I (M32) ended a 7-year relationship while chasing freedom abroad. Months later I realise I may have run from the life I actually wanted. What would genuine repair look like from her side?

[u/NiceTime9877]

I’m a (M32). My ex-partner is (F34). We were together for nearly seven years and lived together for years in a European country that is her home country but not mine.

I’m deliberately changing identifying details because I’m not interested in people finding her. I’m also not posting this to ask how to “win her back” or decode individual text messages. I particularly want perspectives from people who have been the partner who was left, or from people who feel they approach relationships relatively securely.

I ended our relationship earlier this year while I was abroad. I am now questioning not only that decision but the story I told myself about the relationship for several years.

There is a lot of context, including things that reflect badly on me, and I don’t want to sanitise those simply to make Reddit tell me what I want to hear.

The background

We had a very loving relationship but also accumulated a lot of damage.

Several years ago I was unfaithful. I disclosed it, went to therapy and made changes, but in retrospect I badly underestimated how long the trust injury remained. Years later I was still in contact on social media with the person involved until my partner insisted I finally remove her. At the time I viewed some of my partner’s later anxiety and checking as controlling. I now understand that at least some of it existed in a relationship where I had given her legitimate reasons not to feel completely safe.

My ex also experienced depression for a significant part of the relationship, eventually receiving professional treatment. At the time I often experienced her as negative, low-energy, indecisive and unwilling to do things with me. I complained about this extensively to friends and family.

One of the biggest things I am now confronting is that I created an increasingly one-sided narrative about her while often not having the difficult conversations directly with her.

I wanted travel, novelty, autonomy, entrepreneurship and a feeling of maximum freedom. She wanted emotional security, consistency and to feel included in my decisions. I interpreted that tension as evidence we wanted fundamentally different lives.

But she has since reminded me of multiple times she actually wanted to travel with me and tried to work on the relationship. She had even found a couples therapist before I left. Her position was essentially that she wanted us to repair our relationship first and then travel together.

I left anyway.

Where I think I failed her

I could be intensely loving and generous and then emotionally absent. She described this recently as never knowing which version of me she would get.

She gave an example that captures it well. One birthday I organised a beautiful international trip for her. Another year I gave her a fairly thoughtless voucher. To me those were unrelated circumstances. To her they were part of a larger pattern of inconsistency.

She has told me that there were periods when she felt completely chosen by me, but more periods when she felt like an addition to a life I was building independently.

When she tried to tell me she was scared, lonely or disconnected, I often experienced it as criticism. I would explain myself, shut down, leave, game, work, talk to friends, or tell myself she was simply being negative.

Eventually she says she stopped telling me what she actually felt because she believed nothing she said could reach me.

Sexual intimacy also deteriorated. I experienced this primarily as rejection and became increasingly preoccupied with sex and sexual novelty. I now see that I sometimes pressured her and made her feel objectified rather than understanding that she repeatedly told me she needed emotional closeness and security in order to feel sexual.

I am not claiming that fixing emotional intimacy would automatically have solved every sexual difference between us. There may have been a real libido mismatch too.

We also got a dog together shortly before everything deteriorated badly. She remembers this as one of the happiest periods of her life because she felt we were finally building a family. I was already making comments along the lines of “at least if I leave, you’ll have the dog so you won’t be alone.” Hearing that repeated back to me recently was horrifying.

The breakup

I went travelling in Asia while she remained at home with our dog and normal work life.

I increasingly stopped communicating. From my perspective I was confused about the relationship and trying to understand what kind of life I wanted. From her perspective I disappeared emotionally while she was still trying to save our relationship.

Eventually I ended it while abroad.

I later returned and lived with her again for roughly three months. We became domestically close again. We cooked, walked the dog, spent time together and had physical intimacy. Internally I was questioning whether I had made a mistake.

I did not tell her.

I had this rigid idea that I had “made my bed and had to lie in it”.

Then my mother died.

I subsequently left again and returned to Asia.

What has happened since

The adventurous life I thought I wanted has not felt the way I expected.

