Not all relationships are built the last. Some of them are temporary to teach us a lesson and help us grow. Others leave us heartbroken and alone. All in all, we’ve all encountered those moments where we realize that we’re no longer in love with our partner anymore. Those moments of breakthrough are tough, and honestly, we never forget what turned us to the other side. Recently BuzzFeed asked users to share that one moment they realized they were no longer in love with their partner and some of them will break your heart.
1.
It was a slow progression of falling out of love with my ex, but the moment I realized I wasn’t in love with him anymore was so profound. After my sister’s burial service, he left me to go home so he could play his video games. I was all by myself talking to all these people when I needed him the most because it was the worst day of my life. —hannahrosep46c525402
2.
It was during the end of freshman year. we had been dating for a year and a half, the honeymoon phase just ended. we didn’t have as much time together and getting used to high school was tough so we became irritable with each other. I noticed I was falling out of love when everything she did made me annoyed. It felt like I couldn’t stand her. I missed the honeymoon phase. I moved away that year, we didn’t talk for months. Eventually we just didn’t care anymore and broke up. —fruityduchess
3.
For me it was when my ex husband kept threatening to walk out the door and not one piece of me wanted him to stay. —waterbad82
4.
I would fall asleep next to him and just feel incredibly alone. Sharing a bed should be intimate and comforting, but it just made me depressed and isolated. —elizabetho4582daf96
5.
My relationship with my ex became toxic little by little but there’s something I remember in particular. She kept telling my about her problems and I had to listen all the time and be compassionate. That’s ok, I’m a good listener and a nice girl. Then I tried to tell her how I felt bad about the way I used to be bullied at school. I expected her to be nice and listen but she told me I was overreacting and the bullying was “no big deal”. I should have broken up with her earlier. —silencesilence
6.
My ex and I had been on and off for the better part of a decade. He has a daughter that I helped raise and was very close with. The last Christmas I spent with them, she and I woke up early and started watching tv while we waited for him to wake up to open presents. When he finally came downstairs, he started yelling at me for waking up before him. It was that moment I realized nothing I did was ever going to be “right” and I cut my losses. I still keep in touch with his daughter though. Thank god she’s old enough to have her own phone now! —samanthah484e68b4c
7.
There wasn’t a moment I fell out of love with him, but I had an internship in New York (we live in the Midwest), and when he came to visit after three months, I noticed how different our outlooks were on life. He was complaining about the hot weather and wanted to stay inside and I thought we were in the most beautiful city in the world. —lindsaya4d79e1e05
8.
My ex of 6yrs was talking about future plans, and I remember feeling my stomach drop. With that simple statement, I remember the feeling of depression hit me so quickly. I will never forget the feeling of sadness that took over me. —alyssaa4c12e2573
9.
My ex husband and I had been married for a little over and year and I just remember waking up one morning and thinking, “Oh he’s still here.” We had a really rough marriage. He was emotionally abusive and I had caught him several times having inappropriate conversations online with both men and women in which he referred to me as his roommate. Come to find out he had been doing it our entire relationship. We had been together for over 3 years and had known each other since middle school. That morning I woke up and was just done. —megandbethea
10.
My 5 year relationship was complicated to begin with. It didn’t end with cheating, but simply fizzled out as it should’ve done so from day 1. You’d think after 2 1/2 years, not a day without hours on end conversations, video calls, and so many exchanges of “I love yous”, he wouldn’t constantly threaten to leave me out the blue. He’d push the blame on me in the next couple years that followed saying I never listened and he felt he couldn’t talk to me about how he felt, yet he never mentioned any issues cuz he just wanted to never wanted to discuss his disinterests. It was a long distance relationship for basically all of it, so communication and trust were key, but I’d come to find out he never trusted me like I would him, then would finally understand why he’d go silent when I’d say, metaphorically, “Would you die for me?” which I would’ve willingly gave my life for him who I’d consider my life. When we’d argue he would only text me despite my persistence to talk face to face.
Despite all of it, I thought we could still work especially with his entertainment of marriage when we’d reconcile. Which was just what it was, entertainment for him as towards the end, when I moved in with him, he kicked me out after living together for less than a month cuz he thought I didn’t love him. That was a stupid move on my part that almost left my bond with my family entirely broken, me homeless, and which did leave me with other psychosis and a trip to a mental hospital from his emotional manipulation of me, him being my first love. After finally finding calm after my psychosis, he contacted me a month later after he kicked me out saying he just wanted us to not live together anymore, but still be in a relationship. I said sure half heartedly though I warned him it wasn’t going to be the same. As I foresaw coming, a week before Valentine’s Day, he one sidely texted me how he couldn’t be with me and he was done for real again and I simply said Ok as I was ready for it. —djcandy1000
11.
