" I wish I ’d known about this back in my 20s . "
When you’re looking through the rose-colored glasses of early love, it’s not always easy to spot the signs that something’s not right. Recently, older people on Redditsharedthe red flags they missed in their younger days, and it was pretty eye-opening. Here’s what they had to say:
1.“Bad money management skills.”
2.“Lying. If you’re dating someone who lies, don’t ever think that trait will improve or vanish. Lying is usually an ingrown habit that will never get better.”
— atomic number 92 / ulysses61
3.“Wants you to only spend time with them. Pouts when you meet your siblings for lunch. Slowly eliminates your time with friends. Etc.”
— u / kwaykai
4.“In my personal dating experience, it was always the ones who worked fast. They jumped into the relationship like we were getting married tomorrow. Every single time, it always fizzled. I prefer getting to know people gradually.”
5.“An obsession with vanity, with their looks. People who are obsessed with how they look will also be obsessed with how you look. Time passes, and even the most beautiful looks are destined to fade. It’s who we are inside - not what we look like on the outside that truly matters. Vanity alone cannot sustain. It’s a sign of superficiality and a genuine red flag.”
— u / snakebytexx
6.“Control freaks. Watch out… it does not get better.”
— u / noplanetb1970
7.“They put you down in small ways, then laugh and say they were kidding. Trust me, it only gets worse. Try to recognize this behavior early on and walk away. It’s not you, it’s them.”
8.“Pay very close attention to how a man (or, in my case, manchild) treats their mother. I should have run for the hills away from my ex-husband and one of my ex-boyfriends. My ex-husband treated her like utter shit, yelled at her for the way she drove, what she said, and really verbally abused her. The ex-boyfriend woke his mother up at 4:00 a.m. (we, unfortunately, were living in a house next door to his parents) so his mother could do his laundry because he had a business flight to catch in a couple of hours. He treated his mother like she was his slave. NEVER get into a relationship with anyone who doesn’t treat their parents well.”
— uracil / fcukumicrosoft
" Or , insolent side , if he fawn over his parent and they can do no wrong in his eye .
Because that means that if they push your boundaries , he wo n’t have your back . He ’ll just say they ' think of well ' and you should ' get over it . ' "
— u / rotatingruhnama
9.“The most important red flag to be aware of is selfishness. Always doing what they want to do, your time together is spent on their interests, food, sex, etc. Being critical because you’re not living up to their selfish standards. Minimizing your feelings.”
— u / oldandoldschool
10.“If you find yourself trying to ‘improve’ your partner (clothes, speech, ideas, taste in TV, whatever), you’re setting yourself up. This can be subtle and sometimes takes the form of keeping your partner away from people you think might not quite approve of the new relationship. Vice versa, if you sense that your partner is doing that to you, run.”
11.“A subtle one I wish I knew: a partner who is tolerant of your foibles and weaknesses, as opposed to supportive of them. Especially when it comes to weaknesses. If you have a handicap or chronic illness, you may jump at the chance to be with someone who tolerates all your problems. But that’s just another problem because tolerance has a limit. It’s the difference between someone who is genuinely excited if they can help you in some small way and share the pain or trials, as opposed to someone who ‘soldiers on’ and deals with you.”
" One room you ’re in it together , the other and you ’re a load they ’re willing to bear . It ’s a huge difference , hard to differentiate if you ’re not prepared for it or if ' tolerance ' is still good than what you ’ve have before . "
— uracil / justgetoffmylawn
12.“Pushing you to do things that make you uncomfortable, whether it’s sex, partying, spending/lending large amounts of money, etc. If they don’t respect boundaries early, they won’t respect them later.”
— u / cocksure - froyo-1732
13.“If they cheated on a previous partner, they will probably cheat on the next one.”
14.“Ongoing cheapness — with you, obviously but in other ways too. Mooching off friends. Eating your groceries and not replacing them. Showing up to friends' houses empty-handed, expecting you to bring the wine.”
— u / nevdot17
— u / lsb316
16.“Setting themselves up as the smart one and implying you know less/your thought-out opinions aren’t as valid as theirs. This sets up an insidious dynamic that’s hard to reverse.”
17.“A major one that took me a very long time to notice is that he never truly apologized. It was always ‘I’m sorry your feelings were hurt,’ ‘I’m sorry you misunderstood my intentions,’ etc. He couldn’t say that he was sorry for what he actually did until we were almost divorced like he was the Fonz or something.”
— u / msomnipotent
18.“Bad kisser, bad at sex. You might think he’ll get better at it, but he probably won’t.”
— u / sabinelavine
19.“Anyone who nitpicks the food you prepare. I don’t mean, ‘Hey, this is kind of burned,’ or ‘I prefer my beef rare.’ No, I mean kid-worthy pouting, glowering, and whining in reaction to the food I put on your plate. You don’t like the sauce? Scrape it off. You want it done another way next time? Do it your own self. There is no relationship death like the death by a thousand cuts that is whining over your food three times a day as a grown-ass adult.”
20.“Talking bad about exes. If all your exes are assholes, you either are 1) only attracted to assholes and/ or 2) unable to take personal responsibility for past mistakes and learn from them.”
— u / b00k - wyrm
21.“Too many years too late, I learned the lesson: once is a pattern. He has a bad day and comes home and takes it out on you, then apologizes and says he doesn’t know why he let the day get to him ‘this one time.’ He drinks too much and ends up verbally abusing you and calling you some truly awful names, but that’s not normal for him, and it’s just that ‘his boss was buying’ that day. He promises to help more around the house, but everything he does to ‘help’ is wrong and has to be redone — it was years before I learned the term ‘weaponized incompetence.'”
" These things happened to me . If I ’d already been given the salvia advice that ' once is a pattern , ' I would have seen these things for what they were — huge red iris . I ’d have depart instead of endure years of abuse because ' it wo n’t chance again . ' "
— u / janetinspain
22.And finally, “In our family, we call it the Misery Test. You need a situation to come up that puts you and the other person in a miserable situation — physically uncomfortable, emotionally, or mentally challenging. A camping trip can force things a little, but a real pop-up situation is better. Then, observe how the other person reacts and how they treat you and other people during it. You’ll learn so much about their character.”
