Sometimes love is blinding. We put up with people who are often not quite as good as our feelings would want them to be. It can take a lot of time, but everyone has a breaking point. So someone asked women in a one-sided relationship “What was your lightbulb moment it was time to end the relationship?” 

From overcoming guilt to truly weaponized incompetence, netizens shared their personal breaking points when it comes to downright useless partners. So get comfortable as you read through, upvote your favorites, and share your own experiences in the comments section below. 

#1

When his dad asked me why I was staying with such an AH when I wasn’t even related to him. “You don’t owe him anything. Neither do we but he’s our son.” It made me realize I’d been waiting for permission to leave the whole time…

Image credits: companion86

#2

It occurred to me one day that there would be no relationship if I stopped trying. I was doing 100% and he was doing 0%. So one day, I just stopped everything. We didn’t have a final conversation or anything at all. I just stopped talking to him and we never talked again. It was a 4 year relationship.

Image credits: pbd1996

#3

It was when I was 2 weeks postpartum with our second child and bedridden, and he left to take a 10 day retreat/vacation in California. He called and said what a relief it was to feel free of me and babies on the beach. It was the first time I thought, "This is wrong, I am being used."

In retrospect, the financial abuse where he drained my wealth should have done it, but it was the more physically vulnerable postpartum time that got the message through.

Image credits: pedestrienne

#4

When our sex life fell apart. We were having sex once every 4-6 months. I was practically begging for it, but every time we tried I realized I didn’t even want him anyway because I was too busy being the manager of the household and basically his mother. I was 29 years old but every time I looked in the mirror I felt like a washed up old woman. That was the last straw.

Image credits: NTSTwitch

#5

My husband was gone for a few days and the kids and i didn't even notice lol

Image credits: Cultural-Chart3023

#6

He had been gaslighting me for our entire relationship, to the point that I started recording our conversations. He said something, and I disagreed and told him he'd said something else previously. He was adamant that I was lying and started to get angry. When I didn't back down, he told me I needed to go to the doctor to get on medication for my 'paranoia,' even though I had proof that I was right.

Image credits: scorpiorising29

#7

He complained about having to go grocery shopping. I had made the menu for the week, planned, budget it and pretty much paid for all of it. It made me so mad I told him to suck it up. He didn’t understand why I couldn’t do it. At the time I was working pretty much two full time jobs and going to school. He was working 30 hrs and used the rest to play video games. I have him a rundown of all I did at home and how much more I paid for everything. He half apologized. That was a big wake up call. Then that weekend he canceled the first date we were going to have in months last minute. He woke up late because he was tired but his friends called and he was up and ready to go in five minutes. By the time he got back home none of his stuff was in the bedroom. And finally I went out with a friend for coffee and I realized that I was laughing. And it hit me that I hadn’t heard myself laugh in a really long time. I almost started crying when I realized how sad my life was and how miserable I felt. When I got back home I told him I was moving out. He asked me where we were moving too. It took him a second to realize that I meant that I was moving out by myself. He suggested therapy, open relationships, he started actually cooking and cleaning but it was too late. A month later I was out of there. He ended up living in his car, crashing it ended up homeless for a bit. Moved in with someone else he got involved with while still trying to get back together with me. His friends reached out to tell me I was over reacting. I wasted over five years with him. Leaving him was the best thing i ever did. My current partner is amazing always has time for me and he will help me out at home even without me asking.

Image credits: noonecaresat805

#8

He likes to say he is the man and I need to do as he says. He said this to me when I was practically begging him to help me around the house. He's the man of the house even when I pay for 100% daycare, 100% utilities, 100% groceries and half our rent and took care of our kids, the pets, cleaning and cooking. Sadly, it wasn't that or the abuse or the cheating that woke me up. It was my kid telling me we can make it without him. We never looked back after that.

Image credits: Auspicious_Phoenix

#9

When he screamed at me for leaving a light on while he was sleeping, two days after I had brain surgery and was still on some very strong painkillers. The best decision I ever made was leaving him.

