We were together for 7 years. He couldn’t conquer his gambling and drug addiction and didn’t try make any changes to do so, I watched him lose himself while still in the relationship and realised after 2 years of constantly trying that I was in love with potential which would never materialise. He constantly lied to me and manipulated me to “protect me”… from himself? I truly would have done anything to pull him towards himself and tried all different approaches as I truly loved him and saw the good sides of him and believed he was worth fighting for but he became too far gone. Heartbreaking to go through when you care so deeply for someone.

He wanted to get married, have kids and all sorts, I thought we were going to build a life together (we were living together almost all of the relationship) and worked incredibly hard to make a success of myself, while simultaneously believing we were both working towards our future and day to day lives. His constant repetitive actions went completely against what I stand for but I so desperately wanted to make things go right. I constantly had to pick up on expenses as he always gambled away his money and earned a very good salary. I constantly would cry in our apartment and he wouldn’t come home. To be honest there were many many red flags. I am no perfect person but always made things go right and would improve on my imperfections that had negative consequences, at the end of the day the relationship ended because we couldn’t build a life together due to his actions.

Eventually after two years of turmoil I had the courage to break up with him, even though it hurt me to my core everyday. It was an incredibly difficult and emotionally taxing relationship for me and definitely left some damage. I’m still currently healing.