How To Let Go Of One-Sided Love When He Doesn’t Want You
Many people find themselves in one-sided relationships where they are the only ones making any effort. While it can be a painful, complicated realization, it can be a helpful first step to moving on with the rest of your life so you can find someone who wants a place at your side. Read on to explore how to recognize one-sided love, tips to help you move on after a breakup, and how therapy can help you heal so your next relationship can be healthy.
What is a one-sided relationship?
Mental health professionals typically define one-sided relationships as couplings that lack balance and equal reciprocity. Healthy, successful relationships are often built on a foundation of consideration, compromise, and communication. Both partners should work together to support, love, and care for each other’s needs. It may be a one-sided relationship if that sounds different from what you have with your partner.
“In a balanced relationship, you know where you stand with the other person. … A one-sided relationship has more uncertainty and boils down to one person doing more of the heavy lifting—emotionally, physically, and mentally.” — Cleveland Clinic
Why it may be better to break it off and move on
Whatever the reason you’ve grown apart, once the intimacy and deeper connection are gone, there’s not much left to save. If he’s not showing any interest in repairing your bond, it can be healthier to break up and move on with your life. Lingering and hoping for him to change or suddenly recognize that he does love you may be a pointless endeavor that will only likely lead to more pain and disappointment. If you don't feel valued, cared for, or necessary to him and nothing changes after you express concerns, it may be healthier to cut ties.
How to recognize when he doesn’t want you
While the most effective way to know if there are reciprocal feelings in the relationship is to ask him, he may not answer honestly. You can look for signs indicating he's not emotionally engaged in the relationship and doesn't feel the same way you do.
Signs your relationship is one-sided:
- You constantly feel exhausted because you are making all the effort and stretching yourself too thin to hold it together.
- It doesn’t feel like you have a meaningful connection with him.
- You’re always the one who has to apologize.
- There’s never any compromise or sacrifice on his part.
- His needs always come before yours.
- He doesn’t seem interested in fixing anything when you express your concerns.
- You don’t feel like a priority in his life.
- You don’t spend time together.
- He makes time for the things he considers important—but not you.
Exploring healthy ways to let go of unrequited love
Breakups are almost always hard, and when you are the only one who genuinely cares, it can be challenging to let go of your love for him. You may not get to know the reasons the relationship failed. Try focusing on the fact that you put in the effort and did what you could to make the relationship work. When it didn’t, you valued yourself enough to break the bond rather than be a convenient choice or continue leaving your needs unmet.
Focus on loving yourself
Getting out of a one-sided relationship where he didn’t want you may leave you feeling undesirable or as if you’re not worthy of being loved. However, those lingering feelings should fade. Pour the love and attention you would have given your partner into loving yourself. Discover how you want to be treated by doing everything for yourself that you’d like a partner to do. Set the standard for acceptable treatment in your next relationship and work regular self-care into your routine at the same time. Identify what you want in a partner, and don’t settle for less.
Give yourself the time and space to grieve your loss
The relationship may have been one-sided, but you still had real feelings for your former partner. Allow yourself the time and space to grieve the loss of the connection and the love you had for him—but set a time limit for your misery. Give yourself a week or two to feel what you feel, but don’t let it become a habit. Remember, if you’re stuck wallowing in sadness over a lost love who didn’t want you, it could be easy to miss someone who does.
Lean on your support network
Let your friends and family support you through the breakup. Create a positive environment with people you trust and talk through what happened if that could help you. You can and should set healthy boundaries, so if you'd rather be distracted and don't want to talk about the breakup, politely but firmly tell them so.
Put your energy into personal development
Studies show that people who focus on personal development, such as getting fitter, developing new skills, or making other positive changes in their lives, often show higher levels of self-confidence, personal satisfaction, and progress healing from a breakup compared to peers who did not make efforts to better themselves after separation.
Understand that you are worthy of love—he just wasn’t the right guy
Realizing that your former partner didn't want you can be painful and may make you feel that no one will love you. That is likely your grief talking. You are worthy of love; he simply wasn’t the guy for you. The initial spark of connection with someone doesn’t always grow into something more, and even long-term relationships can fade.
Continue letting love into your life
You may not want to even think about love for a while after the breakup. That’s fine—for a while. Try not to close yourself off from the possibility of connecting with someone else. Your ex may not have been the right guy for you, but that mean’s he’s still out there waiting to meet you.
Coping strategies to help you through a breakup
- Keep a journal to help you work through your feelings. Studies show that the act of journaling is therapeutic in itself because you must examine your feelings before you can write about them.
- Visualize the possibilities that new relationships could bring to your life. According to recent studies, you can also feel positive emotions after a breakup. Learn from this experience and use it to grow.
- Perform a breakup ritual to give yourself closure if your feelings are lingering. Recognize and acknowledge your pain, loss, anger, sadness, and the other emotions you feel about the breakup. Get rid of his photos, pack up his things to return, or write a goodbye letter you don't send. Studies show that a breakup ritual can help you find closure and move on to the next phase of your life.
