She cheated on me. Multiple times. On her trip to Europe -- which she is still on. I saw the Facebook messages on the computer where she was still logged in. Then she lied when I called her on it. This all happened about 4 hours ago. I’m at a bit of a loss. I was planning our engagement. I’m glad it happened now I guess. Very rough though.

I found a credit card statement on the floor once, just before a family holiday. He had a accumulated thousands in debt that he'd never told me about. I'd been paying the rent entirely by myself, working in a job I hated, and I was too young and naïve (23) to realize he wasn't an honest man. That was it.

We still chat every now and again. We wanted different things in life, so the argument that followed was the straw that broke the camel's back. My next partner (now husband) had a lot of debt from a failed business, but the difference was he was honest about it, so I didn't care. Money doesn't trump love, but honesty is the bedrock of any relationship.

She was in love with my best friend, and they were both in denial about it. They were engaged a month after we broke up.

They both told me nothing physical happened, and I believe them. But they hung out a lot (which was pretty normal because we were all friends in high school) and I'm pretty sure they were already emotionally involved because she started to drift away from me.

They were both nice about it and asked if I'd be okay. I said yes because they seemed like they would be happy together and I cared about them both -- but I don't hang out with them all that much because as nice as I try to be about it I still feel betrayed. I still talk to my best friend every once in a while, but it doesn't ever really get any deeper than texting, "What are you up to these days?"

She wanted to go to Florida for the Disney college program. (She is a huuuge Disney nerd). But she was too scared she would lose me. I convinced her to do it because if she didn't she would regret it forever, and that no matter what happened I would still be here for her. 6 months and an engagement ring later she told me that while in Florida she realized she didn't love me like she thought she had. The ring is in a box in the back of a drawer in my dresser. Her worst fear came true. So did mine.

My mom was dying. It would be my last Thanksgiving with her. Without discussing it with me first, my fiancé had his mom buy him plane tickets to spend Thanksgiving with his parents and asked if I wanted to go with him. No, I am not missing the last Thanksgiving I can ever spend with my mom. We will have our whole lives to spend Thanksgiving with your family after this. You’re leaving me to face this one alone, or to abandon my mother on her last Thanksgiving?

It was suddenly very clear that he didn’t want to be in a relationship with me, but he wouldn’t break up with me because my mom was dying and he was too nice a guy to dump his fiancée when I was going through such a rough patch.

To his credit, we remained close friends and he continued to be there as my best friend and emotional support through her death, and some months following. Although it was 8 years ago, we still chat/text a few times a year, and catch up on how our families are doing.

She threatened to kill herself if I ever left her. She is alive; I made sure she got the help she needed, contacted public safety and her folks, and then cut all ties.

I found out the guy was no longer working when I called to see why his paychecks hadn’t come in. (I handled the finances for us, and he kept saying his boss would be sending it.) It turned out he quit, and instead of telling me, spent the next few weeks pretending to work. Instead he started going to strip clubs on with what little money he had hoarded.

When I went to break it off with him, he punched his hand through the wall and lost his mind. By the time he finally calmed down, he had turned strangely morose. He looked at me and asked if we could have sex one last time. I told him no.

After a long pause, he sifted through his pockets and held out a dollar bill. "I’ll pay you a dollar to sleep with me. It’s all I have left."

Needless to say, he left with a dollar in his pocket and no final goodbye.

He was completely unable to manage money, spending every dollar he came across on gaming and substances and constantly put off paying important bills. I would be bankrupt if I had stayed with him.

I moved across the world for him. He kept telling me, “One day I want to propose.” Or, “I can’t wait for you to be my wife.” That proposal never came, and I was having visa issues, so after a few years I gave up and moved back.

We had been dating for over 2 years, and engaged for about 6 months.

Then one night, she bit me twice. I slapped her once, and she called the cops.

We had been drinking (of course) and got in to an argument about something stupid, and I wanted to let it all go until the morning when we could talk about it soberly. But she was doing that thing she had been doing for a while at that point -- refusing to relent until she felt she won the argument. I was going to sleep at her apartment that night, but when she wouldn't stop arguing, I decided to get up and leave.

