"Almost Happy" in long term relationships

[marcusantonio]

When it comes to LTR's, at least in my limited experience and field of study, I haven't been able to identify a single one of these relationships in which one of the two parties has never been betrayed or disrespected. It seems like a tradition.

What the world of relationships has shown me is that people in "long-term" relationships have decided to swallow the bitter pill and move on, "rebuilding" the relationship after these "escapes."

Now, "escapes" can involve disrespect, betrayal, boundary crossing, or failure to obey the relationship, yet many relationships continue because people will evidence the relationship's strengths and weaknesses and settle for what they have.

Unfortunately, I don't know of any "truly" satisfied and happy people (many will tell you they "are", but I can actually spot those who are faking it, and mostly all of them are). Relationships are just a job to which people are more or less faithful depending on their current needs and desires.

What doesn't surprise me is that relationships are also a pragmatic exchange, that is, "you give me something I need", but the fact that people "persist" because they're too weak to make the decision to pack up their things and leave, to do new things in life.
They won't do it when they feel they "don't have the means" to do so, but rather, when there are intersections, or rather they call it monkeybranching, when there is a solid opportunity for them to take another vine, then they will try.
On the contrary, they will remain "almost happy" in these relationships. Nostalgia trumps everything.

In my case, the prevalence is a type of relationship in which men know their wives have disrespected them, yet they don't pack up their things and leave. Like, all the majority of men out there, are they afraid of something?
What I've found out, it's incredible: to keep their status, instead, they use "the relationship trouble" excuse to indicate they were disinterested, and then, as if it were a marketing ploy, they say, "OK, the worst is over," and now "let's rebuild the future together, stronger than before."
So now it's like they're selling other people that the relationship was faulty due to the men behavior, and not the women in this case, so they can save their face with "rebuilding the ltr".

Rather than saying "OK" to their woman's behavior and go their separate ways, they stay in the relationship, imposing, often angrily, new "limitations" and "boundaries" that their woman should respect.Or they simply "scold turkey."

What I'm trying to say is that there's a boundless love for tolerance, the desire to rebuild, etc., when instead it would be enough to understand that a person simply doesn't have respect for you..

I see that it is very common for one of the two people in the relationship to react with anger, to have overly emotional reactions, and they consider it normal. Not for me. I may have high standards, but the moment someone I live and spend my time with does that, that's crossed the line for me. Imagine if some more serious lack of respect could happen.

I can't really understand all the love for forgiveness, compromise..

I do live in Italy, but they say it's the same all over in the world.
I'd like to hear your opinion on this.

[Els]

There are a lot of words here, but not a lot of specifics. What exactly do you mean by "disrespect"? Are we talking about a heated exchange, shouting, saying things that shouldn't be said? Or are we talking about something more egregious like cheating or ignoring consent?

What even is "obey the relationship"? Sounds like part of a 1950s Evangelical marriage manual...

But anyway, to answer your question, I think that anyone who has ever been in a LTR will realize that life is not so black and white as you make it out to be. Nobody is perfect, including ourselves. Everyone obviously should have boundaries that protect the things that matter most to them, but expecting perfect behavior from a partner 24/7/365 for 10 or more years is just setting yourself up to fail. If this is anyone's expectation, they should just do themselves a favor and stay single, because there's a 100% chance that they will be disappointed. 

It's possible for relationships to be happy and healthy and yet not perfect. The key IMO is that both partners are genuinely trying, that there is still love in the marriage, that they are happy most of the time and the things that they are not happy about are not dealbreakers.

It's fine if you'd rather be single than in an imperfect relationship, but not everyone who chooses to do so is "settling".

Edited Thursday at 09:50 PM by Els

[Gebidozo]

It’s hard to comment because you aren’t being specific.

If you’re outraged by the fact that people stay together even when one of the partners has cheated, then I sort of agree. The only difference is that in every such case known to me, it was the man who cheated, and the woman who chose to stay.

If, however, you expect people to only stay together with perfect partners, then I think you’re being very unrealistic. There is no such thing as a perfect relationship and no such thing when you like absolutely everything about your partner.

What’s important is to have reasonable expectations and boundaries. And these may differ from person to person.

[ExpatInItaly]

It sounds more like you are upset that your relationship experience is limited and you are bitter about those who have had more success than you. So, you have mounted a pretty high horse to preach about something you admittedly have little experience with. 

Interesting, that.