There are relationships that fill your heart with joy and peace, help you become a better human being, and bring you true companionship. And immature relationships are nothing like that.
You know you’re in an immature relationship when you can’t stop yelling at each other for the pettiest things on Earth, when all you do is tell your friends how frustrating your partner is, and how he’s literally sucking the life from your bones. You’re in an immature relationship when you think stonewalling is a fitting punishment for fights, and nagging is the only way he will change his ways. You’re definitely in an immature relationship if most of your days are spent fighting with his mother because she and her son are siding against you on a matter that concerns your relationship!
Intrigued enough to read more? Well, the following list is a compilation of all the little (and large) red flags that mark a relationship as heading for ‘breakupville’.
So here are 25 signs that your relationship is immature and not going anywhere. And don’t despair if after reading this you realize that you and your partner exhibit a lot of the following. Anything in life can be improved, one only has to be willing.
25Endless Arguments About: “What’s In It For Me?”
It’s a big red flag if you or your partner (or both) have a habit of throwing around dialogues like “What’s in it for me?”
Why? It’s because statements like these reek of selfishness. And healthy relationships do not feature this kind of a dynamic.
After all, if you are always on the lookout to gain something out of your interactions, whether it’s social cred or a balm to your personal wounds, your “love” will come with terms and conditions attached, which is the fastest way to ‘breakupville’.
24Pushing Each Other’s Buttons Just To Get A Reaction
People who like to push other’s buttons are deeply insecure on the inside and need constant attention to feel worthy and validated. Unfortunately, if your heart is a bottomless hole, no one can ever fill it up however much they might love you.
That’s why button-pushers always turn into emotional vampires who slowly (and surely) erode away their partner’s confidence and self-esteem. And that’s not the recipe for a healthy relationship, which is why the partner always walks out on the button-pusher sooner or later.
23She Loves It When He Treats Her Like A Baby
There’s a difference between nursing someone when they are seriously ill and babying them for no reason. And if you (or your partner) expect the other person to do the latter, here’s some bad news for you: you haven’t grown out of your toddler years.
And this behavior can range from expecting the partner to coo around you when you have a minor case of sniffles to wanting them to cook and clean up after you every day. In fact, some people even make their partner responsible for their safety while crossing the road or while on the subway.
22He Never Admits His Mistakes
Ever tried to break up two kids when they are kicking and scratching each other? Once you have pried them apart, they both point at the other person and say they started it. *Rolls eyes*
That’s exactly the mental state of a person who is incapable of admitting his or her own mistake in a situation. In fact, if you or your partner have a habit of blaming the other and dredging up past hurts just so you can prove that the other one is a bully and you are a victim of their nastiness, you two are already on the slippery slope to breakupville.
21She Bails When Things Go Wrong
If you or your partner have ever bailed on each other when the going got tough, your relationship is just too immature to last too long.
This can range from ghosting on the other when they were diagnosed with cancer to refusing to support them when they were suddenly laid off from work. Whatever the situation might be, if you are unable to be there for each other in times of crisis, your relationship really isn’t going to last for too long.
Know that saying about fair-weather friends and all? Exactly.
20He Hates That She Was With Other Men Before Him
If a guy thinks that it’s okay for him to date multiple women over the years because that’s what studs do but wants his partner to be a “pure” woman who has never had a relationship with any other man before him, then he is a delusional fool who is too immature to even understand his double standards.
The truth is, everyone has a past and mature people never let it get in the way of their current relationship. So if he isn’t cut from that same cloth, it’s best for you to cut him out altogether before he ends up convincing you that you aren’t worthy of being with him.
19Holding Grudges After A Fight
Long story short, if you tend to hold grudges after a fight, it’s either because you and your partner never bothered to find a solution for the problem or because you are the “never forgive, never forget” type of person. And there’s nothing comforting about either scenario.
It’s because grudges end up poisoning the person holding onto them, and this, in turn, poisons the relationship sooner or later through misguided actions and guilt-trippings.
