I care for her well-being. I mean, I spent 15 years with someone, and I feel like I’m following a guidebook on divorce.
My marriage ended in a mutual tone. She obviously didn’t love me in the same ways she used to, same for me as I used to for her, but she’s still a person, and we still spent 15 years together. Formative parts of our teenage lives were experienced together. It’s not even as-if there’s a void, it’s a gaping hole through to the other side.
I don’t know if she’s dead. I don’t know if she’s ok. I don’t know anything, and I’m afraid to ask. I cut off all contact, as was pretty much universally suggested and even I had a lot of ideas that I’d never really come away from it entirely unless I literally separated my life from her. It’s a divorce. It’s what you do, isn’t it?
I just want her to know it wasn’t so much by choice as it was a commonplace necessity, but… why would she care? I also get the sense that the second my name is seen on any note, it would just the thrown away, and am I even right to send one, and for what long-term purpose?
It’s just a waste of time, isn’t it? We should just move on, but… can I? 15 years. I’m 35 now. I should be spending my last five decent dating years finding someone new, but I’m stuck on her being ok. I don’t even have to be the one to find out, just someone tell me she’s ok.
She probably just hates me and never wants to hear from me anyway, and what good would it do? I’d know how she is, I guess, but she’d have another thread into my life and things could end up more complicated overall.
Every time this comes up in my head, I decide against it, but it keeps coming up, almost daily, like a self-induced torture. “Just don’t think about it!” Easy talk…
You’re putting a lot of faith in other people’s opinions. Divorce doesn’t mean you never have to see her again, despite what anyone else tells you.
Yes, it most cases, it’s a good idea - mainly as the divorce is acrimonious. It sounds like yours was not.
I can guess at a few reasons your family may say this:
You know how you feel - it sounds like, after seven months, you want to reach out to your ex-wife and ask her how she is. This is a natural thing for a friend to do. If I were you I’d do it as it’s better to regret what you did that didn’t. You should also tell her that, if she doesn’t want contact with you, all she has to do is say and that you’ll respect it.
At this point, it sounds no more complicated than that
My mom never liked her, and my best friend(cousin) never liked her. Two people I hold pretty high opinions of, but yeah, their bias hasn’t helped much.
Mom even asked if I really even loved her that much. I was with her for 15 years. I had to have some hope, and I did, for a long time but eventually you don’t have anything else to give. You don’t have any more time for negative horseshit despite doing everything you can do, never even able to make a positive move for it being seen as me being “up to something”.
Immovable object meet unstoppable force.