As I was starting to put my pants on, she tackled me in a fit of rage. Then she bit my arm so hard that she drew blood (I still have a scar). I squirmed away, but she grabbed my legs and then she bit me again, this time on my butt cheek. (I still have that scar too, only it's bigger.)

The second bite she wouldn't let go; she was gnawing at me like a dog with a chew toy. So I grabbed her hair and pulled, then slapped her.

She was shocked that I would slap her. SHOCKED. She called the cops. They showed up, saw all the blood and that I was the only one bleeding, then arrested her. I was actually kind of surprised by that, but they were reasonable.

I did not want to press charges because I was done with her, and saw no need for them at that point. Turns out the town she lived in has a domestic violence law that compels the prosecutor to file charges without needing my permission. She took a deal that put a misdeamenor on her record, and a year of probation.

About 6 weeks after this incident, I met the woman who is now my wife. This November will be our 22nd wedding anniversary. In all that time, she has never bitten me, and I have never slapped her.

We had been dating for three years. We talked constantly about getting married and what our life would be like. He went back into the military and wouldn’t commit to having a long-distance relationship with me. Because it would be “way too distracting when he’s in the field and I pop up in his mind” and he didn’t want to commit to a relationship while in the army. So we broke it off.

The real kicker is that a couple months after being away in another state, he started dating a new girl who apparently lives in the same state as me. Yikes.

She actually was quite the rude person and believed anyone who told her that acting that way was unacceptable was just trying to control her. She would always deflect and couldn't accept that people don't like blunt and rude people like her in general.

The relationship died.

We had very different ideas of what life should be like. For example, he had said he'd break up with me if I didn't get a college education. He also gave me ultimatums (twice) about moving with him to a small town. The second time I let him carry out his ultimatum.

After 2 years of constantly forgiving him for cheating on me, it wasn't until I needed to be hospitalized that I realized he didn't love me. When I needed him the most he told me, "I'm sorry, I can't take you being in there. It makes me too sad. Call me when you get out." So when I did, I told him I just wanted to be friends, but I had nothing against him. Literally a day after I called him and told him that, he made a post on Facebook saying he was dating some other girl.

I'm married now and really happy in my relationship. I definitely dodged a bullet.

He's an absolutely wonderful dude. He just thought I was a different person than I really was. He and I met during a very stressful point of my life, and he thought that if I quit doing all the things that made me "me," like volunteering, being a workaholic, helping my family, I'd be perfect. In the end, when the crazy subsided, I landed a job that made me the happiest ever, via the volunteering I was doing, and my family stabilized and wasn't quite as crazy as before.

We're both married to other people now, and thanks to social media I can see that he chose well and is super happy. I'm happy here, and honestly, I'm really grateful for the way it all worked out. Nothing wrong at all with him, and he deserves all the goodness in life he has.

She slept with both of my roommates at the same time in the middle of our apartment. Mutual friends walked in on them mid-coitus.

I asked her to marry me and she said no. It's been 7 months since then and now she's trying to get back with me saying she's made a mistake. She said I was the only voice of reason in her life and she feels so lost without me. I don't even know how to feel about that. I don't wanna be anyone's saviour.

I’m pretty sure he lost his mind.

He was constantly accusing me of cheating, going through my phone and emails, jumping down my throat if I ran late at work. He would call my work when he found something he felt was incriminating to berate me and threaten to throw me out.

For example, he took texts and emails he found between me and another guy, whom I was dating during a 9-month period where we’d broken up, and used that to attack me because even though we were broken up at the time "we still meant something to each other" and I shouldn’t have done it.

He was so cruel. He’d put me down and make me cry, then mock me for it. Anytime I tried to defend myself he’d tell me he was the only thing standing between me and standing in line at the Salvation Army and to be careful how I spoke to him. I was on my knees at one point, begging and crying for him not to leave me. I loved that man like a senseless fool.