18Lashing Out Or Stonewalling Each Other When Upset
There are a lot of ways to maturely handle a disagreement or a fight. And lashing out at each other, whether physically or verbally, or stonewalling the other person doesn’t fall under this category.
Why? Because lashing out puts the other person in an adversarial position where they are must either lash out to defend themselves or simply stonewall you to protect themselves from being bullied, both of which don’t incentivize either party to look for a solution. Moreover, stonewalling is a form of emotional abuse that simultaneously punishes the other and tells them they aren’t worthy of your love if they are not perfect.
17Wanting To Be The Coolest Couple On Social Media
You’re a smart cookie, you already know that people who upload a lot of lovey-dovey snaps with their partner on social media are secretly battling with huge relationship problems behind the scenes, whether those problems are acknowledged or seethe under the surface.
Many social media relationships have fizzled out, and the couple then deletes half their old posts, resulting in a sad, obviously altered feed.
So beware if you or your partner want to be the coolest couple on social media. It’s a big sign of immaturity and escapism.
16His Mom Always Comes First
There are three types of men on this planet. The ones who hate their mothers, the ones who adore their mothers, and the rest who love their moms but are independent adults on their own right. The last example is the mature one. The other two need to be sidestepped with a wide berth.
It’s because any man who loves his mother a tad too much is actually a toddler in disguise whose mother never allowed him to grow up. And such men usually let their mothers be their puppetmasters, regardless of what their girlfriend or wife might say, which is a scary thought considering that most women who don’t let their sons grow up actually see the girlfriend/wife as the competition.
15Not Knowing How To Behave In Public
Belching in public, making fart jokes, or behaving inappropriately in public when they don’t get their way are big red flags that the person you are with is seriously immature. After all, toddlers are the ones who break down in tears and throw tantrums when their parents refuse to buy them that sparkly toy, and who repeated have to be told to behave themselves in a dinner party with a lot of guests.
Being in a relationship with an immature person can often turn nightmarish, because human beings are social creatures, and social niceties and rules are a way for all of us to cooperate with each other.
14He Just Wants To Play Video Games All Day
You know it’s immature when a grown man sits at home and plays video games all day long, whether he is employed or currently unemployed. Yet so many women put up with this immature behavior because they are afraid of being alone if they walk out of the relationship.
News flash: you are already alone if your man only plays video games in his free time and isn’t interested in bonding with you! Now, what are you going to do about it?
13She Paid Off His Massive Debts More Than Once
We are living in a world where having money is necessary for survival. Even homeless people need it to secure a sleeping bag and a hot meal.
Knowing this reality, if your partner’s approach to money is to spend every last penny of it on extravagances and then rack up huge credit card debts with the hope that someone (either their parent or you) will pay off their debts sooner or later, you can rest assured that they will be a train wreck in under 10 years.
And if you remain in a relationship with them for too long, they will turn you into one too!
12Not Being Vulnerable Around Each Other
There are a lot of reasons why people are afraid of vulnerability. One of them is past experience where their vulnerability was used against them. And the other is realizing that the person you were vulnerable with doesn’t really care about you at all.
Unfortunately, emotional baggage of this kind can really ruin a relationship if the people with them are unwilling to heal their own wounds. Because if you can’t be vulnerable around your partner, you’ll never be able to reveal your true self to them, which will make you resent and distrust them in the long run.
11He Is Never Interested In Discussing The Future
Mature people are always willing to discuss the future quite early on in the relationship. It helps them stay on the same page from day one and also lets them go their separate ways if they realize both people want different things in the future where the relationship is concerned.
Unfortunately, immature people are usually insecure about being abandoned and so don’t like discussing the future. Plus, they hate responsibility, which is the cornerstone of every good relationship.
Do you see why this is a problem?
10Feeling Alone
The worst feeling in the world is to be in a relationship with someone and still feel absolutely alone. It even trumps unrequited love!
And while there are many reasons why this happens, the one thing that connects them all is immaturity. Here’s why.
