To think some people are taking life advice from dysfunctional people and wrecking good relationships?

[YourJadeLion]

I’m seeing more and more women online and in real life leave loyal, supportive partners because someone on the internet told them they “deserve more” or “shouldn’t settle.” And the people giving that advice are often living chaotic, emotionally unstable or completely unaccountable lives. Some of these women had husbands who were faithful, consistent and kind but got convinced that because their relationship wasn’t hyper-romantic or perfectly Instagrammable, it wasn’t enough.

I’m all for leaving toxic or abusive relationships. But AIBU to think a lot of women are being manipulated by dysfunction disguised as empowerment and they’ll end up lonely, regretting it and wondering where it all went wrong?

(Not anti-feminism. Just pro-critical thinking.)

I think when we read women telling other women to LTB it usually sounds justified.

What I see more often is women being told to go NC with parents, ILs or other family members for the most seemingly trivial of reasons. Yes, your MIL might be a pain in the arse who constantly witters about her friend you’ve never met, and she may have once gave your DC chocolate after you said not to but you only see her twice a year so suck it up for the sake of your DH.

I wonder...

It's not something I've observed in real life, but certainly some people on here are a bit too quick to be all 'LTB' for guys who haven't really done much wrong or for whom it's like 'OK, maybe you wouldn't tolerate that, but other people it might be genuinely forgivable' , especially of there are other good aspects of the relationship

What does this mean?!

Every day here 🤣

I agree with almost all of the LTB comments on here and often make them myself. I'm not bitter and lonely. I've been happily married for over 20 years. I think you're mistaken if you think the LTB-ers are single and bitter. A lot of them are just baffled at the shit that fellow women put up with from their partners. A man doesn't have to be violent or actively abusive for you to decide you'd be better off without him.

This. You don't leave someone you've built a life with on a whim.

I suppose the problem is that there is no one, objective definition of what ‘not ideal, but not divorceable’ really looks like. On balance I think I’ve seen more threads on this site where the OP has been encouraged to ‘talk it out’ over things that I would never characterise as fixable than threads where she’s being egged on to leave him because of toast crumbs in bed.

Agree. Probably the single biggest shock of Mn for me has been how many women are in unequal, unhappy relationships, without thinking other options are available.

I’ve certainly not seen women leaving men on a whim. But I don’t watch people on insta or tik tok trivialising their lives for likes. And no one I know IRL has done this.

What I’ve seen more of is women being treated badly and staying far too long, hoping that it’ll get better. And other women who’ve made that difficult decision to leave sharing their experiences.
Many women don’t recognise huge red flags (me included) and some outside perspectives are really useful to see what’s happening.
How many women who post here and really should leave actually do? Probably not that many. That’s why there’s so many posts from unhappy and unappreciated women.

Agree.
People come to me for relationship advice, I always tell them not to ask someone who has been single for 4 years and direct their query to someone happily partnered.

I'm not lonely or bitter - I am married happily for more than 30 years to a decent guy who occasionally drives me crazy or does something hurtful - like most happy relationships.

I have often said LTB on MN and that is because I read about women putting up with abuse, financial abuse, and misery. I read about lives where children think it is normal for daddy to not talk to mummy for days at a time (it isn't).

I don't say ltb for situations where people may genuinely have a different point of view than me - even if I disagree. So if a woman posts her husband went to a strip club on a stag and spent money they didn't have - if she is only concerned about the money and not the strip club I won't weigh in on that. Even though I would actually leave my husband if he went to a strip club.

Like a previous poster what MN has shown me is that there are women out there who live in situations that are, frankly, brutal to spend your life in - not solid stable loyal or mundane. Just a way no one should live.

Why is stability more important than fulfilment though? Some people might feel more fulfilled and stable being single. You can fall out of love with someone regardless of how stable and nice they are and ultimately the only reason anyone needs to end a relationship is that they don’t want to be in the relationship any more. Reality doesn’t have to be mundane and unexciting, I’m sorry if yours is!

I’m not sure about this OP.

On the one hand, I was talking to a someone today about a former colleague who was an absolute nightmare. Very divisive, manipulative and difficult to work with. She has taken early retirement and is now retraining as a….therapist.

but I’m not sure I’m seeing many women leaving good marriages- from real life experience ( as well as mumsnet) I’d say it’s more common for people to stay in shitty marriages and relationships- despite the good advice they get to LTB!

