r/AmItheEx

It's been almost 49 weeks since we stopped talking. There hasn't been a single conversation between us during that time—no texts, no calls, nothing. I had accepted that we'd probably never speak again and slowly learned to live with it.

Then, out of nowhere, she tagged me in the post.

The post is basically an apology. It says she's sorry for the things she said that she never should have, for the mistakes she made unknowingly, and for the pain she caused me. She says she isn't asking for everything to go back to the way it was. She just hopes that when I think of her, I don't feel hatred anymore—maybe just a small smile—and asks if I can forgive her one last time so both of us can move on with lighter hearts.

Honestly, I never expected something like this after almost a year of complete silence.

I'm not angry anymore, but seeing that notification brought back a lot of emotions I thought I had already dealt with. Part of me appreciates that she apologized because I never thought I'd get one. Another part of me keeps wondering... why now? Is this just guilt? Is she looking for closure? Did something happen in her life that made her think about the past? Or is this her way of trying to reopen communication without directly messaging me?

I don't want to assume anything, and I know none of you can read her mind either. I'm just trying to understand how others would interpret something like this.

If you were in my position, would you reply? Would you simply accept the apology and move on? Or would you leave it alone and keep the chapter closed?

Hi, before you judge me, I need you to understand why I feel this way at all.

My partner has a bit of a self-destructive streak, and has talked about purposefully abandoning relationships slowly in the past. He said he wants to fix that, and I believe he’s been doing the best he can, and we promised to never give up on each other. Back in March, a great-aunt of theirs got sick, who basically acted like their mother for the majority of their life and was the reason they felt comfortable coming out, and unfortunately passed away.

He stopped responding to my messages abruptly for days on end, or would begin to avoid speaking to me for longer than 5 mins at a time a day. I finally pressed for an answer and he told me his situation. Immediately I felt awful and wanted to be there for him as much as I could, but he said he’s the type to “need space from everything” when he’s mourning. I, as someone with an anxious attachment style, did immediately get a small ping in my chest at the thought of not being able to be there or help them work through his emotions, but he’s a grown adult and this is an aspect of his personality that has come up in smaller moments before so I know there’s no way to change it. I try my best to support him regardless, giving him his space while sending gentle reminders every week that I hope they know so many people are proud of them and are here for them in every step of the process.

Cut to this month, and I’ve noticed they’ve been hanging out with some friends, many of which I’ve been introduced to quite a few times and have posted about being out and about with him multiple times, and we actually got to have a few longer conversations for a change. However, when I tried to reapproach us having a good conversation about everything or doing anything together, I get hit with “I’m on a mental health break and this is good for me” and “talking to (you) just hurts a lot more right now”. This has begun to develop a bit of an ache internally, and I thought, briefly, that maybe I also needed to have my needs met at some point. I messaged them how I’ve been feeling lately about this, and they said they wanted to “take care of (me) in the same way (I) have taken care of (them)”. When I said all I want is more time together, they stopped responded and went back to very terse “hi”, “i’m okay”, “just at work” type responses, and only if I force the conversation at all. At this point, our anniversary is coming up and I’m so certain he’s about to not say anything about it, as he already forgot to say anything on my birthday until the last second despite me asking multiple times to plan to see each other again for it. I wanna give him the benefit of the doubt in all this, but I’m beginning to fear that this is grown from a weight on his chest to an excuse to begin his self-sabotaging behaviors again and not get much pushback about it from me or our friends. I feel awful thinking this way, but I genuinely don’t know what else to do for them at this point?

