Relationships are complicated. They start off so good and magical and amazing, but then, one of two things happen. The happy couple gets comfortable together and figures out how to live with each other. They get married, settle down, maybe have kids, etc. The end. The other possible outcome is a break up. At some point, the couple will grow tired of each other, figure out they're not compatible, or deceive each other in some way. Everyone knows that these are the two possible outcomes when starting a relationship, but for most, the desire for a soulmate is much greater than the fear of rejection or breaking up.
These heartbroken Redditors sadly know all too well what being dumped is like. Here, they confess the worst ways a former lover cut ties with them. Content has been edited for clarity.
Better Off Without Him
“My ex-stepfather texted my mom a text meant for his secret sidepiece, using this other girl’s name and very key identifiers. Like this was a paragraph he wrote to her detailing how beautiful she and her sisters looked on Facebook (my mom has no sisters or Facebook). He said he loved her and couldn’t wait to see her again. He sent it to my mom instead.
I was helping my mom with her phone, so I was the first person who saw the text. It was one of the worst days of my life seeing my wonderful, beautiful mom get hurt by this cheating, lying cretin. But this isn’t even the worst or most sickening part.
I look up the name and do some detective work to find out who she is and the girl is the exact same age as ME. The DAUGHTER of the woman he married. I was about 23 or 24 at the time. He was in his forties; my mom was in her fifties.
He and my mom divorced, while he and the new girl got married. A year or so later, we heard through the grapevine that he got divorced again.
My mom’s thriving now; proudly single and hoping to stay that way. Normally, I would want her to not be alone, but she has her dogs and is doing so well now. I’m very proud of her.”
“I Never Got An Explanation”
“My boyfriend let me take care of him, do things for him, spend money on him, pull the load in the relationship for six months. A couple weeks ago I took him to work in the morning. He kissed and hugged me goodbye and never spoke to me again.
Over the weekend, I was out with friends and I got a call from his number. When I answered it his best friend told me he was messed up at a party and needed a ride. I was wasted, so I couldn’t get him, but I sent him my location and told him to put my boyfriend in an Uber. That didn’t happen.
The next morning, nobody could find him and his phone was dead. He had commitments with his child that day (my ex is 30, so old enough to know better), so I volunteered to go to where the house party was and see if he was there. When I pulled up, he was sitting outside and saw me. Without saying a word, he ran inside and refused to come out. He even sent someone out to yell at me.
When I texted him and told him how hurtful that was, he responded by saying ‘don’t text me anymore’ and blocked me on all social media.
I still never got an explanation, so I would say that’s a horrible way to dump someone.”
From Passionate To Pithy
“I started a very passionate relationship with someone I had been friends with for 32 years. We were communicative and intentional. We spoke of future desires of travel and even this being a life long relationship. It was very mutual.
Her life got a bit complicated between work and some heavy personal issues. Nothing huge, but it tough for her to manage. This caused our dynamic to change a bit. She needed to focus on these things and do a little self care in the process. We continued to communicate openly, and we both expressed our desires for things to continue.
She sent me a text she was going to meet a co-worker for a little social time. We agreed to talk when she got home. I didn’t hear from her that night. I sent one text checking in. No response.
The following morning, she calls and tells me she was at her friend’s place, hadn’t been feeling well, and ended up sleeping on their couch. I wasn’t happy about the lack of contact, but this was literally a first offense.
Later that day, we had a date planned. We went to dinner, spent some time at her home, talking, etc. She claimed to be very tired, so it was an early night. Again, she had always been honest with me, so I was okay with having a short evening.
I called her the following morning to see how she was feeling. We spoke for a few minutes before a family member was calling her. She said she would call me back.
