by littlemike 33 Replies latest jw friends
Just to add another point of view: I don't agree with garybuss. I think that if she did come back, you could never trust her again. Marriage must have trust to make it. You should not "settle" for a mediocre life and settling is what you would be doing to go back.
I do agree with whomever said that you are probably on the way to having a wonderful life and just don't know it yet. Keep us posted.
(((((Mike)))))My heart goes out to you, Mike. However it all works out, I hope that you are soon happy and hopeful again. You have friends here.
Shelly
Sad as undoubtably it is, only a fool would leave a happy relationship. if you think about it there will have been signs that all was not well. When my marriage broke up i was amazed at the number of times friends said "but you were so happy". Little did they know. Many relationships just carry on day to day without either party being aware they are not satisfied until a third party comes along and the realisation dawns. You will move on and find hapiness if you let go.
I agree with Garybuss. Twenty-eight years is a very long time. She is not going to find it as easy to leave as she thinks. She thinks of you as a brother? That's NORMAL after twenty-eight years, even HEALTHY. We should all be so lucky to be so comfortable with our partner after twenty-eight years. Could we live with very many people, hip to shoulder, day in and day out for twenty-eight years? Divorces that are final are when the couples DESPISE each other. That's not the case here. It's more a matter of temporary lust, and she needed a reason to end it.
As Garybuss put so eloquently, the sausage packer may lose his charm after a while, and she may come to her senses. Gary's final line is perfect. Take it slow, get some counselling, and wait to see how things unfold.
It still makes sense to close out the joint bank accounts. This is my first advice after twenty years with a divorce support group.
I've thought quite a bit about partnerships and relationships and observed them from the inside and from the outside. It looks to me the long term ones all have the same thing in common. That is, they virtually all continue "in spite of" setbacks and problems rather than because there weren't any.
The people looking for guarantees go from one relationship to the next getting disappointed because they can't find a perfect partner to live up to those guarantees. Go to "trust" a minute. If my wife messes up, does that mean I can't trust her ever again? Say I dump her and go to the available singles pool and pick out another partner. Where's the "guarantee" I can "trust" that partner?
Maybe I have loyalty and commitment too high on my list. If I make high demands of my spouse, do I make those same demands of my sons? If one of my sons makes a mistake does that mean I can't ever trust them again and I have to dump them? Or do I have two sets of standards? One for my spouse and another for my kids?
Maybe it's ownership, property rights. My partner isn't my "property". My partner's my partner, I don't own her like a quarter of beef in the freezer. If I look at her as my "property", that really opens me up to a lot of problems.
Maybe it boils down to expectations. What's different if I expect people to screw up? Maybe I'll say to you that you can trust me not to throw you under the bus if you screw up. Then maybe you'll cut me a little slack when I have a bad day or year. I think for my family, I'm gonna stay put . . . like a boulder in the river. That boulder's got bumps and cracks and it's covered with moss and parts or it are missing but I can hang on to that boulder a long time if I have to and it saves me from going over the falls.
Hi Everyone
Thank you for all the kind messages you have sent me. They are very encouraging at such a dark time as this.
I hope most of you are right about in the long term being happier because that certainly does not seem possible at the moment.
Thank you
Mike
Really liked this little "Gary nugget":
With me it's always emotion over intellect in the short view. After the emotion cools, my intellect always comes back. My challenge is not to make any messes while in emotion mode that are hard to fix in the light of objective reality. I'm a pragmatist . . . except when I'm emotional. The emotional me is an idiot.
Thanks Gary,
Open Mind
Very Crap, she should at least have had the decency to tell you face to face, esp after being together for so long.
So sorry, big hugs
es
I agree with garybuss. I have seen my sister jump from relationship to relationship, constantly looking for some kind of 'prince'. She is now 40, and just starting to realize that people are individuals first, couples second. Together is a choice. Life is so short, so full of crap, that to me, it is petty to stand ground and not take someone back if they are truly sorry and you truly love them still.
Now, about this post, we don't know the full story about why she left. After 28 years of marriage, looking back, was there not any signs at all of her discontent? My friend is leaving her boyfriend of 7 years and now that she has made the decision, put a deposit on another place, he is trying. He is begging and telling her that he will try now. But she is done loving him. She tried for years to love an unemotional, unresponsive man and she refuses to open her heart up again. There were signs for years, she TOLD him blatenly for years what was wrong, how she felt, what was missing, what she needed, begging him to tell her what he needed/wanted out of their relationship. Nothing. Now, he is surprised. Duh.
It was the same with me. 14 years of marriage. It took me 10 years to leave the abusive bastard. Once he knew I was serious, well then and only then was he apologetic, wanted counselling, begged, cried, wanted to talk, but the door, for me, was closed. I knew I would never open it to him again. To hear him now, he was shocked and surprised that I left him. Didnt see it coming. Intentional blindness to relationship problems is a choice.
So, my advice, there is nothing you can do other than learn from this experience. She didn't 'just leave' after that long in a relationship. Obviously the two of you grew apart and stopped communicating. I am so sorry for your pain at the realization of this, but maturity and moving on will require that you honestly examine your relationship with her. If not, like my sister and so many others I know, the balance of the relationship just carries forward.
Jez
(((littlemike))))))
My parents split after 31 years marriage. But i had always known it was never going to last.
Basically my mum said she could no longer do the marriage thing anymore.
They seperated for 6 months then tried it again it just didn't work.
I can't offer any advice but i do like what garybuss has said.
Though also i left my hubby in 1999 after 4 years marriage and we go back together in 2003 the best thing we did was to seperate we are better people now.
all the best
Helen