EDIT FOR UPDATE:

I finally bit the bullet and told them that I think it’s for the best we don’t see each other anymore. Strangely, they started crying and talking about how happy I’ve made them and start putting themselves down. Like nose so runny they’re using their sleeves crying. And I felt nothing, not even an urge to comfort them. It just felt really sad. I think this made me open my eyes and see how pathetic all of this was. I wasted my time, and he wasted his breath trying to fix anything anymore. I think neither of us were really ready for a relationship, and I could be angry or bitter about that but I think I’m just happy I’m free of the burden of another person. Like my day isn’t controlled by whether today is gonna be a good day or not for him. I see a lot of people mention that I might need to go to therapy, and I agree. I think I realized I blend into my partners so much that it feels almost bad when they’re not present, so I’ll be working on that. Thanks reddit for finally freeing me, I honestly don’t know how far it’d go if I didn’t ask.

Looking for some advice… although I think deep in my gut I know what I need to do/the right thing to do.
Please don’t judge me, we all live different lives and have had different experiences..
I am fresh out of a marriage that was badly abusive. Physical emotional mental, you name it.. it took me many years to leave and now that I summoned the strength (he is a full blown narcissist) me and the kids are living with a family member since he kicked us out (both our names are on the house but hey ho).
A few months ago I started talking to this amazing amazing man, and it transpired we are both heavily attracted to one another, and got on like a house on fire.
One thing led to another, and I’d say we are in love. The feeling is totally mutual, however…..
One small detail I forgot to mention….
He was in a relationship and with a baby on the way. Living together. They split up obviously before we did anything (I’m not a total ass) and now the baby is here.
I’m feeling lost, heartbroken, left out, the guy I’m in love with/seeing is head over heels in love with this new baby. And while I love that for him & he is absolutely doing the right thing by being a supportive dad, my heart is breaking. I have tried to communicate this, although there’s nothing he can do?
Guys WHAT do I do. Please help me. I have never in my life had a connection like this, I feel like an idiot…. He is still living with his ex, should I just move on and cut my losses? Easier to say when your heart isn’t involved. Worth mentioning I have kids too but they’re much older & I co parent effectively with my ex, we don’t live together, it’s very cut and dry compared to this situation.
I know there are many red flags & I played a part in this. Please help. I haven’t stopped crying since this lovely baby was born. I can’t even stand to hear his ex’s name. I’m very open minded but this might just finish me off…

So, a few days ago, my girlfriend thought it would be absolutely hilarious to make me think that I had eaten a spider. I couldn't eat for the rest of that day.

I decided to get her back by pranking her back.

So lately, I've been searching the internet and I've come across some lists about the worst things to do and say when in a relationship. So from that, I constructed what I thought was the top 5 worst things ever to say to your girlfriend.

Three days ago, I went through that list throughout the day by saying those five things. By the end, she was extremely irritable and left my place fuming. I told her it was a prank after the final one and that I was just getting her back but she didn't care and left.

I've tried calling and messaging her but she hasn't answered.

Did I got too far?

My girlfriend and I have been together for around two years and living together for about a year. We have one cat.
When we got together, the cat wasn’t an issue. My girlfriend’s mum also has cats, and she’s always been around them without any obvious problems.

Over the last year, though, she’s become increasingly distressed about living with my cat. It has gradually escalated to the point where the cat now lives almost exclusively in a separate sunroom, but even that doesn’t seem to be enough. My girlfriend says she needs a space where she feels peaceful and regulated, and she feels our home has made her mentally unwell. Another thing I struggle with is that she has told me she feels resentment towards the cat and sometimes even towards me because she feels the cat’s needs come before hers. She says seeing the cat can immediately change her mood and make her feel stressed, frustrated, or trapped in the situation. She has described feeling like she can’t fully relax in the house while the cat is there, even though the cat spends most of the time in a separate sunroom. When I’ve suggested she take breaks at her mum’s house or spend time elsewhere when she needs space, she says that disrupts her routine and instead asks why the cat can’t be moved. This is one of the biggest sticking points between us because I feel responsible for my cat’s welfare, whereas she sees my refusal to move the cat as evidence that I’m choosing the cat over her.

The problem is that I feel like I’ve made every practical compromise I can. The cat is my responsibility and has lived here the whole time. I don’t feel it’s fair or realistic to keep moving the cat around or removing her from the home whenever my girlfriend needs space.

