50 Singles Tell The Lesson They Learned About Love From Their Latest Breakup 

50 Singles Tell The Lesson They Learned About Love From Their Latest Breakup 

If you’re single, don’t feel bad. Your last heartbreak probably taught you something, just like these men and women from Ask Reddit.

1. People are who they are, not who you wish they would be. Loving someone and wanting a future with them won’t stop them from being a toxic person. And the only good option with toxic people is to get them out of your life. Even if it hurts.

2. Sometimes, their mental health is not an excuse to stay with someone. Sometimes, you just need to let that go and it is not your responsibility to keep them healthy. If something does happen to them, it’s not your fault.
You can’t fix someone’s mental health. They can only do that themselves.

3. If you start the relationship by editing yourself and hiding the parts of you that you think they won’t like, it’s a trap and you’ll never be able to be yourself. Tears will follow. Do yourself a favor and at a reasonable point in the early relationship, be vulnerable and tell them all the things about yourself you are afraid of admitting. They’ll find them out eventually anyway….

4. Dating someone you like won’t help you get over someone you still worship.

5. Don’t date someone just to be dating someone because it’s been a while since your last real relationship. It’s fine being on your own for a while romantically, as long as you’re surrounding yourself with quality platonic friendships.

6. It takes two to make it work. And I was the only one doing any work, hoping if I worked hard enough, he would love me back as much as I loved him. Doesn’t work that way.

7. Sometimes as two people grow together, they also grow apart, into vastly different people….. and that’s okay.

It sucks, but it’s better that you recognize it instead of letting things go too much longer if you’re not making each other happy anymore

8. Don’t bother giving cheaters a second chance. The trust never comes back.

9. Relationships are not supposed to make you miserable. They are supposed to up lift you and make you feel amazing.

10. Go with your gut feeling at the beginning. If something is off, something is telling you it’s not quite right, even if they are a good person, listen.

I just had to break things off with my ex because while he’s a nice guy, we just weren’t compatible. It was a hard conversation to explain to someone that there’s nothing really wrong, you just don’t feel it.

11. My feelings are valid, having needs doesn’t mean you’re needy, and if your gut feels like something is wrong don’t let someone call you crazy.

And if someone cares enough about you they will be willing to accept their faults and work through issues, not immediately shut you out/break up with you.

12. Don’t date someone just because they’re tall. Also, in this day and age, if a person (more often than not) doesn’t respond to your messages, they are simply not that into you.

13. It’s way harder and takes more energy to be with the wrong person than to be alone.

14. If both of you are not 100% invested in the relationship then it’s not going to work. It can’t be one person who’s all in and the other going at 50%.

15. While it’s noble to fight for the relationship, it’s not always what’s best for both of you. Especially if you feel that the two of you aren’t fighting the same fight. And despite what movies and books may tell you, love alone isn’t enough.

16. You can love each other as much as you can but if you’re not compatible when it comes to kids, future goals, etc it’s just not going to work out.

17. If someone acts like they don’t care, its because they don’t care.

18. Cheating is a non-negotiable red flag.

Refusing to take responsibility is a red flag.

Ignoring your s/o is worse than arguing against your s/o which are both inifinitely worse than communicating with one another about the topic at hand.

And the best one: you have to love yourself more than you love being in a relationship.

19. Sometimes the timing isn’t right and that’s not really anybodies fault.

But at the same time – if the timing is never right, over and over again – well maybe it means I have to figure out what I really want from life.

20. I feel that asking questions and actually listening to your partner is essential for understanding each other. Asking honest questions for the pure sake of understanding, especially when things have been heated, is for me the road map to truly solving issues and building trust in a relationship.

21. Having different sex drives actually IS a problem

22. Nobody should beg for anybody to stay in the relationship. Once one checks out, they’ve checked out and sure you might get the pity card… But is it worth it?

Answer: Fuck no.

23. Sometimes it’s just too late. Doesn’t matter how good it used to be, how much you fucking want it to work out. It’s just too late.

