AIBU to think that love and relationship success is largely due to luck?

[Shakespearesister]

Definitely bitter and biased here but bare with me…

Im almost 40, 3 small children and my long term relationship is falling apart.
There are a multitude of reasons why but it got me thinking about all my friends who are in happy marriages and relationships.

Lots of them are in similar positions to me, with awful, selfish men who don’t want to grow up, debt issues, wanting to get drunk/take drugs far too often, lazy and not sharing the household chores/mental load.
These are lovely, moral, intelligent women... they deserve more.

I also have friends who are with wonderful men who put them first, do their fair share, act like adults and are hands on parents, look after their wives and kids and our family first. (Sadly, there are very much in the minority.)
I get that some women stay too long with idiots (like me) and that’s on them, but AIBU to think that a lot of time, the people we end up with is just luck/bad luck?

I had no way of knowing what kind of father my partner would be when we met, he was attentive, generous and kind but has slowly become a monster.
No one can foresee addiction issues, potential infidelity etc years in the future.

AIBU to think some people just get lucky in love? Or is this to simplistic.

I agree to an extent, but as you say often men only show their true colours after the first kid is born.

thats the problem- we rarely see our partners in caring/ parenting roles before we start a family.

my ex was quite dismissive of his mum, so I suppose that was a red flag showing how he treated his family, but at the time I just thought he didn’t like his mum. How can you tell the difference?

also - I’m much better now at spotting red flags now I’m older and wiser, but most people are optimistic when they are young and think people grow up/ change

This is my issue.
Lots of comments I agree with like settling if you want kids and time is ticking, repeating childhood patterns etc. I get it.

but being in the right place at the right time has a lot to play. It’s not like I rejected loads of decent guys and turned them down in favour of an awful one!

you also have no way of predicting how your life will unfold: family bereavements, tragedy, job losses, and subsequently how people deal with that.. will they become angry, depressed, isolated, turn to substances, or do the right thing and seek counselling?

I think it's pure luck to find someone at the right time and I think that's the only difference between couples and single people.

But I don't think being with a decent person is just about luck. So many people prioritise things that don't necessarily make someone a good partner- good looks, wealth just off the top of my head, ignore red flags at the beginning of relationships or settle because they are scared of being single. I think judgement also pays a huge part, even if there is some luck involved.

In my friendship group, I've noticed that those friends who were content to be single have ended up with much better partners than those racing towards finding someone just so they could be in a couple. They tend to have higher standards.

No not at all. People sont change they always show us who they aare but people overlook it for a multitude of reasons. Lust, nativity, desperation etc, etc.
Heading towards my 40's and all the people close to me are in miserable marriages because they never looked to the future even when told are you sure this is the one. Lust has long gone and stuck due to kids and debt etc etc.

It is not luck. Just some are more wiser and mature and make better decisions. I am not am exception I married the wrong person but woke up quickly and got out sooner. 10 years later married the right person using my brain rather then "love" as my guide.

Relationship experts have said successful marriages are "boring"
They are not based on lust and passion but maturity and common ground. And that rings true.

No, they most often don't act like twats on the first date and will go out of their way to charm the object of their affection but the whole point is that it is an act. Some people are more capable of seeing through the charade and spotting the red flags whilst others seem less able or willing to do this. You may well think the man has done a 180 and completely changed, but I imagine that if he is a real bastard then there were some signs all along.

I genuinely think it's an evolutionary thing and some people are just very good at reading people and seeing the true character beneath. This will obviously boost your chances when it comes to romance as you are more likely to understand the person that you are forming a relationship with and have an accurate idea of their deficiencies and whether you can tolerate them.

DH and I were talking about this the other day. We both think we’ve been lucky, as we realise we didn’t know each other that well when we moved countries together. Somehow we’ve managed to build up a good life together, and seem to have the same values /priorities/ ideas about what we want in life. We don’t often disagree about major things in life so big decisions are fairly easy to make together.
We genuinely want the other person to be happy and able to live the life they want so things go smoothly and we both feel supported.

Did we know this 23 years ago ? Not at all; we’ve grown like this together and feel we’ve been lucky that things worked out this way.

my ex was quite dismissive of his mum, so I suppose that was a red flag showing how he treated his family, but at the time I just thought he didn’t like his mum. How can you tell the difference?

I knew DH was a keeper when he was vaguely nice but wary of talking about his ex. Lots of "I wish her well" and the like. I ended up friends with her sister. The ex was really really bad, including trying to stab her sister. But DH was kind about her very clear MH issues. He could have been awful about her, truthfully, but chose not to.

Men who are keen to talk disrespectfully about women aren't to be trusted in the main. I wish I'd known that at 18.