My girlfriend says that by refusing to do that, I’m “choosing the cat” over her. From my perspective, I’m not choosing the cat over her. I’m choosing not to abandon or repeatedly displace a pet that depends on me.

She’s now talking about moving out and potentially ending the relationship because she doesn’t feel she can cope with the situation anymore.

I genuinely love her and want the relationship to work, but I’m struggling to understand where the line is between supporting a partner’s mental health and being expected to reorganise your entire life around it. It feels controlling to me.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? If you were the partner struggling, what would you have wanted? If you were in my position, would you feel that refusing to move the cat out means you’re choosing the cat over your partner?

My girlfriend and I have been together a month. We have done stuff like go out to restaurants, events, so on. Recently she was talking about her new friends at a bar she frequents while I am out working (I work the night shift). She was saying how she got along with them and was explaining how she met a person like her with some of her issues and I didnt think to much about it.

A couple days later I receive a message about her being at the bar with her "new friends" and I joke about being jealous of her new friends. She got upset at me saying I cant be mad about her new friends. Recently I went over after work and she went to tell me she wanted to be "friends" not girlfriend/boyfriend and I was upset and asked what I did wrong. She said it was nothing and I was wonderful, she just fell out of love with me. I asked some questions and then I asked if it was because of a dude or something and then she brought up that she had "a crush" on the dude from the bar and claimed "it only lasted a minute or two". I dont want to assume she is flirting with this guy but I am worried because I feel like we were just leaving the honeymoon phase and she got bored of me.

Am I the asshole for feeling upset about this?

EDIT: For more context. We didnt break up, she brought up the idea of us being friends with benefits but backed off near the end of our talk because she didnt "want to lose me and be alone".

EDIT AGAIN: So I went and told her how I felt and we broke up. Her in a relationship wasnt the person I knew through friendship and it was an entirely different story. Sadly our family's are close and we have known each other for a while but I didnt want to continue something that felt doomed. Thank you for all your assistance. Apologies for the lack of information regarding this, I know she watches YouTubers and occasionally visits this subreddit so I wanted to be slightly vague on the offchance she read this soon after I posted this.

​Hi everyone! I had my final exams last week, which stressed me out a lot. As a surprise gift, my sister secretly organized a trip, which I only found out about 1 day before departure. My girlfriend and I have been together for 2 years (we were planning to move in together), and I had told her earlier that I didn't want to travel anywhere this year.

​When the trip was revealed, my sister texted her about it before I even found out.

​We went on the trip, but my girlfriend didn't write to me for 4 days, and then on Thursday she told me she wants to break up. She feels like I lied to her and is disappointed in me. She blocked me everywhere. She only didn't block me on Gmail, so I wrote to her there, and she replied with things like I can never fix this and that I should never contact her again. I feel guilty for not being able to handle the situation properly.

​Do you think I have a chance to fix this?

[removed]

31M in a relationship for 3 months.

I last spoke to my girlfriend on Friday night, and she just got back to me on Monday morning.

It's not uncommon that we go a day or two without texting, but that's different than someone not responding.

I tried contacting her multiple times and got no answer.

I started getting pretty worried as she has supraventricular tachycardia and had a bad episode last weekend.

So I contacted her best friend this morning, and now I feel stupid.

Turns out she misplaced her phone at her workplace (which is on the other side of town) and had to go get it today.

It's a plausible explanation, but I feel like she could have let me know via messenger or something — she has a tablet.

Am I stupid for worrying?

TL;DR: Girlfriend din't contact me for almost 3 days because she lost her phone.

i’ve been fighting with my situationship who has BPD, and we finally ended things- no coming back this time. i told them i didn’t want to be romantic anymore and they started ranting about all this other stuff. i also pointed out that i feel sexually pressured by them and they dismissed me, saying it was bs. later, they said that we both need to figure out boundaries that we both agree on.

