How many chances does someone deserve before you’ve had enough? At what point do you accept that things will never, ever change?
A woman wrote to me about her emotionally abusive marriage. She’d finally reached her breaking point and told her husband she was done. She was leaving.
And suddenly, like flipping a switch, he became the kindest, most attentive person she’d ever seen. He was doing everything right. Being respectful. Listening. Supporting her. All the things she’d been asking for throughout their entire marriage.
This sudden change reminded me of those customer service tactics where a company treats you terribly until you threaten to cancel your service. Then suddenly you’re their most valued customer. They’re offering you discounts, upgrades, and special treatment. But the second you decide to stay, the quality drops right back to where it was before.
That’s not how relationships are supposed to work.
I know this pattern intimately because I lived it. I was that person who would only change when faced with losing someone. I was emotionally abusive in my past relationships. I was critical, judgmental, and manipulative. I made the people I claimed to love feel small and wrong. And I only seemed to wake up and try to be better when they were walking out the door.
My marriage ended because of who I was. I caused the problems. All of them. I can’t blame anyone else for that. And when it ended, I had to make a choice. I could keep being that person and keep losing relationships, or I could actually do the work to change.
That’s why I created the Healed Being program. Because I know what it’s like to be the person causing the pain. And I know that real change doesn’t happen in a moment of panic when you’re about to lose someone. Real change happens when you commit to being different, regardless of whether anyone stays or leaves.
Exposing Conditional Kindness
When someone is only kind to you when you’re threatening to leave, that’s not kindness. That’s strategy. That’s manipulation. And I say that as someone who used to do exactly that.
Real kindness, real respect, and real love don’t wait for a crisis. It shows up on a Tuesday afternoon when nothing special is happening. It shows up when you’re tired and stressed and don’t feel like being your best self. It shows up consistently because it’s who you are, not because you’re afraid of losing something.
If your partner has been hurtful, disrespectful, or abusive for years, and suddenly they’re perfect the moment you decide to leave, you have to ask yourself some hard questions:
Is this who they really are?
Or is this who they become when they’re scared?
And more importantly, if you stay, how long will this version of them last?
I’m not saying people can’t change. I changed. But my change didn’t happen overnight. And it didn’t happen because someone threatened to leave. It happened because I finally looked at the wreckage of my relationships and realized I was the common denominator. I had to want to be different for me, not just to keep someone around.
One of the things I talk about a lot in my work is the importance of independence in relationships. And I don’t just mean financial independence, though that matters too. I mean the ability to be a whole person on your own.
When you get into a relationship, you shouldn’t be trying to change the other person. You shouldn’t be trying to mold them into who you want them to be. You’re supposed to support who they already are and who they want to become.
I see this all the time. People get together and immediately start trying to fix each other. They think love means making someone better. But that’s not love. That’s control dressed up in caring language.
If someone needs space, you give them space. If they need time to figure something out, you give them time. You don’t make them feel guilty for having needs that don’t revolve around you.
I remember working with someone who was upset because their partner wanted to take a break from the relationship. They kept asking me how to convince their partner to stay; How to make them see that taking a break was a bad idea; How to prove that they should work through things together instead of apart.
And I had to tell them something they didn’t want to hear. If your partner needs space and you refuse to give it to them, you’re not showing love. You’re showing them that your needs matter more than theirs. You’re showing them that you’ll prioritize your comfort over their well-being.
That’s not a partnership. That’s ownership.
Children Are Always Watching
Here’s something that doesn’t get talked about enough. Kids are watching everything we do in our relationships. They’re learning what’s normal, what to accept, how to treat people, and how to be treated.
If you’re in a relationship where one person dominates and the other submits, where conflict means yelling and slamming doors, or where one person’s needs always come first, your kids are learning all of it. They’re learning that dynamic, that’s how you handle disagreement, and to either be that person or accept being second.
Here’s the revised version:
I think about this a lot when people write to me about staying in difficult relationships for the kids. They think they’re protecting their children by keeping the family together. But what are the kids actually learning?
They’re learning that love looks like walking on eggshells, that it’s normal for one person to control everything, and that you stay even when you’re miserable because that’s what you’re supposed to do.
And then we wonder why they grow up and end up in the same kinds of relationships.
Kids are incredibly adaptable. They develop coping mechanisms based on what they see. If they see healthy conflict resolution, they learn that. If they see manipulation and control, they learn that instead. They’re not just watching what you do. They’re learning how to survive in the world based on the blueprint you’re giving them.
