Our environment tore us apart?

[BrokenPencils]

Recently broke up with long term DP due to suffering years of misery in a terrible environment (private housing) - extreme noise pollution, manufacture, most homes sold off to shared accommodation, neglected/dangerous dogs the authorities won't look into, addiction problems, trash build up and freaky exhaust noise/speeding in streets.

We made plans to leave that he never had any intention of following through. We have been able to afford it, and it could have been done quite easily. For much of the time there he claimed not to be able to hear or see any of it yet still secured the windows shut with padding to keep the constant smell of exhaust and industrial noise out. So it is a house with no light:(
He also boarded up the glass parts of his rear door and allowed most of his property to rot. The property next door is a drug farm, reported years ago but no joy. No one cares. A few weeks before we split I heard several explosions in the early evening and asked him did he hear that. He said no "here we go again".
When i checked outside, two cars were burning at the end of the street. No one came out. I called the police.

It's like having been gaslighted/patronised for years into thinking the problem was me, when I was simply tired and stressed because of the place. Before coming to that place I was an outgoing, happy person.

It is a town neglected by it's local gov. Mostly dereliction and industry waste, a fair bit of arson, smashed windscreens, etc. Most stores boarded up or turned into casino's and lots of local properties don't bother to reinstall smashed windows now. It's all very sad.

According to exDP, I needed a thicker skin. I needed to meditate more and stop mentioning it. Over the last few years it made me very housebound as I work from home, not that you can escape the issues indoors. My work definitely suffered.
Anyway I flipped a few months back and we have called it off, finally. We have been trying to get along whilst i am making plans (it was his house/not mortgaged).
Am currently staying with a friend a few miles out and ready to house hunt. I will likely move to my home town which is still a lovely place to be. It is like starting all over again in my mid forties.

Is this common do you think? Prior to this issue we were great, seemed to have shared values and dreams. Perhaps coming from slightly different backgrounds has an impact? Or was my DP unusual? I think he never fully intended to commit and once the pressure hit he just became shitty and verbally aggressive if the topic to move was pushed. I am coming to see that he treated me with contempt, that so much of me has been pushed down.

I do think your environment, especially if you didnt grow up with it, can utterly destroy a person. I can heal from this but it's been a tough ride. It can also really expose the cracks in a relationship.

I can only say how I'd personally feel, & I couldn't live with that either.
Good luck house hunting & I hope you will soon have a peaceful place of your own, & ex DP & his place will become a crappy memory..

Good luck with your house hunting and your peaceful fresh start away from your ex. Environment can massively influence physical and mental health and being somewhere that is noisy and crime ridden sounds beyond depressing.

An environment of course has an impact on your relationship. I think from what you've written that is hugely apparent. However, I would say that your dp was unusual in that his response to your concerns was not typical.

In any successful relationship you would accommodate and try and make sure your dp was happy, secure and thriving in their environment. If my dp or vice versa had become a recluse and was scared of living where we lived, we'd both make every effort to make the changes required.

I am really sorry for you. However, as much as it is the environment, he has shown you who he is in terms of his reaction to your stress, and his unwillingness to accommodate your needs. You deserve better.

That sounds horrendous OP. Well done for getting out of it and good luck finding a nice place to live.

Out of interest, where were you?

I'm sure it's common. The UK is becoming an increasingly horrible place to live. It's just SO crowded. I'm in rural Essex, in a fairly quiet spot, but things are changing. We bought here because I'm insanely introverted and need as much silence and space as I can get. If I had noisy, intrusive neighbours, it would be a death sentence. It would quite literally trigger a breakdown. I hate noise. Hate it. Actually, posts like yours scare me. I've known two people in my life driven to suicide attempts by the people they had to live near – people who thought it was funny to play loud music all night, rev their cars at five in the morning, etc. The police don't, and can't, do anything.

Like I said, things are changing. My local woods have been hacked into to make way for a new estate. During the summer, some boys from that estate got into a field near me and were told off by the farmer. That weekend, they came back and set fire to his barn. I was woken by the sound of them screeching with laughter (they weren't in the least bit scared of being caught). As I type, another new estate is going up at the other end of the village. It's so big it's more like a mini town. That's on top of the massive new builds that have gone up in the suburbs, about three miles from here. And even that won't be enough. I can feel the atmosphere changing. There are more and more cars, more gangs of kids wandering about at night, more police sirens going off.

My partner is oblivious (or, like yours, doesn't want to know). I constantly moan about the boy racers, for example. You can hear their stupid modified exhausts banging and exploding all night. He claims not to be able to hear them. Sooner or later somebody will buy the field next to me and build on there. I live in dread of this. I also dread the summers now. When it's warm and dry, kids from these new estates go by our house to get into the woods, where they smoke cannabis, ride motorbikes, etc (they even vandalise the tress, for god sake). You hear them pass by our house at two or three in the morning, shouting and swearing. Several neighbours have had cars vandalised, and I live in dread of a break in (we're quite exposed).

