What to do when He/She Leaves?
Assuming you want her (him) back.
People frequently come to me with this problem. Actually, this is my most read article. To me that suggests that a whole pile of people only “really wake up” when their partner starts to pull away. And you are probably one of them, right now. I feel for you. You’ve probably done a whole bunch of things “wrong” and don’t know what for sure. I am sorry it took you so long to wake up. A lot of my work, shared here on this website, is for you. Take your time, breathe and read on. Take heart! Waking up is always a good idea – at least in the long run.
First job is to turn your partner around, or at least halt their moving away. Some years ago, in 1998 I believe, I came up with a short set of answers to this situation and have not felt the need to change them since. It works. Follow the four steps. Print this Article in PDF
1. GIVE UP ALL SIGNS OF PUSHING.
This is very important. Your partner is already moving away. Anything you do to push them will tend to make them move away faster and further. Stop anything that might be construed as pursuing or pressing them. If your instinct is to call them twice a day, start calling them once a week. If your instinct is to send them a gift, do it once a month. If you are trying to find out what they are doing by asking other people, don’t. Leave them alone – a lot, but not completely. (I do not recommend “no contact.” (See my article When to Fold ‘Em.) Let your partner contact you when they are ready. (See Reliable Membership Article.)
2. SURVIVE
Do not be surprised that you may feel awful, or sick, or depressed. This is normal when you feel left behind, abandoned. The feeling will go away – with a lot of time. We all can live alone. It’s not good for us, but we can. So, in the meantime, continue to live your life. Go to work. Eat well. Sleep well. Do more exercise. (It will help you sleep. It will help with any depression you may feel.) Be among friends. While you do this, you might consider staying away from friends of your partner’s gender. If you cannot sleep or seem very depressed, see your doctor. Some medication may be helpful for a while. If your partner speaks to you, don’t tell them how hard a time you are having. That will probably not get you the sympathy you want. Just say something like, “Well, it is tough.” And say no more.
3. WORK ON YOUR SELF, VISIBLY
See a counselor. Read books. Talk your problems over with friends, your pastor, your priest, your rabbi, etc. Learn what you can. Read my papers on Using Turtle Logic and The Two Walls. Chances are there is a lot for you to learn. Most often when a partner leaves, they have been planning it for a long time. Most often they have felt terribly lonely with you. You, on the other hand may have been taken by surprise. Ask yourself, what led you to be so unaware of your partner? What led you to be so unaware that they were in distress enough to consider leaving you? Try to not blame yourself too much. All relationship trouble takes two. And so, Get to Work. Work on yourself.
And do this work so that your partner knows. The chances are one of the reasons they are leaving you is because they believe you will never change. They have become hopeless about you ever changing for the better. By visibly working on yourself, they have to wonder what you are doing and who you are becoming. That is much better than their continuing to believe that you will never change.
When I say “visibly,” I mean that you take opportunities to let them know that you are doing something. If they call, say you only have a little time as you have to get to your counseling appointment. Say, “By the way, I’ve been reading a book on marriage. It’s interesting.” Remember to follow Rule #1, and not say much. Don’t try to “teach them.”
4. BE AVAILABLE MINIMALLY WHEN YOUR PARTNER ASKS FOR CONTACT
It is reasonable that your partner will try to contact you. They may ask for a chat. Ask, “How long?” Agree to give them half that time. They may ask for dinner together. Agree to give them a short one. They may ask for you to spend the night. Stay only through the evening. Get used to this. Think that you are trying to get a deer to come out of the forest and eat from your hand. You have to earn (or in this case, re-earn) their trust and never lose it again.
Good luck.
P.S. And when he/she stops the leaving and starts tentative connecting or checking you out, be ready. For more on this subject, particularly once you have managed to get your partner to slow down their leaving, you might want to read “Out of the Blue” means “Read the Tea Leaves”.