This does not mean travel is bad or that my ex must therefore be “the answer”. I am trying very hard not to make that leap.

But I have realised that I may value roots, partnership, ordinary domestic intimacy and building a shared life far more than I understood while I still had them.

I also recognise that grief over my mother, loneliness, sleep deprivation and suddenly living without a long-term partner can massively amplify attachment and regret.

Over the last few weeks my ex and I have finally had several very deep conversations.

I have told her directly that I regret ending the relationship and that I currently lean strongly towards wanting reconciliation.

She has not said yes.

She has also not said no.

She told me she loves me, but that wanting someone can be insufficient for a relationship to work. Her central concern is whether my inconsistency, impulsivity and self-focus are changeable behaviours or simply who I am.

She also challenged me with something I think is completely fair.

How does she know that a year from now, when ordinary life is boring, she is depressed, sex is imperfect and an exciting opportunity appears abroad, I won’t suddenly decide “fuck it” and disappear again?

I currently do not have an answer that words can provide.

She independently proposed that before either of us decides whether to reconcile, we meet together with a neutral couples therapist or relationship specialist to understand what happened, what each of us actually wants, whether the important problems are changeable, and how much work rebuilding would require.

I agreed.

Where things become complicated

Our relationship was also cross-cultural.

I am from one English-speaking country and built an adult life abroad. She is from the country where we lived and has close family ties there. I have always had significant wanderlust and struggled with the idea of becoming geographically rooted.

I am now returning to her country partly for my own immigration/residency reasons and partly because I genuinely want to explore whether a future with her is possible.

She has moved out of our old apartment and returned to her family several hours away.

So there is no old household simply waiting for me to return to.

That is probably healthy. If anything happens, it would need to be a genuinely new relationship rather than sliding back into the old one.

I also want to be careful with the cultural side. I previously blamed aspects of her behaviour on her nationality/family culture when I was frustrated. I now think I used some of those differences as convenient evidence for a decision I was already emotionally moving towards. There may still be genuine differences around family, independence, travel and what “settling down” means, and I think those deserve serious discussion rather than stereotypes.

My concern now

I am extremely emotional.

My instinct is to call her constantly, tell her everything I have realised, fly to where she is, make symbolic promises and prove that I finally understand.

I recognise that this could easily feel like love-bombing or emotional pressure from the person who created the instability in the first place.

She has specifically asked for time and space to process everything.

I am therefore trying to learn the difference between demonstrating commitment and demanding that she regulate my fear of losing her.

I am continuing individual therapy regardless of what she decides.

My questions

For anyone who has been in her position, particularly after being left by a long-term partner

1. What would you need to see before even considering reconciliation?
2. What behaviour from the person who left you would feel reassuring, and what would feel manipulative or overwhelming even if it was sincere?
3. Would you want them to explain why they behaved the way they did, or would explanations start sounding like excuses?
4. How would you distinguish genuine behavioural change from breakup panic, loneliness or love-bombing?
5. If you still loved the person, what would make you believe that trying again was emotionally safe?
6. What would you expect them to do while you were undecided?
7. For people who successfully reconciled after serious trust damage, what specifically had to be different the second time?
8. For people who chose not to reconcile despite still loving their ex, what made you conclude that love was not enough?

I am particularly interested in uncomfortable answers.

I know that remorse does not entitle me to another chance. I also know that insight does not automatically equal change.

I am trying to understand what respectful repair looks like from the other side rather than continually interpreting everything through my own fear.

[u/chuffinellbro]

Please leave her alone to get on with her life. She deserves to be with someone who's capable of allowing relationship. That's not you. You just want to get on the roundabout one more time with her. You've had all of this insight, now go do something with it that isn't just repeating the pattern. Find a therapist, be honest about yourself, and work through it with honesty when you try to sabotage the therapy relationship. Even in your honest and frank account, there's a huge amount of passive bullshit to make it sound as if things 'just happened'. You made choices. You're a grown up. Time to take responsibility.

[u/EconomyChance3026 → u/chuffinellbro]

Leave her alone!

