Sometimes we fight for days. I get clueless and think there’s no way to “fix us”. At least not one that I could think of. Then I realize you can only rekindle a relationship if it has a healthy basis. Otherwise, all your attempts are doomed to fail.
No matter how much you two may love each other, sometimes your relationship will reach the point when you become kinda distant.
You may be busy chasing a promotion at work or neglecting him for a bunch of different reasons, and then one day you realize the spark between you and your SO feels a bit faded out.
Then you try hard to revive the old flame and get back to how you were before. Sometimes you’ll succeed and other times you’ll crash and burn. Horribly.
If you just failed, and you feel bad about yourself I have something to cheer you up. I prepared a collection of stories shared by the people I know. Their disastrous fails will make you feel good about yours, trust me!
1. “I moved to her city only to discover she’s been cheating on me”
I was tired of our long-distance relationship and moved to her city. I gave up a well-paid job and a life I have built there. Then after a couple of weeks, I realized she’d been cheating on me for the whole time with her high school crush.
2. “One date a month would bring our relationship back to life but she said no”
When we were trying to talk out all our issues, I asked her to have a date, a real date, at least once a month. I thought it would help us to reignite the flame but she never had time for me.
She found this suggestion awkward. Soon after, we broke up. I didn’t regret it.
3. “I had a vasectomy and then she left me to have a baby with someone else”
4. “He took pictures of me without my consent”
He had no respect for boundaries. I hated taking pictures of myself and hated people taking my pictures. He knew that and I told him countless times not to point the camera in my direction.
Anyway, he took pictures of me while I was sleeping, eating, and even when I was taking a shower, explaining he’s so in love with me that he can’t stop documenting my everyday life. Can you imagine that?
Then he showed them to his buddies! Without my consent!
The saddest thing is I was not aware that this is not normal. Therapy helped me realize I was in an abusive relationship. Luckily we’re divorced now!
5. “He scheduled ‘intimacy sessions’”
We had some serious issues and I was not in the mood to be intimate. We were living like roommates for six months.
Then one day he showed me “the calendar”. He required me to agree to a “night in the bedroom” once a week and scheduled some dates. I even considered thinking about it, but then he presented me with the rules.
Apparently, I was allowed to refuse it only once a week. Also, he required “our nights” twice a week. Then if a “session” didn’t happen for some reason, it needed to be rescheduled in the same week.
I left him the very same day.
6. “She dumped me after I went on a solo trip”
7. “He liked to play a victim”
I realized I couldn’t change him so I tried to change myself. I believed we would find a common ground if I improved myself. I started reading self-help books, going to therapists, meditating, etc. I wanted to be the perfect girlfriend!
To my great surprise, it made things even worse. As if he wanted to provoke me to be angry at him all the time so he could play his role of victim and I would be malicious and overly demanding.
Nothing could save our relationship!
8. “A vacation could not help us”
We went to the Bahamas for a vacation hoping to smooth things out. I thought a different environment would help and allow us to rediscover the fundamentals of our relationship.
We couldn’t stop fighting for ten days we’d spent there together. I moved out the same day we got back home.
9. “Proposed me without the ring”
10. “The ‘trilateral meet-up’ was a very bad idea“
He pulled me into an unwanted three-way with his coworker! From the beginning, I said it was not a good idea and openly refused it but he wouldn’t give up until I succumbed to pressure.
It was horrible as it was apparent he had a thing for her, and after that, I couldn’t see their faces ever again.
11. “We ‘sow the wild oats’”
We got married when we were still kids, after high school. Understandably, after fifteen years we were bored and decided to spice things up a bit. So we opened our relationship and saw other people.
It only increased the contrast between the familiar old and the exciting new. We got divorced within two months.
12. “Working together ruined our relationship”
13. “She kept texting her work buddy”
She seemed distant for some time and I noticed she’s often texting her coworker. I tried to talk about her work and learn more about her work buddy. Also, I offered to pick her up from work tomorrow and meet him, but she got mad about it.
In a few days, she dumped me and started seeing her coworker.
14. “He told me he was more into men”
He joined a PhD program in Arizona and got back after a year. I instantly noticed something was different and tried hard to show how much I missed him.
He was cold as ice and told me he fell for his mentor and realized he likes men more than women.
15. “We watched ‘The Affair’ together”
So if you failed in your attempts to revive the old flame, don’t be so hard on yourself!
It only works if the relationship is mendable. If it didn’t work, it wasn’t supposed to work.