As Love Fades, 19 Thoughts Before Saying Goodbye

In studying the relationship decisions on whether “to stay or go,’' researchers reported interesting answers. From the Drigotas (1992) dependence model to studies by Joel (2018), it becomes apparent that relationship decisions can be stressful. The Drigotas model “asserts that the primary issue in understanding breakup decisions is degree of dependence on a relationship.”

In two studies, Joel's team pointed out that “... people can be motivated to stay in relatively unfulfilling relationships for the sake of their romantic partner.”

• At the top of the stay list: intimacy, emotional investment, and a sense of obligation.
• At the top of the leave list: a partner's personality, breach of trust, and partner withdrawal.

Despite the research findings, each person must make a decision based on personal feelings.

19 considerations when your relationship is losing its glow

1. Make a list of at least three qualities about the other person that helped you to fall in love.
2. Write at least two experiences that brought the two of you joy. Ask yourself, “Can we find that place of happiness once again?”
3. What is it that appears to be breaking down the relationship?
4. Make a brief side-by-side list of the negatives and positives.
5. If you feel the negatives outweigh the positives, ask yourself: “Is it time to say goodbye?"
6. Before telling your partner that you think the relationship is over, consider this: “If he or she were to be breaking up with me, what are the words I would want to hear?"
7. Prepare what you might say from a positive perspective: “We have shared happy times together, which I will always treasure. However, right now something is not working between us.”
8. Express your need firmly: “I need to move on.”
9. Be willing to listen, calmly, to the other person’s reaction.
10. Do not try to counter angry words. Simply listen and say, “I know this is painful.”
11. Acknowledge how difficult it is to say the words, “It is over.”
12. Be firm: “I am not telling you this so that you will do things differently. I am telling you this because I believe that this is the end of the road for us.”
13. Decide in advance how to answer your partner if he or she asks, “Couldn’t we give it another try?" Or "Could we go to counseling?"
14. In considering your response, realize that "another try" is often dependent upon conditions and promises made in the past that often were not kept.
15. If you think the relationship can be salvaged, you love the other person, and he or she is serious about making a commitment to stay together, counseling might be helpful.
16. If you have decided in advance that therapy would be out of the question, repeat "It's over."
17. If your partner asks if there is someone else, then whether the answer is yes or no, consider replying, “This is not about another person, it is about us.”
18. Remind your partner that he or she is someone with whom you have shared happy times and you will always express gratitude when you think of those moments.
19. In your heart of hearts, do you believe that he or she is the right one for you? Or is your partner simply the one for now?

The dilemma of “the one”

Leo Buscaglia, a professor at the University of Southern California wrote the book LOVE: What Life is All About. It has been written that the book was based on his lectures in a non-credit course that he devised after the suicide of one of his students.

In his lectures and in his writings on love and loving, he questioned the concept of “The One. The Right Person.” To those waiting for the right person, he said: “I guarantee you’ll wait forever! There is no right person. You become the right person!”

Even if you decide that ending the relationship is what you wish to do, prepare for an empty feeling inside. But keep expressing gratitude for what you and your partner shared. Focus on qualities that you believe can make you happy. Then close the book on the past and move on.

_{Copyright 2024 Rita Watson, MPH.}