Once learning about relationship dissolution, I began to
think about how my second last relationship ended and what factors were part of
that decision. With my ex-boyfriend
Jared, I found that many things played into our break up because we were dating
for three years. There were multiple relational
changes. Relational changes are
relationship dynamics that may impact a relationship over time. With Jared, we spent a lot of time together
in high school since we went to the same high school. Once I began college, I spent most of my time
there and even played a few intramural sports which took up a lot of my
time. He began working second shift so
he went to work from 3 to 11 at night. I
was typically at class at around 9 till 3 so our schedules were completely opposite
which didn’t allow for much time to be spent together which really put a strain
on our relationship. The next relational
change that occurred was infidelity.
Jared decided to cheat on me a few times that I knew of but I kind of
just blew them off because we were in high school and at that point it really didn’t
matter to me because I was doing things with other guys also. The last girl that he cheated on me with was
one of my best friends. Since I was in
college, my whole life goals have changed and I was ready to be with someone
who was serious and wanted to be in a committed relationship. After the last time he cheated we tried to
work it out but the next relational change happened which was low levels of love
and trust. I began becoming interested
in a few of the college guys at school because they were actually working towards
a goal and wanting to further their education.
Because he was cheating, I didn’t trust him when he was spending time
with other people especially girls. Along
with losing the trust, my love for him was diminishing because I was in a
constant worry of what he was doing and who he was with. Along with relational changes, I was
experiencing individual changes.
According to Levinger’s Barrier Model, if attraction and barriers are
low but the alternatives are high, then I should leave the relationship. I was definitely running out of reasons to
stay. I wasn’t really attracted to his
attitude on life and defiantly wasn’t attracted to his work ethic. I started to grow up and look at the future
things and reliability wasn’t one of those.
One of the huge barriers to leaving was the connection and that we were
dating for three years. For me, it was
very hard to leave because of all the time and money that was invested in that
relationship. After looking at the
attractions and the barriers, I found that the alternatives were much
higher. My alternatives were finding a
guy who was going to college to better his education. Granted Jared did go to Tech College in high
school and had a great job, he wasn’t a great worker and showed no
ambition. Guys who were in college were
obviously ambitions otherwise they wouldn’t have been there. Another alternative that I took full
advantage of was to explore other places to live. I was able to meet new people and new guys
rather than stick to talking to guys that only went to my high school. I could also find a guy who loved me and didn’t
feel the need to cheat or hurt me.
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