She didn’t call back and hardly responded to my texts for the next three days. Finally, I caught her early in the morning and asked for her to explain what was going on. We spoke the following evening when she informed me she’s really struggling and doesn’t feel she has anything to give to our relationship until some big things in her life are taken care of. I was bummed, but understood that she had these needs. I expressed that I’d like to continue seeing her when possible. I asked her what her feelings were towards me. She responded by saying something along the lines of she cared about me as a person. It was a vast change from just recently.
We spoke a few days later (there had been some texts) and I made it known that I had missed speaking with her. She did not reciprocate. I told her that her lack or reciprocation was a bit surprising to me. She told me that my reaction made her feel anxious. I backed off, but also felt I was pretty gently expressing my feelings.
Over the next couple weeks, she would ignore or barely respond to my texts, of which there were just a few. Often she would reply hours later or the next day. It was all pedestrian small talk. Anything beyond that would be ignored. I wished her a Happy Mother’s Day and received no response. I grew tired of it and stopped trying to communicate. Two weeks later, she sent a pithy ‘hope you are well’ text. I replied the following day with an equally pithy response.
Up until this point, I was really hurting and was quite heart broken. She seemed to have the ability to go from high passion romance to lack of interest in a quick manner. Her communication told me she really didn’t care about me, and I was extremely confused.
Recently she posted a photo of herself and her new man. A quick glance and it became clear to me that they are co-workers. A little more looking and it becomes clear this was likely the person she was with the night she didn’t contact me and slept on ‘their’ couch. All the confusion I had melted. She hadn’t switched off her emotions and feelings for me, she transferred them to this new guy. I can’t say for sure she cheated on me, but it seems at least a strong possibility. If nothing else she had engaged in an emotional relationship.
In the end, she wasn’t all that honest, and she was more than willing to throw away both our relationship and long friendship.”
“Can’t Wait For This Drama!”
“My first boyfriend ever posted a Facebook status that said, ‘Can’t wait for this drama!’
He then proceeded to change his relationship status from me to another girl, and his profile picture from us to one of him and that same girl. This all happened while he knew I was in one of my lectures.
I got out, checked Facebook, saw it all, and that was that. He always had a flair for the dramatics and I was over it. I never spoke to him again.
I got an A in that lecture too, so forget you Bryan.”
How Could He Be So Clueless?
“I saw a woman absolutely lose it at a restaurant after her boyfriend commented that she should really consider coming to his work for a swim after hours because she was looking kind of chubby (I’m assuming this is not the first time he said this, and clearly she was not chubby).
She screamed and started throwing spaghetti at him. She just learned she was sick and was actually underweight. She dumped him and as she stormed away told him to get with a skeleton if it wasn’t too fat for him.
The poor fool was still sitting on the curb in the rain when I was leaving, and against my better judgment, I gave him a lift to his apartment a few blocks away. I tried not to pry, but he spent the whole time talking about his side of the story…and he was an idiot (he admitted it).”
She Deserves Way Better
“I thought everything was going well with my (ex) boyfriend. We’d been friends for years, and finally got together. After six months of being together officially, I invited him over for dinner (cooking is not my thing, so I went to a lot of effort to make it a special evening). When the door bell rang, I opened the door to find him dressed in a very nice suit – I assumed he was going the extra mile and had dressed up for the occasion and suddenly felt very under dressed. Before I could say anything, he said ‘I’m not coming in, I’m just stopping by to let you know that it’s not working out, and I’m actually running late to go out for dinner with some friends.’
I, of course, assumed he was joking because it was so absurd and out of the blue. Turns out, he wasn’t joking. When I asked for some sort of explanation, he informed me that he was running late. I eventually managed to convince him to come back after the meal, so he could explain what was going on. When he came back, a couple of my friends had come over to comfort me, as I was in shock, so he stormed off saying, ‘Well, you obviously don’t need me after all!’
The explanation that I eventually got from him was that his feelings for me were distracting him from his work (he was a newly qualified airline pilot). He said his insane jealousy meant that whenever he came into land at the local airport, all he could think about was that I was somewhere out there cheating on him. For the record, I have never cheated on anyone in my life and was completely besotted with him. He had no reason to feel this way. Alarm bells!
