u/someguy123321123321

Just curious what the general consensus/expectations are for working on a marriage before divorce.

For context, I am not talking about a cheating or abuse situations. Just talking about when 2 people grow apart, feelings change, life has changed, one person is unhappy, etc…

For me, the commitment to the other person is very important. So I think it should include the following.

A) communicate and work on things together
B) individual counselling
C) Marriage/Couple’s counselling
D) then finally separation/divorce.

My partner skipped steps 1-3 and went straight to asking for divorce. Yes, we had our issues. But nothing major that couldn’t be worked on if she had communicated. Especially when I was reaching out directly to her.

And had we done steps 1-3 and she still felt divorce was the answer, I think I could live with that easier. At least we tried to maintain our commitments and could come to a mutual understanding.

So curious what other people feel, did, or wish had a happened?

"I take you to be my wedded wife/husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death do us part."

My wife is catholic. Insisted we get married in the church. I am secular so it was no issue for me.

But these are the vows we said to each other on our wedding day.

Now, I’m not religious. But I promises very seriously. And even though I’m not religious, I meant every word when I said it.

But now she wants a divorce. Because she’s not happy. Two kids. Forever home. Stable jobs. Built everything we talked about.

Yes, our relationship has problems. We didn’t put energy in with each other as we dealt with crisis after crisis for the last 5-7 years. Infertility. 2 difficult pregnancies. An ADHD child. Family dying. Health scares with our parents. Injuries to both her and me that had us each bed ridden for 3+ months at separate times.

We became team mates. Good parents. But we weren’t partners.

So I get where she is coming from. It’s not her feelings I have a problem with. It’s her unilateral decision to end our marriage, despite our vows, despite everything we’ve been through, without even trying to fight for it.

And yes, I tried to talk to her. She told me she was tired exhausted. Burnt out. So I did everything I could for her, but it wasn’t what she really needed.

And no, she wasn’t burnt out because I wasn’t doing things. We had a pretty even 50/50 split (+/- when one of us was going through something). During her burn out I turned it up to about 90/10. I almost burnt out too.

But it wasn’t just burnt out. She was checking out. No attempt to talk to me. No attempt to communicate, even when I reached out to her.

The catholic one. And apparently those vows mean nothing.

Rant over. Thanks for reading. Needed to get that out and obviously I’m not going to say it to her, because that will just make things worse.

I know this is going to be very dependent on each individual/relationship. But I’d like to hear what other people did for arrangements/boundaries during separation.

For example

We are two weeks in. Technically not separated yet. Wife said she wants a divorce and she didn’t see any hope of reconciliation. But she did step back and is going to speak to a counsellor.

So for now, we decided we will keep the status quo.
- living together
- sharing a bed
- doing things together
- saying I love you
- kisses/hugs goodbye
- cuddling
- massages
- keeping physical intimacy and sex

This isn’t changing her decision. It’s just that she does still love and care for me, and I her, even if she doesn’t see a future together in our marriage. We are still best friends and co parents. There is also still attraction there.

So this will probably last until she either confirms her decision or, decides she may want to work on it.

Assuming she confirms her decision, eventually she will move out. Probably in 2-3 months.

I think my ideal is to continue the status quo until she leaves.

Then when she moves out, obviously we won’t be living together or sharing a bed. We’ll still do things together. Saying I love you and hugs/kisses goodbye will probably have to stop. And depending on how she feels, I’m thinking about suggesting a FWB situation, so we can still have some purely physical fun if we both want to.

And that can continue until it either fizzles out or one of us starts exploring a new relationship.

I’m probably being optimistic, because obviously it will 100% depend on what she wants as well. But just curious how others handled the transition.

What did you hope it looked like? And what did it actually look like?

I’m trying to get a better sense of where I and my wife are at. We met, married, built a life together. 2 young kids. Our forever home. Saving for the future. Both of us have good, steady jobs.

Life is comfortable. I know that doesn’t equal happiness. We’ve been through a lot together. My wife has told me she wants to leave because despite getting everything we planned, and me being “too good to her” (her words), she wants a divorce. I would love to work together, stay together, and get her to a happy place.

So I’m curious for those who’ve been through separation/divorce, what was the ultimate reason you were unhappy and couldn’t work together as a couple to make it work?

Or, if you did reconcile, what was the main issue/changes that helped?

If possible I’d rather not hear about infidelity or abuse. Just average marriages that seemed good on the outside, but weren’t working on the inside, and one person felt it was better for their happiness to be outside the marriage.