You will probably also want to check out my Map of Relationships to put a clear framework around what is going on and what your choices are. Being foolishly stubborn, i.e. doing what you have been doing, will probably lead back to the same “them-leaving” problem. Being stubborn about “learning-to-do-new-things” seems to be the only path.
Notes:
There are so many excellent comments submitted that I archived them in two PDF files. Aug2007–July2008 and July2008–April2010. These are good.
Click here for “all” my articles on Clingers. Avoiders.
Remember, this is just one (Reliable Membership) of the several major problems in relationships. When you solve this one, when your partner turns around and decides to consider staying with you, there are the other problems in front of you. Take a look at How to Use this Website, or Using my logic on relationships, or Where to Start. The most comprehensive place to start is always my Map of Relationships.
Good luck.
Download an audio file of me sharing 26 minutes of further discussion for $5.00.
By © Al Turtle 2002
My husband left me 2 days ago. We have had a tumultuous marriage of 12 years. Military has kept us apart for a lot of that time. During the times that we were apart, my husband had several affairs, at least 5 that I know for certain. I forgave him each time. I began to notice distance about a month ago. Not much physical contact at all and not much conversation. I began to question this and met with not much of an answer. Later, I had come to learn that even though he says he no longer has contact with any of these women, he has been in contact with at least one of them, telling her he loves her and vice versa. his explanation is that he loves her as in cares and nothing more. I came home from work Friday to find that some of his things were gone. We met for dinner that night and he told me he is leaving, he put a “hold” deposit on an apartment and that he needs space to get clarity. He could (or would) not say if he was actually moving into the apartment, but would only say he hasn’t signed a lease. He told me to give him some time and that he has until Oct 7 to decide to move in the apartment or not. Until then, he is supposed to be living with his adult son. I am truly devastated. I feel I have given so much and that there is a big mess here and he has left me to clean it up, both in reality and theoretically. I am not understanding what is happening. Any advice you can give would be appreciated.
Dear Dawn, Sorry it took so long for me to get back to you. Been on vacation away from the internet.
Two different thoughts, maybe three.
Military people (both those who are in a military-like organization and those who were raised by "military" parents) have particular trouble with relationships. Communications skills in the military are completely backward for marriage. You've heard that "the military is not a democracy!" Well a marriage is!!. A soldier has to learn to use military logic/communication at work and shift to democratic logic/communication at home. Tis quite a training to have two sets of skills like that, but I think it's pretty doable. Arguing / tumultuous conversations seem to me a sign that you two were trying to use military skills in a democracy. That won't work. In the service people don't argue because a person who disagrees with his/her superior is sent to the stockade. In a happy marriage people don't argue because both protect the other person's ability to share disagreement/differences in an agreeable fashion.
My guess is that because your communication styles were so inappropriate for an intimate relationship, there were lots of secrets. Intimacy is all about sharing it all and thus no surprises. http://www.alturtle.com/archives/1276
And if he's "fooling around" with other women, part of the problem is that you've been living a lo-intimacy relationship at home. Gotta work on that. Anyway these ideas will probably be useful in this relationship, and definitely in the next, if this goes south. http://www.alturtle.com/archives/801
Hey Al,
So I had my meeting with my ex (she was the clinger). I tried my absolute best to let her do most of the talking. I tried to stay in the present and to vaguely express the progress I have made over the 8 months. She called me out. Told me to be honest with her. She pulled out all the feelings I tried so hard not to express. I never once pressured my intentions but I did tell her how I felt. After I spilled it all to her she essentially told me we would never be together again. It was obviously not easy for her to say and I could sense how much she truly cares about me. In essence she does not want to be with anyone. She wants to explore her independence and be free to make any decision she wants. She believes that if she’s meant to be with someone, she will completely fall for them because its “meant to be”. It was apparent that no matter how much I genuinely change and no matter how much I love her, she still considers getting back together with me a step backwards at this time. She is so set on her current direction that she is willing to give up on us completely. She hasn’t experienced being single in a very long time. So I understand her desires, and I respect her decisions. At the same time, I have never quite felt this way before. I truly love her and I believe in our potential, but there are two sides that need to be on the same page. At this point, do I give up?