Everything kind of blew up when I went to the beach for a day with a friend and he basically accused me of screwing my way up and down the coast. I couldn’t do it anymore. I had reached the event horizon for my tolerance of emotional manipulation and abuse.

A huge argument ensued during which we broke up. I got home and he’d already packed my stuff. I left right then. Yes, I was homeless for a bit, but I had my dignity and self-respect back.

Both of us were drinkers.

I met him at age 22, he was 26. Love at first sight. It was immediately understood without even speaking of it that we were just going to be together now, and that was that for 2.5 years.

My mom and dad were both alcoholics and it ruined my childhood. I had a drinking problem myself that I didn’t understand yet. My drinking increased when we began dating because it seemed so normal to indulge more with him. The more I drank, the more neurotic and needy I became. The more he drank, the more he just faded away from the world.

He always drank to the point of blacking out and I hated it. I would see his facial expression go kind of blank while we were out, and I’d know he was blacked out; nothing there, dead behind the eyes. And I’d wonder where the guy I loved was.

Seeing him like that would always trigger this really lonely and dark sadness inside me. I felt invisible like I did to my parents my whole childhood.

After some time of cyclical arguments (usually while both of us were under the influence) I started to realize he didn’t feel like he had an issue, and I wasn’t sure he would ever face it. I wanted to face my issues -- to win a better life and better mental health. He was not in favor of making changes.

He had socialized with the same group of guys since he was 5, all of whom partied regularly, and his dad was into it too. They were from a privileged, upper-middle class kind of circle where binging was just normal because they went to more expensive bars and only drank craft beers and whatnot. I knew if I didn’t get away from that lifestyle, I was going to end up miserable or maybe even dead.

I still fight for my sobriety every day. He just got married last month. I saw photos from the wedding, where he had a drink in his hand in every photo and the same blank expression I could never cope with. I wish him the best, and I still miss him everyday.

It got to a point where he wasn't working or going to school, and just totally lacked ambition. After all the support and trying to push him to do more, I was done.

I was extremely young and in puppy love. A condition to me even dating him that he was no longer to use substances. I knew he was a user previously and he had asked me out many times during that period. I declined until he was clean and sober. Eventually he was so determined to have me that he got clean.

Later on I found out once he got comfortable with our relationship he was using behind my back, among other things. He, for some unbeknown reason, told his entire family I was pregnant. I was not pregnant and never have been. I never lied to him about being pregnant either. This lie turned my life upside down. It didn’t end well, so I broke it off. Now he’s married with four (actual) kids.

It was too soon to say whether we'd get married, but I was hoping it would turn out that way. He moved for a job, and didn't commit to doing some of the most basic long-distance relationship things. It's terrible to have to break up with someone you want to love because they don't have the decency to break up with you themselves.

We weren't engaged or anything but I thought he would be the one I would be with till the very end. But then my dad died and he never once asked if I was okay, nor did he offer any kind of support. That's when I realized that we just don't have the same values where it matters so I broke up with him. We have remained really good friends though and still hang out sometimes.

She asked me to marry her. She was 22, I was 28. I was her first serious relationship.

We were together 4 years beforehand, and I loved her SO MUCH. But I was like... "Are you sure this is what you want? Are you sure you've lived enough and had enough experiences, and won't regret t later?" She kept insisting that yes, she was sure, and would I please stop doubting her.

We got married. Then she realized she hadn't lived enough and dumped me.

During the following years I thought a lot, dated a lot, tried to find myself. And I understood there is no "the one." There are only people who make you happy and people who don't. And sometimes someone who used to make you super happy doesn't anymore. It's okay. Life isn't a Disney movie. It's just about doing the best you can.

I knew it was over when she ran away with her girlfriend.

He was obsessed with making me look and speak better. He would control my food intake and make me exercise everyday. Whenever I was out with him I would have to wear heels, dress well, and he would point out what other girls were wearing and insist I try to look more like them. Putting make up on was a must even when we were on an airplane.

I wasn't allow to speak other languages aside from English and wasn't allowed to watch TV dramas because he didn't like them.