A month later, he begged to get back with me because he couldn’t stop thinking about me. I foolishly took him back.
The second time he broke up with me, I sent him a message via Whatsapp (he was flying at the time) to let him know that I was having an awful day. I had just lost my job as my company was closing down, found out the house I was renting was being sold and I had two weeks to find somewhere new to live, which would be near impossible without a job. I had been hit by a car as I cycled to the airport to meet him after he finished work, and was now on my way to hospital with a broken arm.
When he landed, he replied to my Whatsapp message with ‘Well, as you’re already having a bad day, I guess I should probably let you know that this just isn’t going to work out. I want to call it a day.’
He didn’t answer my calls or messages for several days. Again, when I eventually managed to get a response out of him, and we met up to discuss it, he informed me that his family felt I was too common for him (he is from a wealthy family; I am not) and that he felt he was better suited to going out with the type of girls that he had seen at Ascot Racecourse the few weeks before.
I was absolutely heartbroken for a few years after that, and he completely destroyed my self-confidence.
Suffice to say, I have grown up since then and realized what a complete and utter loser he is, and that I deserve better than that!”
Breaking Up Is Hard Enough Without Breaking Wind
“I was dating a guy who was very into me very quickly into our relationship. I laid out for him from the get go that I was just looking for something casual, and he said he agreed and was absolutely on board with that.
The same night that I drilled ‘something casual’ in for the third time (…on our third date), he made jokes about owning a house together, installed weird software on my computer, and asked to meet my friends and family. It was bad enough as is, but the cherry on top was when we got back to my place after dinner, he asked me to help him wrap some presents, which I found out later were for my family, my roommate, and me. Just out of the blue, here are some presents.
I asked him to leave that night because he was just too over the top.
The next night, I was out with some friends who convinced me to break up with him while wasted over text. And I did, I texted him that he deserved someone more committed, and I was just looking for a fling.
Well that didn’t stick. That night, he showed up at my apartment and asked me to buzz him in so we could talk. Absolutely not.
The next day, after he’d called me all night and day, I finally texted him and said, ‘If what you have to say is so important, let’s meet at Starbucks.’
And we did. Because I was young and a sucker. He was just there to guilt me, as anyone with any experience would know, into getting back with him.
But 15 minutes in, two really scraggly men, probably homeless, decided to sit at the table right next to us and have an honest-to-god fart-off. They were sitting at the table, taking bites of sandwiches, giggling, leaning to one side, letting ‘er rip, rinse and repeat.
So yeah, the worst way to break up with a guy would be by laughing so hard you cried at two hobos farting for an hour straight, while he sobs into his arms on the other side of the table.”
Even The Good Memories Are Painful Now
“I was with this girl for two years. Everything was going great. There were occasional fights, but they were small, and we ended up joking over most of them. It was a good relationship.
She invited me to go on vacation with her and her family. I said yes and went and everything was great. Midway through the vacation, she broke up with me because I was ‘distracting her from her future’ (school and such)…on vacation? She said she just didn’t think she could focus on school when we got back home if we were still together, because I was ‘all she thought about.’
I asked if she planned on getting back together after school was finished? Expecting her to say yes or maybe or we’ll see, I got an abrupt ‘No, definitely not.’
In the scenario that school was going on and she had issues focusing, sure, that sounds understandable…a little. But on vacation? With her family? 18 hours away from home and I’m stuck in a torturous state around her family? What gives?
I was a total wreck the entire ‘vacation’ obviously.
After I got back from the vacation and said goodbye to everyone and thanked them for taking me with them, I apologized as well for crying so much at random. They just said they understood and were very sorry about everything that happened.
My now ex, walked up to me before I left and said, ‘at least you’ll have a bad memory and not a good one, so it’ll be easier to live with now that you won’t see me again.’ That part messed me up. Who says that to someone?
