Divorce and Destruction

WitchDoctor431 · 2026-02-12T11:34:15+00:00

Well most women once the divorce starts they will become so vindictive and evil that she will most likely force you to hate her before its over

Confident_Ask8782 · 2026-02-12T03:27:55+00:00

It is tough and sorry to hear this. Accepting the thing you don’t control is best you can do for yourself. Look at the bright side. As you grow older you need less to live. Lot less. Yes everything is divided to half, you also probably need half to live because runway has gotten lot shorter. Life is short, don’t regret.

EnvironmentalAd3558 · 2026-02-12T03:16:43+00:00

Divorcing is expensive and you do feel it at first. But with many of us living without her is so much cheaper. You may have lower net income but you have 100% control over it.

koskesh122 · 2026-02-12T02:01:19+00:00

Well bud, join the club.

50% of all marriages end in divorce. 2nd marriages have 60% divorce rate and 3rd marriages 70% divorce rate.
90% of all divorces initiated by the women. • Child support, Alimony, your pension + retirement savings, government support + housing incentivizes them leaving you.
90% of custody awarded to mothers.
False allegations of abuse are prevalent in family courts. • You will be called abusive in order to stress you out so you give in to their unjust demands.

What to do now?

Settle your case ASAP. • The leeches (Judges, Lawyers, Therapists, Legal system will want to bleed you dry by leveraging your kids against you) The system gets paid by you fighting for you children.
Find a hobby.
Focus on your career/start a side hustle/Make more money.
Hit the gym daily.
Stay away from SINGLE moms at ALL costs and anyone who claims their ex was abusive. Do NOT raise another man’s child. You may end up being on the hook financially (Child support) for their kid if you leave.
Travel once a year.
Read books like No More Mr. nice guy
Open up the New Testament and start reading daily + listen to Charles Stanely on YouTube. • Learn to forgive your ex. This will set you emotionally and mentally free so you can begin enjoying life once again.

MonarchistExtreme · 2026-02-12T00:33:27+00:00

It sucks, there ain't nothing for it but time....enduring the suck, the pain and the anger. However, a year from now you will be amazed by good it feels to have peace in your home. Once you meet the woman you projected the image of the woman you loved upon, it gets easier. At the end of it all I'd say for every hour I spent angry at my ex wife, I spent a day mad at myself for not leaving her sooner.

I know it's impossible to visualize now but you will get there.

dharmattan · 2026-02-11T20:55:30+00:00

Married over twenty years and she had me served ten years ago, divorced since 2018. You may be a lot better off divorced. I am a minimalist. I went from a house to an apartment style condo. Less furniture, less clutter, less expenses. I have a couple of motorcycles and when I want to hit the road I lock my place and go. I took up photography and have a better life.

When married I could not get her to stop spending money. The house was borderline hoarder with new stuff she would buy and ignore. Now I know where the money is and how much. My finances hugely improved. Less stress and less conflict. I have not had contact since 2018 and enjoy life more.

You want to know how to do it? Just do it.

EnvironmentalRate853 · 2026-02-11T20:28:06+00:00

I’m on the bus with a coffee so this might be a bit fragmented.

It takes time. I’m still living with STBXW but it’s has suddenly got emotionally hostile. I’ve been processing this for years though.

Journaling with ChatGPT was a game changer for me. It’s taken a bit to tune etc, but it has been a counseller, journal and divorce coach.

The key bit of info you’ll get from this site is that disbelief will be your first emotion, followed by grief and anger and bargaining. If you am an understand that’s a journey you need to embrace rather than avoid, it’s a fraction easier.

I’ve also learnt not to feel like a failure. For the early part you feel massive loss of role and identity. Your role as a provider has been thrown in the trash. It’s easy to feel worthless. Again, very normal and typical unfortunately.

In the long term, so many guys end up in a better state: physically, emotionally and financially.

This forum is amazing. Use it, check in regularly. For me, it’s normalised divorce and all the shit that goes with it. Im no longer lying awake at night trying to work things out in my head.