The 50 Percent Rule
I want you to think about your relationship right now. Are you happy more than 50 percent of the time? Not just content, not just managing, and not just surviving… Actually happy.
If you’re not happy more than half the time, something needs to change. And I’m not talking about little annoyances. I’m talking about the overall quality of your life with this person.
Now here’s the harder question:
If nothing ever changes, if your partner stays exactly as they are right now for the rest of your life, can you accept that?
I’m not asking if you can tolerate it or if you will hold on to hope that it gets better. I’m asking if you can genuinely accept the way they are for the rest of your time together and be okay?
Here’s what I’ve learned. People don’t change unless they want to. And even when they want to, change is slow and hard and requires consistent effort over a long period of time.
So if you’re banking on your partner becoming someone different, you’re making a bet against the odds. You’re hoping for something that might never happen. And in the meantime, you’re living a life that makes you unhappy more than half the time.
I’m not telling you to leave. I’m telling you to be honest with yourself about what you’re actually dealing with. Look at the facts. Look at the patterns. Look at the history.
If your partner has been promising to change for five years and nothing has actually changed, that’s data. If they only try changing when you threaten to leave and then go right back to old behaviors once you stay, that’s also data. If you’ve had the same fight 50 times with no resolution, that’s more data.
Don’t make decisions based on who you hope someone will become; Make decisions based on who they are today.
The Three Strike Rule
I talk about this concept with people all the time. When you’re trying to figure out if someone has really changed, you need to see consistent new behavior over time. Not just once. Not just when they’re scared. Consistently.
I call it the three-strike rule. It’s not that creative of a name, but it’s an effective thought process. First, let’s talk about the opposite of a “strike”:
If someone does something hurtful and then apologizes and changes, that’s one step forward.
If they maintain that change for months, that’s another step forward.
If they maintain it through stress, through conflict, through all the normal challenges of life, that’s a third step forward.
Three consistent steps forward over a significant period of time start to show you perhaps a real pattern of change.
But here’s what often happens instead:
Someone does something hurtful to you, then they apologize.
After that, they’re good for a week or two, but then they slip back into old patterns.
You decide to call them out, so they apologize again.
Hey, now they’re good for another week! But the cycle repeats, and you’re back at square one.
That’s not change. That’s a pattern of temporary improvement followed by regression. And if you’re seeing that pattern, you need to recognize it for what it is. What I see are three strikes.
Real change looks different. Real change means someone is doing the internal work to understand why they behaved that way in the first place: They’re going to therapy. They’re reading. They’re reflecting. They’re catching themselves before they fall into old patterns. They’re taking responsibility without making excuses.
And most importantly, they’re doing this work whether you stay or leave. They’re not changing to keep you. They’re changing because they recognize their behavior was wrong and they want to be different.
Setting Timelines and Accountability
If you decide to give someone a chance to change, you need to set a timeline. Not an ultimatum necessarily, but a point at which you’ll reassess based on what’s actually happened.
Maybe it’s three months, six months, or even a year. But you need to know when you’re going to look at the situation with clear eyes and ask yourself if real change has occurred.
And you need to be honest during that assessment. Don’t move the goalposts. Don’t make excuses for them. Don’t focus on the one good week and ignore the three bad ones.
Look at the overall pattern. Are they consistently showing up differently? Are they doing the work? Are they taking responsibility? Or are they just managing your expectations and doing the bare minimum to keep you from leaving?
I’ve seen people stay in situations for years, always giving just one more chance, always believing this time will be different. And I understand why. When you love someone, you want to believe in them, believe they can change, and believe your love is enough to help them become better.
But your love isn’t enough. They have to want it for themselves. And if they don’t, no amount of patience or support or second chances will make a difference.
The Relationship Contract
Every relationship has an unspoken contract. It’s the agreement about how you’ll treat each other. What’s acceptable and what’s not. What you can count on from each other.
The problem is that most people never actually discuss this contract. They just assume the other person shares their values and expectations. And then they’re shocked when those expectations aren’t met.
I think every relationship needs to have explicit conversations about boundaries and values. What do you need to feel safe? What do you need to feel respected? What behaviors are deal breakers for you?
And once you’ve established those boundaries, you have to enforce them. Not with threats or manipulation. But with clear, consistent consequences.
If someone crosses a boundary and there’s no consequence, you’ve just taught them that the boundary doesn’t really matter. You’ve shown them they can violate your stated needs without any real impact on the relationship.
