Unfortunately, not everything lasts forever and sometimes no matter how much you love someone, it has to come to an end. Relationships end for a number of different reasons - from cheating & having lack of trust, to living too far apart or just wanting to be single. In this post I'm focusing on when sometimes you just know things aren't right, which is quite vague and can cover a lot of different reasons really.
This subject is something that's been quite prominent to me in the past year or so - both to me personally and also to someone close to me. Despite myself and most people I know being completely settled in their relationships - living with someone, being pretty serious, things just weren't right. And that's the tough part - when you've been with someone for so long and they practically are your other half, how are you supposed to end something like that just because you've got a gut feeling that things aren't right?
You can work on things, of course. If you're lucky and you're good at communication, you can talk things through and get to the bottom of the problem. But some people aren't so lucky and I can't explain what it feels like to be in that situation. For me personally, having never even ended things with someone before (on my terms, as in I'd never dumped someone), it was really hard for me as I didn't know if my doubts were genuine or not. All I knew was that something wasn't right, and because of that I began to feel suffocated.
What I think though is that when you do start to have doubts, then something is obviously wrong - as hard as it is to admit that. But how can you accept this - accept that just knowing things are wrong means ending things with someone you love and have built a life with? Breaking up with people is tough enough as it is, but breaking up with them for what seems like no legit reason is even harder, especially if you're in a serious relationship.
Sometimes you have to just bite the bullet though and accept that when it comes to ending things, it's going to be extremely tough. The more history you have with someone, the harder it's going to be. And although it's tough, you have to remember that you survived just fine before you met this person, so you can do it again.
I personally found it extra tough because there wasn't one thing in particular about mine and my ex's relationship that made me miserable. I still loved him and loved being with him and in the relationship - I wasn't 100% happy, but I wasn't particularly miserable either. So we ended up plodding along, because even if your relationship isn't amazing, you're still with someone so it's better than being alone, right?
However, once I remembered how happy I was before I met him - or at least before things started to go downhill with us - I realized that the grass really was greener on the other side, even if I wouldn't be happy right away. And I realized that I had to go through some really tough shit to get to that point. The way I saw it, I could be 'alright and just plodding along' forever, or I could man up, have a really bad few months or whatever, and then come out of the whole experience happier then ever. So that's exactly what I did, and boy was it tough. I regretted it immediately, and months later when I thought I should be over him, I was still miserable. I doubted if I'd made the right decision and I couldn't really see myself being happy again.
Now though? I AM so much happier and I was right. By realizing that things weren't right between us and putting myself through it all, I did come out as much happier and now I can't believe I put it off for so long.
So what I mean is, you have to accept that it will be tough and hard. But you need to remember how worth it it will be eventually, even if you can't see it yet.
And when you do realize, remind yourself that by ending things you're doing the right thing for the both of you. Even though you're hurting them, you still love them and want them to be happy. So by letting them go, you're giving them the chance to be happy and one day be happy with someone else too. Once you remember this, it won't seem so bad.
Someone close to me recently went through this. At 34 years old, they were at the age where they were starting to think of the next step, where it was time to get married or have children or something similar. They had been with their boyfriend for over 10 years, on and off, though for the past five had been extremely happy. They lived together - owning a house in a beautiful village - where they were very settled, having close friends all around the village. They were, essentially, married - they had joint bank accounts, a mortgage - the lot. But she knew something wasn't right, yet having to end things after over 10 years together and having so much together? It was tough and she found it so hard to make up her mind. But despite all this, it just wasn't worth sticking around when she could be happier elsewhere. So she made the extremely hard decision of moving on from the relationship and now I can't believe how much happier she is. The hard stuff was worth it and everyone can tell instantly the difference it made to her. It just proved the fact that at some points, you DO have to put yourself first.
There's no point wasting your life plodding along - especially when you're young - when you could actually be spending this time going out and having fun or being with the right person eventually. It just isn't worth it, no matter how hard it is making that big change.
So if you're concerned things 'just aren't right' and you can't fix them, man up, bite the bullet and end it. It will benefit you both so much in the end, but be prepared for tough times ahead. Nothing ever worth having comes easy. The tougher it will be, the more happier you will be when you wake up one day and can finally realize that you can't remember the last time you thought of them or cried about them and you're at last over them.
And finally remember that in 10 years time (hopefully when you're with the right person!) NONE of this will matter, and you'll wonder why you took so long worrying about something that was really quite simple.
Trust me, it's the right thing to do.
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| Image found via google, image from 'The Break Up' |
However, once I remembered how happy I was before I met him - or at least before things started to go downhill with us - I realized that the grass really was greener on the other side, even if I wouldn't be happy right away. And I realized that I had to go through some really tough shit to get to that point. The way I saw it, I could be 'alright and just plodding along' forever, or I could man up, have a really bad few months or whatever, and then come out of the whole experience happier then ever. So that's exactly what I did, and boy was it tough. I regretted it immediately, and months later when I thought I should be over him, I was still miserable. I doubted if I'd made the right decision and I couldn't really see myself being happy again.
Now though? I AM so much happier and I was right. By realizing that things weren't right between us and putting myself through it all, I did come out as much happier and now I can't believe I put it off for so long.
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| Image found via Google |
And when you do realize, remind yourself that by ending things you're doing the right thing for the both of you. Even though you're hurting them, you still love them and want them to be happy. So by letting them go, you're giving them the chance to be happy and one day be happy with someone else too. Once you remember this, it won't seem so bad.
Someone close to me recently went through this. At 34 years old, they were at the age where they were starting to think of the next step, where it was time to get married or have children or something similar. They had been with their boyfriend for over 10 years, on and off, though for the past five had been extremely happy. They lived together - owning a house in a beautiful village - where they were very settled, having close friends all around the village. They were, essentially, married - they had joint bank accounts, a mortgage - the lot. But she knew something wasn't right, yet having to end things after over 10 years together and having so much together? It was tough and she found it so hard to make up her mind. But despite all this, it just wasn't worth sticking around when she could be happier elsewhere. So she made the extremely hard decision of moving on from the relationship and now I can't believe how much happier she is. The hard stuff was worth it and everyone can tell instantly the difference it made to her. It just proved the fact that at some points, you DO have to put yourself first.
There's no point wasting your life plodding along - especially when you're young - when you could actually be spending this time going out and having fun or being with the right person eventually. It just isn't worth it, no matter how hard it is making that big change.
So if you're concerned things 'just aren't right' and you can't fix them, man up, bite the bullet and end it. It will benefit you both so much in the end, but be prepared for tough times ahead. Nothing ever worth having comes easy. The tougher it will be, the more happier you will be when you wake up one day and can finally realize that you can't remember the last time you thought of them or cried about them and you're at last over them.
And finally remember that in 10 years time (hopefully when you're with the right person!) NONE of this will matter, and you'll wonder why you took so long worrying about something that was really quite simple.
Trust me, it's the right thing to do.
Have you ever been in a situation like this? What other issues would you like to see addressed in this 'Words of Wisdom' feature? Please let me know!
