One of the hardest things is when you leave someone you love deeply, who loves you deeply, when you’re both willing and dedicated to growth, when you’re both authentically trying.
Once upon a time, I thought that these conditions meant that you should be together, that this kind of love and dedication and willingness to work and grow would always be enough: not just enough but perhaps the best recipe, because it meant that you would be able to grow through each other.
I’ll offer what I’ve come to understand — through my own experience and that of my clients — about the conditions under which even loving, well-intentioned relationships must sometimes end.
But recently, I broke up with someone – someone I still love and think I always will. We could not get there, even with love, power and will. It was one of the toughest calls I’ve ever made and I’ll say that
When it finally landed, it was completely clear.
I won’t go into details, because this isn’t just my story telling, but I’ll present what I’ve come to understand — through my own experience and my clients — about situations where even loving, well-intentioned relationships sometimes need to end. When multiple of these are present, the challenges are compounded.
Unaddressed mental health issues
This one is so hard. I’d say we all have our own corner of crazy — we all land somewhere on the mental health spectrum, and we walk that line throughout our lives. But when at least one person in a relationship has a situation that affects their own life, and therefore their life with others, and doesn’t deal with it, the relationship often ends.
The imbalances that result cannot always be remedied without help. And the conditioned person has to choose to deal with it.
Radically different attachment styles
Most of us are familiar with the anxious-avoidance dynamic. What I’ve noticed is that when these patterns are extreme enough, they can be very difficult to bridge. When one person falls too far on the insecure side, it pushes the other person further in the opposite direction, making things worse.
I’ve seen people break up this dynamic, find partners who are more secure or share their attachment patterns, and ease their own anxiety considerably. Because attachment styles don’t just reside in one person—they’re always a dynamic. We want to be with someone who won’t make our insecurities worse.
A radically different love language
If one person is constantly reaching for hugs and the other is shying away from physical affection but quietly having dinner every night, both people can feel incomplete and inadequate, even when both are genuinely trying. Sexual dysfunction usually falls into this category as well.
We can adjust our behavior to meet each other’s needs, and it’s also true that maintaining behavior that doesn’t come naturally is really hard to sustain in the long run. When stress hits—a family crisis, world events, personal exhaustion—it pulls us away from conscious, consistent choices that require real effort. Two people who love each other deeply can both feel, on some level, loveless, if the way they give and receive love is not exactly matched.
codependency
When there is a mental health imbalance — including addiction — codependency often follows. But it can also arise from anxiety-avoidance dynamics, from physical illness, or even from chronic patterns such as unemployment. Codependency deserves its own conversation, and I’ve written about it more fully elsewhere. For now: It belongs on this list.
Ending such a relationship is especially difficult because everything in us screams Love + intention + power should be enough. Sadness is real. Love is real. And yet.
On the other side of this choice can be true freedom, true expression, and a life that isn’t so full of…trying.
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This post was Previously published at medium.com.
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Photo credit: Jeremy Maleki at Unsplash