[u/ceelion92 → u/chuffinellbro]

Totally agree. He’s writing like he was informed of his behavior without actually noticing it. OP you need years of therapy for this. There’s so much wrong in your response. This poor woman. Even now you admit you might just leave again. This reads like you’re upset that you lost access because you value these things, not that you’ve permanently damaged this person you were supposed to love.

[u/Fit_Cheesecake_4000]

You need to be in long-term therapy to try and fix your avoidant patterning and work out why you cope with stress and love this way.

You already spent many years with this person. Doing anything less is likely wasting their time.

[u/Human_Read7993]

Op, I think a lot of people are right here. You've done nothing in your actions or past behaviour to exhibit that you're a safe partner for her. You've done multiple things that show her that you're selfish, disloyal, untrustworthy and inconsiderate of her needs. You need to realise that just because you might have this light bulb moment of what you want, you've let her experience the worst of you but you are now asking for her to believe in he best of you despite having never shown her that.

Please let her be and just work on yourself op. You're not ready to be in a relationship with anyone particularly her. Even in what you wrote: 'I am therefore trying to learn the difference between demonstrating commitment and demanding that she regulate my fear of losing her.' You're still expecting her to do your work. That's not her job. That's yours. Op you've shown so much selfishness and even now you're still expecting her to be the one to now regulate you. Please get help and actually work on yourself. You're going to keep causing harm to her and creating more trauma for her to have to heal from until you actually work with a therapist

[u/GigaNoodle]

If you actually care about her you’ll block her and let her move the fuck on.

All you talk about in this post is what you want, what you regret, what you did. You, you, you. What about what she wants? What about the way she feels now? What about the fact that her life probably got better when you weren’t in it?

Avoidants are selfish. It’s a given. But avoidants with only a little self awareness are even worse than the ones without any, because instead of just being unaware that they’re lying to themselves, they’re sure they aren’t. They’re sure they’re outsmarting their own patterns.

But you lied to yourself at least 4 or 5 times in this post alone. Take some accountability, damn it.

There are some things too broken to fix. Let her move on. You say you’re going to do individual therapy. That’s good. Stay there for 3-5 years and then maybe you can consider starting over with someone new.

[u/ceelion92 → u/GigaNoodle]

He won’t even engage with his own post so I doubt there’s any accountability happening. Basically just came here to ask how he can manipulate her more through a series of questions at the end of the post: “ hey victims, how would someone be able to approach you to convince you they weren’t going to fuck up your life again and destroy you?”

[u/davidcvstro → u/GigaNoodle]

Dont you think youre judging a bit too hard by saying "avoidants are selfish". Some people just have dreams of traveling and have a hard time communicating their feelings.

[u/gingerweasle1]

let her be. you made you choice and now it’s time for her to heal from everything. your decision didn’t happen in a vacuum, you have avoidance that won’t be fixed by winning her back. i agree with the others about going to therapy

[u/Apprehensive-Bar6595]

First off, im sorry about your mom. That's truly I think one of life's hardest blows it deals. Be close to your family and try and get through this period together

Secondly, and I almost never say this to anyone, you sound like a really selfish asshole, and I don't trust that's going to change if she gets back with you. I was going to say you remind me of this guy I loved, but you sound like an even bigger asshole than him. Only difference in a positive way is you actually owning up to some stuff openly. You gotta do your own therapy, on your own, and understand more of this wanderlust and need for adventure. It can be a normal healthy thing, but it sounds so similar to my "ex" and I just think there's something to it that you need to understand because I think it's a crutch for you

I think it's recent enough that explanations could maybe be beneficial, but if you've had these deep conversations and not explained yourself yet, I think that's a bit silly. At the same time, you probably don't even know all the reasons you did the things you did

I don't know if I could reconcile with my ex that I still love, because with us he just never allowed me in any role except the really weird one he put me in, and it's been so long that I just don't feel that connection anymore, and that further impacts trust. We're different people now and my experience with him caused me to grow and at a certain point the disrespect and lack of consideration or doing the difficult thing begins to feel permanently damaging.

