What was the moment you knew your marriage / relationship was over? The straw that broke the camel’s back so to speak

You win! OMG I hope that you are OK and that he is in prison.

He left me alone at 39 weeks pregnant to go to a Hogmanay party with his best friend. He didn’t come home for 2 days by which time our DS had been born (days before mobiles). Found out he had been with a random woman he met at said party.

No actual drama. The light bulb moment was when truing to choose a valentine card and I found myself looking for one that had no romantic or loving words. The penny dropped and I ended our 7 month marriage that night.

He had been an arse for such a long time I took my engagement ring off. A friend, asked where was it, and I said I would put it back on when he started behaving, again, like the husband I married again.

Trying to bring me back into my senses, she said I needed to be fair and what would I feel if somebody came and told me he was having an affair?

The first thought that came to my mind was: Great, at least he would leave me alone for a while!

I started putting my ducks in a row on the same day.

WTF!!

Asking him to please not tailgate, it was dark and pouring with rain, and his response, 'you know the more you moan, the more I'm going to do it' it wasn't the worst thing he said or did but really was the final straw.

I somewhat speak to both of them, though I didn't for a long time. I was in therapy for years afterwards but it's been 7 years now so I've very much healed.

Realising how money orientated he was.

On holiday I heard him talking to our DC about my parents inheritance when they died (they weren't even close!). When I asked him why he thought it was appropriate he said that he hoped we (we?!!) would help out his grown up offspring (my Stepchildren) financially when my DP's died. The same DSC who incidentally I had paid for a holiday for the year before and didn't get a thank you from and one who wrecked a car I bought him. The answer was no and there and then I decided I needed to divorce him before he controlled even more of my finances in the future. I am now happily de-married! I know the thing that eats my EH away is the fact he wont benefit from me financially ever again.

He shouted at a cleaner in a Morrisons cafe for not wiping the tables quicker.. It was at this moment I realised not only did I not love him I actually hated him and was embarrassed to be seen with him in public.

Blimey, some of you have really been through it. Thank you for sharing. I feel almost unworthy with my tawdry tale of fundamental incompatibility ... The entire 'relationship' was That Moment but, for some reason, I plugged away at it. (The sex was great. Never let your fanjo make your decisions!) I nearly called it off the night before, but he came to see me and just sort of sat there looking really anxious. I thought he must care after all 🙄

The wedding day was fabulous. We'd planned the whole thing as a big, relaxed party, all our friends contributed something - not money, elements of the party - and the atmosphere was wonderful. Nobody noticed the happy groom insulting my outfit as I arrived at the altar, the best man's entertaining speech revealing a crime (fraud) XH had committed in the past, or him telling me to fuck off when I fetched him for the first dance. Well, I suppose one of his colleagues heard, but she wasn't bothered as she was sitting on his lap with her tits in his face.

I thought of asking my parents to take me home with them. Instead, I put my already well-worn best foot forward and really tried to have a normal, happy marriage with the weird fucker. That Moment's final moment came a stressed, anxious year later when he was raging on at me yet again for nothing in particular (just not being who he wished I was, I suppose) and the back of mind said very, clearly and calmly, "I don't like him. This is over."

It wasn't quite over, as I had to manipulate him into divorcing me. There was no way he'd accept any fault - this was when you still had to demonstrate unreasonable behaviour - so I stopped trying to be nice and just let him get more and more pissed off until he cracked. Then I promptly signed his ridiculous litany of complaints about me, which I guessed the more permanent of his other women had written, as it contained long words and he didn't know any.

I'd love to end this with a tale of glorious fulfilment post divorce, but the fact is he broke me. Or, more honestly, I broke myself by sinking all my strength and optimism into a hopeless mistake. I know many of us do this - and I spend quite a bit of time trying to dissuade other women from similar!

The best thing that came out of it for me was that I started serious therapy. You know, they say "There's something wrong with you, you need help." So you find a therapist, you tell her there's something wrong with you, then you find out the wrong thing is that people way, way back in your history made you feel like you deserve to be disrespected and ranted at and you had never realised they'd made you into the kind of optimistic sucker those weird guys can see coming from a far distance. So you start fixing that instead of the shitty marriage.

My message to anyone who's managed to read to the end of this post is: listen to the voice at the back of your mind, take no shit, and don't let your vagina make commitments for you!

I remember reading your story, op, so glad it all worked out in the end and you're happy now!

When I caught him snogging the OW.

He insured me for £100k, (this was 1989 so a huge amount) and tried to poison me.

