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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think ‘I could have married you?’

165 replies

User2638394 · 20/06/2019 20:28

I am incredibly happy with my husband, who is a gorgeous, clever, funny, kind, decent man. I truly love and adore him and would / could never be unfaithful. I choose him every day.

But sometimes I meet men (usually through work) and get on with them in a way that makes me think ‘if things had been different, I could have happily married you.’ I’m not in love with them and don’t want anything from them, but I have this feeling that in another life, I could have been happy with them. It’s happened perhaps 2 or 3 times in my life.

Does anyone else feel this way? That you sometimes just have a piercing awareness of how different your life might have been and how under different circumstances you could have loved someone else?

OP posts:

EggysMom · 22/06/2019 10:09

I’m on husband number 3, so I’ve pretty much married everyone I would consider marrying

Really? So am I, but I can think of at least another two I'd consider (and they're not famous, just people who I've crossed paths with over the years)

TotheletterofthelawTHELETTER · 22/06/2019 10:16

I’m single currently but I have always felt like this about an ex-boyfriend.

Dated at 17-18, we ended it as I went away to university and we didn’t want to do long distance.

Dated at 22 for a few months, I’d come home after uni but he had a job offer in London and I didn’t want to follow him.

34 - he’s still living in London but spends a lot of time in our home town, I’m newly separated from exh, we casually date for 6 months, it ends as it gets to the point I’d have to introduce him to DD and I’m not ready for that yet

39 - I’m still single, he’s now married and living back in our home town. We speak cordially when we see each other.

I am fully convinced we’ll meet back up at 50 and be together forever. I’ve always thought he was my one but the timing has never been quite right.

However, I also accept this is an illusion, if we’d given our relationship a chance and lived together etc it may not have worked out.

But still, it’s nice to think “I could have been with you” every now and then

KooMoo · 22/06/2019 10:31

I’ve never ever felt ‘in another life I could have married you’ since marrying. Never.

I can feel an affinity with a person without all the passion & promise that comes with the commitment of marriage.

VivienneHolt · 22/06/2019 23:43

I read once that people who believe in fate are more likely to disengage from relationships when things get hard as it clearly isn't 'fate' if things aren't rosy.

I think this is very true - people who believe too much in fate think that when things are hard it means they aren’t right, and that maybe leads them to give up.

I have fancied people yes but I can't imagine marrying them. You seem to get very strong feelings easily op!

I think people are maybe just misunderstanding! It’s not a strong feeling - certainly not as strong as actually fancying someone. It’s just this awareness that sweeps over that makes you realise you could really connect with someone else. I think if I indulged that feeling to the point of actually fancying them it could become a strong feeling, but it’s never happened yet.

I am fully convinced we’ll meet back up at 50 and be together forever. I’ve always thought he was my one but the timing has never been quite right.

If this does happen please do a mumsnet thread to update us

ChippityDoDa · 22/06/2019 23:58

Yes, all the time! I have two people in my past - I’ve a very brief fling and the other a work colleague - who I’m pretty sure I could/would have married if things had taken a different turn. Sliding doors and all that. Best not to dwell on the ifs and maybes though.

IAmNotAWitch · 23/06/2019 00:05

I have found other people attractive over the years. I have been asked out occasionally as well and thought that if I wasn't married I would be right into them.

What I find interesting/amusing in these circumstances is that the men I find attractive invariably remind me of DH in some way.

I don't believe in soul mates but I do believe that there are certain personality types that are particularly compatible.

I also believe in loyalty and the depth of love that grows over time and shared lives so I smile nicely and get a bit of polite distance.

VivienneHolt · 23/06/2019 00:08

What I find interesting/amusing in these circumstances is that the men I find attractive invariably remind me of DH in some way.

This is very true for me too. Not necessarily physically, but fundamentally they’ve all appeared to share the personality traits I most love and admire in my husband.

I suppose in some ways, they’re just reflecting back to me how great I think my husband is! That when I recognise someone who is like him in some way, I feel that sense of a possible connection because of the connection I have with him.

Sparklesocks · 23/06/2019 00:11

Occasionally on my train to/from work I look at men sitting nearby and wonder what our life would be like if we were together, would we go to the opera and fancy dinners? Or stay in with a bottle of cheap plonk and i played? Would we have a dog, a cat? Life in a big house or a teeny flat?

But it’s just a silly way to pass the time really, I don’t have any attraction to them and I love my DP, but it’s a fun distraction on a boring commute.

HepzibahGreen · 23/06/2019 00:16

Lord no. I'm marriage avoidant.
I have, however, often met men and thought " thank God I'm not married to you"!