BOUNDARIES ARE NOT AN AGREEMENT. IT IS A BASIC THING THAT MUST BE FOLLOWED.
of course, i can’t tell them that, because they will find a way to make me the bad guy.

this sucks. we’re going no contact now and it feels weird. it’s like i miss them when i shouldn’t, because they’ve done me dirty so many times but ive grown to love the way they carry out their act. i hate when you get to know someone so well and you both just end up as strangers. it’s gonna take me a while to get over this.

I found out my girlfriend was married before we met and is hiding the fact that she is still legally married.

How do I confront her about hiding this major part of her life,we live together, and what should my next steps be? I know for a fact she isn't divorced because the marriage happened just one year ago. Legally, here, a couple must be separated for two full years before a divorce is granted. I found photo of theis in her pen cup as well why she putting this if shes moved on already

Sorry guys long message/rant...

I (26M) grew up in a strict conservative religious household which mellowed out as I grew into adulthood. We were raised to respect elders, be polite and well mannered, and dress appropriately for the occasion. Things like women wearing very short shorts (including bikinis) were not acceptable but knee length skirts were okay in public. At home they could wear shorter shorts since we were home. Hope this just gives some context of where I come from.

My wife has no family due to a childhood tragedy and is close with a group of friends and new neighbors. She's very kind and outgoing which I did love about her. Some problems are:

- About 1 in 3 new people she meets (often men) end up becoming creeps or developing romantic feelings. She struggles to set boundaries or cut contact. She is stuck in this weird limbo of wanting to cut contact but also liking the attention if the person is not an old man. She is also afraid how they will react when she does cut contact. I offered every solution under the sun only to get shot down by her. It can take 6 to 12 months for her to cut contact from these creeps which drives me insane.

- She regularly takes long multi hour walks with her pets late at night or after midnight with single male neighbors (the non creepy ones) she calls friends. She says she can make friends of any gender as she likes and not to control her. Even when all these single male friends talk about is their sexual histories.

- She often "playfully" punches her male friends she has known since high school in the groin or smacks their ass which I find very inappropriate.

I could go on and it gets much worse but I gave the most tame ones. I have already forgiven her for those worse moments in the past. I know she loves me.

When I express concern about her safety or staying out late, she accuses me of being controlling and says she does what she wants. She brushes off any worry from me. She has a self proclaimed "savior complex," seeks validation from others, but uses me mainly as an emotional dumping ground.

I feel like we have major differences in values around boundaries, safety, physical appropriateness with the opposite sex, and partnership. She listens to my concerns and says no, not to control her life, and that she can do what she likes.

How do couples navigate differences like not wanting a spouse out after midnight or on long walks with single men in the evening? For example, requests like please don't go on a walk with x after x time, or please don't hang out with x at all because I don't feel comfortable. She responds that I need to learn to deal with it, women can be friends with men, and this is a me problem. I'm not against her making male friends but she continues with ones who have shown interest beyond friendship. She says she will only stop when they cross a boundary she sets. These are new neighbors we met months ago, not lifelong friends. How do I navigate feeling like my concerns after 5 years together are not prioritized?

Are we just incompatible or am I being unreasonable/controlling? I've been extremely patient with her and always de-escalating conflict. I also always take blame since at times I'm the reason for it. I always apologise first and try to be better.

I am already 1 year into this marriage. She lived 5 hours away at first and we only visited each other every 3 to 6 months when we were dating. We only moved in together in the past year and a half. It's then where she put her guard down. The thing is I do really love her but the differences in boundaries make it hard and it feels like my feelings don't matter as much in decisions.

I'm just confused how modern relationships navigate these differences. Should couples just accept big differences in boundaries and validation seeking?

I'm usually very careful and prepare very carefully for everything I do but I feel like I rushed into this. she isn't a bad person I know that. How do I navigate wanting a partner with stronger boundaries around entertaining people who like her, limiting certain physical contact with friends, and not constantly seeking validation from strangers?