24. Fear of commitment can make you miss out on the most amazing opportunity for a happy life.

25. Two incomplete people cannot make a complete couple. And you can’t help those that won’t help themselves.

Life got so much easier once I stopped trying to rescue everyone I dated.

26. Communication is really REALLY important. Being open about your needs, wants and most importantly tour feelings is crucial.

27. People aren’t always who they say they are.

28. If attraction is not really there, you can’t force it.

29. Your partner may become a different person with different goals than they had when you got together, especially if you’re getting together young (19-22 in that particular case) and that’s ok and it’s ok to end the relationship because of that.

30. If you don’t actively want to hang out with her at least 50% of the time, why are you dating?

31. Love, or infatuation, is blind. What you feel in the first three months doesn’t truly portray the relationship or the person. You’re still learning about each other. Don’t let yourself become completely vulnerable at the start of a relationship.

Also, if they don’t want to commit, they’re not that into you.

32. Relationships are a lot of work, and love isn’t enough to keep one going on it’s own. Effort, patience, and communication are needed as well.

33. Date someone you’re actually madly in love with from the get go rather than ‘settling’ in the hope that the feelings will eventually come. In my experience, they generally don’t and, having experienced relationships with girls that I’ve been physically and emotionally drawn to right from the off versus ones that I’ve thought were kind of okay and I wanted a girlfriend and figured they’d do, the latter is not only 100 times worse than the first but just ends up causing pain to everyone involved. If they’re not your dream lad/ladette, stay single and wait until they are.

34. Nobody changes for another person, they change for themselves.

35. Do not attempt to date someone whose fetishes you cannot properly satisfy.

36. Trust your feelings, in general they point toward something that is important to you. You can be happy, you don’t have to settle for someone you don’t want and sometime nothing is better than a broken relationship.

37. If she cheats on her previous bf with you, don’t expect her to suddenly become completely faithful in her relationship with you.

38. Don’t have naive or overly lofty expectations for a relationship, or else you will set yourself up for disappointment, if not frustration.

39. Just because you both grew up in abusive households doesn’t mean the other person will be reluctant to abuse you.

40. Christian does not equal non-abusive, respectful and kind.

41. Don’t wait around for someone who isn’t sure about you.

42. You can’t love away the depression. She self medicated with alcohol, and my love wasn’t enough to make her stop drinking.

43. Sometimes it is your fault and you were the toxic person, but it doesn’t make you a bad person. Just improve on yourself and get rid of bad habits.

44. When you’re in an abusive situation, it’s VERY hard to see it. You’re blind to all that is wrong with this person you love. You believe this is the best that you will get, that there will be no better. You start to feel as if it’s all your fault and you deserve every horrific thing said and done to you. I learned that this is NOT what ANY relationship should be like; regardless of whether it is a romantic relationship, a friendship, or even your family.

45. Don’t date a drinker when you’re not one yourself.

46. Everyone has a quirk. Everyone. Even you- you just might not know what it is. Day to day survival of a relationship can depend on how you react to this quirk. I dated a lot of guys who would just annoy the piss outta me daily with their quirks, and I’m not contributing our break ups solely to these habits, but it definitely didn’t help to be annoyed or disgusted on the daily by your partner. It took me some time to realize that this is just a part of who they are and I will never be able to change that. Learn to accept people for the funny little things they do.

47. Listen… to… your… gut…

48. You can’t make yourself like someone just because they really like you.

That makes me sound like a bad person, but the relationship was really only based on the fact that he liked me and was around all the time. It lasted 3 years and just got progressively…less fun until we decided to call it quits.

49. Sometimes people can seem loving, caring and tolerant on the outside, but actually be judgmental and self centered.

50. Don’t put the rest of your life aside. When they leave, you are then left with nothing. Thought Catalog Logo Mark

January Nelson is a writer, editor, and dreamer. She writes about astrology, games, love, relationships, and entertainment. January graduated with an English and Literature degree from Columbia University.