My ex-boyfriend and I met when we were working on a cruise ship. We kept a long-distance relationship for 9 months. Weeks before my next contract where we were supposed to go on a ship together he told me he had to go on a different ship. So I fought like crazy with the management to be able to go on his ship. Shortly after I arrived he called, telling me his contract had changed again and he was going on another ship. At that moment I just realized he didn’t want to put in enough effort to fight and the world was really trying to break us apart. So I gave up and got drunk with my now-fiancé. —sophiac49d3b2d4c
12.
I feel like the realization was forced on my end, because I truly was optimistic and wanted to work on whatever problems we had. I kept finding things that were clearly evidence of cheating and lying, then convinced myself there was a way we’d work past it together. It didn’t really REALLY click until our last conversation where the blame was squarely placed on me for what he had been doing, and any resolutions to it would be mine to work on alone…I had wanted to fight for it, and he was content to let me, but that’s no way to maintain any sort of relationship. I asked him to leave before he even finished what he had to say, and haven’t looked back. —brassbracelets
13.
I felt it to be more of an obligation to go out with him, I didn’t enjoy it anymore, I didn’t even want to touch him anymore. I started “fixing myself up” for someone else who gave me butterflies. In the end, it wasn’t his fault. We just ended up growing in different directions, I realized I didn’t want the same things anymore. My values changed, my interests, my maturity grew. He didn’t. —kimdear
14.
When he left for boot camp, later than most military men do as he’s in his mid-twenties, and I slowly found myself not wanting to make time to write letters and I wasn’t getting excited that his graduation was coming up. We just aren’t in the same place in life. —babiduck13
15.
I was 5 months pregnant when I went with my mom to my ultrasound appointment to find out the babies sex (because he didn’t want to go) and when asked about the babies father I told the tecnition I was a single mom and ment it. He left us when MY beautiful baby was just 3 months old. —trishofalltrades80
16.
I knew I fell out of love when he couldn’t even put in any effort to text me, and I didn’t care. We had been growing apart for a few weeks but when I realized that someone I had just became friends with put more effort into talking to me than he did, I knew it was over. —Allegrolegacy
17.
After my friend died of suicide, my ex told me he did it for attention. Then I realized how shitty of a person he was. —reaganskinner18
18.
When I got butterflies with a guy I had started hanging out with and realized I hadn’t felt that with my s.o. in a very very long time. I knew it was over. —OyWithThePoodlesAlready
19.
I’m a huge dog person (see username) and love and treat my dogs as if they were my children. When one of my babies passed completely out of the blue it sent me into a huge depression that I’m still recovering from almost 2 years later. In the days following, I could barely function. Couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t talk to people, barely got out of bed. The first time I left the house I threw up and had to come right back home. Then I went to see my boyfriend and he kept kissing me seductively, kinda trying foreplay. Honestly, it disgusted me. That was the last thing I wanted. It took so much for me to even talk to him and I don’t even think he realized how much I was screwed up. That moment I thought, either this guy is completely unaware of my feelings and who I am or he’s a selfish dick who had no empathy. Either way, that was the only time I could tell the exact moment I fell out of love in my life. —doggolove
20.
I went away on a trip to Europe with some friends for almost 2 weeks and didn’t feel the immediate need to see him once I came back. I realized then that we weren’t going to last much longer if I didn’t actively want to see him. —gencats169
21.
we always made such a big deal about birthday/valentines/anniversary/christmas presents. we’d never do teddies or anything generic – always something heartfelt and unique to the person. his birthday was coming up and i didn’t forget, i just didn’t care. however i still made him a scrapbook of all the years we’d been together. on his birthday he told me he’d rather be with his friends than see me. i never gave him the scrapbook. —TrudyBarry
22.
When I pretended to be asleep when he came home from work every night. Things were gradually falling apart already, but I knew then when I started doing that that it was over. —pandabear14
23.
When i realized I truly wasn’t in love with him. He had cheated on me several times with different women but for some reason I believed him when he lied. I finally knew what true love was when I reconnected with the guy I knew since high school and fell in love. One kiss is all it took. —Straberriepinapple
24.
When he hugged me, I literally felt absolutely nothing. Like I was hugging a stranger. —queen_slayer