The thing is, your loneliness could be a direct product of complacency and a serious lack of effort. Or, it could be because of the selfishness of one partner and the resulting resentment in the other. But they are both lonely because of the immature belief that love is self-sustaining if you are with the right person.
It’s like expecting a plant to survive off of rainwater in the middle of summer!
9Never Compromising
Compromises are not meant to be unhappy truces where one or both the partners have to kill a part of their happiness to accommodate the other’s desires in the matter. In reality, healthy compromises always leave both people equally happy because their wants are complementary and they both care for the happiness of the other.
That’s why refusing to compromise is a big sign of immaturity. Either because you are too scared to get out of an incompatible relationship, or because you are too selfish and only care about getting the better end of the deal always.
8She Has To Walk On Eggshells Around Him
If this is the scenario in your relationship, run as fast as you can! It’s emotional abuse in disguise.
After all, would you feel the need to be careful about your speech and your actions if your partner was a mature individual who understood that disagreements are a normal part of being in a relationship? The truth is, people who walk on eggshells are secretly terrified of their partner’s reaction. Either because they get physically aggressive or they tend to stonewall them in passive aggression.
7Spying On Each Other
If you or your partner have the habit of checking each other’s emails and chat messengers when they are in the bathroom, just because you want to be sure they aren’t cheating on you with anyone else, you are seriously violating the other’s privacy and trust in you. In fact, it’s worse when you openly force your partner to give you their passwords and share their whereabouts with you every hour!
Trust us, no one feels the need to do this unless they have been scarred in the past and haven’t healed those wounds, or are deeply insecure about their own worth.
6Trying To Make The Other Jealous
This point is very similar to the one we discussed earlier, about pushing each other’s buttons. The only difference is, this one involves a third, usually unsuspecting, person in the mix.
So if you or your partner have a habit of testing the other’s devotion by flirting with someone else just so they fly into a jealous rage and tell you off for doing it, you are secretly insecure and have huge self-esteem problems.
Why else would you voluntarily torture your partner with an untrustworthy behavior of this kind?
5She Hates His Friends, He Hates Hers
This one can usually be chalked up to basic incompatibility. After all, we share a lot of our characteristics with our good friends. That’s what allows us to have so much fun together without fighting all the time!
So if you and your partner hate the other’s friends, there’s a big chance you don’t like each other all that much either.
And if that’s not the case, the hatred might actually be jealousy caused by insecurity where the friends are seen as a threat to the couple’s “togetherness”.
4He Compares Her To His Mom
Don’t confuse this point with the one about him placing his mother’s decisions above yours about your relationship.
When we say immature men compare their partner to their mother, we are talking about men for whom the ideal woman is a lady who possesses all the good traits his mother has. And just because children can be very naïve about their parent’s flaws, when he finally does get a girlfriend, her human imperfections make her seem less than his mother in his mind, even if she possesses a lot of the same good traits.
Yup, it’s as convoluted as it sounds!
3She Can’t Stop Nagging Him
Nagging has never inspired anyone to change their ways. Instead, all it does is tell the other person how pitifully imperfect you think they are and how much you don’t accept them.
The truth is, people are inspired to change when they think you love them just the way they are but are cheering them on to grow and become a better human being. Not just for the relationship, but for society as a whole.
2She Wants Him To Change
There are two ways this pans out.
First, you get into a relationship with him knowing about his less-than-stellar traits but confident that your love and guidance will change him. And second, as your relationship progresses, you start to notice certain habits and behaviors that are harmful to the relationship, like clinginess and jealousy, which he doesn’t want to improve because that’s how he has always been and no one’s complained before this. (Yeah, right.)
And in both cases, the mature way to handle the situation is to walk away.
1He Is Always Late
People who are always late get on everybody’s nerves. After all, it’s a blatant disrespect of the other’s time, which they freed up for you.
And so if he’s always late, it’s either because he narcissistically believes that turning up late is fashionable and you have nothing better to do anyway, or because he isn’t all that into you anymore and it’s his passive-aggressive way of expressing that disinterest.
Either way, that kind of behavior is super immature and may be a sign that your relationship isn’t going anywhere.