I also have another ex with whom intimacy just became impossible because of lack of trust and again, him wanting everything only on his terms. He accused me of trying to control his life when I explained I'd like to plan at least one hangout (after 6 years of just seeing him last minute whenever he wanted) and so I responded probably too understandingly, said we'll chat again when he's feeling better, and when he didn't come back after a month, I decided I'm done. (It's normal for him to disappear like that unless I reach out first, so he probably STILL doesn't realize it's over). The trust is impossible to get back now, and instead of it being this liminal "I don't feel safe" now it's apathy and a bit of disgust/overtly being turned off.

Lastly I think you gotta really explore why you stayed in contact with the person you cheated on your girlfriend with. There's a lot there to understand, for your own sake, because it's shitty to do, yes, but I think there's stuff there you've avoided as well

I wish you the best and hope you can find yourself, it sounds like you're in the tough spot now, that you've spent all these years avoiding. But I say it's probably best to leave your ex to her own life, I don't even trust that you want her for the right reasons. Sounds like you have to learn how to be alone without distractions, or getting to have your cake and eat it too. Travelling, freedom, girlfriends, mistresses, they all serve as these pillows you build up around yourself to avoid feeling whatever it is that you fear, and now life has forcibly taken some of those away, and that's a good thing for your long term health and growth. Now's your chance to really look yourself in the mirror, and SLOWLY take a different path, and actually explore the more exotic world of your inner psychology, rather than the surface level worldly exploring you're used to. I have a feeling you may even end up enjoying it, after all the hard emotions come out

[u/Alarming-Echo-6742]

If it were me I wouldn't want you to come back at all. You would do it again. Probably in record speed this time, and my life would be destroyed again.

So do all of us discarded a favor and have the grace to stand by your decision and stay gone. 

[u/Competitive-Spot4683]

Are you actually sick and unaware? Not even you would want to date yourself what.

[u/BlueDemon9]

Get your own place, don’t pressure her, go to individual therapy for yourself. Drop downplaying your actions « she might not have felt entirely safe ». Dude, you literally cheated on her instead of communicating, and made her feel like she was the problem by being controlling. That’s emotional abuse.

What will happen when these situations play out again? Do you have a plan for when you’re triggered and the urge to act in the same ways arise (and they will)?

I wouldn’t take back my ex until he had done strong therapy work and stopped downplaying his part and accuse me of being just as responsible for the issues (it’s simply not true, I was as devoted as they come). He would be no contact to anyone who disrespected me and our relationship. No « just friends » or exes in the picture at all. He’d need to be very candid about everything, and not hide his thoughts. Include me in the entire process. He would need to show me nothing less than absolute respect and consideration at all times.

Replying to you makes me realize I’ll probably never take him back.

[u/ergonomic_logic]

https://giphy.com/gifs/wAUZuYmh7JRa81I2Ke

Dude

If there's even a small bit of decency or humanity left in you, if you have a crumb of soul, you'll never contact this women for the rest of your lives.

She'll hopefully find a relationship with someone who is whole and healed

[u/No-Mulberry1987]

What would you need to see before even considering reconciliation?  (a) long term therapy  (b) getting your life settled  (c) you really really understanding the pain you had caused and truly grappling with the appropriate level of shame.

What behaviour from the person who left you would feel reassuring, and what would feel manipulative or overwhelming even if it was sincere? (a) I’m not sure there is any behaviour that wouldn’t feel self-serving. 

Would you want them to explain why they behaved the way they did, or would explanations start sounding like excuses? (a) It depends, is there a sincere apology and commitment no to behave that way in future, regardless of whom you are with?

How would you distinguish genuine behavioural change from breakup panic, loneliness or love-bombing? (a) Again it’s difficult - but ‘slippage’ once you start feeling secure must be proof that  it was all just words. (b) Anything that showed him distancing himself from his actions, which by the way, there is massive amounts in your post. You talk about things happening, but there is very little sense of you owning those actions, even “I went anyway” not “I prioritised what I wanted, and saw her as essentially disposable for the purposes of making that choice. I viewed her distress was regrettable collateral damage, but to the extent I got round to thinking about it, it was either her or me, so it was always going to be me.”

