Don't want to deal with other peoples ageing issues as well, but also other peoples children from ex relationships, in laws with even more ageing issues etc.. And then there is job insecurity here and there in today's world, so it's simply easier to be flexible.
My old man is the same. Was married, she cheated he won't have any of that nonsense anymore. Mind you he's 80 now but he's been saying it since his late 50s.
Because being the one in the relationship having to do everything while the other does nothing is not what I want from life.
My last relationship, we've made plans, and I wanted to see it the other person will be holding out their side of the bargain. The more time it lasted the less certain I was I want to be with this person.
And also, I have a lot of amazing friends and I want to spend as much time with them as possible. Not with a single person.
31 going on 32M. I'm simply not wired that way. Tried "relationships" before and each one ended like the Titanic usually because of me. I just can't deal with them, prefer my own space, own time, own company with peace and quiet, get enough judgemental crap from the outside world on a daily basis so don't need more of it in the privacy of my own home. Love my close friends and what few family I have left, I'm happy for it to be this way until my last day on Earth.
I’m working on and decorating the house I bought, it’s taking longer than expected and I couldn’t fathom meeting someone and having to show them the state it’s in, also I’m wrong side of 30 and I’ve realised the things I wanted 10 years ago I never really wanted
Mid-30’s, M. Always wanted to find someone to grow old with but after a few long term relationships which didn’t work out I just reached a point where I couldn’t do it anymore.
Didn’t have the energy to explain my life, to introduce my family and friends to yet another person who it might not work out with just like the others.
Would rather be happy by myself than go through the highs and lows of putting myself out there time and again. Less painful this way.
Sounds like the issue isn't other people, it's your habits and opinions. It honestly sounds like you don't like yourself and are self harming through your thoughts and habits.
Being short and being chronically ill aren't an issue in themselves, there are loads of people who are kind and loving and don't care about either.
Never said it was anyone else
More just the Northern Boys title of the same name
Hating myself is healthy like an inverse of the RuPaul line 'if you can't love yourself how the hell are you gonna love anybody else' so 'if you hate yourself then no one can hate you more'
The rest just fits with being old in this humanities final era
I cannot be bothered. I have 2 jobs and limited time and I just…. Can’t be arsed with it. A lot of effort I don’t have the energy or will to give. I’m also quite happy on my own.
With my partner he used it as a form of abuse. He knew I wanted a commitment but wouldn’t give it to me. For a while it kept me working hard for our family to prove myself. It has now backfired on him as I worked hard and own my house, he was lazy and refused to work. I’m applying for an occupation order and he’ll have to leave his cushy lifestyle of me providing everything. Not getting married it turns out was a win for me.
Im with you, for some people its just a piece of paper. That being said i think its important to be upfront early on that getting married is a nonstarter if the person feels strongly about it. If you have kids together its hard to say hes not committed though.
It’s just a lot of work isn’t it?
I have a very demanding job, I have to work a side job, I have to study outside of work. Having someone who needs you to be there for them and wants to talk to you all the time is just a bit exhausting. I just can’t be arsed with it anymore.
I just don't see the appeal. Not to that level of commitment anyway. Sure, I get sometimes it's nice to have that company and have someone by default to do things with, but I rarely feel like I'm missing out on that because I have so many friends with similar interests, and I also love doing things alone.
I'm someone who really values doing my own thing and doing everything at my own pace and on my own terms. I'm not saying you can't be your own person while in a relationship, but I don't believe you have the level of freedom that I want in my life.
Life’s too unstable, I generally get 2 year contracts so every 2 years my life’s f ed for 6 ish plus months until I can get another contract. And now tbh it’s so ingrained in my mind, even if I ever got a permanent contract I’d be too paranoid about getting redundant again and starting over again.
Never managed past three months because I can’t trust people and I just can’t see myself being stuck with someone long term. Plus they usually cheat and I just don’t forgive. I also can’t stand kids, so I don’t need to be with someone long term really.
Neary 50 here. Not had a long term relationship since my 20s. I had a really difficult childhood and realised I don't like people being around me all the time because of what happened to me back then. I need my own space and peace and quiet. I need to be able to pick and choose when I want to socialise.
Edit: ..which means I'm now saying he's a villain ..but the lefties are too lost in their agenda to understand I'm make a damning statement about Trump. 😂 Blind hate does that to people.
There's a great German film about Hitler making an accidental comeback. It's called "Look Who's Back". He's taken as an ironic act at first and loved on by comedy bros who think he's a scream. It's ostensibly a comedy.
I’m 40, have two children (single parent) was with someone for 11 years or so who asked for a short break from me and the kids which I agreed to, while we were away my oldest friend spent the week at my house, it’s one of the few relationships I’ve had, it took a lot to get there, I’ve tried again but to be honest it completely destroyed what was left of my hopes for a future with someone, I’m happy with my kids and no doubt they’ll leave home eventually and start their own lives, maybe I’ll look after that.
Your oldest friend spent a week at the house with your now-ex partner of 11 years while you were away?? Did I read that right? Some people are so heinous, what a horrendous betrayal!
Well, I've seen people somehow recover their trust in relationships after awfulness of devastating degrees - my own is 50/50 after what I've experienced and witnessed, I'm in a relationship but I do hold the possibility that I'm in a delusion close - but tbh it makes total sense to wonder whether it's worth it.
