Skip to main content

Why My Marriage Failed




I've been divorced for almost 8 years now and the journey it took me to get to today will always be one of the greatest life lessons I will ever have regarding relationships. My ex-husband and I met at the end of 2007 beginning of 2008. I remember because that December in 2007 I was so stressed out from my current relationship that my set the calendar period was a month late. Here I was a mother of two girls with a fear that I was carrying the spawn of satan forever attaching myself to a man I deep down didn't even like. He was emotionally, physically, and mentally abusive. In order to get out of this toxic relationship, I had to wait until he was sleeping, put his stuff out on the porch and then wake him up to put him out. I stood in the doorway of my house refusing to close the door until he and all of his stuff were gone. What exactly does this have to do with my divorce? We'll get to that in a minute.

I met my ex-husband while we were working at Walmart together. We kicked up a conversation on the bus home not even a month after my breakup and instantly connected; he was in a broken relationship and I was just out of one. Things moved fairly quickly on our part... we were both pregnant and married within six months. Here is where it would have been nice for either one of our family members to say "hey you're moving too fast." I can't speak on his side of the family but neither of my friends or family did. We were married out of pure love; and ignorance. 

I want to say right here right now that there was not one moment when I didn't love my husband. We struggled together and we had our fights but we loved and we both loved hard. I screwed up, but before we get to that point I want to show you the first place in which I made my mistake. I remember before getting married asking God if this was something I was supposed to do. I waited for the answer and the answer was not no but it wasn't yes either. That was my first mistake, I took silence as a confirmation of something I was going to do with or without God's permission. The second thing I did wrong was not taking the time out to find out who I was unbroken and I essentially carried my brokenness into our marriage. In my mind, we were perfect together because neither one of us would hurt each other. I was right but I was oh so wrong. 

I've rationalized the signs that our marriage was failing that things were going wrong after I looked back at all the things I let go that bothered me, but those were just excuses and a way to take the blame off of myself. Where I went wrong; the most damaging thing I myself did wrong, was have the belief that I could begin a friendship with someone I was attracted to at work. I was arrogant. I knew what marriage was before going into it. I knew that as long as I wasn't actively seeking to start something with someone a friendship just wasn't wrong. That was far from true. I mean, I made sure that the guy knew I was HAPPILY married. We conversed daily before work on lunch briefly before leaving work everything was fine. We. Were. Just. Friends. Until we weren't.

At the time I'd convinced myself that kissing wasn't cheating and as my feelings for this other guy grew deeper I began to lose sleep. Tossing and turning dreaming of someone who wasn't my husband. Sounds cliche but it was the honest to God's truth. My spirit was so bothered that one day I just came clean out of nowhere. I couldn't take it anymore. I told my husband I was attracted to another man and that there was something wrong with us and we needed to fix it. From there it would be; for lack of a better word a shit storm. I said we need to fix us and he heard I cheated. We...I wasn't on the same page because at the time I didn't consider it cheating to be emotionally invested in someone else to kiss someone else. It would be 2018 before I would realize the impact something so seemingly trivial would have on a marriage. 

Looking back there were so many options I hadn't even considered in rectifying this situation. I rationalized that we couldn't afford for me to quit my job and get away from this person, I didn't stop to think about changing shifts or even changing my behaviour. The lowest thing I have ever done in my life was make that man feel like he wasn't enough; like he was the problem when the problem was me. I was still a broken person searching for an emotional high and when the person who provided that high stopped being my husband I went seeking it elsewhere with the belief that it just happened. 

That is the backstory, those are the events that lead up to the fail of my marriage, and this is the truth of why it didn't work...
At 23 (going on 24 years of age) when I, yes I, made the decision to get married I was not ready. No matter how much I'd tried to convince myself that I was. I was still a child with a childish sense of what marriage was supposed to be instead of what marriage actually was. I had not dealt with anything in regards to my past. Looking back on the situation there was one sign, in particular, that should have served as a warning to the area in which I was vulnerable. I had a friend I'd been friends with for the worst part of 10 years whom I'd loved dearly, the moment I would not let that friend go should have told me that trouble was headed my way. Sadly it didn't. Another reason my marriage failed was that I'd never had a clear understanding of what cheating was. I still had this high school image of what cheating was I had yet to grow up. I was a grown up playing grown up. And last but not least I hid everything about me. My depression, my mental health issues, my way of thinking I was only ever open and honest about the here and now and not the when and then. He'd married the figment of my imagination I created myself to be. At that time I wasn't even sure who I was, I never should have brought someone else into my own uncertainty. 

There you have it, the reason my marriage failed. I don't take pride in these facts, however, I am woman enough to admit that I was in the wrong. 

In my next blog Why I Let Go I will be focusing on if we could have made it work and what finally made me let go.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Get Ready

I was walking at work one day when I heard a small still voice say "get ready". It stopped me in my tracks because there was no one else around other than myself. Get ready? Get ready for what? "Get ready". In my heart, I knew what it meant but I was and somewhat am not so much reluctant but anxious about what was ahead of me. 

Increase

How many of us have prayed for financial deliverance? How many of us have had faith that the Lord would give us that deliverance? As Christians, I am certain that we all have. "God, why do I struggle so much financially? X amount of dollars is not enough to live off of. Lord, I need financial deliverance!" Those are all things I've cried out and prayed before. I'm also the one who takes what little I have and puts it into the offering bucket, praying desperately along with pastor to press it down and shake it up so that it will be returned unto me tenfold. To what avail?  The truth is, I have done absolutely nothing to change my financial situation. Week after week, month after month, year after year I have prayed desperately for increase, and like so many others, yet I have been left wanting.  As I read the scriptures above I suddenly remembered The Parable Of The Talents ( Matthew 25:14-30 ). This passage is about a man who decided that while he was off

Mental Health Pandemic

This is more or less an impulsive post. After many years, for the first time, I decided to watch Good Will Hunting. Of course, I'd seen it referenced in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, but I'd never once actually seen the movie. I was quite shocked to see that Robin Williams was in this movie. Although the movie was an award-winning drama and was meant to play at your emotions, the entire time I couldn't help but feel saddened by the absence of Robin Williams in real life.