By Mark Ryan, BACP Accredited Psychotherapist and NCPS Accredited Relationship Therapist
You may have asked yourself this question in the shower, on the commute, or at two in the morning while your partner sleeps beside you. Perhaps you have asked it for months, or for years. It rarely arrives as a single dramatic moment. It tends to return in quiet moments, and it tends to grow louder as the year ends.
The end of the year has a way of forcing the question. Christmas puts your relationship on show, and the new calendar year feels like a natural line to draw. Many people tell themselves that they will decide in January. That can be a healthy plan, as long as the weeks before it are used well and not simply endured.
This article is for one person asking the question alone. It looks at what usually sits beneath it, why both staying and leaving can feel impossible, what the research can and cannot tell you, and a set of questions you can work through before the New Year. It applies whether you are married or not, whatever your gender and whatever the gender of your partner.
Article Summary
The fear I see most often is not about the relationship itself. It is the fear of not being able to cope with the uncertainty of an unplanned future, and sometimes the worry that you will regret the choice later.
In a small study of students, people expected breakups to hurt more at the start than they did, and the overestimate was in the early intensity and not in how long the pain lasted.
People often stay because they are thinking about their partner. In two studies, the more dependent people believed their partner was on the relationship, the less likely they were to start a breakup.
A useful way to decide is to list the good and the hard parts of each path, then ask which hard parts you could carry and which path would sustain you enough to face them.
A fortnight in close quarters at a stressful time can push a relationship towards a breaking point, so it helps to ask whether your doubts were there before the season and will last beyond it.
The days between Christmas and New Year are a good time to think and a poor time to act. If safety is part of the question, specialist support comes first.
When the Question Will Not Go Away
If you are asking whether to leave, you are probably tired. You may have turned the question over so many times that it has stopped producing anything new. One day you are sure you should go, and the next day a good evening together makes you doubt yourself. That swing between certainty and doubt is one of the most common features of this question, and it does not mean you are weak or confused.
Christmas can make it louder. You may be pretending to be happy for family, watching other couples, or noticing how little you want to spend a week alone with your partner. You may be dreading the pressure to sit through another year that looks like the last one. If the season is already difficult, the article on staying together until after Christmas looks at the choice to wait.
It also helps to know what this article is not. If you are already sure that you do not love your partner, I don't love my partner anymore may be a better starting point, and how to know when a relationship is over looks at the signs. If you and your partner are asking the question together, should we stay together or break up is written for two people. This one is for the person who is carrying it alone. If what is wearing you down is resentment, or loneliness inside the relationship, the articles on resentment in relationships and feeling lonely in your relationship look at those.
What Is Usually Underneath the Question
People tend to assume that the question is about the relationship, and it often is. More often than they expect, it is also about something else. In my work, the thing underneath is usually fear. It is the fear of not being able to cope with the uncertainty of a future that has not been planned. Sometimes it is a worry about regret, the thought that you will look back and wish you had made a different choice.
Both fears make sense, and both can keep someone stuck for years. A relationship that is unhappy but known has a shape. You know where the bills go, who comes to which family event and what Sunday looks like. Leaving takes that shape away, and nothing is yet in its place. It is understandable to feel that the unknown is a bigger risk than a familiar unhappiness.
There is some evidence that the fear is larger than the reality. In a study that followed 26 first year university students through a breakup, researchers compared how much distress people predicted with how much they felt. At the moment of the breakup, people expected to feel worse than they did, and they were still overestimating their distress ten weeks later. The error was in how intense they expected the early period to be, and not in how quickly they expected it to fade. People who were more in love and who thought a new relationship was unlikely made the biggest mistakes in their predictions (Eastwick and colleagues, 2008). It was a very small study of young people in dating relationships, so it cannot tell you how you will feel. It does suggest that the imagined version of the aftermath is not always a reliable guide.
The wider evidence points the same way. A review of research on separation, divorce and health concluded that most people cope well and are resilient after a marriage or long term relationship ends, while around 10% to 15% struggle substantially (Sbarra, 2015). That does not mean leaving is painless. It does mean that being afraid of it is not evidence that you could not manage it.
Why Both Staying and Leaving Can Feel Impossible
If the choice feels like two bad options, it is worth looking at what is holding each one in place. Staying is often held by fear, by habit and by the effort and history you have already put in. Leaving is often held by guilt, and by the thought of what it would do to someone you care about.
That second pull is stronger than people tend to admit. In two studies, one that followed 1,348 people in relationships for ten weeks and one that followed 500 people who were contemplating a breakup for two months, the more dependent people believed their partner was on the relationship, the less likely they were to start a breakup. This held even after accounting for self focused factors such as how invested people were (Joel and colleagues, 2018). The researchers described this as people making stay or leave decisions with their partner's feelings in mind. Kindness is a good quality, and it can still keep you in a place that is hurting you.
Other pressures sit on top of these. There may be children, a shared home, money, a family who will be disappointed, or a community that treats a separation as a failure. If your relationship has already had to defend itself against other people's doubts, leaving can feel like proving them right. None of these things decides the question for you. They are reasons the question is hard, and it is fair to name them.
