Cheaters Suck

I have been thinking a lot about my past relationships and why they may not have worked-whether it was initiated by me or my boyfriend. I came to a conclusion that MOST of my relationships have involved cheating!
I have a very skewed and sometimes changing view on marriage, and I think this also stems from cheating. See my mom and dad divorced when I was very young, 4 or 5 I think. See I really don't know for sure because they hid it from me. My dad would still be over, when he wasn't my mom would say he was working or golfing. He golfed a lot, or so I thought. One day we drove past the golf course and I said, "Let's go see poppa!" That's when my mom told us they were divorced. I think I was 8 and my brother was 5! They really hid it good and I was pretty naive-hey I was 8! Anyhow, it wasn't until I was much older that my mom coughed up details. It was a time when my dad was now separated from his 2nd wife because he was cheating on her with his now 3rd wife. Yep. My mom then told me how my dad cheated on her with a woman he worked with. He would come home late or not at all. They had been high school sweethearts(my mom and dad) and just bought a house together shortly after I was born. Once my mom knew what was going on she packed all my dad's stuff into garbage bags and threw them on the porch. My dad wanted to work things out I guess but my mom wanted NO part of it. Hearing that info really affected the way I viewed marriage and even relationships as a whole. Especially knowing that my dad had done it again to his 2nd wife and it got so ugly that my stepsister even beat up my now stepmom. I was forced to "chose" my dad and his new then girlfriend over my then stepmom and stepsister. Yea it was ugly.
I have had my fair share of cheating in my relationships. Unfortunately, I was not always the victim but sometimes the culprit. I have hurt people by doing that, and in turn I was hurt from the same thing. It changed me as I got older and I would be honest with a boyfriend about how I felt about cheating and how I had cheated in the past. Sometimes it came back to bite me on the ass, and trust always became an issue. I had a NO tolerance for cheating, and was so concerned about "prevention" that I was always being a detective and very accusatory. I think this sometimes drove my boyfriend to actually cheat on me. Maybe it did, maybe he would still have cheated on me, who knows. But trust was always an issue with me. After I split from my husband I did not date for almost 2 years. I was so scared to be hurt and was so unsure about my thoughts on relationships and love that I just hung out with friends. I started dating this guy that I met at a dance club. He was a marine and had a good job, went to school, and had his own place. All things I was not used to w/the guys I dated! I dated him for a couple months, but he had just gotten out of a long relationship and still pined for his ex. He wanted a long term thing and I didn't at that point. I met Len around this time, I worked with him. He was always tagging along around me and trying to flirt w/me. I was really not interested. Then one night my friends and I went out and Len was invited. He was very charming and he made me laugh. We got a long great. We started hanging out/seeing each other but we weren't exclusive. He had a couple girls he was seiing, I was still seeing Matt. But we were so drawn to each other. Neither of us wanted a serious relationship but we had such great chemistry-it just happened. Before I knew it we were living together and so caught up in each other that no one-not even friends-could come between that. We were very honest w/each other about our pasts and everything. He said I was more closed off then him and I told him I didn't want to be hurt. He said he would never hurt me...You know the rest of the story, or at least the ending........
I am at a point in my life where I am SO CONFUSED about love. I am so lonely for it, but yet so afraid of it at the same time. So much so that I don't even know how to act anymore around guys. There have been guys that are interested in me since my break-up with Len and guys I have been interested in, but I always manage to screw it up by either being too aggressive, too much info, or even too stand-offish. I am not necessarily trying to "be someone I am not" but I don't know, it's like I forgot what to do. Weird? Anyhow, there are a couple of guys I would like to ask me out but one is NINE YEARS YOUNGER than me( will I ever learn) and the others I just don't know how to get things going-so to speak. Dating sucks so bad, maybe that's why I have had so many long term relationships and not so much "dating" in my past. UGH