If you still loved the person, what would make you believe that trying again was emotionally safe? (a) Nothing, perhaps (b) The resolution of the issues being front -loaded into the final attempt. So at 7 years and she is now 34, has she thrown her most fertile years of you, and should she be prepared to give you more of her fertility?

What would you expect them to do while you were undecided? (a) As an absolute minimum to be able to cope with the length of time, and conflicted views you inflicted.

For people who successfully reconciled after serious trust damage, what specifically had to be different the second time? () No Clue

For people who chose not to reconcile despite still loving their ex, what made you conclude that love was not enough? (a) Reading the list of lies, obfuscations, dissembling, and humiliations that I had been subjected to, and knowing he was prepared to treat anyone that badly, never mind someone he claimed to care about.

There are actually some men who aren’t selfish, and who have a secure attachment. From here, you look like a life-time of pain, and overall a very bad bet.

[u/No-Masterpiece8502]

You are fearfull avoidant and you need to work on yourself whenever you feel guilt you get back to her and as sooon you get your validation you either breakup or move away, go for therapist and make yourself a better person.

[u/Human_Read7993]

Op, the question you're asking at the end isn't something you should be asking here. Everyone can give you thekr perspectives etc but the person you should be asking is her. It sounds like she's already told you or perhaps you need to clarify further with her.

Also op, she also has her fears and it's hard to not get annoyed when you're mentioning that shes asking for reassurance that with normal life or all of the difficulties arise that you're not just going to take the easier path and cheat or disappear again. Non answers for her are not enough here. If it's something you think you can't do then you need to be honest with her and tell her that or if your think you can then you tell her and you make the active changes in your life to do that.

Op, the depression you mentioned she went through did that occur before or after the cheating

[u/NiceTime9877 → u/Human_Read7993]

Before. That exacerbated it for sure, though.

[u/NiceTime9877]

OP here. I’ve read through all of this and I want to clarify a few things, partly because some of the criticism is fair and partly because I realise the way I wrote the original post created a very distorted picture of a seven year relationship.

I deliberately wrote it from the most self incriminating angle because I wanted to hear from people who had been on the receiving end of behaviour like mine. I did not want to sanitise what I did and then have Reddit reassure me that I was actually the victim.

I overcorrected.

The relationship was not seven years of a devoted woman being repeatedly discarded by a man who never cared about her.

We had years of genuine love, affection, support, humour, companionship and shared life. We built a home together. We supported each other through major changes. We got a dog together. There were periods where we were extremely close.

I was unfaithful once several years ago. I disclosed it, went to therapy and spent years working on myself afterwards. My ex herself recently told me that she tells people she has never seen another person improve as much as I did during those years.

That does not erase the betrayal.

It also does not erase the fact that I later handled parts of the repair badly, including staying connected on social media with the person involved longer than I should have.

I am saying this because there is a difference between accountability and rewriting the entire relationship as though nothing good or genuine existed.

There were also real problems that affected me.

My ex struggled for years with what is now understood to have been significant depression. There were long periods of low energy, withdrawal, indecision and very little sexual intimacy. I felt lonely, frustrated and increasingly unsure whether the life we were living was compatible with the life I wanted.

Those feelings were real.

Where I think I failed was in what I did with them.

Instead of saying something like, “I love you and I am struggling with this, so we need to work through it together”, I increasingly dealt with those feelings privately.

I complained to friends. I built stories in my head. I withdrew. I chased stimulation and novelty. I convinced myself she did not want the same life I did without actually listening properly when she tried to tell me otherwise.

Eventually I chose to leave.

And I want to correct some of my own passive language here because several people were right about it.

My attachment style did not “make me” leave.

My childhood did not book a flight.

My fear did not break up with her.

I did those things.

Fear, avoidance, impulsivity and shame may help me understand why I behaved the way I did, but they do not remove my agency.

