Just curious. My friend has been separated for a year and is staying married for the time being so his wife has insurance. She’s looking for work but hasn’t been able to find anything. They don’t live together. They have a teenager together. He’s having a hard time getting dates.
If a person is married purely for the sake of convenience, would you date them? If not, why not?
Perhaps because the line, “I’ll be leaving my wife as soon as she gets a jobb/recovers from mysterious illness/my kids get a bit older etc.” is getting a little old?
Dating a married guy who promises to leave his wife, “who doesn’t understand him” is the classical definition of “naive” (read: stupid).
I’m not saying this is the case with your friend (and I certainly don’t mean to call all people who have dated married guys stupid), it just might be that this is the reason he can’t get dates.
No. Married is married. No dating until the official divorce. Too risky.
I would not date a married-but-separated person. I’d have a hard enough time reconciling an actual divorce with my concience. But I absolutely would not date someone who viewed marriage as a convience, and was in no hurry to further separate himself from his wife.
Marriage is many things, but I doubt that it is all that convenient for most people. Among those things, marriage is a sacrement which joins two people, and their families, together. In the event that the relationship didn’t work out, divorce is desirable, but is common–balancing my moral view with my practical one. If one has not yet reached the point of divorce, then one might be a fine human being, but one is not yet ready to be a suitor for my hand.
He already left her and the divorce, while mutually for the best, was initiated by her. He has had his own place for a year. It is strictly about the insurance.
As I said, he’s helping her out until she gets a job. She was going to school for the last couple years in preparation for the divorce. The market is pretty sucky.
Oh, it’s definitely the reason he can’t get dates.
I would definitely date a guy who was separated. Especially since they aren’t trying to kill each other. She’s dating, by the way.
Nope. I ran into this at the start of the year, and he didn’t tell me until a few dates into it. He’d been separated for seven years, and stayed married for the insurance thing and because divorce was too expensive, or so he said.
It bothered me that he wasn’t up front about it and it bothered me that he was still married. You’d think seven years would be long enough to get his shit together, and I just had no interest in being the “other woman.”
That was sort of an unusual situation, but I wouldn’t much be interested in dating someone recently separated either. Too much emotional baggage potential there, and with my luck, I’d get all invested in him and then he’d decide to make it work with his wife. I don’t need that either.
Back when I was single, I would. And did. And, I married her, which is why I am no longer single.
Me too.
I dated a married-but-separated woman once. Getting sucked into the divorce proceedings was not fun.
I have dated married (but separated), married (not separated), single (not looking), single (looking), women and eventually got married.
I put dating in the “pre-relationship” area – we’re together because we’re friends. Once we get into the forest lust sexual “relationship” area, that’s not dating anymore - it’s a whole different animal.
I’ve done it a couple of times. The first time it worked out fine. When he said he was going to leave her, he did. When he said he was going to file, he did. We eventually broke up, but for non-related reasons.
The second guy I dated; not so much. I didn’t even particularly care, as I knew it wouldn’t be long term, but he seemed to have a need to tell me these elaborate stories about her detriorating health. Aside from being dishonest, it just seemed so whimpy.
Divorce in progress - yes. We-are-staying-together-for-some-lame-excuse no.
What if she doesn’t get a job. What if its years before the divorce is final because it takes years to get it started (and it isn’t uncommon to spend another year in the actual divorce). Assuming I am dating with the intention of marriage - nope, not putting my life on hold cause your “ex”-wife can’t find a job with insurance at WalMart.
(Now, assuming I want a fling - probably wouldn’t care. But I doubt that is the motivation of most women - some, but not most).
Nope. It’s a total deal breaker.
I want all the "i"s dotted and the "t"s crossed before I would even consider it. Doesn’t matter what the reason is either, be it insurance, or the kids, or monetary, or convenience or whatever.
I come into a relationship free and clear with no liens on my property, or my person. I have no problem expecting the same from a potential date. Otherwise there is a connection to another woman that I’m just not comfortable with.
Never.
But that is because of my own experiences. My best friend, whom I love more than life itself, got into this situation with a man who kept promising her the world. We nearly lost our friendship over this man, and she is still chronically depressed over him (he went back to his family, as is right I think - they had young kids).
No. In addition to some of the other reasons that have been listed here (I’d never, ever want to be the other woman. That’s nasty.), I’d be concerned about the child involved. I would not want to cause hard feelings between myself and the teenager, or between the teenager and his or her father. I guess my main reason for feeling this way is because of my own experience. I think my dad is a bastard for seeing his now-wife before my parents were divorced. If my parents had divorced first and then he found a girlfriend, I’d have been fine with it. I know this isn’t quite the same situation since they’re separated, but I’d still be cautious.
Sure.
I dated my husband before his second marriage was annulled. I think I might have moved in with him before it was annulled.
Speaking as someone who was the M-b-S person, I’d highy advise against it.
We were just about exactly like the OP describes – still technically married, but we’d been living apart for quite some time. We were still friendly, so I was ok with keeping her on my insurance until everything was finalized.
Which wound up really sucking for the girl I was dating when my wife and I both realized that we were already married to the person each of us wanted to spend the rest of our lives with – we just needed that break from each other to come to our senses.
Yep. Did. Married him. He tried to serve her with divorce papers four times in the preceding five years but she kept moving. Finally SHE sent HIM papers when SHE decided to remarry.
We got a lot of good laughter mileage out of the fact that I was “living in sin with a married man.”