I don't think it is luck, some of it is resilience and faith in your own decisions, knowing when to make it work and being willing to walk away because it's not right rather than hoping for change, not having children because you desperately want them even if the circumstances aren't ideal.
I was in a relationship late teens early twenties and I loved that man with the bones of me, I was absolutely infatuated, I stayed a little longer than I should have but I didn't move in when he wanted me to, I carried on with my degree and my career path I was religious about my contraception. Eventually I moved away and ended the relationship, coding the floor having said goodbye I sobbed and sobbed even though it was my choice.
Twenty years down the line he has two children by an ex partner and an ex wife. He still works as he always has , but his personal life is a mess. That would've been my life tied to someone like that.

I do also think marriages take work, DH and I have been together almost 15 years and not all of it had been easy, we've both been through some horrific times, and any relationship isn't all hearts and flowers.

Edited to add I've known DH as friends from the age of 11, we got together at 25, I've seen him in his character forming years, in other relationships, going through difficult times with his family. I felt like I truly knew who he was as a person before we even contemplated a relationship and I realise that's not possible for lots of people to have that depth of knowledge!

Luck, in the sense you mean it, is not a thing. There is random chance that factors into every aspect of life to some extent but being inherently lucky or unlucky are just fairy tale myths.

As to your question, relationship success is mainly down to choosing very wisely and then putting the effort in. If you have chosen wisely, your partner will put the effort in too and all will be good. Unfortunately, too many people do not choose wisely and many just accept as their life partner the first person that applies for the job. I swear a lot of people put more thought into buying a car they will only have a few years than they do a partner they will have kids with, buy a house with and spend the rest of their life with.

I have seen very, very few people in my lifetime who have fundamentally changed their character, other than as a result of severely traumatic events. What I do see, far too often, is people who seem utterly oblivious to character flaws that are glaringly obvious from the get-go and/or people who see the flaws but naïvely think they can fix the person. It almost never works out for the better.

I agree with much of what you say OP. I also agree that you really see a persons true colours when a child comes along and you are pushed to your limits as individuals in the early months/years.
im not sure bits bad luck though rather than poor judgement or ignoring some of the red flags at the beginning of a relationship?

@Shakespearesister
I am sorry to hear you are having a crap time in your relationship,

My take on this
I think certain things that can happen in life come down to luck such as whether you have good enough parents not perfect ect,
the type of family you are born into,
are they extremely dysfunctional or bit dysfunctional but able to and want to improve better themselves?
The culture society environment you come from ect

as for relantships i think 🤔 it's quite interesting,
i think it's a mix combo of to certain extant your experinces of your own family dynamics and personal experinces that have had a good or negative affect on you
i will explain it better
You can often acctract or be acctracted to friends and lovers who have something in common with you,
in their background,
you may not be consciously be allways aware of this either,

You fall in love ❤️ or lust or both and you find later down the line how weirdly similar types of experinces you have both have had in the background
yourselves in childhood or teenage years or older than that,
such as your parents got divorced when you both children
or
your families has similar dysfunctional patterns issues ect

I don't think 🤔 it's as straightforward as it's a matter of luck good or bad luck in regards of relationships,

I think it's a mixture of the ubove and how much you value yourself as a person and regularly maintaining that,
having robust personal boundaries

and also listening to your female intuition of what feels right or off dodgy about someone's character dating,
not succumb to the cultral belief system in the west,
that anything to do with intuition is just wow and nonsense
It's only if something is scientific or analytical able to measure it that's all there is or important,

Well when it comes to dating especially how you feel whether obvious or you can't put your finger on it type of weird feelings
you need to notice them
and wonder what that particular feeling is telling you,
whats the message behind that emotion,
rather than ignoring it , in some cases and ended up with a domestic abuser Arsehole ...

I think a happy an healthy relationship involves a lot of work and commitment. It's spending a lot of time together before deciding to have children together, taking time away from the babies to nurture your relationship rather than growing apart through exhaustion. It's ensuring you value and respect each other.

When dreadful things happened, we chose to work together, help each other out, move heaven and earth to support each other.

We were young and knew nothing when we got together, but we worked damned hard to make a strong and loving team.

I’d take a step back. Alcoholism doesn’t develop overnight. The signs of a potential alcoholic were always there. An addictive personality, not knowing when they’ve had enough, just “one or two” after work most evenings, a personality that seems to completely change after drinking, needing a drink to feel confident/ have a good time.
Woman A and Woman B both overlooked the signs, Woman C left years ago.

@Bumpitybumper by your logic, women who experience DV only have themselves to blame for not having 'spotted the signs'. What twaddle.

If I’m completely honest with myself, my ex was always selfish, tight with money and horrible/ nasty when he couldn’t get his own way. The problem was that when we had children his shitty behaviour impacted me much more. Whilst I agree they don’t change per se their behaviour can escalate and their is often no real limit / boundary to their nastiness!

I’ve been with my now DP 3 ish years. He is a really good, kind man. I do feel lucky but I do believe I chose a better man as I am now more mature, now my self better and also knew what values were most important to me! I

Great summary @cauliflowerqueen.