NilesGuy · 2026-02-11T20:24:25+00:00

OP what about coming up with creative marital agreement such as still living together and sharing bills until both parties are better financially situated.

Terrible-Mind2633 · 2026-02-11T20:18:36+00:00

I signed up for therapy sessions once every few weeks. Not a cure, but after doing it for a while I’m starting to appreciate a regular place that lets me ramble for an hour to a person without any relevancy in my life and a legal obligation to keep things confidential

TheWallGoingUp · 2026-02-11T17:35:06+00:00

I read somewhere that men after 50 lower their standards for women, just to have a caretaker in old age. 30 years and you want more of the same? Go contribute something for God's sake, you're gonna die anyway.

Big_Marsupial_8142 · 2026-02-11T17:00:05+00:00

Allow yourself the time to grieve. My divorce was several years ago - so the pain has faded along with my recollection of how truly awful of a time it was for me. We were married 17+ years, together for 25+.

Emotionally it was death by 1000 cuts. Playing the whole scenario over and over again on replay in my mind and the sheer betrayal / callousness my wife displayed wiped me out for MONTHS. I was on anti-depressants for a year through the whole process. For what seemed like weeks - I would have mini panic attacks / crying spells during the day for whatever reason. I was able to keep my composure at work and not let it become a distraction for my coworkers in the office. Slowly but surely - things started to get better as I realized that being miserable was MY choice and that SHE wasn't coming home to me.

So I did what most guys on here have suggested - I focused on ME and what I could control. I ate better, stayed away from excessive alcohol consumption, but would meet my best friend to have a beer on occasion. I found that I started sleeping better, feeling better and as a byproduct of all the stress - my appetite wasn't there, so I lost a lot of weight which helped me gain energy and self esteem as I became more active and loved watching my body change / becoming a better version of myself both physically and mentally.

It is a slow and steady process - I put my head down and focused FINANCIALLY on burning down debt as quickly as I could afford - I didn't buy new stuff immediately and didn't spend excessively on the kids. I was on a budget and held firm to my plan as much as I could. It took me close to 2.5-3 years to get to a point where my debt was paid off and my finances were solid.

Sorry for the novel - things DO GET BETTER with time and getting yourself into a different mindset - one that focuses on YOU and YOUR WELL BEING. The rest will come in due time. I'm sorry you're in the beginning stages of this garbage... It sucks brother.... No two ways about it.

Clear-Sail-5298 · 2026-02-11T16:28:01+00:00

Renewed focus on yourself. Do what you couldn’t comfortably do, what you didn’t have time for, or what you were scared to try. The first year is a combination of self loathing and self discovery. If you do more of the latter, you’ll set yourself up with a better chance of future success romantically and individually.
Prioritize your health. Yes, get in the gym, be consistent, change and better your body and mobility. Longevity training is a good way to put it. It’ll improve your aesthetics, but more importantly it’s good for your quality of life as you get older. Half glow up, half grow up. Don’t stop there though. Try to look at your mental health too. See a psychiatrist if you have something untreated that may have interfered some in your life. Talk to a therapist to sort out the mess of feelings you have. Try to get closer to some friends you inevitably grew apart from during marriage, happens a bit to almost all of us.
When you’re ready, put yourself back out there. Sex is awesome, we all know that. But it’s the “feeling seen” and “being desired” thing that most people start to miss. A good portion of divorce happens after emotional detachment and a feeling of being nothing but ships passing in the night. That’s terrible for your psyche long term. But when the opposite sex shows interest in you again, and maybe some of them find your quirks attractive rather than annoying, it’s an instant confidence booster and over time you may find someone who is just simply more compatible with you, and the divorce was a blessing in disguise.

Good luck bro. You got this

Cool-Lavishness-1955 · 2026-02-11T16:26:45+00:00

OP, I totally understand where you are coming from. My divorce was a year and a half ago, and so much better on the other side with time. But just even today, I still grieve the financial loss that came with it. But the way I look at it, money comes and goes and you could rebuild it over time.

TheConjugalVisit · 2026-02-11T15:52:49+00:00

I'm not on the other side, don't know if I ever will be. She was the love of my life, still is.