**TL;DR:** 26M conservative husband, 1 year into marriage. Wife (no family, childhood trauma) is free-spirited with poor boundaries and a savior complex. She takes late-night walks with single male neighbors, does "playful" groin punches and ass smacks with high school male friends, attracts creeps and takes 6-12 months to cut contact while liking the attention if its a younger guy, and dismisses my safety/feelings as controlling. We lived apart during dating and she changed after we moved in. Feeling deep incompatibility on respect, boundaries, and partnership. I love her but worry I rushed and need advice on how to navigate this.

[supprimé]

What is the PETTIEST thing you left your partner over??

Dated this man 38M 24F for a little more than one year, I have very high standards and we both come from very well off backgrounds.

He knew that the man before him gifted me an apartment even before he started dating me but he kept going on, throughout the relationship he gave me two gifts totaling 4500 dollars. After we parted I told him I always thought he was cheap and never felt cherished by him, that being with him made me let go of myself.

Am I being transactional? Because I expected him to spoil me for my time or was he cheap?

First off I want to say that I (30M) love my wife (28F) and would never do anything to embarrass her on purpose. We were hanging out at our place with a group of friends a couple of weeks ago. For context, the friends happen to all be men and they had all been friends with me before I met my wife, so she hasn’t known them as long as I have. But everyone gets along anyways so it’s no big deal.

We were hanging out and that night and for some reason my wife kept getting up to go use the bathroom, on top of that she’d often leave quickly and it was obvious to everyone where she was going. It got to a point where my friends started to notice something was clearly off with her. One of my friends joked “Might want to go check in on her, what are you feeding that poor girl?” (It is known that I am the chef between us). Wanting to keep the mood light, and not steer us towards a conversation regarding what my wife was doing in the bathroom, I joke “IBS is a b*tch, but I love her anyways.” (For those who don’t know, IBS stands for “Irritable Bowel Syndrome”.) Now, my wife doesn’t have IBS. So I thought that it was clear to everyone in the room that I was just making a joke. I took their laughter as confirmation that nobody took what I said seriously.

A couple of weeks later, apparently one of our friends made an offhand comment to her about the IBS and how I had brought it up. My poor wife (bless her heart), didn’t know what IBS stood for, so I guess out of fear of looking dumb she just kind of went along with it and tried to talk about other things. She looked it up later to her horror. She was furious with me as apparently now the entire friend group believes she has IBS, and I was the only one who could see how obvious of a joke it was. I tried to explain to her what happened, how I could’ve never guessed they would take me seriously, and I didn’t mean to embarrass her. Apparently the reason she was rushing off to the bathroom that night had to do with her period, and I won’t be providing more details on that.

I thought “so what”, even if they didn’t catch on to the joke is still pretty harmless. She insisted that she’s humiliated and asked me how I’d feel if she lied to everyone and said I had an STD. I told her that’s not the same thing at all. She begged me to go clear the air with my friends and explain that it was in fact a joke. So I kindly pointed out that if she truly wants to convince people she doesn’t have IBS, her husband out of the blue weeks later going out of his way to clarify “oh by the way my wife told me to tell you guys that I was lying about the IBS thing”, would in fact, just make her look even more like she has IBS and trying to hide it.

She’s pretty angry with me but I think we’ll move on from this. The only thing crappier than an IBS joke is a divorce over one.

AITAH?

(TLDR: I accidentally spread a rumor to our friends that my wife has irritable bowl syndrome. She does not).

My girlfriend and I are both 29 and we've been together for around 2.5 years. She has wonderful qualities about her, such as being funny, affectionate, smart and kind. I will say she also has other sides to her that Iove but can be a lot.. she's very opinionated and can be nitpicky about specific things, especially when it comes to whether things "feel clean", which is relevant here

Today we were coming back home from travels and we ate at an airport restaurant. It's one of those tight spaces where tables are close together and you share a bench with an entire row. We were placed next to an elderly couple, and as they got up to leave, the elderly woman farted very loudly inches away from my gf. I do admit the smell was awful, but it's something that will pass.