How therapy can help heal after one-sided love
Recognizing and ending a one-sided relationship can be challenging and complex to manage independently. Consider working with a licensed relationship therapist online through a virtual therapy platform like Regain. Therapy can help you identify and reshape unhealthy thought and behavior patterns, develop a wide range of practical coping skills to help you manage stressors, and communication strategies to help you let you effectively discuss your feelings and needs with your next partner. Therapy can help you develop your sense of emotional intelligence, awareness, and literacy, so you can identify, understand, and express what you feel. Parents or guardians looking for ways to support their kids can find online counseling for 12-19-year-old children at TeenCounseling.
The American Psychological Association conducted numerous recent studies to explore the effectiveness of different therapy delivery methods. The research indicates that online and in-person psychotherapy provide similar outcomes. In addition to being more cost-effective and requiring shorter wait times, teletherapy platforms offer connection to a comprehensive network of licensed therapists and mental health professionals. Unlike most brick-and-mortar therapeutic offices—which generally have a limited selection of providers—it’s simple to connect with someone else if you don’t find a therapist who makes you feel comfortable and fits well with your circumstances and personality on the first try.
Takeaway
Realizing that your relationship is one-sided and that he doesn't want you can hurt. However, it does give you the closure necessary to start moving on so you can find someone who can’t imagine life without you. The information in this article offers insight into letting go of one-sided love and how therapy can support you through healing and thriving.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
How do you move on when he doesn’t want you anymore?
If you’re wondering how to move on from someone who doesn’t want you, you’re not alone. Many people struggle to move on when they discover someone they cared romantically about doesn’t love them anymore.
Simply voicing the question (about whether or not someone loves you anymore) can be scary and overwhelming. The best gifts you can give yourself are time and space.
Time will help heal the wounds that come from rejection and heartbreak, even though it’s hard to hear and accept. Sometimes time is best paired with space - space from things that stress you out, space from things that bring up painful memories, and space from your old life. When you give yourself space, you’ll likely learn to love new things about yourself and find ways to cope with your experience. Then, you can say without getting hurt: “He doesn’t want a relationship, and I’ve gotten over it.”
How do you stop loving someone who doesn’t want you?
When you love someone who doesn’t love you back or who doesn’t return your love, moving on can seem impossible.
When you’re managing to move on from someone who doesn’t want you, you might find it harder to move on when you see them constantly. In this case, you can consider taking a break from social media or taking some space from the places in which you would typically see them.
You can also incorporate new things into your life (like new hobbies, new friends, taking a trip, etc.) to refocus your attention on the things that matter: your friends and family, your health, and your own wellbeing. You might always love the person in question in some small space of your heart, but eventually, it won’t cause you the same emotional turmoil.
How do you know when a man doesn’t love you?
It might be hard to know when a man doesn’t love you. You may be suspicious, but it can be a complicated conversation to have. Still, communication is often necessary to work through significant issues in a relationship.
You can use this sort of mentality to consider it: if he knew you wanted him to act a certain way, would he change his ways? If you communicate your feelings, would he do so in return?
If you’re in a relationship, talk to that person before jumping to conclusions that he doesn’t love you. If you’re not in a relationship, lean on your friends for emotional support while you figure out a way to ask for the clarity you need.
If he doesn’t love you, you might be stressed about moving on - you might find it especially challenging to move on from someone who doesn’t want you or doesn’t want to date you anymore. Be sure to seek out the assistance of a mental health professional during this difficult time if you need one; there’s never any shame in accepting the guidance you deserve.
How do you test him to see if he cares?
You don’t have to test your partner to see if he doesn’t return the care you give to him. The best way to figure out how your partner feels is to honestly communicate with them, as difficult as it may be, about your emotions and their behavior.
You can ask yourself some questions to help establish what sort of patterns of behavior is hurting you. Is he treating you well? Speaking to you well? Showing up for you when you need it? Or is he causing you confusion, emotional turmoil, and refusing to communicate his feelings?
To know that a person cares, you ultimately need to talk to that person about their feelings and behavior in a healthy way. If he doesn’t love you anymore, you’ll have a better sense of that by talking about your feelings and intentions.
How do you tell if a guy is confused about his feelings for you?
If a guy is sorting through his feelings, he might be more reserved or more inconsistent with what he says and does.
When considering committing to someone long-term, there can be a lot of feelings to sort through. To make sure you’re ready and that your partner is prepared for a healthy relationship, don’t rush into anything. Take your time to sift through what you want and what you need from a partner.
Likewise, if he’s confused about whether he doesn’t love you anymore, he might be more distant or have a shift in behavior. Communication, in this case, is critical; it’s the only true way to understand how your partner is feeling.
How does a man act when he’s falling in love?
Falling in love can test your comfort zone. Many people don’t know how to behave when falling in love. Much of our what society pictures when thinking about how a man acts when he’s falling in love is somewhat cliche: you might expect him to talk to you often, buy you gifts, go out of his way to spend time with you, gush about you to others, or any number of other similar behaviors.
In reality, falling in love will look different for every person. The more you get to know your partner, the better you will notice how they display their love and affection (for instance, in a long-distance scenario, you may only be able to show love through text or calls).
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