It’s so difficult when you come to the realization that your relationship isn’t working anymore. Whether you’ve been together for weeks, months, or years, the thought of having to break away from someone who you’ve put a lot of time, effort, and energy into is just devastating. However, if your issues are fixable, there are ways that you can get things back on track.
- Establish your issues. Firstly, take a long, hard look at your relationship and figure out what it is that’s going wrong. Does your partner work all the time and you hardly spend any time together? Do you suspect that they’re cheating? Are you having trouble getting the spark back? Once you pinpoint the issues, you can take active measures to fix them.
- Address them with your partner. The next step is to discuss the issues with your partner (if you haven’t already). Sure, it’s going to be a hard conversation to have, but you need to have it to be able to move forward. Get everything out there on the table and don’t hold back. If your partner isn’t aware of the severity of the situation then tell them. Explain that you’re at the “make or break” stage and you’re trying to work out how you can both get back on track before you head on a one-way train to Splitsville.
- Assess what you can do to improve your relationship. Then come up with a plan together on the steps you can put in place to help you resume your closeness. Can your partner cut down his working hours? Can they be honest with you about their cheating and promise not to stray again? Can you guys spend more time one-on-one to try and reignite the spark? If you both want this to work then you will both be willing to work together to fix whatever it is that has broken.
- Give the relationship a chance to get better. After this initial discussion, see how things change after a period of time. Hopefully, they will have improved significantly. If not, perhaps it’s time to take some time away from the relationship to reflect whether it’s even worth it anymore.
- Have some space. Tell your partner that you need some space to figure things out. Sometimes, just taking a little time apart can work wonders for your mental health and help you put things into perspective. It can also help you gain clarity on your current situation by removing you from the bubble.
- Put a time limit in place. That said, try to establish a time in the near future that you can get back together to talk things through about how the break has gone. Whether this is a couple of days, a week, or two months, do whatever it takes to help you make the decision of whether to say or leave indefinitely.
- Re-assess the situation. Once this time period has lapsed, re-assess your relationship as it stands. Are you still in love with the person? Are you still willing to make things work? Do you want to try again? Communicate your thoughts to your partner no matter how harsh they seem. Honesty is always the best policy here.
- Ask yourself if you’ve done everything you possibly can. If you both agree that you love each other and you want to make your relationship work, go ahead and have another stab at it. At the end of the day, it’s better to do this than to have regrets. If you’re not sure how you feel and you don’t even know if you can get there, or vice versa, ask yourself if you’ve done everything you can possibly do to fix things.
- Ask yourself if it’s worth your time and energy anymore. If you’ve done all you can on your end and you’re fighting a losing battle with your partner or you’ve accidentally fallen out of love and there’s no way to get the spark back, perhaps it’s time to call it a day. After all, you’ve already put so much time and energy into the relationship. Sometimes, there’s no way to move forward, there’s only a way out. It sucks but it happens. The bottom line is that you deserve to be happy and if you can’t be happy with them, you need to remove yourself from that situation and fall in love with yourself instead.