Coming to terms with the idea that some people just aren't very nice

[markus36]

This is a short version of my story, I know I’ve made lots of mistakes and handled it badly and gone against a lot of the advice on this forum, but I thought I’d share and hope for some advice on what I think is the final stage.

 

I met a woman at an intensive work event thousands of miles from home that lasted just two weeks (in the US). This woman and I seemed to connect instantly, and we both seemed to become infatuated with each other. She was telling me I was the most amazing man she’d ever met and we both got carried away. Towards the end of the two weeks, she told me she had an ex-boyfriend (you can probably see where this is going), but he was definitely an ex, he was mentally unbalanced, he had made her so miserable, and anyway, she was in love with me.

 

She works in the US but is from Europe – I’m from Europe. She was going back to Europe for a month or two so invited me to visit her family, and I naturally said yes. On the way to the airport, she told me she still had feelings for her ex but to come anyway. I went and it was horrible – her family didn’t treat me well (they wondered who I was), and it was just a bad week. However, we still slept together.

 

The stupid part is that I stayed in touch – after all, she had a miserable ex boyfriend, who sounded abusive (had threatened to kill himself), she told me she was still unhappy, and I thought she was great, and just confused. If I’m honest, I bugged her, and in the end, I discovered that she’d never split up with her boyfriend (as far as he was concerned, things were fine between them). She threatened to do me some damage and has been downright awful. She’d been married before (she married her University Professor, possibly for a green card), and divorced and had multiple affairs during that relationship.

 

What I think I’m struggling to come to terms has just been accepting that she’s simply not a nice person. I’m naïve, and tend to assume most people are fundamentally good and honest – it would seem that it’s the case with her. Although I’m upset (or thought I was that we didn’t work out), my main gripe is just how much she lied to me, and continued to lie to both me and her boyfriend afterwards. Has anyone else been this naïve and struggled to just accept, some people aren’t very nice?