If it wasn't for family ties, I'd move to rural Scotland. I'd literally go anywhere for silence and space.

Thank you, I'm glad I'm not alone.
I am beginning to see that my personality and self confidence took a real shattering from that relationship. And even though it's over, I am still learning about how it affected me so that I can become wiser in the future.
I keep having realisations as to how pushed down i had become, how fearful of making my own choices, how alone I felt, with someone who constantly dismissed my feelings.
Even though it isn't typical abuse, it has done a number on me. It's crazy how much you 'learn to see' at the end.

I can't imagine being with someone who didn't get angry with my personal standards - which include not sleeping in a room heaving with diesel fumes, or having my bones shaken by lorries and intrusive machinery noise.

The place is just sad, very let down by local gov and people just don't care now. No matter how much you can sympathise with how far people can fall, it is awful to have to live in the middle of it.

I don't fear noise, but there are noises of a certain vibe that are detrimental to mental wellbeing. Neglected, unsocialised animals and exploding vehicles (both stolen and modded) are not good for anyone's health. And he is able to afford to move, it's as if he just decided this was his lot in life.

YANBU. I used to live somewhere like that and my mental health took a massive downturn. I did everything in my power to get an HA exchange and move.
I can't understand your ex being ok with it - unless he has some vested interest in living there.

It sounds like an awful place to live but his attitude is very depressing. I couldn't live with him anywhere, never mind there.

Do you have children together? If not, why did you stay as long as you did?

No children, but i am asking myself some hard questions. I have no idea how i stayed with him as long as i did, this is why i think something must have messed up my confidence. I have to rebuild it now.

We did have a great closeness previously, he certainly appeared to be like myself in many ways with shared values, etc. Only the fist few years were good to be honest so now i look back and can't understand myself.

I had a decent life before him, good family, nice childhood, opportunities, no idea how I allowed it to get this far.

Your dp was emotionally abusive, uncaring and gaslighting you.

I’m not saying that environment didn’t contribute to that, but the environment isn’t the reason he misrepresented his intentions, minimised your concerns and pretended not to notice his surroundings and imply you were mad.

My concern for you is that by focusing on that place, as the root of your relationship problems, you risk sleepwalking into a similar relationship.

It’s very painful to end a relationship and you have to grieve your hopes and dreams, and the person you thought he was.

Well one positive thing is that i have been thinking this way for a long time, uncovering these realisations, and the love died for me some time ago.

Dont worry, I am aware that the place is a red herring, just an unfortunate side effect that has left me a bit scarred. I'd like a good long time on my own, new friends, a healthy space.

Sorry for posting so much but it is good to get it out.

What seems odd is that he chooses to live as if in poverty when he isn't anywhere near struggling. He has savings and a decent income. That is so baffling to me.
His choices in all things are the same, he let the house decay, he deliberately bought cheap tinned or boxed food he knew I didn't like, but when I cooked up healthy home meals he made an excuse not to eat them. It was like my entire personality had to be sidelined. He lived like a bachelor in many ways, and as time went on seemed to have no interest in anything i did whatsoever.

This person was putting a huge wall between us but wouldnt actually let me go. If i tried to chat about the possibility of splitting he just got angry. He professed to love me and wanted to stay together. That my observations were flat out wrong. In the end, after a year or two of suffering this, I said enough was enough, it's over. Thankfully this time he nodded.

We were in the Lake District last year and I mentioned how much more civilised things were up there, in a sort of jokey way and he then went on to point out every motorbike that passed us or every shout her heard to 'prove' all places are the same. He always stressed that every town in the uk was the same as his and that I was living in a fantasy world. It was like watching somebody disengage from life and anything good in it.
I do wonder why he is like that though. It is like a denial of self worth.

So of course the town isn't the main issue we broke up, it's been falling apart for a while, but I do think reacting to our environment in fundamentally different ways can definitely screw up a relationship.

I have no idea why I stood for the shit for that long, feeling trapped through covid in that place wore me right down. I wanted out then but it seemed like the wrong time. Most of my feelings for him are stone dead. Everything from our past now just looks obviously toxic for me, I suppose we live and learn.

I’m sorry you went through this OP. However, if you feel that your ex just didn’t want to spend his money on a lifestyle that was comfortable and pleasant to you, perhaps it wasn’t the right relationship for you. Also, I always think that if a relationship won’t stand up to everything life may throw at (environment, family illness, natural disaster……) perhaps it isn’t meant to be. I hope you find peace and tranquility.