My partner has left me.

[JLove2019]

Hi everyone,

I wanted some advice regarding my recent relationship. I have been on here many times when looking for advice and support and found you all so helpful and honest and I need that at this moment in time. I am almost 34 and been with my partner for three years. We are engaged to be married and have a wedding booked for next year.

So I will try to keep this as brief as possible. I have been with my partner for just over three years. He moved into my house (I bought it just before we met) after a short time of dating. When we met he was in some financial difficulty due to a job loss he had experienced and having very little family support. By financial difficulty I mean that he had taken out some pay day loans in the past and the repayments were impacting upon him. He was also renting a house and struggling to manage payments. He has had a number of relationship breakdowns in the past. He has a history of living a various addresses and moving from place to place. People that have known him a long time have commented that he is 'unpredictable'.

Long and short of it is that we had some tough times at the start in our relationship where he had been dishonest with me about further debts he was facing (due to pride). He often became defensive when challenged and this would result in a big argument and him leaving me for a a few days. These arguments occurred a number of times and have been very volatile, lots of shouting, crying and hurt. I struggled to trust him after this and things were hard but we worked through these difficulties and he has gotten himself on his feet and financially he is now in a good place and has a good job. I trusted him completely with money.

I supported him by allowing him not to pay too much to live with me at the start of the relationship and helped him to get a better paid job. I also supported him by contacting the loan companies to claim irresponsible lending and got him compensation for this. He is now on his feet financially and seemed to be making great progress.

We got engaged last year and we have booked our wedding for May 2020 and sent out invites and I have bought my dress.

Lately he has been emotionally distant with me and there had been an incident where I had not been entirely honest with him about my recent struggles with money (nothing big, I just couldn't afford to pay as much into the joint account due to starting a new job which had been paying less money however I had not spoken with him about this which upon reflection was wrong). He lost it with me and told me that I had been dishonest with him and that I had 'punished' him for his previous mistakes around money and that what I had done was just as bad.

I sat down and spoke with him and was completely honest about money and apologised and said that this would never occur again. I told him that I was committed to making the relationship work and that I saw us having a happy future together. We have since spoken about the future and about buying a house together and everything seemed to be moving forwards.

We have been at logger heads since this time really. He has continued to be emotionally distant from me and despite me trying to make things more fun and loving he has not made the same attempts. I have had this overwhelming feeling that he is unhappy with me and that he would leave. We have continued to be intimate and have had some lovely times over the past month. We have also booked flights to visit a friend in Australia in December which he paid me for and we were discussing very openly.

I came home yesterday from work after speaking with him during the day to find that he had taken every single one of his belongings and left me a letter stating that he had decided to leave.

Within the letter he talks about how much he still loves me and how this is the hardest decision he has ever has to make. He talks about not being able to make me happy and that I am the best person he has ever met and ever had a relationship with. He says that he believes that this is the only option for us both to be okay.

As far as I am aware, he has taken his belongings to his sisters home. I have tried to call him but he is not responding. I have sent him an email explaining how this has made me feel. He has read this but not contacted me.

I am beside myself with grief at the loss of this relationship and also at the way in which he has done this. He has not contacted me or checked that I am okay. He still has keys to the house. When I spoke to him in the day I told him I was looking forward to the weekend and he advised that he was too. I am so confused by this and cannot understand why he would leave in this way. He stated he had no option other than to go when I was not there.

He also has a daughter who is 12 who I have a good relationship with.

What should I do now?

Thanks,

J

Unintended biscuit !!

OP it is normal to hit rock bottom after what you have been through. From my reading of your OP there was a considerable difference between your financial misdeeds and your ex’s yet he has tried to gaslight you into thinking they are the same in a bid to create an out from a relationship he had already checked out from. That is a total head f€ck. Enough to make anybody feel like they are built on quick sand couple that with the emotions of a broken down serious relationship and it is to be expected that you would be in an incredibly emotional vulnerable position. So what to do:

1. focus on the practical stuff, change locks, empty your share of the joint account
2. self care, write a short list of what you need to do to get through the coming days start with the basics and check them off your list as you do them. If you are in a really bad place it could include eating and brushing teeth and each day add to the list to get you back on your feet.

You will feel sad, you will feel grief, but you will get through. He found a strong together stable woman, he destabilised her world but you can do this. You will get back on your feet. for you.

