SW15
Master Don Juan
- Joined
- May 31, 2020
- Messages
- 13,288
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Here’s the thing @pipeman84 the first boyfriend I dated who I lost the V card to etc., he cheated on me, because of my inexperience. Ain’t that a thing? Broke my heart too. I left him because I’m not going to be with a cheater.
The five year boyfriend proposed to me very early on (six months into the relationship) and I didn’t feel I knew him well enough at that point to get married. We dated another 4.5 years. I discovered almost 5 years in that he was sleeping around behind my back here & there. He loved me but thought he could get away with it. It broke the trust, and I broke it off, which broke his heart in a major way. His mother, who I was very close with, told me a number of times that he often lamented how he treated me, I was the one that got away.
So nope, those are nowhere near divorces. Those are guys who were not worth marrying in the end.
@pipeman84 -- The guy she was in a relationship with for 5 years but never married was a man who proposed marriage to her 6 months into that relationship. Following that marriage proposal, that relationship lingered for another 4.5 years until it failed. That guy cheated on her.They both cheated on you ... you're the common denominator here. I don't believe there were no signs these 2 guys were no good ... actually I think they were 'bad boys' and you thought you're going to tame them. And after two relationships, one of 2yrs and the other of 5yrs you married your husband after 6 months of dating. How does that work?! A marriage that unsurprisingly ended in divorce. (of course, his fault, according to you.)
I agree with the general idea here that @BeExcellent carried a bad relationship history into her first marriage. She might have only had a 2 notch count in her late 20s courtship phase with her ex-husband (then a nightclub owner/operator, now a former nightclub owner/operator). It's probable that the guys in these two non-marital relationships were top tier men who ultimately weren't monogamous, as many top tier men aren't. It's possible that @BeExcellent thought she offered enough to keep top tier men monogamous but those top tier men decided monogamy with her wasn't going to be in the cards. It's also possible that these top tier men didn't have great character either.
The biggest mistake that @BeExcellent made in that 5 year non-marital relationship was letting the relationship linger after the failed marriage proposal. That would have been an excellent time to depart that relationship. She wasted 4.5 years of her prime in a bad relational fit. That man also made a bad decision to propose marriage after only 6 months. That's a very short time and her reaction to a proposal at the 6 month mark was reasonable.
It isn't at all surprising that @BeExcellent had a failed marriage after failed non-marital LTRs of 2 years and 5 years where there was infidelity. It's likely she carried the pain of such events into that relationships and it's possible that affected the development of the relationship. When she met the nightclub owner, she was in her late 20s, which would have been the tail end of her prime/past her prime depending upon how you define prime. Peak female attractiveness is ages 18-25.
When @BeExcellent has discussed her marriage, she gives justifiable reasons for why it ended and why she had no choice but to leave. I don't think it's worth arguing that story and I never have done that. However, it is commonplace behavior for women to gloss over or omit some important contributory factors from their own behavior that indirectly caused the marriage to fail. My mom is great example of doing this as she neglects to mention some of her own behaviors that were contributing factors to her divorce from my dad, but not primary factors at all. My mom is less blameless than she makes herself out to be, and it's likely @BeExcellent does the same thing as my mom. The circumstances were a bit different in my mom's failed marriages as compared to the failed marriage @BeExcellent had, but the same theme likely exists. Since I could observe my mom's marriage, I could identify the parts of the story that my mom tends to not fully portray as reality.
Both @BeExcellent and my mom had spotty relationship histories going into marriages that ultimately failed. They both carried that baggage. I think there were selection issues in both situations. With @BeExcellent , a nightclub owner is not an ideal candidate for a marital relationship. These are guys who have abundance and can cheat in an instant. They also are surrounded by drugs, alcohol, and some other things not conducive to a good family life. Those elements are very exciting in the early stages of a relationship, so it's easy to why the attraction was there. Ultimately, it was a situation where both parties probably overstayed the viable life of that relationship. There were also mitigating circumstances such as the failure of the nightclub business.
@BeExcellent and I do not agree on certain topics. That's understandable. I am impressed that she's able to have the emotional composition that she's displayed to have the conversations that she's had on this forum over the years. It's not easy to do.
I'm not sure it is fair to count failed LTRs of 2+ years to be quasi marriages. If we count failed 2+ year relationships as "marriages", the average 30+ year old has more "divorces" to their names.
These are interesting points in general.I think it is, because it shows you what kind of 'expiration date' her relationships have. You're practically forewarned you're dealing with a bomb with delayed firing. So you have a woman who reaches 30yrs old and has had 2 relationships, one of 2 years and one of 5 years. Now you're going to marry her and start a family? Firstly, you're taking on legal responsibilities to get what the other 2 guys got for free so to speak. Secondly, you really must feel lucky or be naive to think you'll happily pass the 5yrs mark.
It would be common to encounter a 30 year old, never married, and childless woman who has had a failed 5 year relationship, 1-3 failed 2-3 year long relationships, and 1-2 failed 1 year long relationships, plus instances of one night stands, casual sex, and many "one date, no sex, no second date" interactions. This typical 30 year old woman I describe would have a notch count somewhere in the 5-10 range, which doesn't sounds like a lot if she's been trying to date actively for roughly 15 years. That woman likely isn't going to be a good fit for a legal Western marriage with the inherent risks of legal Western marriages and raising children.
Plenty of men out there would pursue the never married, childless 30 year old that I just described.
It would even be difficult to get 5 good years out of that woman in a non-marital relationship with no kids.