It’s because you read my blog, isn’t it?
I’ve been married. I haven’t been in a relationship in five years. Once in a while I get interested in someone, but the idea of inviting someone new in to mess up my life again always dissuades me.
I like it the way it is, and I can’t see getting married again.
While the saying, “The only women looking for husbands are those who have never had one,” is not entirely true, I can sure understand the sentiment.
Take, for example, the seven extra hours of houseworka week a married woman gets stuck with.
Marriage is wanting to choke the living shit out of the person you married, but you don’t do it because you love them too much.
And the jail time.
My response would be magnitudes longer than your question, so I’m just going to offer you a vacant smile for the time being. 
Oh, and to Queen Bruin: the desire to keep a relatively clean criminal record is a great motivator for many people.
Been married & divorced after a short time.
Lived w/someone for 6 yrs after seeing him for a year (total 7yrs), engaged for 5 yrs but could never bring myself to marry him. It ended horribly (he thought you had to legally be married in order for the resposibility of one’s actions to take hold).
I seem to be terrible at relationships.
Soon to be ten years married. There are times when I wish I hadn’t married because then I could live wherever I want to live without considering someone else’s feelings. But most of the time, well, all of the time, I can’t imagine sharing my life with another person or without the one I’ve got.
I definitely feel like I’m half of a whole. Not necessarily half of myself but more like one slice of bread of a really great sandwich. Does that make sense?
I’d think that if getting married were even half the trouble of getting divorced that it would weed out a lot of the “should never have been married” crowd.
And the divorce rate would soon show a marked decrease.
I was married and that ended in divorce. I am not sure I would ever get married again. This one was so emotionally draining, ended badly with no real closure for either of us. Just messy all around. It was my choice and I constantly second guess myself whether I made the right decision or not.
I think I was more excited about the wedding day, I didn’t think about how hard the marriage would be.
I mean, I really loved that guy and look how that ended. I think I would second guess myself on everything in a new relationship. Plus no amount of love is worth that amount of hurt. Not for me. I hurt one man bad enough, I won’t do that again.
My neighbor and I talk about this occasionally. She says, “I love my husband dearly. He’s my best friend and I’ve been with him for 30+ years. But I’ll damn sure never have another one.”
I’ve been divorced twice and all I want to do is raise my kids and hopefully never get lulled into believing that I want to be married again. I’m not good at marriage.
Bottom line: I’m too stubborn and independent to be married. On top of that, I’ve had my blood pumping mechanism ripped out one too many times. It’s back in place and working nicely now, thank you very much.
That’s exactly how I feel.
But marriage isn’t for everyone, that’s for sure, and I would never pass a negative judgment on someone who decided never to marry (or marry again). Whatever works for you, just be sure you let anyone you get into a relationship with know how you feel.
You’re exactly right. I don’t have kids with my gf, but she has a daughter and it’s going to be tougher on her than on us. I hate that.
Posted this elsewhere but it merits repeating. Someone (Oscar Wilde?) once said something to the effect that marriage is the triumph of imagination over intelligence and second marriage is the triumph of hope over experience.
I know a lot of people who said they’d never do it again. Then they fell in love.
I’m recently divorced and thanks to a busy schedule and complete lack of social life, it hasn’t really come into my thinking.
I’m not really sure how I’d handle a real, strong relationship nowadays. Being alone is nice sometimes, but after a decade-long relationship the loneliness is gnawing.
If the relationship felt like a partnership - “yes dear, I know you dont feel like putting away the laundry, or getting rid of old files…, let’s do it together and talk…”
So what matters is if you motivate eachother to be your best - yes? I can see myself in this kind of relationship permanently. But if it’s one-sided… that is too damn exhausting.
I agree with you 100%. It’s not for everybody, and not every relationship would necessarily work as a marriage. It’s not the marriage I have that’s so great – it’s the human being I’m married to, and we were great together long before we ever tied the knot. I knew then, and I still know now, that a commitment so huge is always a gamble-- there is no telling what the future holds. Seeing how fragile marriages can be just makes me feel really blessed for the way things are in this moment. I think that appreciation for the moment ironically gives us a great outlook on our future together.
It is work to keep up a relationship, and it is too exhausting and soul-draining if only one of you is doing the upkeep.
I’m going to agree that marriage is worth it if you both are diligent about keeping up your share of the emotional work, but that it is an abomination if you are the only one putting energy into the relationship.
The ‘piano-playing’ part is locating someone who will keep that pact with you, who you can also stand living with.
I was married for 19 years, then divorce. I’ve been in a relationship with a wonderful woman of nearly identical circumstances for the past 5 years, and neither of us have any interest in marriage. It’s perfect.
The curious thing about marriage is that it is a contract, the most profoundly serious contract you can enter into. Yet, we very meticulously avoid educating people (particularly youths) about the specific legal realities of this contract. Why? I think the answer is that if we did, few people would marry. And for some reason we want people to marry, and apparently as naively as possible.
As a society, I think we’re being unethical. Don’t get me wrong, if you are smart, lucky, warmly open-hearted and generous, marriage can be a fabulous, wonderful way to spend your life. But why do we lure the unqualified?
Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly. ~Voltaire