Is It the Relationship, or the Fortnight?
If the question has grown louder over the holidays, it helps to ask how much of it belongs to the last two weeks. Many couples spend a fortnight in close quarters at a stressful time of year, with little rest, little space apart and a lot of family. That affects decision making, and it can bring a relationship to a breaking point that may not reflect the whole year.
That does not make your doubts false. Sometimes the holiday simply shows what was already there. It does mean that a decision made on the worst night of a hard fortnight deserves a second look once things have settled. A useful test is to ask whether the doubts were there in October, and whether they will still be there in the middle of January. If the answer to both is yes, you are probably dealing with something that runs deeper than the season. The article on surviving Christmas without falling out looks at why this fortnight is so hard on couples.
What the Research Can and Cannot Tell You
People often hope that there is a checklist that will settle the matter. There is no research that can tell you whether you should leave. There is research on what tends to make relationships good or poor, and it gives you better questions to ask.
A large project combined 43 longitudinal studies of couples and used machine learning to find which things predicted how good a relationship was. The strongest relationship specific predictors were how committed you believe your partner is, how appreciated you feel, sexual satisfaction, how satisfied you believe your partner is, and how much conflict there is. Among individual factors, the strongest were your own life satisfaction, negative mood, depression and attachment avoidance and anxiety (Joel and colleagues, 2020). The study predicts relationship quality and does not tell anyone to stay or go.
It does suggest two useful things to look at. The first is the relationship itself, meaning commitment, appreciation, intimacy and conflict. The second is you. If your own mood is low, or your wellbeing is poor for reasons outside the relationship, that can colour how everything looks. It does not make your doubts false. It does mean that it is worth asking how much of the unhappiness belongs to the relationship and how much to the rest of your life.
Questions to Ask Before the New Year
These questions are not a test, and you do not need to answer them in one evening. Writing the answers down helps, because it slows the mind and gives you something to come back to. The most useful approach I know starts with the good and the hard parts of each path, then moves to which path you could sustain.
Weigh the good and the hard parts of each path
Take a sheet of paper and make two columns, one for staying and one for leaving. Under each, write the good things and the hard things. Be specific and be honest. Under staying, the good might include a shared history, a home you love or the person's kindness on a good day. The hard might include feeling unseen, repeating the same argument or missing a kind of closeness you once had. Under leaving, the good might include relief, space or a chance to live differently. The hard might include loneliness, money, telling your family or the loss of a life you built.
Then ask the question that matters most. Which set of hard things could you carry, and which path would sustain you enough to face them? Every path has a cost. The point is not to find the option with no difficulty. It is to find the one whose difficulties you are most willing and able to take on, and whose good parts will give you the strength to do it.
Ask about the relationship
Do I feel respected and safe with this person?
Do I feel appreciated, and do I appreciate them?
Do I believe my partner is committed to the relationship?
Are the problems ones we have tried to solve, or ones we have avoided?
When I have asked for change, has anything shifted?
Do we still want the same kind of life?
Ask about yourself
What am I most afraid of, and is it about the relationship or about being on my own?
If I knew I would cope, what would I choose?
Which regret could I live with more easily, leaving and wondering, or staying and wondering?
Whose voice is in my head when I think about this?
How much of my unhappiness belongs here, and how much belongs to work, health or the rest of my life?
Using the Days Between Christmas and New Year
The quiet days between Christmas and New Year can be a good time to think, and a poor time to act. Emotions run high, there are fewer routines to steady you, and anything said now can be hard to take back. It is usually better to use these days to gather your thoughts than to make a decision.
That might mean writing the two columns above, going for a long walk without your phone, or speaking to one trusted friend who will listen and not tell you what to do. It might also mean noticing what you feel at different moments. Pay attention to when you feel most like yourself and when you feel least, and to what you are looking forward to and what you are dreading.
It can help to set yourself a date, perhaps the end of January, by which you will decide whether to say something to your partner, to seek help or to take a step. A deadline can stop the question from running forever. Decision research suggests that once a choice is final, people tend to settle into it more easily than when the option to change their mind stays open. In studies with photography students, those who could swap their chosen prints liked them less than those who could not (Gilbert and Ebert, 2002). Those were prints and not relationships, so it is a principle and not a prescription. It does suggest that a clear decision point can be kinder to you than leaving the door open indefinitely.
If you are on the other side of it already, the piece on your first Christmas after separating may help.
Raising It With Your Partner Before You Decide
Some people reach a decision without their partner ever knowing how serious the doubts have become. You are not obliged to share every thought, and if you are afraid of your partner, the section on safety below comes first. When it is safe, saying how you feel gives the relationship a fair chance and gives you better information to decide with.
It tends to go better if you begin with how you feel and what you need, and not with a verdict. Something like "I have been struggling with how things are between us and I would like us to talk about it" opens a conversation. "I think we should split up" closes one. Say what would need to change, and agree a period, perhaps a few weeks, after which you will both look at whether it has.