The drive from her house back to my house, I can’t describe the emotions I felt after hearing that.
A week later, I got a text from a girl who was previously (key word: previously) her best friend. I found out that my ex was cheating on me for six months at that point with her ex from high school. I then realized what was really going on and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t really hit me hard…like really hard.
It’s been a year since that all happened and, to this day, I hope she gets what she deserves. I don’t understand what I did to deserve that at all…but I guess things happen and that’s life? She’s still with that guy and I’m personally not planning on dating ever again. I have trust issues that I doubt can be fixed because of past relationships, she in-particular is a big reason for that.
The thing that hurts the most is I have so many good memories from those two years that I don’t want to remember because they remind me of something so much more painful. What lesson is there to learn? What can I learn from something like that? I trusted her with everything in me, she made me genuinely happy and out of nowhere it vanished. It’s been a year and I still don’t understand what I did wrong. Honestly, I wish I did do something wrong because this feeling is something I can’t get rid of.”
She Crushed Him At The Last Moment
“About 10 years ago, my then girlfriend spent a year living abroad and working as an au pair, as many people do after school. At this point, we had been together for about seven years.
Basically, the relationship was already falling apart because of the long distance (but inexperienced me refused to see that of course) and when her time abroad was almost over, I had the opportunity to visit her for a few days.
A couple of days before I came to visit, she broke the news that she wasn’t sure about us anymore and that she probably wanted to break up. She was willing to give me a chance though and told me to still come to visit to see if she was still ‘feeling’ it.
So I hauled over to her hoping for the best, fearing for the worst. Maximum anxiety for the duration of my stay ensues. She gives me no clear hint of how she is feeling during the time. We spend time together, sleep together, you know behave like a normal couple.
On my last day there, she tells me that it’s over, and she doesn’t feel anything for me anymore. This was about three hours before my flight back.
A couple of days, later we get in contact just so she can tell me that she started seeing the guy she literally told me not to worry about.
The whole ordeal really messed with my head for a long time. I have always struggled with depression, but this breakup really brought me to my knees. Just the feeling of not being good enough for someone else.
It would have been infinitely easier on me if we broke up a year earlier and not have left me hanging for a year only to crush me at the last moment.”
She Could Have Saved Him A Trip
“My first year at college, I was in a long distance relationship with a girl from back home. I didn’t have a car at the time, so I had to take a bus if I ever wanted to make the 300-mile trip back home. I tried taking a bus to visit her a few months in, but the bus was cancelled for maintenance issues.
Fast forward a month later and I book another one. At this point, we had been talking about how we were both so excited to see each other since my last visit hadn’t panned out. I got on the bus, put in my headphones and dozed off. About an hour into the bus ride I get a call from her, and she asks ‘hey I’ve been thinking we should just be friends from now on.’
This girl waited until I was on the bus heading to her to break up with me, after months of telling me how excited she was that I would finally be able to visit. That, ladies and gentlemen, is the worst way to break up with someone.”
Bitter And Heartbroken
“I was working away in another country for a year and would come back for a week every few months. To make up for being away, I’d spoil her with gifts, get flowers delivered to her house, buy her massages/fuel/food vouchers she could use whenever. This was on top of messaging her and video calling whenever I could, despite the unfriendly time zones. Basically I was doing what I could with the position I was in. The plan was to buy us a house when I got back – it was a whole reason for me taking the job in the first place.
The year was up and I gave her my flight details for my last trip home. She wanted to pick me up from the airport. She messaged me an hour before I got on the plane to tell me she had been cheating with her ex pretty much the entire time I was away and that were over because ‘she needs some time to herself.’
I was bitter and heartbroken, but fell on my feet and met the best girl ever a month later. I ended up taking the new girlfriend on a year long world trip with some money I’d saved. The ex found out about this and completely flipped her lid. My God, it still feels good even today.”