Did I make the right decision?

[BrookeHx]

A few days ago I broke up with my boyfriend of 18 months. I live with him.

 

We had been having problems for the last 6 months as he had been stressed for unknown reasons as well as having a small health issue.

 

I had stood by him regardless of how he was treating me. He was arrogant and selfish. His parents had even warned him about being nasty to me and taking me for granted. He could be manipulative and make cutting comments with some jealousy/insecurity issues too.

 

Around a month ago, I told him that I had lost that 'spark' and I loved him but I didn't feel in love with him anymore. He asked for a chance to work at it and I ageeed.

 

Some small things changed, mainly materialistic with him buying things for me but after a week or 2, his attitudes started creeping back in.

 

A few days ago, I found out that before any of these issues had started while things were, what I thought to be, good he had been messaging another woman sending rude pictures and videos of himself to her. He had initiated this contact and flirted with her.

 

He has cheated in previous relationships more than once and while he tells me there was nobody else or anything else he did, I struggle to believe him.

 

I told him that I didn't there was anything left to work at and a relationship without trust will ever work out.

 

He now begs me for another chance and tells me how heartbroken he is, he's never loved anyone as much as me etc. On occasion he turns and becomes nasty saying I never cared for him, I'm heartless and obviously seeing someone else. I know he's hurting too but I have to think of myself.

 

It's hard for me as I do still care for him regardless but I feel like this is the right thing to do. He however, thinks I need to not make my decision so quickly and give it time.

 

Thoughts?

[charity]

You've absolutely made the right decision. You can care for someone and simultaneously know that they are not right for a relationship. You probably could have left when he was treating you badly but you didn't. Now you know that even when things were good he's still not capable of being good to you. Move on without looking back.

[glitterfingers]

You've given it heaps of time before making your decision. You didn't have a fight and split up out of anger. You gradually came to the decision that he was wrong for you, then considered breaking up. You gave him a chance to change. He didn't. And now you're leaving

 

If you go back now, he's not going to learn anything. It takes months or years for people to change behaviour like this, no matter what the catalyst is. So yeah, you should walk away.. If he wants to work on himself, here is his chance. But you staying in an unhealthy situation is not a requirement for him to change (and likely will prevent him from doing the amount of work that he needs to do)