My last straw was him asking me to consider to getting a breast enhancement when I lost so much weight from all the exercise and dieting he had pressed me to do. I realized I couldn't live this way anymore and he would never be satisfied.

Even though I still love him, I was mentally drained and constantly felt that I was ugly and unworthy.

I've been engaged twice. First one ended after meeting my family for the first time. My fiancé made fun of my brother, who is very intelligent but sometimes socially awkward, for half the ride home. I slept on it, then gave the ring back the next day. Screw that guy.

The second engagement, we dated for 3 years and got engaged after 2. The closer it got, the more he decided he wanted to have children immediately, wanted me to stay home with them, and then said, "Knowing that, I'm wondering if it's worth it for you to continue grad school." (I was just starting my second year of my master's program.) Buh-bye.

I didn't want any kids and I wanted to be allowed to work. He wanted a housewife and a large family. I was willing to settle on a compromise: 2 kids and I still got to work. He left me for it because I wouldn't be exactly what he wanted. He married someone else later who did exactly what he wanted and he was miserable with her and was attempting to take a mutual friend as his mistress. I dodged a bullet.

My high school boyfriend and I definitely would have gotten married if I'd stayed in the relationship. We were planning on it, both going to college in the same city, etc. And we really loved each other a lot. I say this now as someone in her thirties with several years of marriage under her belt -- this high school boyfriend and I had a bona-fide relationship going.

A month before leaving for college, my family took our annual summer vacation trip to New England. Boyfriend came along, as he had for the past two summers. I don't know what changed, exactly, but at some point during the trip, a switch flipped. I realized that left to itself, our relationship would in fact continue through college, through grad school, boyfriend would become a lawyer, I would become a teacher... In one moment, I just saw the whole thing, and I wanted none of it.

As attractive and awesome as I found my high school boyfriend, I knew that was what he wanted -- stay in our hometown, live a life exactly like the one he grew up with. For whatever reason, it turned me off completely. I broke up with him over that vacation and spent the rest of summer vacation crying my eyes out because he took all our mutual friends with him. Nobody understood why we broke up -- least of all me, to be honest. I just knew that I had to end it because if I waited it would get harder.

Over a decade later, time has proven me very right. Boyfriend took less than a year to start dating another girl from our high school class. They live in our hometown, just popped out a kid. He's a lawyer, works for the law firm of a friend of his dad's. I assume they're living in a house their parents bought them in the town we're from. He's living the life he's always wanted to live.

I would be so unhappy if I'd stayed in the life I knew my high school boyfriend wanted. I have no idea how my 18 year old self knew it, but I'm sure glad I listened to that feeling in my gut.

She cheated on me. Though, going through that made me learn a lot about myself and readjust my standards. So in an odd way, I'm thankful that happened.

Went back with him to visit his family in the UK for a month. I'm Chinese and he's Scottish. I found that he's an extremely selfish, self-centered spoiled brat, but his family thinks he's an angel and expected me to bow to him as they all did. Worst of all, he was never this way when we were dating here in my country where he's an expat, but his true colors shone when he was back with his family.

We moved in together too young and tried to be adults too fast. I should’ve known things were not going to work out when he tried to convince me to buy a house with him at 19. In Southern California. On two retail employees’ wages. Like, WHAT?!?

We were high school sweethearts. He was smart and ambitious. But he also loved to spend money, and worked insane hours to try to make up the deficit. After we moved in together, his work schedule changed so I was working morning shifts, and would literally pass him in the driveway as he left for his night shifts. There would be several days in a row where we wouldn’t see each other, and when we did see each other we were too broke to do anything fun.

We went on a trip with his family after a big fight, where I begged him not to ask me to marry him. I told him I wasn’t sure how I felt anymore, I was unhappy and he seemed unhappy. We had both become a workaholics to try to keep up with the expenses.

I wanted to see if the vacation would bring a spark back into our relationship, then maybe we could work ourselves back into normalcy.