I'm so sorry that he used you so horribly to get back on his feet. He's been distant for a while and has had you unknowingly doing the "pick me" dance.

My advice is practical as I'm not good at the emotional side and that's the only way I can deal with this sort of upset in my own life. Whilst you're hurting this much it can be hard to see what you need to do to protect yourself, so hopefully just getting busy helps you deal with the fallout ... The start for 10 that I would work through are:

• Your salary. If it's being paid into the joint account, contact HR and have it changed NOW. It can take a week or two prior to payday to action. If they can't do it in time, be logged in to the joint account just after midnight the date it lands and transfer it immediately to you.

• Joint account. Take your share out now. Make sure you cancel any overdraft facility and phone the bank to say the account is in dispute. Find out what you need to do to remove your name from it. It may require playing nicely with him to get him to sign the forms.

• House. Change your locks NOW. If you can't afford a locksmith, you can get just the barrels from Screwfix or B&Q reasonably cheaply. You only need you tube /google and a screwdriver to do it yourself.

• Joint account. If there are any bills that you need (mortgage or utilities) that get direct debited, move them to your personal account ASAP.

• Utilities- if you have any particular things that are just for him (Sky sports package, Kids cinema for his kid, extra high download limits, etc) Call the companies and cancel/ downgrade to just what you need.

• Utilities. Call the council and amend your council tax to the single person discount.

• Utilities. Contact the electoral register and de-register him from your address.

• Utilities. Change your passwords on anything he might have access to - Sky Go, Netflix, Amazon, news or magazine subscriptions, etc.

• General IT & info security. If you have used any of his tech at all for access to email, social media, etc then log into them all, find the security setting to log you out of all devices, then change ALL the passwords to ones he wouldn't guess. Complete PITA to have to log in again on each of your own devices, but worth cutting him off.

• Financial protection. Does he have the details of any of your cards including CVV codes? If so, call the bank and report them stolen. It will mean a week or so with limited card access / popping to the bank for cash, but he can't spend on them in retaliation.

• Life admin. Is he listed on any of your insurance policies (house incl mobiles/bikes/devices out of home/accidental damage, private medical, car, anything else?)? If so, call them and remove him.

• Wedding. Cancel it. Get help from your mum and your bestie if you need it. Go for the one which is the politest bulldog that can get you the most money back from any deposits you've paid. Go through your contracts with a fine tooth comb to see what you can reclaim.

• Wedding. Sell your dress. Keep the ring - put it aside for now and decide what you want to do with it once you're back on an even keel.

• Wedding. Keep all refunds that you can get. If you feel you have to give him any cash back that he's contributed, put the refunds into a separate account in your name and only refund him his half once the joint account is closed (no debt), any expenses are covered (like cancelling contracts for his sky sports, changing locks, he's used your card for something, etc) and any refunds to any family for money they've paid towards the wedding have been returned. There won't be much left to split.

• General health. He's been distancing himself for a while. Whilst it probably was completely down to getting back on his feet financially and you having a dip in salary, he may have decided to line up his next financier. Please get yourself a STI/ general wellness check. Your GP can also help you access a short course of counselling so you can pick up the pieces and put yourself back together emotionally a bit better.

• Social media. If you can't bring yourself to block him, put him on a restricted status so he can only see what you want him to see.

• Contact. Even though you're hurting and feeling broken, please don't keep calling / messaging him. As hard as it is when you just want answers as to WHY?!?! sit on your hands. Write it down for you only. Holding your dignity will help in the long run. You'll also get all the answers in time and honestly if you step back and hold your tongue.

• Contact. You may not want to block him on your phone just yet as you will need to communicate over the joint account / any other financial ties. You can put him on Do Not Disturb though, so you only see his stuff when you want to and not at 3 am when he's lonely and stressing about losing his access to your cash.

• Contact. Emails can be directed by rule to a sub folder, so you only have to look at them when you're ready or you can get someone else to read them and give you the summary.

Sorry - that was long and a starter for 20 rather than 10.

Sending you all the fortitude (and unmumsnetty hugs) that you need. I'm so sorry he has done this to you.

Wow. That was longer than I realised and maybe a complete information overload for you.

Summary- I'm so sorry that this has happened to you as you sound amazing. If you need a list to sort shit out, start here.

Let him go.
You sound like the complete package while he is the opposite. Go get yourself someone a million times better cause you deserve it.