Relationship never ends mysteriously. Breakups don’t happen out of the blue. There are always subtle signs that show that your relationship is not working out and a breakup is imminent.
When your lover is considering the breakup, he or she will be sending out signals. The receiver ought to become alert to them. If you can detect these signals early and know how to save your relationship, maybe you can stop the breakup. Even if it doesn’t change the outcome, it can make recovery less difficult, damaging, and devastating for you because taking away the surprise lessens the depth of the wound.
I was told many times by my readers that they did not see it coming and there were no indications their relationship was in trouble.
Well, that is not possible. It has been known that although attraction or love begins to wane and doubt sets in, your boyfriend/girlfriend will still stay in the relationship until they are sure what they want to do.
Yes, it is true that they keep a secret about their wavering feelings, but emotions are difficult to conceal.
During this period of time, the unsuspecting party usually gets mixed signals. However, girls are prone to dismiss the warning signs than guys because girls tend to take any small loving gesture as reassurance that fights and arguments are nothing to be worried about. As a result, they will be more shocked when their boyfriend has finally made up his mind and break the news to them.
” He just say that he just doesn’t love me any more.”
” He says that we are not good for each other. And here I thought we were so happy together’
” She just said she was sorry and it is over.”
I received so many emails from my readers telling me their ex just suddenly ended the relationship and caught them completely off guard. Many of them still don’t quite understand why it happened.
One of my readers, Sarah , dated her boyfriend for two and a half years and even got engaged a few months ago. During the whole time they were together, her boyfriend never stayed out all night. Not that she knew of anyway.
When she found he was out all night, she figured that he must be cheating. She went to his house to wait for him to come back home and then confront him.
He initially gave her all kind of unreasonable excuses, but in the end he came clean. He confessed that he had been seeing another girl for quite some time and he was spending the night with her. While he was at it, he also told Sarah that he wants to break up.
Later, Sarah admitted that looking back there were signs she missed. She thinks that his recent burst of jealousy, checking her phone and e-mail messages may have been evidence of his own guilt. The more she thought about it, the more clues she saw sprinkled over the last several months.
Warning Signs & Signals
We will decipher the most common signs and signals for you. However, try not to jump the gun and decide your boyfriend or girlfriend is trying to end the relationship without sufficient evidence.
What you should do is that you should take questionable conduct and analyze it in the context of your entire relationship and watch for corroborating signs.
Breakup Lines
Below is one of the more common breakup lines. If your boyfriend or girlfriend tells you one of the following, you better sit up and listen carefully. He or she may be setting you up:
‘‘ I love you,but something is missing. Let’s be friends.”
” I love you, but I am not in love with you. You deserve someone better.”
” I’m not good enough for you. I can’t make you happy.”
” You are a good girl. But we are not suitable for each other.’
” I can’t give you what you want.”
When you hear these words, don’t panic and don’t be afraid to react. As a matter of fact, you should respond in a sweet, open-minded way.
Take initiative to ask your boyfriend/girlfriend what’s missing or why he or she can’t possibly make you happy. This way, you can dig out more information and get more insight into the situation , instead of sitting down and thinking about whether or not what he or she was saying was meant to be an breakup line.
Take control of the situation and don’t lose your grip. The worst thing you can do for yourself is passively waiting for your boyfriend/girlfriend to decide on the fate of your relationship.
Distress Signs
You don’t need to rely on just the breakup lines to determine whether or not someone is trying to dump you. There’s plenty of proof in his or her actions, which is why you should carefully review the distress signals below:
- Takes trips with someone of the opposite sex other than you
- Shows no curiosity, concern, or tad of jealousy when a past love or someone of the opposite sex calls you or messages you
- Suddenly changes behavior or stop calling you by nicknames
- Frequently cancels plans
- Deliberately attempts to start fights
- Exhibits annoying behavior
- Shows a preoccupation with everything but you
- Makes new references to old loves
- Hints at a need for other people in his or her romantic life as well as yours
Beware of these are glaring signs that love is waning. I am certain that you must have felt loss of comfort, happiness and trust when your partner does any of the above. Take them at face value and begin to seriously consider taking action that benefits you!
Let’s look in the bedroom next. The following are hardly signs that love is part of these sexual romps:
- Rushes out after sex and can’t spend the night
- Always too tired for sex
- The absence of intimate moments, personal insults before, after, or during sex
- Lack of responsiveness
- Derogatory remarks about sexual performance or participation
- Turning over without a kiss or saying good-night
- Interest in their own sexual satisfaction only
- A lack of responsiveness to your sexual overtures
By now, if too many of these clues are adding up, your suspicions may be right on target. He or she is either losing interest or maybe has someone else in mind when they look into your eyes.
