I'll start with a little background on me. I had very little dating experience before meeting my now ex wife in my early 20s. I had one previous relationship in high school that didn't really go anywhere. It was with someone I had a big crush for a few years and she had been going through a rough time in her life and our relationship started out of me being there as a friend to support her. Looking back I had no clue what I was doing, but once I had her, I realized I never truly loved her and sort of pitied her? I always sort of felt bad about that. I felt disingenuous or something. That's one of the reasons we broke up right before I started college.

I started college kind of in a daze from that experience. I wasn't sure what I was looking for in a relationship or what they were even for. At the time I didn't care about having a partner, I wasn't thinking about marriage / a family. I was a bit of a loner when it came to things like that. I went a majority of the 3 years without even so much as a date. My friends used to joke that I wasn't into women and only cared about my hobbies/work/school, but it was true. I did have a ton of friends and was fairly popular. I also had a handful of random crushes that I sort of tried at. Looking back I found that I got way to obsessed with people who barely had any interest. I'd end up getting myself hurt but it was completely self inflicted. I also had several people who expressed interest in me, but I'm so picky I never gave any of them a chance for whatever reason. The TLDR is, I wasn't really strategic about anything.

Fast forward to my 3rd year in college, I met my now ex through mutual friends and we completely hit it off. We had a ton of similar interests, similar values, ect. I just liked that she was different, we just clicked. She was going through some tough home life problems and at the time we met she wasn't fully open to the idea of a relationship. So we started off me just supporting her as a friend though that tough time. (Sounds familiar ikr.) Nonetheless we moved really really fast. I got SUPER attached early we talked about marriage very early on. I had never felt feelings like this before in my life. I had never been attached to someone like this. I think it's because she showed me a softness or care that nobody had ever done for me. I kind of grew up with emotionally cold parents so maybe that's it. Either way at the time I felt like I couldn't live without her. We were pretty much inseparable. And to be clear it wasn't a one sided thing, I do believe she truly loved me. From the outside looking in, all of our friends thought it was a bit odd what I experienced. I was this sort of cool/mysterious collected guy who was very independent, and then overnight I'm swept up in whatever this romance thing was. We were engaged after dating for a year and a half or so if I remember correctly and married the following year. I was the guy who cried during the ceremony, I guess at the time it was happy tears, but looking back I really don't know.

We never lived together before we got married. I definitely think looking back we should have, because our entire relationship before we never tried "real life" it was just college. Pretty early on there were a lot of issues we had to work though but at the time we made it work. I'd say the first few years of our relationship were good. We acceled in our careers, traveled a bit, made lots of friends who were new married couples, grew our hobbies, bought a house, got a dog. Everything was going pretty well. We discussed family plans on and off but never really reached a consensus. The last few years of our marriage were miserable, there was a distinct tone shift and she began putting me down in front of our friends a lot, that tenderness we used to have was gone. I was definitely this sort of performative self sacrificial type of person so I tried to do my best with grand gifts and acts of service. Maybe hoping to win her back and that tender care she used to give me. She just continued to keep me at arms length. She began excessive substance use, spending time with people who weren't good influences, (I found lots of evidence of an affair which turned into a huge fight) We had never fought before too which I don't know if that means I was meek or had a lot of self control, I dunno. I got the whole "I'm just trying to find myself" talk after all of these behaviors that were so humiliating and disrespectful towards me. (This is a gross oversimplification but I don't feel comfortable getting into all of the details here.) but the long and short of it is a line was crossed that shouldn't have been and I should have stood up for myself a long time ago before it even got to this point. Looking back I think she wanted a more "free" lifestyle and marriage wasn't what she thought it was and began acting out. She said a lot of really hurtful things to me like, "I want to have a family but not with you." I overheard her tell a friend, "Oh you wouldn't want to be married to him." Her family lashed out at her telling her she was making the biggest mistake of her life and I was the best thing that ever happened to her. "She told them, "He is not the best thing that ever happened to me." This was all very soul crushing to me and I know I didn't deserve it.

She packed her things and left on her own and I served her divorce papers shortly after. I handled the entire legal process myself. Credit where credit is due, she trusted me to handle it and we were very fair with each other. I have no complaints there. It was a ton of research and work which I'm sure many of you who have handled it yourself know what I'm talking about.

I came out of this experience just completely shell shocked. I honestly spent my whole life, probably like a lot of men, just stuffing my emotions, but this experience was so much I couldn't not process them. I felt the most amount of grief I had ever experienced in my life.

I knew I didn't want to just wallow in my sorrow forever. I began working out, went to therapy, eating better, sleeping better, got a promotion at work, I fine tuned my friendships. I had some amazing friends who had gone through similar experiences and they really supported me. It was so good to have people to talk to. I'm finally able to listen to my emotions and actually process and talk about it. I've had so many amazing experiences now that I'm living for myself and doing what makes me feel fulfilled. This is my first time doing that in my adult life. I truly feel the best that I ever have. I don't have any regrets really, I learned so much from this experience that I wouldn't have otherwise. My marriage/divorce was the best and worst thing to ever happen to me. In a lot of ways it broke the old version of me and I had to salvage what was worth salvaging and build a new version of myself with a lot more self car and self respect. I know now what I am willing to tolerate in a relationship and what I am absolutely not. I'm still trying to figure out what I want in a future relationship if at all. I have gone on a handful of dates and learned a fair amount about myself and my patterns. I found I was first attracted to people who needed, "fixing?" (I eluded to this earlier) I think because I had some complex about needing to be useful to someone. I also was able to identify unhealthy amounts of obsession when I like someone. Those few experiences were good for me to realize these things and hopefully break those patterns. Weirdly enough now that I did identify and break those, I find myself now very uninterested in dating or relationships.

Right now it's me and my peace.

Thanks for reading this brain dump. Happy to answer any questions or encourage those of you in the comments. Have a good one!