That’s not their fault. That’s yours.
I know that sounds harsh. But I learned this the hard way in my own life. I would tell people what I needed, and then when they didn’t give it to me, I’d just accept it. I’d complain. I’d be upset. But I wouldn’t actually do anything about it.
And so they learned that my boundaries were suggestions, not requirements. They learned they could treat me however they wanted, and I’d stick around anyway.
It wasn’t until I started actually following through, willing to walk away from situations that violated my boundaries, that things changed. Some relationships ended, and some got better, but all of them became more honest.
When It’s Really Over
There’s something that happens when a relationship reaches a true point of no return – when someone genuinely decides they’re done. It’s this point that changes everything.
I’ve seen it happen over and over. A person who’s been stubborn and unwilling to change or compromise for years suddenly becomes open to anything! At the relationship’s true end, the partner who refused to change and saw everyone else as wrong suddenly has a change of heart and sees things differently. That’s the person who refused to go to therapy or work on themselves. But now, when their partner is walking out the door, they suddenly become willing to do whatever it takes.
A person who changes in the face of true loss like that is finally acting from a place of fear. Genuine change could happen in this moment, but initially, their change is coming from the panic of losing something, not necessarily from a real understanding of why their behavior was wrong.
Like I said, the beginning of their change could be occurring in this very moment. After all, sometimes the shock of losing someone does wake people up to what they need to work on. Sometimes that moment of finality is exactly what someone needs to finally take things seriously.
But you have to be able to tell the difference between someone who’s changing and someone who’s only going through the motions out of the fear of loss.
If a person changes because they’re insecure, they will usually go back to old patterns once they feel secure again. However, the person who’s changing because they understand the behaviors they’ve been doing were hurtful and need to stop is more likely to do the work necessary to heal and improve themselves, regardless of whether you stay or leave.
When I finally decided to stay single after my marriage ended, it was one of the hardest decisions I’d ever made. I was terrified of being alone. I’d always gotten my sense of worth from being in a relationship. I didn’t know who I was without someone else.
But I knew I had to figure it out. I knew I couldn’t keep being the person I’d been. I couldn’t keep hurting people or keep losing relationships because I refused to look at my own behavior.
So I stayed single. And I did the work. I went to therapy. I reflected on every relationship I’d ruined. I looked at my patterns. I figured out where my triggers came from. I learned how to sit with uncomfortable emotions instead of lashing out at whoever was closest.
And eventually, I met my current partner. But I met her from a completely different place. I wasn’t looking for someone to “complete” me. I wasn’t trying to fill a void. By the time I decided I was ready for a relationship, I felt already “whole” on my own.
I remember when we first started talking, I told her I wasn’t looking to date. I was honest about where I was and what I was working on. And instead of running away, she appreciated the honesty. We became friends first. We built a foundation of trust and respect before we ever became romantic.
That’s what a healthy relationship looks like. It’s built on two whole people choosing to be together, not two broken people trying to fix each other.
What Next?
If you’re reading this and recognizing yourself in any of these patterns, I want you to know something. You have more power than you think you do.
You get to decide what you’ll accept in your life.
You get to decide what your boundaries are.
You get to decide when enough is enough.
And yes, those decisions might be hard. They might mean losing relationships you’ve invested years in, facing fears you’ve been avoiding, or admitting you’ve been accepting less than you deserve.
But on the other side of those hard decisions is a life where you’re not just surviving. You’re actually happy. You’re with people who treat you with consistent kindness and respect. You’re not walking on eggshells, making excuses for bad behavior, or hoping things will get better someday.
You’re living in reality. And reality, when you’re making choices that honor yourself, is actually pretty good.
I’m not saying you have to leave every difficult relationship. I’m saying you have to be honest about what you’re dealing with. Look at the facts. Look at the patterns. Look at the history. And then make a decision based on what is, not what you hope will be.
If someone has shown you who they are over and over again, believe them. And then decide if that’s someone you want in your life.
You are powerful beyond measure. You deserve to be treated with kindness and respect every single day, not just when you’re threatening to leave. And you have the ability to create a life that reflects that truth.
But it starts with being honest with yourself, recognizing the difference between real change and temporary performance, setting boundaries and actually enforcing them, and being willing to walk away from anything that consistently makes you unhappy.
That’s not selfish. That’s self-respect. And it’s the foundation of every healthy relationship you’ll ever have.
