Years on, I am still sad about losing the life I thought I would have

[Notcontent]

Apologies for the slightly “feeling sorry for myself” tone of my post but some feelings I usually try to repress came to the surface today when I read something in a magazine. I was getting my hair cut and came across a piece by a woman called Rosie Green, in Red magazine.

She talked about the terrible heartache of her husband leaving after a long marriage and having to start a new life alone. I think many women would be able to relate to the almost physical pain of heartache, loss and rejection that she described, as well as this feeling that you are now responsible for everything alone, but she also said something else that really struck me - the fact that she was losing the life she thought she would have - the family holidays, dinner parties, etc.

I know that many women experience terrible financial pressures, as well, that overshadow everything else, but i think many of us, who have experienced marriage/relationship breakdown, do mourn our own versions of “the life we thought we would have”.

It’s been a decade since my exH left me with DC and while my life, by most standards, isn’t bad, it’s not what I thought it would be and i still can’t Help feeling a bit sad about it sometimes.

I know the feeling so well. Whilst I can feel proud of how far I’ve come in my own, I also never imagined I’d be trying to decorate a house completely alone and still be childless in my mid 30s. I was married with a very different life ahead of me in my head and I’ve had to adjust that view point.

I once read something and it really works with me. When I get down, I just remember how fortunate I am in life. There’s people in the world who would actually love to have my life and I’m actually incredibly lucky in many ways.

Well that idea of everlasting eternal safety and everlasting 'love' is and was always mostly an illusion. Nothing lasts for ever. This idea of the life you thought you would have had was a fantasy, there was no guarantee it would have worked out as planned. None. You are allowing a fantasy to define you. Let it go - it never existed - daydreams.

When you had lost a long relationship as I have and you have, sadness/grief is just part of it, you always live with a version of it. I don't mourn that future because my partner checked out about 2/3rds of the way through. I kind of realised there was no future before he finally left anyway. What I mourn is the lost years - when I stayed, and I should have been brave enough to leave. I mourn neglecting myself.

You might like "The Cost of Living" by Deborah Levy (or try the audiobook version read by Juliet Stevenson - it's great). It's just such a wonderful soulful journey - an autobiography about the period after the end of her long marriage.....

HarrietOh - thanks for posting and yes, you are so right! And as I have got older, I can see more clearly that not that many people have that perfect life we think everyone else has...

Yes I can relate. I have two special needs children and am now unable to work. This isn’t the sort of life I envisioned and I mourn for the life I haven’t got.

Rosabug - thanks! I will have to read that book - I loved Debarah Lev’s writing in Hot Milk.

You are no doubt right - clinging in to a fantasy is not a good way to live.

Alwaysgrey - I hope you get some practical and emotional support. I can imagine that must be incredibly tough.

I can relate too. Today I was just thinking we would probably have gone for a walk around an English Heritage place or had a day at the beach. As it is, I was stuck at home all day alone with a poorly child.

My only consolation is that I don't miss the shit bits. And there are quite a few shit bits when sharing your life with someone. Quite a lot of compromise. I find it less exhausting / feel more in control being single.

Never yet found a way to really accept the lacking in lovely days out / company on holiday / someone to share wine with while cooking and chatting.

So yes, feel / share your pain.

I find the same thing sometimes, but the feeling is quite fleeting. Partly as I am also enjoying the new life I am leading instead. Do you have that kind of feeling too, or is it mainly sadness?
Last week I went on holiday on my own, and stayed at the seaside for a week with the dog, for instance. That wasn't something I envisaged for the future. I'd never have done that if I'd stayed with my ex. And last month I went to a festival and spent 4 nights in a tent with my bf. I'd never have done that with my ex, either. Do you have any moments like that, when you find yourself doing something that you couldn't have imagined you doing, when you were married?

I am sorry and totally get what you mean. I think many women will be able to understand.

I think many of us grew up knowing quite a few people who were married for donkeys years, and that appeals to us, on a base level, doesn't it?

I'm not saying their marriages were always 'that' great, years ago? But I suspect, that Maybe people didn't divorce quite as easily back then?

People cheat so easily these days, don't they?

I know deep down that I would not have been that happy if the marriage had continued as it was flawed in many ways. And there is a certain freedom in not being reliant on someone else.

And yes, I do have some happy times and things i am looking forward to.

My best mate has been married over 30 years and frequently moans about her husband. She says when I talk about mine she realises that she doesn’t have that loving relationship with him anymore.
Except my husband died ten years ago after just seven years of marriage so we never had the chance to get to the more companionship/less passionate phase. She met her husband at 19. I met mine at 39. She’s had lifelong security o scf a long marriage, but it has been tainted with a son taking drugs, and her husband in prison. I’ve had the joy of finally meeting my soul mate when I’d almost lost hope and then losing him seven years later, he’ll never walk his daughter down the aisle, watch his son play rugby or grow old with me. But if he hadn’t passed away we may be divorced now - who knows?
My sister always wanted the white picket fence happy homemaker life with two kids and a dog . What she has is a disabled child and no partner.
So basically you have the life you have. You can mourn for the life you don’t have but really don’t dwell on it - you make the best of it.
I can’t think too much about the life I don’t have. My life is pretty darn good. I miss my husband every day. My childrens’ lives may have been very different. I still shed tears about what might have been. But then get up and get on with it.