Mothers day weekend my husband walked out on me. We have been together 12 years and there is a very big age difference with me being the eldest. Our marriage has had its ups and downs and we have separated before but found our way back to each other. This time it feels so different. Before we use to fight a lot this time we were not fighting at all. I thought every thing was fine. He left for work one night kissed me said I love you and never came back. The situation was complicated because he only moved across the street. He is a volunteer fire fighter and we were renting a house owned by the fire department so when he left he just went across the street to stay at the station. It was like everything he did was putting it in my face. We never really went to many places that were far from the station as he didn’t want to miss a cal. Now he was never there on the weekends in stead he was out with friends male and female and was drinking and get drunk all the time, that was just not him. When we would see each other it was like he looked right through me didn’t even see me. Lines of communication all but broke down. He quit paying the rent and we were already behind so we got evicted in July and at the end of August he moved back into the house we were evicted from. I have not worked in 4 years as I have been battling breast cancer and the effects from the drugs and all the surgeries. he started feeling bad I guess and started giving me a little bit of money but not enough to live on. We would only communicate via emails or instant message I didn’t have a phone number. In the last month in a half he has messaged me more and most of the times its just to chit chat. Three months of not talking on the phone he has called a few times now. It is always about something important but then its like he doesn’t want to hang up. It really confuses me because its always during the week not the weekends and I am guessing its because of his girl friend. He has taken her to family functions and everybody we know has seen them together. He claims they are just friends but they are very close and he didn’t know her before he left its only been since July. I sometimes thing he is conflicted and I know he is being influenced by his family and friends. I Love him very much and there is a divorce pending. Its just everything. When he first left I did al the wrong things chaseing, begging the whole nine yards. Then I just stoped. Why do you think he keeps texting and why does he act concerned if I am ok or if I am mad when I dont answer him right away I dont now what to do. My heart is breaking.
Hi stumbled upon your site and browsing the past couple days. Some very interesting concepts that are certainly new to me and how I view my situation. I was dating my latest girlfriend for 11 months prior to her leaving 1 month ago. I think alot of the lizard strikes home, as she did not feel safe enough with me. From the beginning she felt I was ‘behind’ her, and never expressive enough or ‘excited enough’ to be with her, and think she always wanted more than I was ready to give at the time. We had a very strong connection though and it was the most intense I have ever felt about a partner (im 33). The last 2 months of the relationship developed into great times ruined by lots of fighting, as she would get very ‘sensitive’ about something small and I would not understand why she was ruining the evening or whatever. Now I see that she was acting out her insecurities about the bigger issues I think. She left the relationship as ‘just because we are not right now, does not mean we are not right later’ and says she still loves me. I have been heartbroken and unable to focus on anything else in my life, and unfortunatley not following the steps you outline in this article. Because she felt I was not expressive enough, I have reached several times to tell her how i really felt and say all the sweet and loving things I didnt before, as well as apologize for my part in breaking the relationship. That was mostly thru email, and once in person after we ran into each other. Response has been warmish, but then says that its ‘too hard’ to hear from me, and that we shouldnt communicate for a while. She also says she thinks may be depressed and is still struggling to get back to being herself, and only wants to focus on that, but also her friends and family are now against her restarting the relationship as well, as they view it as what caused her to be so unhappy. Where do you suggest I go from here ? Im struggling to move on and attempt to see other people and obsessing over how to reconnect.
of course i want to change, everything start with me she doesnt have many areas to work on me well i know i have alot of work to do this is why i get the reaction from her that i get, i not mad or even upset, i want to become a better person for whom ever im with , guess im far away from being with anyone at this time, will keep working on myself, well since this is were im at in my own life think it would be okay to maybe leave her alone for a few months till i get more of a grip on my emotions and other things.. ???? thanks again for replying…