Suspecting He/She Might Be Cheating
If you think that your guy or gal may be fooling around with someone else, see if any of these extra-bedroom activities have popped up lately.
- Keeps coming home late
- Unreasonable excuses about his/her questionable whereabouts
- Exhibits a diminished sexual appetite
- Shows an overnight concern with appearance
- Purchase fancy new underwear you never see him or her wearing
- Doesn’t look you in the eye
- Stops making those private, affectionate gestures
- Makes secret phone calls you discover
- Leaves receipts around for gifts you don’t receive
- Disappears at parties with another man or woman
The signs and signals you have been given thus far should be obvious to the naked eye.
Let’s dissect some of our readers’ relationship problems:
Ultra-short Term Relationship:
”We have been dating for almost one month. On the next morning of our last date, while having breakfast, he told me that he cannot get married in the near future. Even though he would like to have a long-term relationship, he just doesn’t see us going into that way.
I said okay, and he thought I didn’t get it. So I said to him that I understand what he meant by saying those lines, I know that he wants us to stop seeing each other.
And then I asked why, he said that we are too logical and have less passion. And the weird thing here is that he still wants us to be friends, like “just” friends.”
My Advice: From what I have been told so far, you probably have mentioned marriage in your conversation while you two were still dating. That would explain why he was telling you that he cannot get married in the near future.
This is a classical case of girl being too eager to take the relationship to the next level and bringing up the ‘M’ word too early. Most of guys don’t handle this very well. The ” we are too logical and have less passion ” are just some convenient breakup excuses. When a guy wants to break up with you, there is always a ” logical ” reason.
Dating A Divorced Father
”Two and a half weeks ago I was blindsided by the man who I thought was the one. I was happy for the first time in years. I had never felt more like me, I liked myself more than I ever did. He and I were so close,and we shared everything.
In four months, I became intimately involved in his and his 12 year old child’s life. For the first time in my life, I saw a future with someone and it all just made sense. And then, seemingly out of the blue he told me he just “didn’t see it.”
That he didn’t feel like he could give me what I was giving him. I gave him a couple of days, then laid it on the line. I wanted him, I wanted him to be in my life and wanted and wished we could work it out. Denied.
He says it was one of the hardest and most difficult decision he had ever made in his life (and he’s divorced), but he stands by his decision as the best decision. Well, I disagree. One more long email basically laying it all on the line again. I told him I love him and that part of me always will.”
My Advice: The fact that you are so in love with him and happy with him might have blinded you from certain signs that he was giving out before the breakup. You mentioned that he told you that he didn’t feel like he could give you what you were giving him.
That probably means that you were the giver in the relationship. He was feeling the pressure of you being too good to him and he was finding it hard to reciprocate. Also, he was divorced before. The idea of getting into a new marriage might scare him a little. He is probably not prepared for this yet.
On the other hand, you have become so involved with his life and also his son’s life and are sort of playing the wife’s and mother’s role. He knows that you are serious about building a future with him, but he is not sure if he can give you what you want – marriage and family.
Single Mums Dating
”I met my ex and had the best 5 hour first date ever. For the next four months, we were so happy in love. He was planning on me meeting his parents and wanted to be so involved in my life as well as my kids.
Then 3 weeks ago, I get a “Well I’ve been thinking we may not be good for each other but I’m scared if we break up you won’t be my friend :(“.
Since then, I mailed him a letter and poured my heart out. I told him I wanted him in my life as a friend and etc No response to that letter or my a total of 3 texts I had sent or my voice mail I left. I just don’t get it. How can a man just out of the blue just be gone and have zero contact after he said it was HIS fear?”
My Advice: It is not a stereotype, but singles mums have a more challenging time to make a relationship work. At first, the guys fall for you. Everything was just perfect. He even makes efforts to get involved in your life and also your kids.
But, what they fail to do is to have a realistic expectation about what they are getting themselves into and also be mentally prepared for all that. Because of this mismatched expectations, they will often choose to back out or disappear after a while.
This cowardly and immature behavior is especially common in younger guys who have never been married or had a kid before. For single mums, be selective on whom you want to date and pick the more mature ones:)
oluwarotimi says
my gal i dnt really wat wrong wit her,may b she luv me or nt.she jst ask me money 2 do photo shot on her own.wen i d nt giv her d money she request to,she then send me her nd her bf pic 2 me through facebook later on she told me tat d her nt luv her again nd she block me.please who is d main cause of dis break relationship.
