It can often be pretty difficult to tell whether a couple is actually happy when you’re just their neighbor. Or, even trickier, when you went to school with one of them and are now just scrolling through their Facebook profile.
But some romantic relationships are so broken that they’re beyond repair, and Reddit user ADTID thinks this can be really evident. So, they made a post on the platform, asking everyone to share what they think are the biggest signs of a couple breaking up.
Immediately, people started sending in their answers. Here are some of the most popular ones.
#1
Having a kid to “fix” their relationship.
Image credits: ThingsOfThatNaychah
#2
When he smashes her face in the cake at the wedding and she hates it.
Image credits: A_wild_Mel_appears
#3
Social media addiction. If the person constantly needs to show the world they have an SO, and that they are just soooooo happy together, and then gets mad that the other doesn’t post as much.
Social media addiction ruins relationships
Image credits: Whitley2001
#4
I was at a party one time and there was a marriage counselor there that had been working for 20 something years in couples counseling. I asked her what the number one sign was that the couple wasn’t going to make it. Without hesitating, she said “If one person shows contempt for the others feelings, it’s over!”
Image credits: Marauder
#5
If the relationship started by one of them cheating on their previous partner and then leaving them to be with this new person. I’ve witnessed two of these irl and both of them ended with, surprise, more cheating. Like I don’t know why you’d possibly think starting a relationship with someone who you already know isn’t faithful would be a good idea.
Image credits: sapphomelon
#6
If all disagreements end in arguments. Me and my partner disagree about a lot of stuff. But we can talk, discuss, and even sometimes agree with the other person’s side. It’d be weird if you saw eye to eye on 100% of stuff too.
Image credits: jayhitter
#7
I always think of [the bird theory](https://archive.nytimes.com/op-talk.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/07/11/our-love-affair-with-predicting-divorce/). If one person says to the other, “oh look a bird” and the other doesn’t want to connect over the bird (just looking at it and giving a “hey thanks, that’s a cool bird”) the relationship is not going to go well. Basically you have to be willing to make small every day connections. I find this is true of a lot of relationships outside of romantic or sexual ones as well.
#8
When one person wants to “fix” the other. If your relationship is a repair project, you didn’t fall in love with who they are. You fell in love with what you want them to be.
#9
‘walking on eggshells’ around your partner in terms of what you can and can’t say. if you feel you can’t disagree with your partner and/or voice your opinion without it turning into an argument.
Image credits: shelby75R
#10
If they have strongly conflicted plans for their future. Either means they’ll break up eventually or one or both of them will end up in an unhappy compromise.
Image credits: slinkocat
#11
I’m a big fan of John Gottman, a researcher on marital happiness and relationship stability. He can predict with over 90% accuracy which couples will make it and which couples will divorce just by observing how they interact. His books have a lot of insight into the little things you can do to build strength and resiliency into your relationship.
According to him, it’s criticism, contempt, defensiveness and stonewalling. I think once you get to contempt, it’s difficult to recover.
#12
When they argue over insignificant things like buying the wrong type of spaghetti sauce.
Edit: The spaghetti sauce was just an example and honestly I was half asleep when I wrote the original comment. I should have switched “argue” with “full on screaming matches, insults and name-calling.” Regardless if someone bought the wrong spaghetti sauce, fights like that would happen in any toxic relationship for any reason.
Image credits: Elle12881
#13
When you start calculating how much you give and receive in a relationship.
Image credits: stma2022
#14
When we lost our child and he told me that he doesn’t believe in depression?
#15
Breaking up every few minutes and then back together again
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#16
In my experience, huge expensive weddings.
#17
The way they speak to each other when they’re not alone.
I noticed this after my divorce and I started dating again, because you speak to these new people with a lot of respect and kindness. Then we’d get around married couples and they’d saw awful things to each other in nasty snappy tones, and it was jarring.
Fast forward ten years and all those couples I noticed doing that are divorced now.
Image credits: SnoBunny1982
#18
When both make the atmosphere so uncomfortable when you are in their house.
Image credits: Big-Nerve-9574
#19
if one or both of the people are controlling over the other
Image credits: kristiidf
#20
When she pushes you because “you’re being a little b***h” while you’re going to ER for probably a broken foot.
It was Broken.
#21
Lack of communication.
Discussing every disagreement means screaming over each other, exploding, shutting off Communications and/or running out of the room.
So they won’t be able to resolve anything in a constructive manner
Image credits: Bebe_Bleau
#22
Tattoos of each others names.
Image credits: anachronistika
#23
Sexual incompatibility
Image credits: Upper-Tradition-645
#24
In my experience:
* Contempt / mockery
* Lack of communication / respect / empathy for the other person
* Glue babies
* Having a wedding as opposed to making a marriage
* With the exception of children, consistently and habitually prioritising others over their SO
Then there’s the things that for me are default dealbreakers: any kind of abuse, cheating, financial dishonesty, violence, gaslighting. This criteria also applies to their treatment of my children where applicable.
EDIT: Since I don’t seem to have been clear enough about what I meant regarding prioritising the children, what I actually meant was my children are the only people I would ever drop everything and run for, over my partner. In day to day life of course your relationship with your partner is equally important.
