Thinking of breaking up, but not 100% sure

[Rose Mosse]

You don't have to feel bad about letting someone go to live their best life without you. Give yourself a few days to decompress and let it sink in that the relationship is over. I think you handled it very well. Good call letting her talk and have her say.

 

I think you hit the nail on the head by mentioning this:

 

Am I supposed to not take chances on people unless I feel 100% about them right away? I guess I have some learning to do when it comes to knowing how to see the difference before someone starts to feel led on.

 

You were only dating for a few months, not a few years, so no, I don't think you led her on. Longer relationships have ended due to incompatibility developing over longer periods of time or when people grow apart. I think you should take everything she said with a grain of salt. Also, don't look to try and change anyone you meet. You recognized all the signs early enough and had doubts very early on. It's time to brush yourself off and move on.

[Wateroflife]

You were only dating for a few months, not a few years, so no, I don't think you led her on. Longer relationships have ended due to incompatibility developing over longer periods of time or when people grow apart. I think you should take everything she said with a grain of salt. Also, don't look to try and change anyone you meet. You recognized all the signs early enough and had doubts very early on. It's time to brush yourself off and move on.

 

Thank you very much. Its so helpful to hear outside perspectives especially when I try my best to do the right thing but still screw up sometimes and am pretty hard on myself about it.

[Batya33]

Batya33 You have some interesting points but lets keep the bumpy topic of "drugs" out of it because its irrelevant, besides she smokes weed daily anyways and that still has nothing to do with our incompatibilities. One particularly interesting thing is she quickly jumped to the conclusion of the worst case scenario simply because I didn't text her for two days. That seems a little extreme to me. Boundaries around this idea were never talked about, and we had a usual pattern of a daily text, so believe me I know, I know now it would have been way more considerate to her feelings to just send a quick message saying I'd be gone and it was a jerk move to not do that. I apologized to her about it in our very next text before I even got back. Our breakup would have gone smoother if it weren't for that mess up on my part. If I feel like the boundaries should have been looser, then I should have talked about that before acting on it.

 

For a future partner I'd like there to be a broader sense of trust and independence and optimism. I don't want to feel like I'm directly responsible for my partners sense of security and emotional well being. If they trust me, then they trust me. Especially if the partner is only seen once a week and lives in a totally separate town 30 minutes away, I want to be able to have the independence to go do my own thing on a moments notice and not feel like, Oh shoot I better let her know. I feel like the amount of trust in your partner x the amount of self-reliability for ones own state of happiness is = to the amount of personal liberties the other partner is morally able to maintain during the relationship. I do not believe in the arrangement of co-dependence. Maybe this is a stance I took after getting out of a long term relationship with someone with BPD, and I'll have to think on that.

 

Next time it would be wise for me to bring a topic like this up during the start of a relationship. I feel if a partner needs to get away for a few and we arnt living together or have any prior plans or joined responsibilities like kids or what not, then the partner should be free to do so without notifying me. If I trust her and I'm not relying on her for my own sense of security, then it shouldn't be an issue.

 

Its an interesting thought, and its not why we broke up, but still something I'd like to think a little deeper on. Thanks for your feedback.

 

Yes- if you think it's ok to go MIA for two days without advance warning when you typically speak every day - please tell your partner that. I get that she smokes weed- but she wasn't sending you information about whether you should smoke weed daily and what the benefits are, etc -was she? I get that to you it is "bumpy" but she might have had a far different perspective. My husband and I spoke daily when we were dating and often emailed once or so a day -I did not have a cell phone when we were dating - I got one in my last trimester of pregnancy. But yes we checked in with each other and let each other know if we weren't going to be accessible that day.

 

I trust him implicitly. He trusts me. It was just common courtesy given our habit of talking every day. Spontaneity is awesome too . So is being polite IMO -the two can coexist. It's unusual to want to be in a serious relationship but want to be able to disappear for a few days on a moments' notice and go MIA - so yes tell the person that so they don't get worried that something happened to you. My husband and I didn't live together before marriage.

 

To me it's not about "personal liberties" -it's a personal relationship. I feel 100% free to come and go as I please but I don't have the need to be free to disappear without telling my partner. We all have different definitions of "free". And yes I'm not free to come and go as I please because we're married and have a child. And I'm not free to date others -but I don't desire to.

 

i think if you are a person who wants to be able to disappear on a moment's notice -especially if you have standing plans with your partner or an arrangement where you're in contact daily or something like that -then yes please do tell the person as early as possible in the relationship.

[electricorchid]

Sounds like you're not that into her, and you should politely tell her.

[boltnrun]

Sounds like you're not that into her, and you should politely tell her.

 

He already broke up with her. He wrote about it in the thread.

[Wateroflife]

 

i think if you are a person who wants to be able to disappear on a moment's notice -especially if you have standing plans with your partner or an arrangement where you're in contact daily or something like that -then yes please do tell the person as early as possible in the relationship.

 

Yup definitely clearing this up next time around. Thank you for the advice, much appreciated.