Image credits: EnvironmentalAd3673

#10

when he was nearly 30 and pretended he didn't know what a baking sheet/cookie sheet was because I asked him to make dinner one night - it was a frozen lasagna, the instructions were to put it on a cookie sheet and shove it in the oven.

Image credits: KittyLord0824

#11

I kept going to take a shower and realizing I already had. The only time I had a minute to myself was in the shower. It was like working two full time jobs. Worked all day in the office to drive home to do house work/child care until bed. I would wake up hating life. Now I'm single and so much happier.

Image credits: scubagirl44

#12

Oh hell, mine was the moment back in 2010 when he called his mom on the phone and ask if he could go live with her. He didn't mention if WE (myself and our 5 year old son) could also live with her. I had to ask him very out loud (so she could hear me) "What about us??!" Then he changed it to, "Oh yeah and them too". I knew then love was no longer a thing between us and I'd fallen out of love at that very moment.

Image credits: SugarBabyWannabe

#13

When she was so terrible with our finances that I had to get a 2nd job, we had to get roommates, and the whole time she came up with excuse after excuse as to why she couldn't get another job and why she couldn't cut back on her spending. And then she turned around and bought her mom a Disney trip on MY credit card without even asking me first or giving me a heads up. I found out when I went pay the bill and it was a couple thousand dollars higher than I expected.

I stayed with her for so long because i'd grown up with people saying relationships are hard work. So I thought it was the right thing to do to stay with her and work through our issues together. But at that point I realized I didn't care if it made me a bad person or an a*****e. i had no desire to continue to be someone's piggy bank.

6 months after leaving her, I scraped enough together for a down payment on a house. 6 months! I kick myself imagining how much more money I'd have had I left her sooner. That's how much she was bleeding from me.

Image credits: Fantastic_Relief

#14

I told my husband that he needed to lay off our daughter for getting a B on a unit in chemistry. She was asking to quit all her extra-curriculars (that she loved) and didn’t to get out of bed. I said we needed to be worried about her mental state.

He said “Well, if the kids aren’t going to respect what I say, then maybe I should leave.”

It literally flipped the switch on my feelings for him, after 20 years together. Instantly. Our child was struggling and he was so self-absorbed that he could only think about himself.

Done.

Image credits: 143019

#15

My fiancée barely reacted when I told him I got a big promotion, which involved a 25% pay rise, a car allowance, and managerial responsibilities. He never listened when I talked to him about my job, but this especially stung. We'd been together for seven years and had our wedding planned, deposits paid, and invites sent out. I'm so relieved I realized I didn't want to spend my life with him when I did.

Image credits: SouthHopper

#16

I let myself into the house after work after travelling 45 mins one way. It was after 6pm. The house was in darkness. Husband worked from home. He was lying on the couch watching YouTube. He did not get up off the couch to greet me. He was not unwell. No food was ready for dinner. This was the standard situation but this one got to me.

Also, my daughter and I were rear ended in the car. We drove it home not far away and went into the house and told him. “How’s the car” he said. Later on I said how it had upset me that he didn’t ask how WE were. Cue shock. “ I could see you were fine!”. I cooked dinner that night with an ice pack on my shoulders.

Image credits: jenneke-gotenberg

#17

When I had suffered through 1.5 years of post-partum depression without realizing it, and I was sitting on the couch with our child sleeping in my arms, and I was sobbing to my then-husband, saying "Something is wrong with me. I need help. I can't do this alone."

He didn't even look up from his phone. He just kept scrolling and flatly said, "I already raised my kids. This one is yours."

Stayed with him 8.5 more years for a total of 12.

Finally out now, tho!