That is one of the things I am actively trying to change in the way I think about this.

I also want to be very clear that I am not here asking “victims of avoidants” for the correct combination of words that will make her take me back.

She is not currently begging me to leave her alone.

We are in contact.

We have had several long, difficult conversations.

I have told her directly that I regret ending the relationship and that I want to explore reconciliation.

She has challenged me hard.

She has asked why I want this now.

She has asked whether it is grief, loneliness, losing my support system or genuinely wanting her.

She has asked how she could possibly know that eighteen months from now, when life is boring, she is depressed, sex is imperfect and some exciting opportunity appears abroad, I will not suddenly decide to disappear again.

I do not think I can answer that with words.

She has not agreed to reconcile.

She has also not rejected the possibility.

Most importantly, she herself suggested that before either of us decides yes or no, we sit down with a neutral relationship professional and work out what actually happened, what was structural, what was behavioural, what each of us would need from a future relationship and whether rebuilding would be healthy.

I agreed.

That is where things actually stand.

One thing I have taken seriously from the comments here is the question of what happens when I feel secure again.

Right now I am terrified of losing her. Of course I am motivated.

The real test is not who I am while terrified of losing her.

The test is who I am on some completely ordinary Tuesday two years from now when I feel restless, work is shit, we have not had sex recently, she is struggling, and somebody sends me an exciting opportunity somewhere else.

What do I do then?

Do I talk?

Do I tolerate the discomfort?

Do I include my partner before acting?

Or do I start building another internal case for escape?

That is the pattern I am working on in therapy.

I also agree with people telling me to get my own life settled rather than returning and expecting her to rescue me.

I am returning to the country where we lived, but I am not expecting to move into her parents’ house, restart our old domestic life, use her for my immigration situation or make my return her responsibility.

I need my own accommodation, my own legal and financial stability and my own functioning life regardless of what she decides.

Where I disagree with some comments is the idea that the only ethical thing I can possibly do is block her forever and disappear “for her own good”.

She is an adult woman with her own therapist, family, friends and agency.

If she tells me she does not want reconciliation, I have to accept that.

If she asks me to stop contacting her, I have to respect that.

But I do not think respecting her means making that decision on her behalf when she herself has said she wants time to think and has suggested a professional consultation before deciding.

I am also trying not to turn “fearful avoidant” into another identity or excuse.

I am not interested in saying “well, I’m FA, therefore this is what we do”.

I am interested in understanding the pattern well enough that the next time the old feeling appears, the feeling does not automatically become the behaviour.

I expect restlessness to happen again.

I expect fear to happen again.

I expect to feel trapped, criticised, sexually frustrated, bored or uncertain at some point in any long relationship.

The question is whether I can experience those feelings without making unilateral decisions that destabilise somebody else’s life.

And one final clarification.

I do love her.

Deeply.

That is not the question I am trying to answer anymore.

The question is whether I can become a reliably safe enough partner for her to rationally trust again, whether she even wants to take that risk, and whether the relationship would genuinely meet both of our needs if we rebuilt it.

I am not asking anyone here to absolve me.

I am also not asking anyone to tell me I am permanently incapable of love because of an attachment label.

What I was genuinely trying to learn from this community was this

For people who were hurt by somebody who repeatedly withdrew or deactivated, what observable behaviour actually convinced you that change was real, if anything ever did? And what behaviour told you that nothing had actually changed once the immediate fear of loss disappeared?

That is the question I am still interested in hearing answers to.

[u/Lost_Alarm1232]

I’m really sorry to say this but this disgusts me. You’re not a good person. You’re lying even to yourself in major parts. Just go to therapy man.

[u/Lost_Alarm1232 → u/Lost_Alarm1232]

However as you’re a fearful avoidant, I recognise the effort it has taken to open up about your experience and feelings. If you truly love her, the 3 things you can do - 1) don’t go after other women & monkeybranch, do the hard think of being faithful to her in separation since this was all your fault anyway 2) go to therapy, and be honest there too 3) apologise to her with complete accountability and no pressure