He didn’t listen and asked me to marry him in front of his entire family, surrounded by strangers, hundreds of miles away from home. I was 21, and had no idea how to say no. Our engagement lasted 9 days, because that’s all I could stomach while thinking about spending my life with someone I wasn’t in love with.

I have no idea what he’s up to now, but I’ve found my soulmate so I’m peachy keen.

She became very dependent on me. She didn't have many friends, nor any opportunities to go out and make any because she didn't have drive to do anything other than just sit at home and do nothing. No motivation to play any sports or get a job. This sabotaged my life as I'd always be spending time and money on her because she couldn't afford anything herself.

She ended up being an emotional toll as she had mental issues and I thought leaving her would just make it worse. But I'm so glad I left. It lifted a weight off my shoulders and allowed me to achieve a lot more than I was when I was with her

We figured out that while we love each other, we don't like each other as much as we used to. We were becoming less and less close (physically and emotionally) and even getting lost in our travel-adventures could only keep us together for so long. Oddly, she could be one of those sweetest most thoughtful people you'll ever meet, but could flip a switch at the worst times.

Breaking it off after 6 years was one of the most adult and most painful things I've ever done in my life. I made 5 women cry that day, her, our moms and my sisters (I also cried like a girl). I half-joke that I may end up just dying alone to avoid a mess like that again.

We had an intense attraction to each other but there were two reasons I had to walk away. Firstly, he was very jealous and controlling. I couldn't say hi to someone in passing without getting grilled about who he was, how I knew him, was I talking to him secretly, did I wish I was dating him, etc.

Second -- our ambitions didn't match up. I wanted more out of life than he did. I wanted a professional degree and he wanted to work on cars. There is nothing wrong with that at all but our paths to our preferred destinations took us in very different directions.

I still think of him and wonder, but I've been happily married for more than 25 years.

I was in nursing school at the time he and I got together. I was in a transitionary period in my life where my career wasn’t set, so I rationalized that it was okay that he worked a minimum wage job at 30 years old. After all, I wasn’t sure where my life was headed either.

A few years into our relationship, we talked about marriage a lot. He was still working a low-wage, dead end job -- his sixth such job in two years, with no clear plan at all. Any attempts to lead him into a grownup job were always met with negativity and dismissal. He could work overtime, though, at his pizza job.

He told me that he was going to save up money to buy me a ring. Instead, he bought a $2,000 mountain bike that sat in our garage. He never worked out or enjoyed active things, so it was a purchase that didn’t make sense. He never saved for my ring but still talked about marrying me. I hated going into my garage after that.

Fast-forward a year later, and I’m a nurse. He is working a new minimum wage job (his eighth in 3 years) and spending all of my money on things like gun parts, a clunker of a car he was going to “fix up,” and a ton of other hobby items that he never used and eventually sold for half their value.

It came down to the fact that I knew I’d have to support him and any kids we might have, which would be no easy feat. It also didn’t help that he refused to do household chores and spent his free time playing video games while I hiked, kayaked, and went out to social gatherings without him. We grew apart.

I decided we were better as friends and called it quits. I still feel terrible about it because we had so much fun together! We simply weren’t compatible enough to go long term.

I think the final nail in the coffin was when he told me he wasn’t sure he wanted to have kids anymore, and he knew that was a deal-breaker for me.

He cheated and got another woman pregnant. Then he called me a few weeks later asking me to be the child's godmother because he knows I'm "really good with kids." What a guy.

He went to Europe and fell in love with someone else. I was at home going through chemotherapy and a leg amputation. He came home and kept seeing the girl to avoid my situation, even though he promised he wouldn't. It was too much for him coming home from a fun holiday to his girlfriend of six years on the edge of dying.

I lost a limb to stay alive, but my bigger loss was him when he decided to leave for the Europe girl. We still talked and stayed friends. The Europe girl ended up leaving him because he didn't want a relationship and she felt used. After my treatment finished and I was back up and walking again on a prosthetic, I met a couple of guys who loved me for who I was and not what I looked like. But today, I am single by choice. I want to focus on me and become happy with who I am before I share my happiness with someone else.