Image credits: WhoGotSnacks

#18

One night, he went to his friend's apartment and got wasted. He called me at 4 a.m. to come pick him up 30 minutes away. I did as he asked, and just as I am a minute from his friend's place, my cell rings. It's him, drunkenly stating, 'I'm home, thanks for nothing.' He had driven himself anyway because he didn't want to wait for me to pick him up and apparently thought I wasn't actually coming. I snapped my pink Motorola Razr shut and drove back to our place, gathered my s**t, told him I was done, and called my mom. I had put up with three years of cheating, assaults sexually, physically, and verbally, and I was done. My mother's first words to me were, 'Thank God. Come home.'

Image credits: Hillraiser

#19

I was doing everything but paying the rent and bills - and I offered to pay a fair portion, but he insisted that he ought to do it. I was keeping house, running errands, making minor repairs, planning dates - you name it, it was me.

I was encouraging him to pursue his dream job as a writer, so he would spend his time after work in the office I cleaned up for him and I would bring him his dinner. I found out that he hadn’t been writing at all - he had been playing StarCraft for weeks, maybe months while I waited on him so he could write. THEN I found out that his parents were paying for everything for us. Rent and bills. His paycheck went mostly to buying b******t he didn’t need. I’ve told this story before but his parents weren’t wealthy and his dad worked a very taxing blue-collar job.

Image credits: ContentfulTaint

#20

When I started to look forward to his business trips, because everything was so much easier and more pleasant when he was gone. I was only cleaning up after myself and an infant! (Which, that sucks in and of itself, but...) There was no second adult making messes and waking me up in the middle of the night to pester me for sex.

I got the idea, *this could be every day.*

I made it happen. And then the baby was the only one waking me up, because that's what babies do.

Image credits: insertcaffeine

#21

For me, it was when my then-husband blamed me for the weather. Everything that was not perfect was always my fault. He'd been unreasonable like this for so long, but him angrily pointing his finger at me because it was raining was the last straw. I made the decision to gently push him out of my life. The most infuriating thing is that, now, he tells everybody how perfect I was and that I never made a mistake.

Image credits: sitruspuserrin

#22

My breaking point was when he cheated on me — for the third time that week — with a person online who wasn't even real. I know this because anyone could see that it was a fake account, and this was later confirmed to be true. I was dumb enough to give him a chance after the first time, but I was done. He then tried to convince me that my new boyfriend was cheating on me, in an effort to win me back. You mean... like you did? What a clown.

Image credits: FedahpWithThisWurld

#23

I got a tattoo of a small flower on the inside of my knee, symbolizing my commitment to being a good mother to my son. Quite a few years after, I graduated from college summa cum laude and wanted another tattoo. I decided I wanted a butterfly on my left breast, right above my heart. He threw a fit and told me he wasn't going to be married to a tattooed woman. It was all about control and what other people would think. That was it. I got that tattoo, and a lot more since we divorced. I have a full back-piece that comes over the tops of my arms, the outsides of both thighs, one calf, one ankle, and one foot. My current husband loves me, tattoos and all.

Image credits: bornonGisland

#24

One day, he crossed a line I did not know I had: He called me a stupid b***h. He had cheated, manipulated, gaslit me, and called me crazy so many times in the couple years we were together, and I stupidly put up with him, but for whatever reason, this was my last straw. I no longer felt weak — I felt angry. I threw all his stuff into the dumpster at my apartment and never spoke to him again. It was so out of character for me, but I felt so powerful.

#25

The last straw for me was finding out that his mother was at our place, looking through my drawers and belongings while I was at work. She found my medication and called MY MOTHER to tell her I was a liar for not telling anyone about my health issue (my ex did know; we just didn't tell her because it was none of her business). I was extremely angry and told my ex what had happened, expecting him to be shocked, too. Turns out he wasn't. He let his mother snoop in the first place, knew that she called my mom, and didn't bother to tell me. At that point, there was already a long history of MIL terror, and he just wouldn't stand his ground or protect me. I left in the evening of that day.