My girlfriend made a stink of it, thankfully after the couple was out of earshot. She kept saying how disgusted she was, how she lost her appetite and the valley girl accent came out where it sounded particularly more judgey and entitled than she usually is (i promise she's a kind person generally). The first couple of times, I joked with her amd agreed it was gross. But the 3rd and 4th time, it sounded malicious almost and I actually got triggered because we both have parents getting to that age.

I told her that it straight up isn't cool to make fun of old people and not to do that in front of me.

She immediately got defensive and looked at me like I lost my mind. She said she's allowed to express when something is gross and uncomfortable, especially since she did no harm in her mind since the couple couldn't hear her. I explained to her that this was starting to sound like bullying a more vulnerable group of people who can't control their bodily functions.

She got even more angry with me and said i was "infantalizing" the elderly (yes she actually used that word), and that if they are capable of traveling and walking aroudn then i shouldn't treat them like they're helpless. I used the comparison of someone speaking badly about her mom as an example, and she said it was a poor argument since her mom farted a lot at the dinner table growing up and her/her father would always call her out for it.

Anyways, she was angry the rest of the meal. I tried apologizing for jumping the gun, but she's convinced that i misunderstood her intentions and said i was morally policing her. She's usually a very reasonable person and we don't fight much, so I was surprised she was so adamant that she isn't wrong here. I told her that it's our job as romantic partners to hold each other accountable when we're speaking in ways that aren't cool, and she doesn't think she spoke badly.

I do admit looking back that my tone might have been sharp since I was pretty triggered and angry, but I don't think the bulk of my message was wrong. We're both compassionate people who volunteer, help our friends in need and always do the right thing. She's still upset with me though and asked for space. AITAH?

EDIT: I do want to clear things up about how my girlfriend was ranting about the old lady. She never said anything mean or malicious about the lady, but she kept saying, "I'm so grossed out", "this is disgusting", "it smells so bad", "we barely ate anything today and now this?" I'm not defending her tone, but I want to make the lines clear of what was said since I think people assumed she was shit talking old people directly. Regardless, I know how this can still feel targeted towards the elderly.

And as I said, the couple already left when my girlfriend started ranting to me about it.

I am visiting my girlfriend in the town where she recently moved to play rugby. On my first day, she had a game and we all went out (with her teammates and friends) to a bar afterwards. She explained to me before that some of her teammates are into her and have flirted with her and said things like “if you are ever looking for a third” and “please make a public service announcement when you break up” . She is very loyal and I trust her. But I am annoyed at her teammates. They even went to the lengths of squeezing her shoulders as they walked by when I was sitting right there (might be a friendly move though so I’ll let it slide)

I know that my girlfriend is trying to fit in with her teammates and she loves them all. But I am kind of annoyed that she won’t take an extra step to put her teammates in their place.

We learned this morning that the same flirty teammate started a rumor that me and my girlfriend don’t like each other very much after seeing us at the bar and said that we seemed very distant. I just like to respect my girlfriend’s space when she is with her friends. I let her talk to people. I don’t tag along in every conversation and we are not a big PDA couple anyways. But hearing that the teammate said that about us really upset me.

TLDR: said teammate invited us to watch a baseball game with her and some others to which i said No I don’t want to hang out with girl-which annoyed my girlfriend. She said that she wants to hang out with her friends and I understand that. I really don’t want to mess with her flow-especially if I’m coming to visit her in her own space. I however am just generally uncomfortable with the situation.

My girlfriend keeps saying that all these girls flirting with her are really hot but that she loves me a lot-especially for my personality-which honestly hurts like damn. I don’t want her calling other girls attractive to my face. And I don’t want to hang out with everyone that’s in love with her and praying on our downfall.