VivienneHolt · 23/06/2019 08:37

I have, however, often met men and thought " thank God I'm not married to you"!

I’ve also felt this too!

FudgeBrownie2019 · 23/06/2019 08:46

No, it's not a feeling I've ever had, however I'm not at all romantic or convinced by fate. A friend of mine used to talk about her "one that got away" from her teen years and a few years ago they met up and got together again. No question they'll be together forever, but I can't remember ever feeling that.

VivienneHolt · 23/06/2019 08:51

No, I’ve never had a ‘one that got away’ feeling either. All of my exes are lovely men who I respect very much, but there isn’t even a shadow of a doubt in my mind that we were right to break up. I’m not in touch with them any more but if I bumped into them I would want to see them happy and settled with a lovely partner themselves!

HolesinTheSoles · 23/06/2019 08:53

I'm not voting either way as I've never felt this way (I find it difficult to imagine being with someone else) but don't think yabu at all.

Camomila · 23/06/2019 09:29

I do this sometimes but I'm just harmlessly imagining different lifestyles rather than fancying them...

Like a good friend growing up in Italy, is now a dr and still lives localy...its quite fun imagining still living there and doing all the 'village' things.

Or random boys I used to flirt with at uni (and am still fb friends) and now have interesting looking lives....I'm like ooh that'd be nice living there (mainly abroad)

Reading back, I'm not bored of DH, just England!

VivienneHolt · 23/06/2019 09:33

Reading back, I'm not bored of DH, just England!

Nothing wrong with a happy Italian riviera fantasy! A good friend of mine asked me out when we were students together but I said no because I wasn’t sure if I fancied him and I liked our friendship. He’s now a writer and lives in New York. I sometimes idly imagine what my life might have been like if I’d agreed to go out with him! (Though we definitely wouldn’t have made it to marriage - we were not sufficiently suited!)

LeilaDarling · 23/06/2019 11:18

Yes, absolutely identify with this, sort of like a “sliding door” moment.
Great thread OP.

VivienneHolt · 23/06/2019 18:46

Thanks Leila. It’s been really interesting to read everyone’s responses!

Tableclothing · 23/06/2019 18:52

Definitely think choice of life partner has a huge impact on where you end up. I nearly married someone who lives in Paris and I would have moved to be with him, no doubt. My life would be so so different better dressed if I had.

However, DH is a bit of a legend really, and I find it really hard to imagine that anyone could make me happier than he has. Most often when I meet men now I think 'thank God I'm not married to you...'

morepooh · 23/06/2019 20:56

I read once that people who believe in fate are more likely to disengage from relationships when things get hard as it clearly isn't 'fate' if things aren't rosy.

then I think this is very true - people who believe too much in fate think that when things are hard it means they aren’t right, and that maybe leads them to give up.

I am not sure this is true for everyone, and for some it would be the other way, staying with the wrong person too long because of some initial thought that it was fated.

I agree that thinking about the reasons why you might find commitment or attachment or intimacy hard (if you do) or why you choose people who aren't available emotionally is the key thing if you want to end up in a good longstanding relationship. But I don't think believing or not believing in fate or luck or serendipity is anything to do with it - they are just belief systems and you can think about things and work things out and also believe in the possibility of fate at the same time, it isn't mutually exclusive

Paxleh · 30/11/2019 08:19

Just with one person. I was sat next to a man on a long haul flight and I felt a strange feeling that if I had taken a different bus to school one day (a sliding doors moment) this would have been my husband. We lived in different places, with very different careers, and we're both happily married with young families. We didn't exchange names, but talked for 10 hours. What was stranger still, I ended up sat next to him on another flight many months later to somewhere different. We said hi at the gate, laughed and remarked on the coincidence, but then ended up sat together too. Again we passed the flight like we had known each other forever, but didn't exchange names.

catwithnohat · 30/11/2019 08:46

I sometimes think about my life in general; the what ifs (if I'd made different choices) and occcasionally the if only....

littlepaddypaws · 30/11/2019 09:07

this is my 4th marriage and dh is THE ONE, i would have liked to met him earlier in life, but i think i had to go through life experiences first until the time was right for us to meet

fascinated · 30/11/2019 09:09

Of course. You’d have to be a hopeless romantic to think otherwise!

Leflic · 30/11/2019 09:10

Thing is - they have to want to marry you too!

I’ve had two contenders. I loved both. Married neither. I didn’t want to gamble my youth on the first and the second was an absolutely perfect love on my side but probably not reciprocated enough.

You have to them, they have to love you, you have to be the marrying kind.

Jayaywhynot · 30/11/2019 09:26

@tallgreenbottle
Probably the most honest comment I have read for a while, made me sad but the honesty made me smile

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