Image credits: whattodo9000

#26

After five years of severe abuse, someone I had just met saw me take a phone call with my then-boyfriend. He came up to me a few days later at our mutual friend’s house and said, 'I saw your face when you answered the phone. You looked upset and scared. It’s not right for a boyfriend to make you look the way I saw you look. He wasn’t doing it in a creepy way. He wasn’t trying to get into my pants. He was just a nice guy, making an observation and checking to see if I was okay. Plenty of people in my life had told me to get rid of that a***hole, but something about an acquaintance that I had just met making that observation really snapped me out of the fog I had been in. We became friends, and he helped me get away. I am convinced that that relationship would have k***ed me, and 15 years later, I am still so grateful to him for essentially saving my life.

#27

When he told me I should tell him what he should do that would make me happy? I mean if YOU on your OWN cannot think of single thing that would be able make me feel prioritised in your life and want ME to tell you even THAT. Then sorry bye!

Image credits: Liverryday

#28

Oh, there were a ton. But something that was just the beginning of the end--- He abandoned me when I almost died during my c-section. When he came back he only had a half a**ed apology. And he didn't even bother to buy me flowers Twas a lonely time in my life. And the beginning of a darker, harder, lonelier time.

Image credits: DazedAndGandolf

#29

Simple: He didn’t want to go to a museum with me. It was the straw that broke the camel's back, after all that happened. He likes to tell people that’s why I left him...not all the other issues we had.

#30

When I had cancer and had to have surgery. My grandma was coming over and I asked him to do the dishes, not much because I did them before I went to the hospital. He complained the entire time and we got into a fight. He told me it was “his coping skill”. I ended up doing them with a drain coming from my neck.
He called out of work “to help me” but played video games all day long and I did everything for myself.
He took me to my follow up appointment and road raged on our way there, then lectured me after I got upset with him. He wouldn’t come into the appointment with me. I left that day. It’s been 2.5 weeks since I moved back in with my parents and I realize if I had stayed, nothing would have changed. Lies have since come out and he has been blocked. I am healing, mentally and physically. I just can’t believe myself for letting it get that far.

Image credits: quirkyusernamehere1

#31

The last straw was when I caught him smirking while yelling at me. That smirk ended 20 years of marriage.

#32

The last straw — that literally snapped something in my brain — was him suggesting we get separate bedrooms. I highly, highly suspected he was cheating AGAIN, but I had no solid proof. I knew him well, and I knew his 'plan' was to keep me around for 'wifey stuff' and to keep up appearances, because his family looks down on divorce. So, when the time came, I told him we were getting a divorce instead. In the end, this actually forced him to have his side chick move in. I ended up telling his family about the divorce, because he tried to hide it, hoping I'd change my mind. I didn't. He got everything he wanted, and he still wasn't happy. Since our divorce though, I've never been happier. It was a rough way to get there, but so worth it.

#33

The moment I knew happened the first time he saw me after nine weeks of being apart. Instead of being excited to see me, he snapped at me immediately. I realized I had been happier without him and left for good two days later.

#34

I was away for a couple of months, about a month in I cried on the phone with him because I missed him, and all I wanted was to know I wasn't alone in this, that he missed me too.

He got angry and said I'm asking too much of him. So he stopped talking to me, cuz I was upset he didn't miss me.

Image credits: Big-Bug6427

#35

When he sat me down after a long day (of me working 2 jobs, going to school and raising our child) to tell me about how I'm not meeting his "needs"

Image credits: chronicpzzapain

#36

When he told me that I’ve done nothing to show my love for him, even though I was the one constantly making him feel validated and fully supported financially.

Image credits: Moonlightdreamer91

#37

We were married for six years, and I was just blind, maybe not willing to give up on the marriage. It didn't go downhill right away, he just got more and more lazy during the years, leaving all the chores for me (I also had a full-time job). Luckily, we didn't have kids. Trying to talk to him did nothing. The lightbulb moment: I guess it happened when I came across a guy who was kind to me and thought of my needs (unlike my ex). It wasn't at all easy to admit to myself that the marriage was over. I broke down because I had been ignoring my feelings for so long.

