Split with a long term DP at 30, which also resulted in giving up my business & getting a job.
In the next 10 years I managed to squeeze in another couple of disastrous relationships whilst realising if I put the same effort into my career & myself, I got far better results.
Enjoyed travelling, partying a fantastic career & bar a few flings on my own terms, I stopped bothering about wanting a relationship.
The relationships & flings I realised became a template for what I DIDN'T want in a man.
Some less independent friends didn't understand how much I was happy on my own. One hassling me for a list of my perfect man. I jokingly obliged with a quite bizarre, I depth & nit picky list to throw her off. She piped up - OMG that's xxxx - her ex from many years back & a mutual friend I had lost contact with. Lots of eye rolling & get losts at then friend. I had always had a soft spot for this guy, but I Really wasn't interested in a relationship with anyone.
Another friend died in strange circumstances & he was a mutual friend of this guy of old too. Myself & other unrelated friends were arranging a memorial & split up the list of contacts we had to find & make. This guy ended up on my list.
I rang him & turned out by coincidence, for the first ever we were both single, he was also living in a town I was visiting the next weekend with another couple of gay friends, so we arranged to meet for old times sake & nothing else.
Bizarrely that week I had a recurring dream about living in a house with blue decor & wooden beams, In my dream I was married with a little girl.
Met old friend in a gay bar, first time I had seen in 10 years. My 2 gay friends decided to head off & eat leaving me with old friend, headed back to his house so he could pick something up before going for a drink elsewhere - turned out it was the house from my dream 
We were married 18 months later, I was 41 & DD was born later that year - still together & very happy 16 years later. DD was born on dead friends birthday!