Then watch what happens. If your partner listens, asks questions and begins to change, that tells you something. If you have raised the same concern many times and nothing has shifted, that tells you something too. The articles on how to suggest couples therapy to your partner and on how to stop arguing with your partner may help you start.
Practical Things to Get Clear On
Much of the fear around leaving is the fear of an unplanned future. You cannot plan every detail, but you can make the picture less blurry. Gathering information is not the same as deciding to leave. It simply means that whichever way you go, you are choosing with your eyes open and not out of fear of the unknown.
Where you would live. Think about the first few months, and who could give you a bed or a room if you needed one.
Your money. Write down what you earn, what you share and what you would need each month on your own. Many people find the real figures less frightening than the ones in their head.
Your support. Name the people who would stand by you, whether friends, family or colleagues, and the ones you would want to tell first.
Children, if you have them. Think about how they would be told and what day to day arrangements might look like. The articles on telling the kids about separation and co-parenting after separation cover this.
Advice for your situation. A solicitor or a free advice service can explain where you stand on housing, money and children. Their advice will be specific to you in a way an article cannot be.
If any of this feels impossible to look at alone, that is a good thing to bring to therapy.
If You Decide to Stay, and If You Decide to Leave
Both are active choices, and both need a plan. If you decide to stay, staying is not the same as doing nothing. It means saying clearly what needs to change, and giving your partner a chance to respond. It is also the moment to consider couples therapy, since many people try it before leaving. The articles on when to go to couples therapy, whether couples therapy is worth it and how to suggest it to your partner cover the practical side. If children are part of the question, staying together for the kids looks at that choice.
If you decide to leave, the aim is to do it with as much care and as little damage as you can. The articles on ending a relationship amicably and how to separate or divorce well describe how to plan the practical and emotional sides, and telling the kids about separation covers that conversation. If you are not sure that you want a permanent break, a trial separation is another option to consider. Once the decision is made, life after separation looks at starting again.
Whichever you choose, the research on recovery is reassuring. A long German study found that life satisfaction dropped as divorce approached and then gradually rebounded, although on average the return was not complete (Lucas, 2005). It looked at divorce and describes averages, but it supports a hopeful point. Difficulty usually eases with time, and it often starts well before the formal ending.
When Safety Is Part of the Question
Everything above assumes that you are free to think, to talk and to choose. If you are afraid of your partner, or they control who you see, what you spend or how you spend your time, this is a different question. Leaving can be the most dangerous time in an abusive relationship, and it deserves specialist planning. The National Domestic Abuse Helpline is free and runs 24 hours on 0808 2000 247. In an emergency, call 999. The articles on signs of emotional abuse and coercive control versus conflict describe what to look for.
How Therapy Can Help With This Question
If you have been going round in circles, an outside voice can break the loop. Therapy is not there to tell you what to do. It gives you a steady place to say the things you cannot say at home, including the parts you are ashamed of, such as wanting to leave and fearing that you will.
In individual sessions we can look at what is underneath the question, work through the good and hard parts of each path, and look at what you would need in order to carry whichever you choose. We can also look at the fear itself, since the fear of an uncertain future is something you can work with. If you would like to explore the question with your partner, couples sessions can give you both a place to say what is true. If you would like a focused place to untangle it in one sitting, a single prepared session is another option.
If you are wondering whether to leave your relationship and would like to talk it through, I offer a free 30 minute consultation, in person in London or online. It is a chance to say what is going on and to see whether working together would help.
Looking for something to work on between sessions, or before you decide on therapy? Our Resources page brings together a mix of free and paid resources for couples and individuals. You will find free guides to help you prepare for therapy, alongside paid workbooks on themes such as attachment, desire and intimacy, and ending a relationship well. Each one is gently paced and designed to be used at home, on your own or together.
About the Author
Mark Ryan is a BACP Accredited Psychotherapist and NCPS Accredited Relationship Therapist based in London. He works with couples and individuals on relationship decisions, separation and the patterns that develop between partners under pressure.
References
Eastwick, P. W., Finkel, E. J., Krishnamurti, T., & Loewenstein, G. (2008). Mispredicting distress following romantic breakup. Revealing the time course of the affective forecasting error. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 44(3), 800 to 807. <https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2007.07.001>
Gilbert, D. T., & Ebert, J. E. J. (2002). Decisions and revisions. The affective forecasting of changeable outcomes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82(4), 503 to 514. <https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11999920/>
Joel, S., Eastwick, P. W., Allison, C. J., et al. (2020). Machine learning uncovers the most robust self report predictors of relationship quality across 43 longitudinal couples studies. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 117(32), 19061 to 19071. <https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7431040/>
Joel, S., Impett, E. A., Spielmann, S. S., & MacDonald, G. (2018). How interdependent are stay or leave decisions? On staying in the relationship for the sake of the romantic partner. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 115(5), 805 to 824. <https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000139>
Lucas, R. E. (2005). Time does not heal all wounds. Psychological Science, 16(12), 945 to 950. <https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16313658/>
Sbarra, D. A. (2015). Divorce and health. Current trends and future directions. Psychosomatic Medicine, 77(3), 227 to 236. <https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4397145>
