I feel so sad, I think my relationship is over....

[anditgoeson]

I've been wanting to post for a while, I know there are much more pressing things at the moment but I'm so sad and just need to talk about it. I cant talk to my friends or family because they all told me not to get back with my partner and close off when I mention his name.

We've been together for 3years and have known each other for longer. We have had a LOT of ups and downs, some really bad downs but we've always got back together but now I feel done with it and I feel heartbroken. I'm 39 with two children, I'm a lone parent and have little childcare as my parents are old now and in poor health. I feel like I'm going to be stuck being alone and it's so depressing.

Im really grateful to have my children, my health, my hobbies and a job I enjoy and I know how lucky I am to have these things. I just cant seem to get it right with partners.

I've had therapy over it and my therapist tells me I need to stand up for myself and my boundaries and I agree, I just hate the thought of being alone forever.

Has anyone found love and/or a good partner later in life? I cant carry on compromising and I fear that's what it's going to take if we are to stay together.

This may sound ridiculous, what I would suggest is maybe try and work on yourself.

Try and begin to feel comfortable with being on your own. Do you know your own boundaries? Do you what you want? Are you just settling? Most importantly do you know your worth? What do you know about yourself? What thoughts/feelings go through your head when you're alone? Are they positive/ negative?

Just idea.

I feel like I'm going to be stuck being alone and it's so depressing
WHY?
This is what you need to tackle!
You will always 'settle' unless you realise that being on your own is better than being in a bad relationship.
You need to be happy on your own.
Happy in your own skin.
I've been single a couple of years and love it.
No-one to answer to or consider.
See who I want and when I want.
Watch what I want.
Whole bed to myself and no-one keeping me awake with their snoring.
Eat what I want, when I want.
No cooking if I don't want to.
Go out when I want (well not now obviously)
Do the hobbies I love as and when I want.
Go to bed when I want.
I just love it and cannot imagine for one minute having to live with a bloke again.

Be a good strong role model for your DC.
Don't 'settle'.

Can you try and focus on YOURSELF rather than finding love and/or a good partner later in life?

Being alone forever may seem daunting, but it is infinitely preferable to the misery of forever compromising and hoping for someone else to make your life complete.

my therapist tells me I need to stand up for myself and my boundaries and I agree, I just hate the thought of being alone forever

“The key is in learning how to live a healthy, satisfying, and serene life without being dependent on another person for happiness.”
― Robin Norwood, Women Who Love Too Much

To be honest I loved being on my own for two years in fact if I hadn’t have met dh I wouldn’t have bothered, I preferred to stay alone than have another idiot in my life mummy’s boy, ex husband alcoholic. Find things you enjoy live your life for you. Hugs.

Thank you all for your messages. I honestly dont know what's happened to me. I never used to be like this, I was on my own for 4 years before I met my current DP and by and large I was ok.

I just find it sad that I may never get married or settle down. It can be very lonely being a single mum, I dont get to go out a lot. I know its silly really.

You are all right tho, and in fact @Oxfordnono12 pretty much everything you said my therapist has also said to me.

I would be so heartbroken if my daughter was settling because she felt she had to.

It's this reason that I'm thinking of ending my current relationship..as cringe as it is I do think I need to work on what I do actually want, and on myself.

You are still very young! I think because you are sad you are thinking of the worst case scenario.
You will find someone else part of why people never seem to maybe because they are too fussy or don't really want to.
You will know when you meet the right one but you'll be better at judging when you've had a break.

The scariest and hardest thing to do, is to look at ourselves. But yet the greatest reward. Take your time, be selfish, write it down.

I wish you best of luck.

Has anyone found love and/or a good partner later in life? I cant carry on compromising and I fear that's what it's going to take if we are to stay together.

I haven't. Split up with DD's father aged 34. 38 now.

But I date casually and I've come to accept and be okay with the notion that it may never happen on the grounds that I have looked deep and have concluded that - if forced to choose - I prefer being single to settling.

I've been a lot happier since coming to this realisation.

And, just so we're abundantly clear: yes, after weeks upon weeks of lockdown, I do have my moments of longing for any old idiot at my side just in order to be less bored and less alone. But these longings never last if I put a face to them and ask myself in earnest "is that who you'd like to be stuck here with?".

I still hope it will happen - but if it doesn't, that's okay, too!

@ilovetheseventies (I do too btw), thank you. You made me cry, but in a nice way.

I think I am just feeling isolation too which is possibly why I feel so pessimistic. I also think when you've been through a lot you can't help but think negatively about your future.

Also, when we think of the end of a relationship it's the good stuff that comes back, its thinking like this that has confirmed for me that it is the end.

Do you really need a DP though? How about a boyfriend instead? A relationship which is less be all and end all and more about going out on dates, having fun. Obv not in lockdown but you get the idea. A boyfriend or boyfriends might be fun!

@BrexpatInSwitzerland that was were I was at before I met my DP. Happy either way but still hopeful. I need to get back to that place.

@PeppaPig exactly, that's what I thought this was but it's gotten so intense and neither of either.

@Oxfordnono12 it is indeed. Therapy has been very illuminating and also difficult.

You write beautifully, the last part sounds like a poem.

Think of other relationships that went tits up, you survived and you will again. Just look at how some people go totally off the rails and then pick themselves up.

No-one to answer to or consider.
See who I want and when I want.
Watch what I want.
Whole bed to myself and no-one keeping me awake with their snoring.
Eat what I want, when I want.
No cooking if I don't want to.
Go out when I want (well not now obviously)
Do the hobbies I love as and when I want.
Go to bed when I want.

Bliss! I can't wait for this!!

Bliss! I can't wait for this!!

As stated in my last post: it's definitely not only that!

Lockdown for singletons really also means: sobbing relentlessly on your own shoulder - because it's not as though anyone else's is available. Waking up from a nightmare at 2am and having to soothe yourself back to sleep - because we're all having nightmares, but being awake is a lot less terrifying when there's a living, breathing, preferrably larger human next to you for physical reassurance.

Even under normal circumstances, you'll long to utter the sentences "please hold the screaming child for 20 minutes, I'm at the end of my tether" and "damnit, I just want someone other than myself to decide what's for bloody dinner tonight, please!"

But that's all still lightyears ahead of settling for someone you don't enthusiastically want to be with forever in my book.

@BrexpatInSwitzerland I don't do any of those things. I am honestly happy being single.

But... I don't have a screaming baby - my DD is 22 and living with me with her DP so I do have 'back-up' if I need it.
My friends are available if I need them as are my family.
I'm very lucky to have wonderful friends and supportive family around me though. I do know that!

Lockdown for singletons really also means: sobbing relentlessly on your own shoulder - because it's not as though anyone else's is available. Waking up from a nightmare at 2am and having to soothe yourself back to sleep - because we're all having nightmares, but being awake is a lot less terrifying when there's a living, breathing, preferrably larger human next to you for physical reassurance.

Very true. but these coins have 2 sides...

Being alone means being without someone who may cause you pain. So less risk of sobbing relentlessly.

And there is nothing worse than waking up in the night, distraught because of whatever he did, and looking at his back, knowing that he will not give you any kind of reassurance, physical or otherwise. So you lie there. staring into the darkness, waiting desperately for sleep...

Never again!!

I suspect you are holding on to the idea of the perfect relationship rather than the reality. Letting go of a relationship that isn't working is really positive and the end period is always the lowest as you face reality but you will be fine.

Many people, including myself, are happy single. Yes, I would love the idea of a perfect relationship but is that reality?? I don't think so, many people settle or tolerate because they don't have choices.

Rejoice in the knowledge you have a choice and see this ending as a start.