#38

In college I was going through premed finals and he offered to make me dinner so I could relax. He had no car and no money so I picked up and paid for the groceries after helping him decide what to make. I get home after a 15 hour day of class work and studying and he was sitting in my apartment using my tv and didn’t start dinner until I asked him to. I ended up having to coach him through the entire dinner until I was the one actually making the dinner. My roommate pointed it out to me in passing and I woke up.

Also, this is a friendly plug to everyone in this thread to read Fed Up by Gemma Hartley. You will feel so validated.

#39

When he spent daycare money on cigarettes. Our rule was diapers first, even if it meant we ate ramen a few times a week. I scrubbed toilets to cover rent when he lost his jobs. This was after 7 years of me doing 99% anyways, but once I couldn't make up for his deficiency and it impacted my ability to care for our kids, that was the lightbulb.

Been almost 4 years. Best choice I ever made.

#40

When I came home from work he was laying on the sofa playing video games.(He was unemployed at the time.) Dishes in the sink, the bed wasn't made, the house was a mess. He didn't even lift his head to greet me.

#41

When he punched out my rear view mirror while I was driving because I asked how his job search was going.

#42

He called me a "hypocrite feminist" one too many times.

But it never actually occurred to me that the balance of the meal planning/housework was tipped in his favor until much later. While I was in a relationship with him it was more like a gut feeling that something was off.

What happened was that I left for Germany to do my PhD (questionable decision, I'm not sure I regret it or not), but he was really negative the whole time. He wanted us to stay in Romania (=home country) and was telling me to come back and give up at every chance he got until I just stopped talking to him about it completely. Then we broke up because of the distance.

And à few months after being single in a different country, I just sort of realized that my work load at home didn't change. I was equally as busy as I used to be when I lived with him. Then I started talking to some people and figured out what the b did.

When we split the house work, he chose things that seem difficult but aren't done as often. For instance, he was in charge of cleaning the floors, which happens once a week, and I was in charge of cleaning the dishes, which happens way more often. And whenever he was in charge of the food situation, he would just bring some food from his aunt (who cooked with lard... à lot of lard...). So every time I would find the food gross, I wouldn't eat it and I would do something else to eat just cuz I didn't want to starve. And, of course because I'm such a kind idiot, I would prepare some for him as well.

We literally talked about splitting the food duties in half and this guy would almost always find a way out of it.

And these situations were what I would complain about or just be too tired to do anything about it and just leave my "chores" undone. So he would get upset with me and call me a "hypocrite feminist" for pushing stuff onto him. He would say things like "if you don't want me to treat you like a woman in the past, then don't treat me like a woman either". But, of course, he would also pretend like women in the past weren't treated badly...

#43

When you realize you are better off without them a they add nothing

#44

When he didn’t show up while I was hospitalized pregnant with our baby. When he didn’t show up to the NICU. When he wouldn’t even bother to wake up on a Saturday to spend time with me. I’m in it still but I want out

#45

Our sex life practically vanished and people in my life started to open my eyes to just how bad the relationship was. I wasn’t perfect in it by any means and should’ve left a lot sooner, but Jesus Christ it was such a miserable relationship with so many unwarranted hardships and so much emotional turmoil.

#46

When he became my fourth child. I gave birth to 3 children, I didn’t need a fourth

#47

When my STBXH told me I was replaceable, and when he told me “you make less money, so you deserve to do more.”

#48

When he had an affair while I was busy taking care of everything so he could golf on the weekends to “relax after working all week” (we both worked full time) and then blamed me because I wasn’t a good partner. All while not noticing that I was deeply depressed.

#49

It just…stopped. I had no more mental energy. We were living in a somewhat ‘fundamentalist Christian’ community and I had no support as a wife or a woman. I reached out for help and no one was there. I became s******l. It was oddly enough his boss telling me that I had to be a better wife or leave today. I left that day.

#50

Lots of little things… but really cemented everything when I was trying to have a conversation (he didn’t talk much) and I really wanted to talk and have an actual conversation and he told me how I “didn’t give him much to work with” ?