Anyone who leaves a relationship on the say so of a random on the internet wasn’t in a good relationship to start with.

A pal of mine actually left a really good bloke after spending hours a day on the r/relationships subreddit, she admitted eventually that it had poisoned her into seeing red flags where there were none and believing minor disputes and misunderstandings were malicious and cruel on his part.

She still regrets ending it, he was a lovely, solid guy who really didn't do anything wrong - she's now sworn off internet relationship advice as it often doesn't come from as benevolent a place as it can seem at first glance!

I've seen this a lot. Only today I eye rolled when someone posted about all the male apologists on a thread. It was one where neither partner was terribly unreasonable but they had an issue that they had a conflict on. OP was I think genuinely asking who was right and some posters felt her Dh was in the right. It wasn't a philosophical debate about a patriarchy, it was a normal relationship difference of perspective but anyone who didn't agree automatically with the woman was a 'male apologist' apparently, because this man represented all men and the OP all women. I can't imagine how narrow minded the poster who said this is.

I absolutely agree. My cousin listened to her very toxic best friend who advised her to end her marriage. She now regrets listening to someone who she thinks was probably jealous of what she had. It’s scary when you see similar dynamics on here. We should all be much more discerning when it comes to the motives of others. So many nut jobs spewing absolute nonsense. These advisers often very clearly do not have their own lives together but for some reason adopt the role of being a moral authority. Weird! Gives me hand that rocked the cradle vibes.

My cousin listened to her very toxic best friend who advised her to end her marriage. She now regrets listening to someone who she thinks was probably jealous of what she had.

Who does this? Marries someone and then divorces them because their bf told them to? Anyone who does this isn't ready for marriage.

Agee
There does seem to be a lot of projecting (man haters)

I agree with both of these posts. The divorce rate would be through the roof if the ‘hard truthers’ on here had their way.
Additionally ‘some women on here put up with a lot of shit from useless men’ and I am often staggered at the excuses made for these useless men.

'And the people giving that advice are often living chaotic, emotionally unstable or completely unaccountable lives.'

How can you possibly know this about people who post online?

I’m talking about situations where a relationship is solid but imperfect - stable, loyal, mundane at times, and dissatisfaction that might otherwise have been worked through gets amplified rather than examined.

You’re right that many women stay far too long in genuinely unhappy or unhealthy relationships. That absolutely happens. I don’t think that contradicts what I’m saying, I think both can be true.

These women are unhappy.

Unfortunately, all too often, 'work through' actually means learn to settle and put up with things - with the burden on this placed on the woman with the man just carrying on as before.

Is stable, loyal, mundane enough?

Maybe they'd simply be happier without having to deal with all that crap and be by themselves.

This idea that you should work through things is in many respects one that rests on the concept that you can't leave a relationship that's okayish. There has to be something drastically wrong with it.

This isn't about chasing some Instagram perfect life or dubious ideas about romance and living happily ever after.

It can simply be about not wanting to pick up those holey underpants from the middle of the bedroom floor and watch the same things on TV every night for the rest of your life because 'thats just what you do' when you married and you have to stay married for the rest of your life.

I think there's an growing element of understanding you don't get a second chance at life and if you don't grab it you'll regret all the things you didn't do more than the things you did. This is a freedom men have always had to a degree that women never have. Women are now realising that things don't have to be like that. You don't have to compromise all the time (and unfortunately compromising usually gets done a lot more by women than by men because women are socially conditioned to conform and be passive to a much greater degree than men).

It's ok to leave someone for a 'shit reason'. Because someone else's 'shit reason' might actually be a massive fuck off huge ick that totally destroys the love for life and sense of spirit of fun within you.

This. It sounds like absolute infantlising nonsense to me. I give most women the credit that they are breaking up because the relationship was not good or they decide they would rather be single and independent.

Because relationships are not obligatory. Personally there are very few men I'd ever be interested in having sex with and and a tiny, microscopic, invisible to the naked eye number of those I'd willingly have a relationship with. Fortunately DH is one of them.

MN is one example there is some great advice given in a mature intelligent way written by adults, then there is advise that sounds like it been given by an immature 12 year old ie 'well just take him for what you can' 'just tell him to give you the house' 'he slept with your best friend so of course the judge won't let him see the children' etc.

But there has if people take life changing legal advice off random people on the internet they have bigger problems they need to get on with, take some personal responsibility