Realistically speaking a relationship lasts about 5/7 years tops. So either way you would/could've lost your high-school sweetheart at age 22. Quite a normal path: around age 30/35 most men will have had between 2 to 4 LTR's.
This is the hard truth.
But put yourself in the shoes of people who have not grown up in a place where this has been the norm for many years, where social groups are formed in this way, and therefore see family as a significant achievement in life.
In our generation—mine and my peers'—we are the first to witness this phenomenon. We are the ones with the "destroyed dream," the first to question what is wrong, and the first to learn about concepts like the blue pill and red pill. The others have lived in the dream; we must live in reality.
I am here to learn from those who already live that reality, from those who have had the opportunity to deal with it.
Most of my primary social circle is in relationships that are 8-15 years long at this point in time. These are married men who have had children at this point. Their relationships are still ongoing but the best days of these relationships are all in the past. Multiple married from this social circle have mentioned to me that they don't particularly enjoy the current state of their relationships and are not enjoying raising infants/toddlers right now.
Having a LTR and a LTR to make kids and build a family it's a totally different thing.
Do you also see exceptions or rarity? Say 1 couple on 10 in your circle is still there and loving after 20 or plus years, for some reasons. Those are the exceptions.
And yes, can confirm all you guys said before about how women monkeybranch when they start to feel their relationship its coming to an end
