Women who almost broke up with your SO, what was the breaking point, and why did you stay anyway?

I realized my then-partner developed a drinking problem. That alone was a huge issue and combined with short temper, it was not fun to be around him sometimes. I stayed because addiction is treatable, and anger issues can also be worked on. Gave it another 3 years with long cycles of sobriety and relapses. He did try to get better but ultimately always relapsed. I left in the end for various reasons, this being one of the biggest.

We’ve had a few moments that almost broke us.

When he got fired again. When we were fighting over household chores.

With him getting fired. I told him this can’t happen anymore. I went to the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror and went “Can I live like this for the next 10 years?”

I was so upset and told him this can’t happen again, I can’t take much more of this. He cried in front of me for the second time in our relationship. I realized I came down too harshly out of panic. I gave him a list of things he had to do to fix this. And he hopped up and did them without question. He went to the job help classes and he applied to everything under the sun, went to job fairs. He had a job in a little under a month.

I was still on edge and not satisfied. I said we need to go to couples counseling. He agreed without hesitation. Couples counseling triggered me to finally move us to the Midwest (we’d been thinking about it for awhile).

I told him I would prefer he continue individual counseling here (and I did the same, had to stop for scheduling conflicts reasons and I’m about to start again), and he did so without hesitation. With the household chores we were fighting once a week, I would set an expectation, become impatient that it didn’t change in a week, and we had our biggest blow up fight. I decided in anger we’re separating our cooking and cleaning dishes. I told him he wasn’t doing enough and threw his accomplishments in his face.

This became the third time he cried in our relationship and I never saw him cry like that. He pointed out how much he had improved, and this wasn’t the first time he pointed it out to me, and I kept minimizing how far he’d come. I felt awful. I realized I was still holding onto anger from his behavior that has long since changed. We talked it out, and then I cried cuz I made him cry and then he comforted me. I felt guilty that it became comforting me because I hurt him and didn’t feel I deserved kindness in that moment.

I’m still slowly forgiving myself for that incident. He’s fully moved on and he’s happy. I’ve gently asked for new things I want in this relationship. The past year has been working on the practical of living together. Jobs, household. He is in a stable job. Got a promotion, and his boss loves him. This job is the longest he’s been stable in a job and he’s doing well. We separated out chores and I realized I was majorly unfair because I make most of the mess and I was essentially getting upset at him for not cleaning up after me. I do more cleaning now, but it’s cleaning my mess, and I don’t build resentment like I did before.

I made myself responsible for his success, in every aspect, and I’m still learning to back off. He broke his shoulder last year and I needed to be caretaker for awhile, but I over functioned and didn’t treat him like an adult, and I should have.

I don’t think the blame is all on me. He definitely had stuff he needed to improve on to make our relationship last, and I understand why those things drove me to the edge. But there were much healthier and more loving and more kind ways to go about expressing all that. And to do it in a way that made us a team.

So the last year was the practical stuff. I’ve lately been asking for more romance/relationship focused stuff. He was in charge of our anniversary celebration this year per my request. And I’ve asked for small tokens of appreciation. I was really worried that it came across as me never being satisfied. Always looking for something. I didn’t feel I had a right to ask. He said. “You know why you feel guilty? Because this is all for you.”

He’s been very happy to step up the romance. He leaves me notes. Brings home little surprises. Initiates spending more time together and initiates more cuddling and kissing. He did a fantastic job with our anniversary, and it was a great lesson in me understanding someone else can take the reigns and I’m allowed to relax. I’ve been so happy, and he’s been consistently doing this stuff for awhile now. It feels like a pattern, our new normal, and not something he’s just doing to appease me for a short time.

I hope now when I bring up stuff, he knows I want to tackle the issue as a team. I have apologized. I realized a lot of this a few months ago. I sat him down and said “I’ve been a jerk.” He tried to argue with me that I wasn’t, and I insisted. He never thinks poorly of me, we say “understanding” is his super power. I apologized in depth for my errors. Why what I said and did was wrong, and that I’m going to change.

We’ve had a couple moments where I’m at the beginning of the poor treatment I’ve given him in the past, but I’m upset and need to express it. I ask him in the middle “How am I doing?” He assures me that I’m communicating well and he validates that I have a right to be upset.

So we were at a breaking point because of struggles in our life. I then took the positive changes for granted. I realized I kept holding onto the negative. We’ve talked and talked and talked and talked.

I also hope and feel and think I’ve changed. I notice myself thinking some of my old patterns that led us to where we were. I identify that feeling, think it through, and find a way to settle it. Either by gently voicing a concern, or reminding myself that things have changed and present evidence to myself, or just take a deep breath because it’s nothing more than a fleeting doubt. Which I’ve talked to him about those as well and he’s helped me feel so much better about those.

We just celebrated our 3 year and I’m very happy and he’s very happy, and we’re both hoping for many years to come.

Edit: Clarified some things

he cheated, I left him for several months but we came back to each other. honeymoon phase lasted a few months and I was happy. then he stopped putting in effort, doesn’t have sex with me or even kiss me, and showed up to my 20th birthday empty handed after over a year of being together. I’m still deciding whether or not to end it.

Technically we did break up for a couple days. It was maybe 2 months in, and the longest relationship I had been in was 6months (I wasn’t into dating). One night I got a message from an old fuck buddy which led to him spilling his feelings for me. I didn’t know how to react, I knew I never wanted to date that guy but suddenly I felt very trapped in my relationship. So I broke up with my boyfriend out of fear of being in a committed relationship. Within the 2 days we were broken up I quickly realized I made a massive mistake, and that I really adored my bf and didn’t want to lose him. I explained myself and asked to get back together, thank god he said yes. Now we’re a little over 2 years in and I can honestly say he’s the best thing that ever happened to me, and committed relationships with the right person are the shit.

When I realized I couldn’t love him and myself at the same time. He was still in love of the version of me he met when we started dating(3 years prior) and not who I was becoming. I was still in love with him when we broke up but we were holding eachother back