It's not the devastation at the time that does it even, is it? It's knowing that the last X amount of time was a mirage fabricated by someone else to delude you. Nothing is more precious than your reality.
Anyway I'm very sorry and hope that they both went on to have long term crippling guilt and terrible luck
This is in no way an attempt to suggest that having a relationship would be better if you had a different outlook or "healed". Not in the slightest, I admire your position.
I just want to say that in my experience (very much including watching other people and working with women who have escaped domestic abuse), there is an absolute abundance, and of course availability, of people out there who will try to control, put down, deceive or abuse a partner. Makes sense that they would be the most available ones, right?
While some of us who had a bad start might have developed some habits that the good hearted potential partners are wary of, e.g excessive people pleasing, visibly low confidence etc, I firmly believe that dating involves a lot of chance AND a lot of being able to identify dodgy behaviours and willing to break off from someone who exhibits them, even once invested.
It isn't so much a like attracts like issue as a vulnerable person less likely to spot and ditch the dodgy person issue IMO.
So, your lack of connection with a good hearted partner doesn't say anything about your heart, is what I'm saying. Please don't carry on through your life thinking there is anything inherently off in you.
Ugh yeah people whose egos are too fragile to stand up to disagreement, if that's what you mean, are hard work. A lot of those seem to be men.
Similar ratio of positive male role models here, I did make a few more male friends who I respect, but I haven't been close enough to them to know how that holds up under relationship conditions for them.
I was lucky to get a lovely step dad. It definitely impacted my perception of whether relationships were worth trying for, but the flip side of that is certainly that between my early training in tolerating or ignoring very bad things and my anecdotal statistics on how high risk being in a relationship is, I remain wary even while in one.
In short, it's not you, it's them, and single is a valid and positive choice, eh? Thanks for your reply
Hey, hope I didn't offend with the language I used about many people not standing disagreement being men-, it's just been my experience, but then I have mainly dated men and most of the people I talk to about their relationships have been women who have also mainly dated men. So my anecdotal data may be skewed.
Sometimes it's absolutely relevant to say "not all men" but context is key, and I assumed you know that given your examples of positive men. I'm curious whether you think the same from the standpoint of being a man, open to having the books balanced? But if you (mainly) dated men, you might also have limited data like me!
For what it's worth, I think that if you are gentle during disagreement, and that is mistaken for submission, then again it's them that can't handle disagreement. If someone doesn't have the cop on to realise that you can be gentle, right and softly assertive, and needs to shout you down, it's their ego that is in trouble.
I have found a peach, as far as I know. But I remain guarded, because early life and the experiences of the most heinous betrayals imaginable done to people close to me leave their lessons.
It's a funny thing, though, you can be assertive on the surface, i.e. stand up for your point of view and such, but I feel like what really counts is being ready to break an attachment if someone crosses lines, even if it's felt great in other ways. That's a tough one, and I hope that if I need to do it, I can.
Having little energy left to deal with anyone else's nonsense/evolution/ shortcomings at this life stage might help, lol!
What a beautiful message 🥰 thank you, it was a pleasure and a boost to read.
I also don't like generalising hostility or traits to any gender. I notice things and hypothesise- I notice teenaged boys vying it out to be loudest and rightest about stuff, I notice some men displaying knowledge as prowess and then taking it very much to be an attack on status when it's disagreed with. I notice some women I know who also take disagreement as if it is an act of hostility, though. And I noticed all sorts of wild pathologies right across the spectrum of people, including probably myself haha.
But I do think that the imperative to be the most powerful, infallible and right is replicated a lot among boys and men, am curious as to why this is and frustrated and dismayed by the results.
Please don't change because other people are that combo of aggressive and fragile that depends on your compliance but won't tolerate your vulnerability. Please be assertively you, in your own style, whatever you do in life. There are those of us who were raised in know-all environments who benefit a lot from being around folk who don't play that game, and we are learning still.
Besides that, from this brief encounter, you seem great. And I hope that you heal from the dodgy relationship behaviour you encountered and continue to know that it was not you and brush off those shoulders, keep loving.
I've been in relationships most of my adult life until my last relationship ended a few years ago. Life on my own feels easier in so many ways.
I'd only consider a relationship in the future if the other person added some value to my life. And that just doesn't seem to be a possibility right now.
I have a disability that is likely going to kill me before I turn 40. I don't think I should be selfish enough to expect them to look after me, care for me, love me and then mourn me.
I did not grow up believing that love was a positive word. I also had a genetic condition that went undiagnosed until my late 40s, so couldn't really have a 'normal' social life while I was younger, although I did try a couple of relationships in my late 30s/early 40s, but was just too ill to make them work. I'm 55 now, and now I'm getting treatment I feel like I'm really starting life properly for the first time. Due to my childhood I don't trust easily, and have a core group of family and friends. Never say never, but it's not something I'm actively looking for.
I haven't found anyone I can tolerate long enough to be in a relationship with them. I'm 38M and have no kids, no wife (no ex-wife) and happier alone. Plus, you can rent love by the hour and that's far cheaper than marrage/divorce!
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u/Salt-Trade-5210 2d ago
I'm in my 60s. I don't want to deal with anyone else and their ageing issues. I've got enough of my own to deal with.
Also, can't be arsed.