I never saw the red flags.

@larson318

I've been down this road, and it's very tough. I swore off single mothers, in fact, as a result of that situation. However, years later, little did I know that I'd become a step-dad and couldn't be happier. The first situation, as I look back, just wasn't right for me. Her parents hated me, 2-year-old was a terror, and she firmly believed that raising her child with ZERO rules was right thus allowing him to stay up at all hours of the night watching TV, and that is just the start. We ended things at ten months because that was all I could take. I loved loved LOVED her, but couldn't stand her child no matter how hard I wanted it to work out. She's better off now, and so am I.

Now? I have a teenaged daughter, and I'm far better with her than I'd ever been in the past. Of course, I'm also a lot older now too, which was a factor. In my first round, I was around 20, far too young to be a step-dad to a two-year-old.

Why did I tell you all that? I suppose because I can deeply understand where you're coming from and what you must be feeling. I also went through a withdrawal process with her, because I cared so deeply for her, but it was all a package deal - all or nothing, and that wasn't going to work.

In your situation, those little things do add up and matter - as you discovered. You may have matched with her perfectly, but again the child was still the issue and when you add in the resentment, it totals up the relationship ending. She wants someone to be like a father to her son, and she will easily sacrifice many things for herself so that her son can get everything that he needs to grow and develop.

For these situations to work, there has to be a significant foundation in place, and it sounds as if you moved quite fast - even moving in together, which was also part of the issues you both faced. It was too much, too fast, too quick, which also contributed to the end result. It would have been far better if you'd dated a lot longer.

Yet, all of that is in hindsight, right?

Learn the lessons that you need to learn from this situation and always aim to never repeat them.
Grieve over the loss of your relationship, but get back into the field - and something that REALLY worked for me was finding a purpose that did not include a relationship. This means that I invested in myself, as a man, took classes, saw a therapist, and worked on my body (exercise). It all did wonders for dealing with a lot of those past issues that caused previous relationships (including the single mother to fail).

Today, that relationship I mentioned above is LONG over, but today I look back and fondly remember the times I shared with them, but also realize that I should never have been with them - yet, if I had not, I wouldn't have made several choices that followed that decision that determined my pathway to where I find myself now... and I wouldn't change where I'm at now for anything or anyone.

I think that sometimes life hands us situations like these to teach us valuable lessons we wouldn't have learned any other way. Today, I'm much wiser, better off, and while I remember those times - I also realize how unprepared and how wrong we were for one another but I couldn't see that back then. Red flags, indeed.

After I ended things with her, I moved on after a healthy and normal grieving process. As I said above, find your passion and find HEALTHY outlets for your pain and energy.

I hope that you not only find peace, but you learn a great deal about yourself - change some of those bad habits or issues, and you move on to find a relationship that is far better than the one you just left.