Just have to march on soldier. Days are sad, nights are lonely but I refuse to involve another women in my mess. Did that in college based on the advice of my friends, made me feel worse for hurting women that liked me.

I felt so ashamed for hurting them because I could see they really liked me.

UrAristotle · 2026-02-11T15:49:46+00:00

Take it day by day, sometimes just through the morning or the afternoon or the night. Sometimes just through the next hour.

Little by little you’ll get to a new normal.

TeddyPSmith · 2026-02-11T15:12:56+00:00

Day by day. Cry, get angry, don’t suppress your emotions. You have to grieve it and it fucking sucks. But your body and mind are made to heal themselves so long as you don’t get in the way.

I have found some solace in a therapist, DivorceCare, family, and friends. It still feels like being awake during surgery.

dystinct · 2026-02-11T15:12:48+00:00

This is going to be hard to hear, but I feel a lot of men on here suffered in silence. You are about to feel very alone and nobody is coming to help. Most likely nobody is going to check on you and nobody is going to ask you how you're handling the divorce. This is going to suck, but when you get to the other side you'll be a far better man.

I didn't go to therapy, no hate on those who do, it just wasn't for me. Instead I focused on work (don't let this impact your job), diet, finances, fitness, and new friend group. Most of the friends we had were as a couple, so I cut them out pretty quickly.

I'm so much happier than I ever thought I would be. You'll start to appreciate the little things. I don't have to consult someone to make a decision. I do things on my own terms. I'm OK being alone. The silence is no longer deafening.

The biggest change to my personality is my ability to not be bothered by anything. Oddly enough it was a video I watched of Mathew McConaughey talking about his 24 hour rule. I no longer dwell on shit, especially things out of my control. Most of the time now I don't even need a full 24 hours to let things go.

Matthew McConaughey has spoken about a "24-hour" approach to grief, which advises allowing oneself one full day to deeply mourn, cry, and lie in bed feeling sorry for oneself before moving forward.

This perspective on managing loss includes:

Limiting the Mourning Period: The goal is to avoid getting stuck in a "moping" cycle, by concentrating the intense grief into a single day.
The "Rule" for Heartbreak: It is framed as a way to end heartbreak by recognizing one's own worth and, if applicable, understanding that the loss is the other person's, rather than a personal failing.
Context of Loss: This philosophy is often discussed alongside his personal experience of losing his father, which he described as a turning point that forced him to grow up and shoulder more responsibility.

Delicious-Curious · 2026-02-11T15:07:56+00:00

The amount of pain men like us endure in this situation is so unfair. A life partner. Uh huh until she decides I’m out. It’s so 💔 and 🤬

dday_throwaway3 · 2026-02-11T14:52:00+00:00

I was with my wife for 24 years. I know it's scary, but you've got to become more comfortable with uncertainty. I took it day by day when I went through my divorce.

Once the dust settles, you start reconstruction. The aftershocks of divorce are profound. You’re emotionally and psychologically stressed, and your entire future changes as well as most of your relationships. It takes time to figure out the new normal.

If you haven't retained an attorney yet, here's why you need one and how to find one: https://www.reddit.com/r/Divorce_Men/comments/1c2n16i/fundamentals_you_need_a_family_law_attorney/

You've probably thought about moving out before divorce is final. Don't. It's a huge mistake. Here's why: https://www.reddit.com/r/Divorce_Men/comments/1c1u1g6/fundamentals_do_not_move_out/

bluetrainlinesss · 2026-02-11T14:34:10+00:00

Nothing to say other than you can do this. Millions of men have, worse than us.

KingJon85 · 2026-02-11T14:33:40+00:00

4 1/2 months in and I just play it day by day. I just do what I can to take care of myself.

Title	Divorce and Destruction
Author	jdprime
Upvotes	15
Comments	69
Date	February 11, 2026 2:12 PM UTC (5 months ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/Divorce_Men
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/Divorce_Men/comments/1r1yfkh/divorce_and_destruction/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/Divorce_Men/divorce-and-destruction.1573255 https://theredarchive.com/post/1573255

Comments