My marriage always been bad. He was a very selfish man. Lots of emotional and financial abuse. I should have left years before I did, but usual story of no money, nowhere to go, two young kids etc. It ramped up when our two DDs got into their teens and began answering him back. He thought he could boss them about and demand (never ask politely) they do the domestic chores he wasn't prepared to do himself. One day me and DDs were in the kitchen, keeping out of his way, playing with the dog. I threw a really soft ball for the dog and it accidentally hit 'H' arm. No way it would have hurt as it was small and filled with foam. He went mental and launched the can of coke at me that he'd just got out of the fridge, just narrowly missing my head. He'd also been upping the verbal abuse to DDs, telling them to "fuck off out of it". I had received a redundancy payment from leaving my job of 30yrs so me and the DDs started secretly looking for a rental place. He was pretty gobsmacked the day we left as he had no idea it was happening.

My previous LTR ended slowly and, in fairness, not especially painfully - my ex and I had grown apart after about 10 years. He was, probably still is , fundamentally a decent bloke and the mechanics of the parting - selling house etc. were amicable.

There was one moment that crystallised that the relationship was over, however. We were out for a family meal with my parents and sister - my dad's birthday -and I was eating something a bit messy - can't even remember what it was - and got some sauce in my hair. My sister said to me, really disdainfully "You've got food in your hair" and ex just looked at me, matching her sneering tone with his expression. My parents ate on, paying no attention, and in that moment I felt humiliated, really small and alone.

I realised that in a happy relationship, my 'other half' would have said or done something to lighten the mood, made a joke such as 'Trust Cecilia to do that!' or 'Can't take you anywhere, can we?" or even leaned over with a napkin to wipe the food off. It was sitting there with ex and sister's matching expressions of disdain over absolutely nothing that made me realise I was on my own.

We'd been together 6yrs, not married or living together. Our last 'date' was less than 15mins. He stayed in his car with the engine running. I was leaning over to talk to him through the window. I looked like a hooker negotiating a price. Somehow he thought that was acceptable. He cried when I ended it. I didn't.

Another 'D'P and I booked a week off work together. Just beforehand he announced he was going on holiday instead. He went to Spain with 26 girls for a piss up and left me here. He was the only bloke and was genuinely baffled when I ended the relationship.

If I need to explain what's wrong with that then we aren't even reading the same book, never mind on the same page.

We moved house twice and on both occasions he didn't bother to take time off and left me to handle it with the help of friends. The last time he came back from work when it was all
done, house full of boxes and nowhere yet to sleep, and then announced that we were going to a friend's party.

I told him no way, that we needed to make sure we had a bed to sleep on that night and to unpack some kitchen stuff. So on that first night in our new home, I spent the evening on my own while he went to the party. It limped on for a while but that was the night it was over for me. Once again he was a selfish manchild and I had to be the adult. It wore me down so much.

I've broken up with my now ex after over twenty years, because he's decided that he wants to be a woman. He's known this about himself for years, possibly decades, but never thought to tell me any earlier so that I could make a decision on my own future. But, he dosn't act very womanly. Has punched doors when in a temper. Our mutual friends never saw that side of him, so they all think he's golden. Once we're living separately, I'll probably lose friends because they'll all be about supporting him to be his "authentic self", but only a couple have reached out to me to ask me how I'm feeling.

I was having a really tricky time at work with another team, and he took their side.

even if I’d been completely in the wrong (I wasn’t) I just suddenly knew we were no longer on the same side and he wouldn’t have my back

It was years ago and probably super silly, but I got a bunch of balloons with little notes for his birthdays and told him there were these little notes and he could read them once the balloons go off. A few days after that he took a bunch of these balloons to his workplace because it was a collegues' birthday and he "needed to show up with something" and he forgot about the notes.

We broke up in a month or so for unrelated reasons and about a year after a learnt that he started seeing this said coworker. There was no overlap with me from what I understood, but this got me wondering if she saw these notes and thought they were for her (there were just wishes and compliments, nothing that would mention his name, actually).

He finished off my bottle of champagne without asking.

It was the lightbulb moment of realising how selfish he'd become, and how his wants would always trump our children's and I.

20+ years of marriage and that was the palpable moment I stopped loving him.

I knew it was over a few years before but when he tried to strangle me and said, ‘You’re going to die tonight’, that was truly the straw that broke the camel’s back.

This gives me hope for my DD.

@SpidersAreShitheads you dont aound pathetic at all, you were in an abusive relationship. Sending love to you and your father .

I’m so glad you got away.