Not too long ago, we shared a Reddit post in which user u/nocturnt asked divorced people to share the red flags they ignored, and the responses had our red flag detector going wild:
Here are some of the most memorable responses, along with some new stories from readers of the BuzzFeed Community:
1. "My red flag was when I was standing at the back of the church with my dad, staring straight ahead like a deer caught in headlights, and he said to me, 'You don't have to do this, you know.'"
"Earlier that day, I realized I spent the entire morning doing my bridesmaids' makeup and focusing on them, when finally one of them said, 'Don't you think it's time you got ready?'"
2. "When we got married, his mother cried tears of sorrow, not happiness."
3. "He always said — almost proudly — that he'd been the one to end all of his previous relationships. I thought I would be the exception. I was not."
4. "I married my first wife extremely quickly. She wanted to get married, and I didn't want to break up."
5. "He cheated on me constantly, and I caught HPV. I wish I didn't let him gaslight me into thinking I was literally hallucinating his behavior, but I let him. I would take pictures of evidence, and he would say I staged it. I even tried to admit myself to the hospital for these 'delusions' he convinced me I was having, and ended up going to therapy instead. Six months later, I realized the problem was him."
"This is when I learned about gaslighting."
6. "On our first date, he mentioned that every one of his past relationships resulted in him at the police station because all of his ex-girlfriends were 'crazy.' He said he wanted someone 'normal' for a change. I should've realized he was the common denominator in all of those incidents."
7. "His mom told me to leave him, and that he wasn't 'ready' for someone like me. I wish I would've listened."
8. "I enjoyed my time away from him more than my time with him."
9. "My wife cheated on every single long-term partner she ever had, and even cheated on her first boyfriend with his brother! And she would talk about it almost as if she was proud of it, as though they deserved it."
10. "He liked to go through my phone whenever I was asleep. I caught him once and asked if he found anything good. He said, 'No, but you deleted it all.'"
11. "I was 'the other man' in her previous marriage."
12. "We were best friends with little bedroom chemistry."
13. "She lied about seemingly small, insignificant things too often."
"Once she introduced her friend as her sister. No problem, except when her 'sister' needed to borrow money. I didn't even find out she wasn't her sister until years into the marriage! If they can lie about something small, they can definitely lie about something big."
14. "Her bad credit. I knew it wasn't good, but I didn't realize how bad it was until right after we got married when we showed up to our apartment community with all of our shit in a moving truck and the manager wouldn't give us our key because she had a vehicle repo on her credit that she hadn't mentioned."
"I had to call my parents from their office and have them wire money to the bank before we could move in! We made it 50 weeks."
15. "Before we got married, his mom said, 'If you ever get divorced, we will know it was because of him and not you.' That was a huge red flag, but at the time, all I could think was, 'Wow, what a mean thing to say about your own son!'"
16. "When we were filling out the marriage certificate in the courthouse, I remember thinking, 'Huh, so that’s your middle name.'"
17. "She wasn't mean, she was 'honest.'"
18. "I was always alone. I'd come home and be alone, I'd wake up and be alone, I'd have a few days off, and she'd always be gone with her friends, the majority of whom were men."
19. "I was shaking and had drops of sweat rolling off of everywhere — even my legs — right before I said, 'I do.'"
"Also telling was when the officiant had us repeat the vows, 'And fidelity,' and he said, 'Infidelity.' Turns out he had been cheating the whole time!"
20. "She was always jealous of my accomplishments. It was me vs. her in her mind."
21. "My red flag was when he told me I 'saved' him from being gay."
22. "I had a gut feeling that I was marrying the wrong person — as I was walking down the aisle."
And finally:
23. "All of my mom's eight ex-husbands apparently ignored the red flag of how many times she's been married. Poor husband number nine ignored them, too!"
Some responses were edited for length and clarity.