EDIT 2: A glue baby is having a baby in an attempt to save a relationship.
#25
Opening marriage to fix problems
#26
Getting angry at your SO for being depressed
#27
“Where are you?”
“Hanging out with my cousins.”
“Really? Vc me rn.”
#28
Being attached at the hip/never allowing your SO to have alone time or hang with other people without you. Had one friend whose GF was like this to the extreme. They spent every day and waking moment together for the first 3 months of their relationship due to her always demanding to be with him/never allowing him any alone time. Usually it comes from a place of insecurity. They lasted 3 and a half months and she went full rage crazy when they broke up.
#29
Love, to me, is a selfless thing. I think that for a long-term relationship to thrive, you need to care about your partner at least as much as you care about yourself, and your partner also needs to feel the same way.
#30
When one of them posts a giant story on some dating advice sub when the answer is almost always, “You need to talk to your partner about this.”
It’ll be the most mundane thing being blown out of proportion.
“I (22m) can’t stand when my gf (23f) chews with her mouth open. What can I do to make her stop? Should I install a limiter on her jaw so she can’t open up as wide? Should I call her mom and tell her she didn’t raise her daughter right?”
“Did you tell her?”
“No.”
Like wtf!?
#31
I heard eye rolling is the most common sign of eventual relationship failure. It shows contempt, which is poison to any type of bond.
Image credits: Old_Hamster_4218
#32
Joint Facebook account
#33
One sits alone in their car for a while before going in the house. Just… sitting.
#34
The extreme jealousy. The jealous one probably the one will commit breakup things
Image credits: inductedmelon
#35
Moving in together after two weeks. Saying I love you after two dates. Basically anything that happens way faster than it feels it should.
#36
Opening up the relationship after years of monogamy.
I’ve seen poly relationships work when they’re poly from the beginning, but from what I’ve seen amongst my circle, a sudden switch to an open relationship after a decade together is a sign that it’s about to implode.
#37
A pattern that I have noticed is that my friends that spent the very most on their wedding, I’m talking about thousands and thousands of dollars, lasted less than 2 years. My friends that got married cheaply, like me and my best friend, have stayed married. Just an observation.
Edit: typo
#38
A coworker got married. He and his wife never stopped partying separately with their friends. He would come to work and tell the same “clubbing” stories he told before he even met his wife.
Some of us had a secret bet on how long it would last.
Surprise, surprise, BOTH cheated on each other and they filed for divorce before their 1st wedding anniversary.
I bet 6 months. They made it 10 months before filing.
#39
Talking on the phone/ facetime/ texting 24/7 . Fastest way to codependency. When one of the partners can’t pay attention to their phone, the other gets sour. I’ve seen it a billion times.
#40
A recent personal experience I witnessed.
The entire immediate family of one side of a wedding said it was a bad idea and less than a month into the marriage one of them stayed at their mom’s house for the night because they were fighting.
Also they got engaged as a result of a failed break up attempt…
#41
The inability to have a conversation about a hard subject that doesn’t immediately devolve into a screaming match.
#42
Getting pregnant after getting together for less than a year.
#43
Having to explain all your expenses to your partner. Priding themselves in never getting into arguments. Or better, starting a relationship based on lies.
#44
Going out separately, every weekend. Then having children and the guy not slowing down and still going out every weekend with his friends.
#45
When they post each other too much. I get the occasional pic together but when you full on document every little thing it just comes across as wanting to prove your relationship to other people because you’re insecure
#46
If your conflict resolution method is either screaming and insults or completely shutting down.
#47
Arguing over the context/content of what a previous argument was. I walked past a couple the other day who had gone out cycling and they were standing there shouting at eachother because the girl had asked the guy to put a helmet on at some point previously and he wouldn’t let it go that she was trying to force him what to do whilst she said she was more annoyed that he wouldn’t drop it. Reminded me so much of me and my ex before we broke up.
#48
Just arguing all the time. Doesn’t matter what about. These things should not be public
#49
All of us saw could predict that our ex-flat mate who moved out to move in with her Boyfriend of like 2-3months would not last long. Mainly cause;
He was the jealous type who was even uncomfortable with other guys just being in her room, especially them sitting on her bed (our rooms were small so was a normal/default place to sit).
And she really liked the angry jealous sex that happened whenever she deliberately antagonised him by flirting with other people.
Yeah, they lasted another ~2-3 months or so.
#50
Fighting one minute and then acting all cutesy the next. Both of you are unhinged as f**k.
#51
Lack of mutual respect
#52
“I am so lucky to have you, you are my world, Iove you sooooo much” All on Facebook, when they’re in the same room.
#53
When they don’t know how to fight! Not fighting in a healthy way or being able to talk about your problems will kill any relationship no matter how much you like them
#54
If they’re in their nineties.
#55
Based on a study of relationship survivability: the number of negative events vs positive events. You need 5 to 1 positive moments for a relationship to succeed.
#56
We’re literally the same person
#57
“Happy One Month Anniversary, Baby!”
Image credits: algaebomb