"What Was Your Simple Common Mistake That Entirely Ruined Your Relationship?" (30 Answers)

Accommodation to avoid any conflict. At the time I was working through a lot of childhood trauma and I didn't know better, now I do. I lost my identity trying endlessly to please him so he wouldn't abandon me, but he was going to do that anyway. You can't and shouldn't have to earn love from people, and them betraying and disrespecting you is a cue to exit, not a sign to "try harder.".

She expected me to know why she was mad at me without communicating to me AT ALL about what was bothering her. I'm completely open to correcting reasonable things that bother a partner, but I can't do that if you don't tell me what it is. I broke up with her after she was all pissy and telling me I should know exactly why she's mad for TWO DAYS. Eventually she relented and told me she was mad that I watched a new episode of a show we normally watched together. Which, granted, I did do. But that was the final straw in the no communication issues we had.

Not immidiately stopping the wedding when he said "Once we're married, the mask comes off." I stupidly assumed it was a joke.

Focusing on all of the things they aren’t giving you instead all of the things they do give you. (I’m in a happy marriage, but I did used to do this. I became happier and our marriage became stronger when I stopped).

I was a “if they want me to know, they’ll tell me” person married to a “if they care about me, they’d ask” person.

Oversharing. I know that with your partner you should be able to talk about everything. But sometimes I should kept my mouth shut.

She kept fallin onto other dudes dongs, I hate it when that happens.

Lack of communication, he never told me about what he thought or how he feels about our relationship. Those feelings just compounded over time until he ultimately called it quits.

I wish he talked to me, we could've figured it out together. I was always in the dark and didn't even see the break up coming. Hurts, but I think it was just meant to be.

Communicate with your partner, be transparent. Helps both parties.

Doing too f*****g much, and getting *nothing* in return.

I did this grown mand laundry, I cooked, I cleaned, I bathed the animals, he did f**k all except cheat on me.

When I asked why he didn't leave because, clearly, he didn't love me. He said "I just loved having someone to come home to.

Now in happily married and we just had our daughter. He still stalks me on social media, I'm sure because he had a million burner accounts and I couldn't possibly remember the names for all of them to block them.

Getting too comfortable with doing the bare minimum. Take her on dates and buy her flowers before you wish you could again.

Having to be right about everything.

Taking her for granted.

Not saying sorry here and there.

He told us we shouldn't talk to our individual friends about our relationship issues because they'll "always take our side". 3 days before our breakup he talked to 2 friends about our relationship issues and yes, they took his side. Meanwhile I'd been telling my friends everything was fine with us when it wasn't, and looking back if I had spoken to friends about it I would've had the strength to break things off a lot sooner.

Telling my friends about all of our fights.

Took a nap one day, she thought I was cheating . Big blowup argument I found out she was cheating on me

I installed the towel rail unevenly.

Trying to communicate with someone who couldn’t receive or recognize healthy communication, and then not ending things as soon as he turned resentful and cold towards me, but foolishly thinking that somehow we could communicate as to why he was suddenly treating me poorly. Even if you create a safe space for communication, if the other person isn’t willing to do so, it’s pointless. It’s silly now to think that “I ruined the relationship” for being open and transparent.

I’ve tanked a lot of relationships by thinking everything needed to be fixed. I almost did it in the one I’m in. He’s in a bad mood, he’s being snappy with me, we need to fix this, I need to sit down and have a heart to heart, I need to COMMUNICATE that he’s hurting my feelings right now. I’m overly therapised and really thought this was the best way to handle everything.

My current SO and I went through a lot of therapy apart and together ironically to work on this because, with him, this is what happens. He gets angry and stews and stews and will never bring the thing up to me until I coax it out of him. The suggested way to handle this was, surprisingly, less communication.

I feel like we’re in a better place when he can be acting like a total reactive jerk and instead of being like “have I upset you? I must have because you’re treating me really weirdly and you’re in an awful mood. I just want to get to the bottom of this!!” I can be like “You’re vibe is positively a*s, you need to take a nap or something. If I did something to upset you that’s making you act like this I’ll be open to talk about it later today, but right now I think we’re both just annoyed. I’m gonna go do the rest of my day alone, I hope you feel better.”

Then I get home and it’s 50/50 “yeah I’m sorry, you did this thing last week that really upset me and I’ve taken time to think about how I want to address it calmly” and “Yeah I have no idea what that was about, I think I didn’t get enough breakfast and it made me moody. I’m glad you had a good day after that!” but either way we’re both totally calm by the time we talk about it.

Assuming they’d do something that they said they would. Honestly, that’s my bad.