Relationships
9 Women Reveal The Final Straw That Made Them Cut Their Ex Out Of Their Life & Wow
by Candice Jalili
If falling in love is a totally beautiful and all-consuming sort of joy, falling out of love is... well, the opposite of that. It's confusing, painful, and exhausting. I mean, at what point are you supposed to really know that it's finally time to call it quits with a person you spent so much time with someone you were totally in love with? How do you go about cutting an ex out of your life and how do you know when it's time to actually pull the trigger? A recent Reddit AskWomen thread asked ladies to share their responses to just that question and I've included their best responses here for you.
Now, before you start reading, I'd like you to keep in mind that every relationship is different. What might have been the breaking point for one person might have been NBD to you, and vice versa. Trust your own gut and be inspired by the fact that eventually these women were able to muster the strength to leave.
He was not at all there for her during her time of need.
My Ex- He started screaming at me about what a horrible girlfriend I was and refused to spend the night with me after I found out my mother had a severe stroke.
She died three day later. I broke up with him the day after her funeral over the phone. Then, he sent me a text saying "I think you want to call me back and talk to me in a way that allows [me to] continue respecting you. I don't want to believe you're okay with that conversation". Turns out, I was actually pretty okay it.
She realized he didn't know anything about her.
My ex-non-boyfriend. We were seeing each other on and off for a year and change and he refused to commit. I don't drink, and he came over one day and brought me a bottle of Yellow Tail red wine. It seems stupid now because I had a million reasons to cut him off, but seeing a physical reminder of how little he cared to know me was the straw that broke the camel's back.
Meeting someone else who made her happy gave her the strength to leave.
After 5 years with abusive ex, I met my now boyfriend at a festival and spent that entire night talking and laughing with him. He was so kindhearted, and that night showed me what life could be like. It was like I’d forgotten that guys could be kind after spending every waking moment with a complete asshole. I told my ex the next day that I was leaving, and it helped that friends were staying with us at the time because they all backed me up and didn’t let him attack me in any way. My mom helped me get my stuff out of his house and even got a police officer to accompany me to make sure nothing happened.
I ended up staying in contact with the kindhearted guy I spent that night talking to at the festival and we started dating not long after. Fast forward nearly five more years and we’re living together in the Poconos with our family of animals, happy as can be. I can’t believe I once thought I was doomed to a life of misery with my piece of crap ex. My life and future felt so dark and hopeless—I didn’t think I could ever leave, but I really did it!! I still feel amazed and grateful even now
She finally came to her senses when he updated his relationship status.
My ex — We had been dating for 3 years when everything got flaky. He was hiding stuff about being with another girl and wouldn’t text me for hours, sometimes days, only for me to find later that he was at another girls house (because she posted a snap of him laying naked in her bed). Regardless of all this knowledge, I naively thought the problem was with me, not him, and that there was always something I could do to fix it. Finally, one day he randomly posted a “relationship status” on Facebook with another woman, while we were still together, and I just laughed. Honestly, laughed, because I finally realized how ridiculous I had been. It was such a weight off my shoulders. He came back around two years later asking me if I wanted to have lunch. I politely declined.
— Whoreo2
She saw through his lies.
My ‘ex’ (I say it because we weren’t officially together but he was so incredibly needy and took up all my time and energy anyway.), we dated briefly but he broke it off because he didn’t know what he wanted. He wanted to be friends so we tried that.
He ended up being a terrible manipulative and toxic person. The straw that broke the camel’s back was when he ‘accidentally’ sent me a text meant for someone else (who he wanted me to think he was dating) and then the lies just started crumbling around him. I cut contact and blocked him but not before he got in a few last abusive messages.
She decided just being friends with him was never going to be enough.
After breaking up with my most recent ex, he still wanted to be friends. I kept him around in the sense that we'd still talk and stuff, but I decided to cut him off when I realized it wasn't really going anywhere. Our relationship was almost parasitical, and I realized that the friendship was almost like that too.
She managed to get herself out of a potentially dangerous situation.
A guy I was talking to started scaring me a little, because he started getting super possessive and controlling. It definitely raised red flags, so I slowly stopped talking to him. He would get upset about it, but I just didn't really respond. After maybe a day or two of not talking, I got a text from a random number with my area code, that I didn't know, asking me if I had done the calculus homework. I asked who they were, and they claimed that they went to my school and that they admired me from afar. Other than that, they didn't really specify anything. This person repeatedly kept asking me if I was in any sort of relationship because they wanted to ask me on a date. I truthfully said that I wasn't, and then this person revealed himself to be the guy. He cursed me out for saying that I wasn't in a relationship with him and called me names. He said that he spent money on this stupid app to test my loyalty to him. I told him to never talk to me again, and immediately blocked him. I don't think anyone has ever scared me that much, in my entire life.
He made it clear she wasn't a priority so she decided he wasn't either.
He told me he has been thinking about this girl a lot, who he ended things with 3 months prior, the day after telling me we should start dating. He ended things with her because she was vanilla in bed, and spent a “whole week” working on it before dumping her and running back to me, his fwb. A month later I said we should be just friends because I had feelings for him, but I knew he didn’t reciprocate. So he pulled this bullsh*t of wishy-washy expecting me to just accept that he was stuck in this “dilemma” but go out with him regardless. I said I never want to see his face again. I was angry and broken. I was more hurt and disappointed by how I thought he was worthy. We had been on-again and off-again for almost 2 years and I always thought even if nothing works out for us romantically, I’d still want to check-in on him from time to time for years to come... I felt like a fool to think that way.
She amicably ended things for his own good.
my ex-boyfriend of a year and a half had been struggling for the last 6 months of our relationship. he had multiple family issues, was academically struggling, struggled with depression, and would constantly lie to me or our mutual friend about all of this (dismissing it or withholding information when we asked him). after breaking up 2 times, we were still together; it was hard for me to leave him at this time. but it came down to one night where he threatened suicide and i realized there was no way for him to grow if i continued to be his emotional crutch. i broke up with him, wished him the best of luck, and we haven't talked since.
The main takeaway here? Even if things are feeling totally impossible right now, eventually you'll be able to find the strength to leave.
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