The Easiest Way to Get Nothing Out of a Relationship

She thought she loved him. She thought they’d be together forever. She thought she’d found her prince, and she wanted the fairytale. So, she didn’t raise her voice. She didn’t create any objections. She went with the flow all the time. She wanted to keep things light. She didn’t want to make a fuss when things weren’t perfect.

He started showing up late or sometimes not at all. She pretended she didn’t notice. She never complained. She signed off on his excuses. Eventually, he quit offering them. He didn’t have to answer to her or explain himself. She didn’t require it. So, he didn’t bother. It was pretty simple. He quit being romantic. He quit making an effort. She didn’t want to nag. She didn’t want to be “that” woman. She didn’t want to be difficult or high maintenance.

And it worked, or so she thought. The day she walked down the aisle, wearing in her mother’s wedding dress, marrying the man she thought she loved, she thought they’d have a perfect life together. They were getting married after all. It felt like everything was going to be alright on that day. The pictures were so beautiful.

She thought her idea of what perfect should have been was unrealistic. She told herself, real life isn’t all that flowery stuff. Relationships are hard work. She was doing the hard work every day by settling. She tried to negotiate with herself. She tried to lower her expectations. She didn’t want to be disappointed. She told herself she wanted too much, but she didn’t ask for more.

She told her friends she was happy in her marriage. They believed her, but the problem was, she wasn’t convinced. Everything looked great through the windows looking in. Things looked good on the inside too, but something didn’t feel right.

He worked a lot. He worked late a lot. She didn’t complain. She would warm up his dinner at 10:00 p.m. when he got home. He rarely ate it. She ignored the voices in her head and the feeling in the pit of her stomach while she stared at the wedding pictures on the wall in the living room. She did her makeup every day. She kept the house clean. She went to work, came home and put dinner on the table. She often ate alone. She wore perfume that was supposed to enchant him.

He was distant. But she told herself that was just who he was and she loved him - for better or for worse, she loved him. That was the vow she took, so she was doing it hard every day.

She thought maybe she wasn’t pretty enough. She decided she needed to be different. Maybe she was too heavy. She went on a diet. She started running every day. She pushed herself too far, too hard, for too long almost every day. She wanted to be perfect. He didn’t notice.

However, one day she noticed something. On her run through town, she noticed her husband sitting on a bench with another woman at the lake. She stopped dead in her tracks to catch her breath. It wasn’t the running that left her breathless. And from a distance she watched him. He was attentive. He was laughing. He looked in her eyes when she talked. And when he touched her arm in that very familiar way she knew without having to ask any questions.

And she didn’t ask any questions. She didn’t want to hear the truth and she didn’t want to listen to a lie. She didn’t want to be confrontational. She figured it was her fault anyway. She thought she could do more.

It didn’t happen that quickly. It took what felt like forever. But one day he walked in and told her he’d decided he needed a break. He said he felt a lot of pressure in their marriage. He told her he needed some time and space. He told her he needed to alone for a while. She didn’t ask too many questions. She sat on the bed and cried while he packed a bag. She hoped he’d be home soon.

He wasn’t alone for very long but that didn’t mean he came home. Apparently, he didn’t need that much time alone. He rented a hotel room for a few days before he moved in with her. When she asked him why he moved in with her so soon he answered the question in one short sentence.

“Because she asked me to.”

Our girl, was alone, but that wasn’t really anything new. She’d been a lone for a long time. She got what she asked for, which in the end, turned out to be nothing.

We get what we settle for in relationships and everything else. And here’s the thing, you know when you’re settling. You feel it in your gut. That fear of asking for too much is the short road to being alone even if you’re sleeping next to someone else every night.

Life, much like men have a way of rising to what we ask of them. Love tends to do what we expect it to do. If you continually lower your expectations because you are afraid to ask for what you want, you will end up without the things you need sooner than later.

If she’d asked for what she wanted and he’d walked, she wouldn’t have lost anything because he walked anyway. She might have saved herself a year or two and a measurable chunk of her self-worth. But here’s the thing - I don’t think he would have walked.

Here’s what he said:

She acted like she didn’t give a damn. At first I thought she didn’t really care what I was up to or what I was doing. However, at some point, I became suspicious she didn’t give a damn about us.

She checked out of our relationship before we even got married. She wasn’t interested in what was happening with me. She was too passive to fight for our relationship. I know I sound like a child pushing boundaries to get attention, and maybe that’s partly true. However, when she quit acting like she cared I started thinking she didn’t.

I know relationships ebb and flow, but when we hit that ebb it was like she didn’t even notice. She didn’t care what I was doing so I did what I wanted to. I knew we were in trouble. I didn’t want a relationship that was convenient. I wanted a relationship that was real. She was never honest about her feelings and it led me to believe she didn’t have any.

I didn’t mean to hurt her, but I didn’t think it mattered that much when I left. I’d been gone for a long time and she didn’t seem to bother her.

So, I left.

The woman I’m with now is demanding. She’s loud. She’s smart. She’s seems to notice me when I’m there and notices when I’m not. I’m on my best behavior, not because she requires it, but because I want to show up for her. She sees me. She’s not afraid to say she wants me and frankly, I want that.

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Lisa Hayes, The Love Whisperer, is an LOA Relationship Coach. She helps clients leverage Law of Attraction to get the relationships they dream about and build the lives they want. Lisa is the author of the newly released hit book, Score Your Soulmate and How to Escape from Relationship Hell and The Passion Plan.