I also agree with those saying that it pays to be fussy, to have the confidence to be single, and to be clear about your “show stoppers,” I.e., the lines that can’t be crossed.

At one point, I was exhibiting behavior that DH couldn’t tolerate ( generally being difficult and nasty) and my DH clearly told me that if I didn’t stop, we’d be over. I did , and we got through it-but you need to draw those lines.

I agree with this. It's the same reason you see so many people go from one toxic relationship to the next and then complain about men as a single collective because they just don't believe that good men exist. They do, of course, they're just with the women who know what they deserve and don't settle for less even if that means staying single. People don't fundamentally change; the circumstances around them do but how they will react to those changes is relatively easy to predict based on previous patterns. I was with DH nearly 10 years before our DD was born and whilst is was unbelievably hard, how both of us reacted was exactly as both of us predicted we would.

Well I don't think you're being unreasonable. I married the nice guy. Everyone said so. Calm, kind etc. 15 years into marriage he developed what was diagnosed years later Bipolar disorder and was so severely ill and disturbing (sectioned more than once) it was like a bomb went off in our marriage and devastated my and dcs health and wellbeing.

I have a wonderful relationship and I feel lucky to have it, however I am not someone who puts up with any shit and would rather have no relationship than a crap one so I think this attitude helped. Some people don't dump a waster because they would prefer to be with said waster than be single. No thanks!

Oh I love that last paragraph of this and genuinely long for a boring, stable marriage.
Much better than the extreme highs and lows I’m currently enduring.

@cauliflowerqueen

I agree with your insightful good post..

Yes and no.

I think that there are ways of maximising your chances, but these do involve maintaining some detachment and clear sight on compatibility and early red flag signs, which is hard when the clock is ticking on having kids.

For example, some thoughts would be:

• what is your DH's relationship with his parents? do you like the template for your in-laws?

• if you do like the template and it is a loving one where the parents are also kind to you and respectful of his life, that helps.

• if he comes from a dysfunctional family, can your DH recognise it and talk about it? Or does he think it is actually a good model - is he in FOG?

• does your DH have a habit of getting drunk etc when he is experiencing emotions, good or bad (using drink to celebrate in an over the top way can be an issue as much as drowning sorrows...)? Is your DH an all or nothing person around alcohol or can he stop after one?

• do you agree on money? What is your attitude to saving and budgeting? Does your husband share details of finances with you (find it extraordinary that women have kids with men who are clearly and obviously reluctant to share finances with them)?

• Can you name the things that are most important to you and can you agree?

• do you read each other well? Have you faced a challenge together? What happened?

• does one of you do more in the relationship in terms of the day to day admin from an early stage? If he doesn't pull his weight and help with booking holidays or cook or tidy up or buy gifts for his own family, what makes you think he will when you are married and have kids?

• does your DH generally do things when asked without nagging?

• Does he listen to details of your day and ask thoughtful follow up questions later or enquire about issues you have been having, or do you always have to bring things up?

• does he discuss the future with you, or does he have to be dragged kicking and screaming to each stage?

• does he display behaviours that suggest he will struggle to have divided attention? Does he sulk if he doesn't get your full attention when you have something stressful on? Is he overly focused on your appearance?

• does he have a fragile ego? Can he lose to you at games? Does his self depend on making a certain amount of money/more than you?

I'm not saying that these are automatic dump, but they are things that should give pause for thought and need resolving before kids come into play.

That’s not bad luck. That’s just another person not wanting to change and the woman making a (bad) decision to stick with him no matter what. Your husband became and alcoholic and doesn’t want to change, you can leave him. Luck is not responsible for your choices, you are.

I have name changed for this as I know I will probably get slaughtered!

I agree with you to an extent OP. I think there are some cases where red flags were ignored early on, but like you, I have experienced being completely blindsided by exes. Family and friends were also shocked by their behaviour - cheating, secret online lives, addictions that were well concealed. Not only have I experienced that, but so have a number of my female friends and family members. After 10 years of terrible relationships, I decided that my next relationship would be for both love and security. I made sure the man I settled down with (marriage and children), had enough established wealth that if he did cheat on me or turn out to be awful, I would have financial security for myself and the children. I did this by only dating men within a certain income bracket who had assets, and making sure that once we were married, all money and assets became shared.

That may make me sound awful but after a decade of being shafted, I decided I needed to take back some control. I want to be clear that I love my husband, but I’m not naive to think he wouldn’t or couldn’t cheat on me or turn out to be rotten.

Timing plays a part, so I suppose that is sort of luck but, my ex was quite dismissive of his mum, so I suppose that was a red flag showing how he treated his family this.
You need the same morality, a shared sense of humour and see loving relationships as all important. After 34 years we have had some cracking arguments, and of course starting a family changes prospective but the values remain the same and we are sickeningly happy together.