Jackie says
If you’re in a long distant relationship either get together and stay together or get out quickly because in my experience they never last. Trust me, my spouse and I are apart for logistical reasons, he’s living in Europe because of the inability to acquire status in the US with me, we’ve been together for almost 9 years now and apart for almost 3 years with a few trips to visit. So far it doesn’t look good. When it comes to the rules of the state think twice before getting involved with someone who resides in another country. Unless you can afford it, forget it.
mike says
I was really close friends with a girl, best friends in fact for about 9 months before we got together. The last two months were more like we were already together.
After the nine months our relationship lasted a little over 20 months. The main reason it ended was the distance between us as she moved away for university. The first 5 months she was away it was fine, we missed each other but we could deal with it. The last two months weren’t great at all though.
I went through a tough time were I lost my job and I suddenly had a lot of free time. Two weeks before I lost my job I went up to visit her for 5 days as a Valentine’s Day present. We both had one of the best weeks together that week, but with losing my job and having all this free time after a great week just made me miss her so much as I thought about her a lot. I got silly emotionally by being jealous, clingy and argumentative. We would always get passed it but eventually she got sick of it and started to stop caring.
She eventually came home but very really wanted to see me. When we did see each other we both always got upset which never happened, but we still were quite physical during this period. I knew the way I was started to drive her to other men. One might we were out and she was saying we were gonna break up but not now coz she wanted to do it privately and not when we were out.
There were two times I thought we were gonna break up but she never actually said it but we just talked about how things were. Then she was going on holiday for a week and decided the day before she went we would break up, but after me saying why we shouldn’t she sat there for a while thinking. That night we were physical again, she went away and we were still together.
The day she came back was the day before she went back to uni and sh was texting me saying we really need to talk. I knew what was coming. She said she thought about it while she was away and decided it was best for us to break up. It felt rash to me because she realised it was the last day she could do it in person. We broke up but it was a clean break up, were so comfortable with eachother we were able to laugh and reminisce. She said she wanted to stay friends and she’d keep all our Instagram photos up. The reason she gave for breaking up was that she didn’t love me anymore.
A month passed and we barely spoke, I did well at trying not to contact her, but all the times we spoke I was the one to initiate it. I asked if it was okntonstartbteying to be friends now and she said it was too soon. I asked why she thought it was too soon and then she said it’s not too soon I just think it would be weird if we spoke. She also started to stealthily start to remove our Instagram photos, every time she put a new one up she would take one down. I asked if she planned to take them all down and she said I know it’s harsh but I think it’s time to move on. I’m not sure how she feels about us being friends now but she went back on her word over Instagram.
Her friend was also in a long distance relationship a year before us and they argued with eachother all the time but they lasted a year. Her friend and ex now hate each other and I think that’s because they stayed together so long and I think that’s what my ex was thinking about, she didn’t want us to end up hating eachother but I don’t even know if she wants to be friends anymore.
It’s weird because we were best friends for 3 years and we were really close. So it’s weird of were not friends at all. I have a plan to try and win her back because I think when she sees I’m back to the old me she fell in love with she’ll see sense. What do you think? Do you think it’s over or should I try? I’m still in love with her and wouldn’t even know how to begin to try and get over her nevermind actually doing it.
Thank you for reading this and thanks in advance for the comments.
helen says
I met this guy C in December. We are both early 30s. He and I had a lot of mutual friends. At first I wasn’t sure about him, I didn’t even know if I liked him, but he charmed me so hard. He went out of his way for me, made little gifts for me, took me out different places. We had sex all the time and he was very attentive to my needs and it was great. He couldn’t get enough of me, always passionately kissed me and couldn’t keep his hands on me.
He asked me to be his girlfriend and I was hesitant because I’ve been hurt so badly so often in the last couple of years but I caved because he was so wonderful and so sweet and we had so much fun together.
Well, inevitably, I fell in love with this guy. And unfortunately, when I fall in love with someone I tend to start to feel a little insecure….you know, the hurt-in-the-past thing again. The little actions that C did for me in the relationship slowly started fading away. He stopped wanting to see me on certain days of the week. Stopped having sex very often (almost three week hiatus at one point). Kissed me hello but that was it. Still texted me regularly.
Of course, I absolutely freaked out. I started picking these little battles with him for the last month… asking him why this and why that. He said nothing has changed. My friends just thought he was getting lazy in the relationship. He still saw me on days that we usually hung out but it seemed different. Sometimes it was still great though, it was about half and half great days full of love and the other half just more like buddies.
So on Tuesday I went to his basketball game, just like I do every Tuesday as supportive as I am. When I get to his basketball games he usually comes over and kisses me hello and then we go out to eat afterward. Well this Tuesday I was all sorts of insecure when I got there, and all he did was give me a little wave hello, and when the game was over I snapped at him for not saying hi to me. Not exactly my best choice but I’ve been really nervous about the relationship for a couple weeks. We also had a big fight last Friday night about him not texting me to check up on me and make sure I was ok when I hung out with my girl friends.