Married 11 years. Young kids. Shared everything (house, bank accounts, credit card, etc…)

When we got married, she insisted. We are going to be together forever, why not? I didn’t have anything against it at the time. We even found what she called our “forever home”.

She’s been checked out for at least the last 6 months. I noticed. I talked to her. She said she was just tired, so I gave her opportunities to recharge. Took things off her plate. I literally said once “you don’t seem like yourself”. And nothing. Just exhausted. I ended up basically running the house and taking on the majority of responsibility while she worked, scraped by with the kids, then lost herself in TV shows. I couldn’t help her out of it. And by the end I was burning out, so I stopped trying, and was just trying to push through.

Then she drops the bomb on me. She’s not happy. Hasn’t been happy for a long time. Didn’t know how she felt to tell me. Recognized by efforts but didn’t know how or what she was feeling. She literally said “it’s not fair to me or the kids” and that “I’m too good for her”. Says she still cares about me, trusts me, even loves me, but isn’t “in love with me”. And no, there is no infidelity.

What I’m really struggling with is how it got this bad. And why she’s just throwing in the towel. No effort to work on things. Doesn’t want couples counselling.

Our vows. Our plans. Our future. Our kids future. Out the window. With zero effort. Zero try.

I want her to be happy. And I don’t want her to stay if she’s truly unhappy. But not even a chance?

We are going to go from a comfortable lifestyle to both barely scraping by. No vacation. Little to no cash flow for savings. We will have to stop contributing to our kid’s education funds. Housing, groceries, gas, utilities are all out of control where we live. Manageable with two incomes. A real struggle on one. And both our jobs are tied to where we live, not a lot of opportunity to change.

I just don’t get it. Really struggling to understand.

I guess if there is anyone out there who’s been through this, or anyone out there who has lived her side? Anything you would be willing share would be appreciated it.

My wife told me she wants out last week. This is very early, she has slowed down, and we have a lot of things to figure out. For context, we have 2 young dependant kids (neither in school yet). Married for 11 years.

I will be getting a lawyer for this, but we want to get a general idea.

She seems to think that we can just file and whatever we decide will be accepted.

My understanding is it’s not that simple. That there are legal minimums even if we agree on something different.

For example. I make more than her (about 15% more). She doesn’t want child or spousal support because we will do 50/50 custody. But as far as I can tell, I will still owe her hundreds of dollars a month in child support.

2nd would be my pension. She also has a pension, and she thinks we can just split it where she takes hers, and I take mine. But my pension is worth significantly more and my understanding is that goes fully into the “assets” category, which we need to split 50/50. And if I want to keep my pension, I’m going to have to pay her out elsewhere.

So guess I’m just curious if we can actually do this uncontested and agree to what we want, or will the process force us to meet the legal minimums?

Like, it seems like the law is set up to protect the lower income spouse and protect the children so they are taken care of in both new households. And I don’t disagree with that… our kids will come first and I want to be fair in the split of our assets. I just don’t see it being as simple as she thinks, and I’m going to get raked over the coals if we follow the legal minimums, simply because I make more and have a bigger pension.

So I found out a few days ago I’m getting divorced.

Partner is leaving. Says they are not happy, have not been happy for a while, and doesn’t see that changing while we are together. Not interested in working on anything together.

There was zero discussion of issues before this. They have been checked out for awhile, so there were signs, but whenever inquired about how they were doing, they were either flat or dismissive. I chalked it up to stress and was powering through, making their plate lighter wherever I could.

So I’m lost. Apparently there was nothing I could have done. They acknowledged the effort I’ve been putting in. Even used the words “you are too good to me”.

Did get a reason out finally. Basically, have everything they wanted (kids, house, spouse, dog, steady jobs, financially stable) and yet they are still not happy.

So now we are discussing separation. Custody. Finances. Assets. Home. Everything.

It just still feels like a bad dream. And I’m just at a loss. Struggling day to day. Up and down, but on edge regularly.

I’m functioning, but barely. Keep swinging back and forth between how to make this as good as possible for the kids, and I can’t believe they are doing this. I want it to be amicable, and I will.

But holy… what an upheaval when you have everything you wanted and we could just talk and get you where you need to be. I would do anything for them, had they brought things up when I asked we could’ve worked together as the team we always were.

So yeah. I guess I’m just asking how people get through this when it’s not by choice and really nothing you could’ve done to stop it. And there not anything “wrong” per se.