserve to be trusted. You were an asshole to these people and you just need to live with the fact that they will never forget the shit you’ve done.
If those people are anything like me, you exist less as a person and more so as a concept that they would rather avoid.
Camden Robinson
I'm in the same boat as you, OP. Only younger.
It's great that you are changing yourself for the better. You are still young and have time to create a better life for yourself.
Like others have said, not everyone will forgive you for what you've done and some may even hold grudges against you for a long time. It's best to try to start anew and find closure within yourself for what happened with them in the past. Not everyone will believe you changed, but with due time, your past self will be further away than it is now. You just have to keep up improving yourself and acting better towards other people.
The guilt will likely never go away, but the fact that you feel it is a good sign that you are turning into a better person and understanding why it's bad instead of justifying it.
Good luck, Op.
Charles Cruz
>spends years building a bad impression >wonders why it's not disappeared in a matter of months b o i
Carter Perry
Thank you very much for the replies, everyone. I wish I could reply to everyone, and maybe later I will. For now there's just one thing I want to clarify.
It definitely wasn't two decades. I haven't been bad for my entire life. I was born July 1995 and didn't turn bad until my 17th birthday in 2012, where a friend of mine got me to try meth 'just for fun,' at which point I slowly tried out drugs more and more often and was a full-blown addict by the Christmas of that year. Four years of complete awfulness followed (much of which I don't even remember), and the only reason that some of my friends and family tolerated me for as long as they did was because I'd always been a pretty nice, inoffensive guy before then. This makes me want to cry looking back, but I remember how on my 16th birthday, my dad told me that he couldn't have asked for a better son and that he was blessed to have such a well-behaved kid. I really let him, and everyone, down.
Tyler Russell
"It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it."
You're gonna have to keep going at it for longer to really expect half the people to believe you. You could also just move away and start a new linfe, that way no one will know of your scumbag past