So he left me, and texted me and ended the relationship. He said we were not compatible, it wasn’t going to work, we weren’t the same, I was too sensitive, the chemistry was gone. He told me this over and over as I pleaded and begged. I texted him all night knowing he would get it in the morning, saying I could change and please give me another chance.
Wednesday morning he reiterated that the relationship wasn’t going to work. I texted him sobbing and pleading for about five minutes, asking to start over, and he said “Well if you want to take a break for a few days and talk on Monday we can do that if you can handle it.”
So I don’t know what this means. So like an idiot, I called in to work on Wednesday and got wasted at a college pool and texted him over and over. Every time I asked him to give me another chance he said we should clear our minds and think about things and decide what we both want and talk on Monday. I am very impatient and I don’t know what this means.
I discussed it with my friends and they think he just wants me to stop texting him for the weekend, the relationship is over and I should just accept it.
Today I told him I felt like his mind was made up so what is the point. He said part of our problem is I need to calm down (true). He brought up talking on Monday again and that we both need a couple days to think what we both want.
I don’t know what to do. I’m flipping out. I’m not going to text him any more today but I am so devastated. Do you think he just wants to break up with me on Monday so I stop texting him all weekend like my friend said? I know I need to stop texting him, so I’m definitely done doing that. If you told your bf/gf what he told me especially after telling me we were DONE so many times, do you think he might want to work on it or do you think this relationship is completely over??
harry says
my ex and i were having a lot of arguments and back and forth for awhile before the break up. The funny/sad thing is we were suppose to have a convo the following day about us because i just felt like things we’rent going so well and wanted to find out what was happening and what we could do to fix it/us.
Our arguments were always about the same thing us not spenidng time together and even though i saw him on a daily basis for about 45 minutes which was our lunch break from school it just was never enough. He expressed to me how he had a lot on his plate, First he’s a foreign college student thats doing two majors and he was also taking a few course over at my school so we could see eachother. I really understood this but it was hard to be in a relationsip with someone u never hanged out with or went on dates with and this was a relationship that was going on for about 10 month. I would bring it up every few weeks and he would say he would try but we would always end up in the same arguments over and over again and it didn’t help that most of his freinds are females which just didnt put me on ease but in that moment i would react and ask questions and we seemed to be getting tired of it.
Anyways, the night before or conversation was suppose to happen he sent me a message saying….he needed to take a break from seeing anyone at the moment because it was to distracting for him, that he hopes we stay friends, and he hopes i dont take it the wrong way but this is how he was feeling at the moment and that he’s sorry. I called him right away and he didn’t answer and i messaged him to talk and he aplogized and said he wasnt in the mood to talk tonight(it was past 12am) so i sent a follow up message saying ‘aftre everything we went through you won’t even talk to me” which he replied saying the time for talking will come, just not up for it tonight, iam sorry. GN ttyl. I never called or messaged him again. 2 weeks in he messaged me saying ” hope all is well on your end. XO” and i didn’t respond. I returned something i borrwed to use a week after that message during school time and when i did he asked if i was done with it and all i said was hmmm and turned around and walked away.
Iam just having a hard time cause he still comes to the school i go to and i see him once in awhile and i just feel like this is stopping my recovery time because its a constant reminder seeing him.
liz says
My boyfriend and I have been on and off since 2010. He has broken up with me 3 times while I have never broken up with him. To be fair, the first time I kind of deserved it (I was really needy). The other times he was going through mental health issues. But either way – all of those break ups were devastating to me.
We got back together almost a year ago. The time between the last break up and when we got back together was about 9 months. During that time, I tried contacting him but he wouldn’t reply – until he finally replied last June. Like I said before, this break up was really hard on me and I felt really bad about myself because I couldn’t believe he left me again. I hooked up with a guy on the outskirts of my friend group (meaning I’m not great friends with him, but I have good friends who are) 2 times during those 9 months.
My relationship with my boyfriend now is solid… EXCEPT that he can’t get over the fact that I slept with that guy. My bf wanted to know if I had been with anyone and I was honest with him (so he had known about it before we even officially got back together). I have no feelings for that guy – at the time, both he and i were kind of using each other to feel better about being single, lonely, and hurt by our exes. I have never not loved my current boyfriend. However, my bf gives me so much sh** for hooking up with this guy. He is still in a lot of pain about it and makes me feel really bad about it. It sucks because all the other parts of our relationship are so good.
What makes me mad is that my bf has hurt me and betrayed me multiple times in the past but I have always forgiven him and put the past behind us despite the hell I experienced during each of those break ups, but it seems like he cannot do the same for me. It’s like his pain is worth more than my pain. What should I do?