Here’s a brutal truth: When you commit to a relationship, you’re also committing to unsolvable problems.
If only I’d known this a long time ago, I could have saved myself so much pain and confusion.
I know, I know. It’s not what anyone thinks of when they’re single and dreaming of having a relationship. They don’t envision what kinds of fights they’re going to be having. What the first time their partner disappoints them will be like. And how.
They’re thinking of all the fun things they’re going to do when they have a steady person to do them with. Looking forward to sleeping next to someone at night, having someone to always eat dinner with.
That kind of thing.
But the reality is that every relationship has its quirks. This is particularly true when you’ve been in it for a while and you’ve road tested it in a number of different situations and different stressors. It’s very much like a car that way. It may be perfect when you drive it off the lot, but eventually there will be quirks that spring up. Quirks that have to be dealt with.
And some of them will never go away, no matter how many times you “fix” them.
Looking at you, fussy brakes on my last car. Can’t tell you how many times I’d “fix” them, only to have the same problem reoccur. Because it’s just how that particular machine functioned. The way it trended.
Relationships can be quite similar to this. Heck, life itself can be that way, even if you’re single. I know I’m going to be struggling with certain problems of my own for the rest of my life. Throw another person in there, and there’s even more unsolvable stuff.
The question you ask isn’t if you can permanently fix what you dislike about the relationship (or what troubles you, your partner, and/or both), but if you can be happy even if those problems are never solved.
Can you live with a particular quirk that needs tending to over and over? (Although in relationship land, unlike automobile land, there is quite a bit more that can be ignored safely.)
But the bottom line remains: You do better if you find a relationship that has problems you can live with.