Mind you, my own parents were divorced, and I always felt like I might end up divorced too (even before I met my ex, that is), but even so, every time I imagined my old age, it involved me staying in my home, with my ex. Maybe you just can't hold that many possible outcomes in your head at once, so you just go for the "happy ending" scenario?

I know that feeling very well OP. You aren't alone. I find it extremely hard having to see him all the time because of the dc. Rubbing salt in the wound.

I gave my heart and soul to the life we built together. Now I have the empty shell of it. He's irreplaceable - no one else will ever be the father of my children.

At my bleakest moments it feels like living in the upside down (Stranger Things), all the 'niceness' in the world has been taken away and I'm all alone.

Rally feeling it today, as you can probably tell. He's playing happy families with the dc and his new partner, never had a moment of this crushing loneliness.

I'm very grateful for this thread today

The future that you thought you would have had was an ideal until you had lived it. Who knows what would have happened if you’d had stayed together, there was no guarantee of the fairytale ending if you had.

I never set out or wanted to be a single parent with no support but here I am and I look at the compromising that friends in relationships have to do and I thank God that my experience of parenting wasn’t ruined by placating an entitled man baby.

you t

You mourn the life you should have had, which is understandable, but were you doing that INSIDE the relationship anyway? Most of these broken relationships were abjectly horrible on the inside. How many fraught walks on the beach and silent rather than romantic dinners? Fucking loads.

I mourn, then remind myself of the burning pain of loneliness-whilst-accompanied. Much worse IMO.

You are right of course PicsInRed So far though (after 3 years) I still feel on average worse than when in the relationship. It was bad but never got that bad, and I believe it would've been fixable with counselling, if only he hadn't moved on to someone else immediately.

How do you stop loving someone??

Fotheringhay - your post brought some tears to my eyes (they were close to the surface anyway!) as I used to feel exactly like you when my dd went to see her father - particularly that he has built a life for himself that on the surface at least looks like the ultimate fantasy - new family, amazing house, etc. These days it’s easier because time has passed and dd, while she still sees him, refuses to pretend it’s all a holy families - but that could be a whole new thread or even a book... Just try not to focus on that at all, and remember that his life will never be that perfect fantasy either, even while he might pretend it is.

Oh I know that feeling so very well.

I sometimes wonder how the OW is enjoying living the life I should have had, living in my retirement house, going to the places I loved....

On bad days I feel she has stolen my life.

I needed this thread today. I don't just mourn the life I was expecting, the one is worked for; I mourn the one I thought I had. I mourn the family photographs that were a lie. I mourn the days out, the night in with babies, the cuddles, the support, the "I love you"s, all of which were lies. I miss what I thought I had so badly, if there was anything I could do at all to have made it all real I would. Oh god, and now I'm really crying.

You poor thing cranky it can shake you right to the point of questioning reality can't it?

to everyone here. I don't know anyone irl who feels like this.

I don't want to be cynical about love, ie. a future relationship, but it's hard to keep the faith!

So relate to the stolen life
I did all the hard work.
Just at the point we were discussing having children
She moved in. I was with him when he earnt 8 k and drove an old Ford escort. Once he earnt 160k drove a bmw and we had 5 bedroom house plus swimming pool she was suddenly interested.
I was dealing with a parent with cancer 100 miles away and trusted him. More fool me.
I would assume he is
A still as boring as fuck
B has no friends
And
C crap in bed
Couldn't see it at the time
Onwards and upwards all
X

At the end of the day we only ever have ourselves anyway even if we are in a relationship or not as it’s ourselves who are experiencing the world around us if that makes any sense. I try not to let myself get sucked into the fantasies in my own head of how things “could” have or “should” have been as every decision we make in life could have lead to a different path but we are where we are now and need to only embrace what is.

Rightwayup, I so empathise with that, when I met my H he had changed jobs, was earning not much at all, grim flat but in a good area etc but I loved him anyway, if I left now I know he would be much in demand by good looking younger women and that really really annoys me as I worked hugely too to put him in that position— whearas I know most 50 old year old guys that would like me would seem
Like a bit of a downgrade.

I can totally relate to all of these feelings. It's especially hard seeing another woman living the life you had with the man you worked so hard and supported so much to get to where he is, all that is forgotten by him of course.

A friend sent me a lovely card the other day...

'Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened'

Thought that was v sweet & meaningful.