Love Her But Can't Have Her... Am I Making a Mistake?

[Kolgar]

Hi. First post here, and I'm hoping for some good advice.

 

I'm 33 and I just let go of the sweet, wonderful woman I've been dating for the past year and a half. The reason? She wants marriage and kids, and I'm not sure that I do.

 

I've been married before. Unfortunately, it was to a con-artist I met over the Internet. She came into my life, took advantage of me, and turned my life upside down. That was five years ago. It took me until last year to finally clean up the mess.

 

But the woman I've been with these past 18 months - Shelly - brought back my smile. We'd actually met 10 years ago. We dated once or twice and I stopped it because I didn't really want a relationship - and we weren't really on the same wavelength back then. But now, I think I love her. She's smart, funny, honest, responsible, and caring. And maybe a little naive. She wants to be married and have kids, and I find myself questioning the value of both - at least for me.

 

Why marry when what we had was so great? We saw each other several days a week, and always had a blast together. But I also had my space. Being fairly independent, I really enjoyed the situation. I'm not sure how I'd fare having to live with someone again and be around each other practically all the time.

 

And kids - that's a TON of responsibility. Your entire life changes when you become a parent. And as I said, I'm independent and I enjoy flexibility and freedom - kids don't allow for much of that.

 

Besides, if I ever marry again, it'll be because I love someone and want to be with her so much that I'd take that risk again - the risk that life may throw me a curve ball and I could lose everything. Won't having a child take my focus off her and her focus off me - won't we "lose" each other to some extent?

 

My problem seems to be that I really don't know what I want. I love Shelly and miss her terribly, but I feel like I have to let her go so she can pursue the things she wants. With a divorce rate of more than 50% and the scary life changes that children bring on, marriage and kids don't sound like a great bet to me.

 

Maybe if I had a crystal ball I'd feel different, but I don't. I can't tell the future - so how can I ever realistically promise to love her for the rest of my life? How can she? People change. People grow apart. I feel that all I can promise is today, and unfortunately for most women, that's just not good enough.

 

And yet I can't help but wonder if I'm making a mistake. What if she's the right person for me to do this with? I really don't want to grow into an old and lonely man who forever laments the one that got away. Damn it, I really hate not having a crystal ball.

 

Part of me thinks that I'm just having a hard time because this is all so fresh. That time will heal this wound and I'll be better off - and so will she. "Love is an obsessive delusion cured by marriage," as someone once said. I just don't know if I can risk so much again.

 

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

 

Rob

[Babes]

Getting Married can be a wonderful or horriable thing. If you love each other and its True Love nothing will change. You lifes with just grow together and become one. As for having children, a child is a celebration of your love. Your love joined into one tiny little person.

[magpie]

i disagree. a child is a TON of responsibility. if you want true freedom and are not ready to settle down yet, having a child could be a terrible mistake. being a parent is easy. being a GOOD parent is difficult, and if you are not in the right frame of mind, its easy to screw it up. just look around you and you'll see what i mean. people yelling at their kids, taking out their resentment on their kids, grown kids all messed up because their parents did that to them. not that you would do that. im just saying that unless you are ready, and if you already have reservations, dont go there. not till you are 110% sure its what you want. ive seen great couples break up over this. if one wants children and the other doesnt, it can be a HUGE problem. but, i would let HER make that choice (decide if its such a huge deal that she is willing to move on over it). if you love her, and if she loves you, give it time. marriage should be about expressing your love, and if you can express your love and commitment without all the legal crap, go for it. maybe you could compromise. have a ceremony for your close friends and loved ones where you do just that: express your love for one another. isnt that what the big thing about marriage is supposed to be, anyway? it wasnt until fairly recently that one had to sign legal documents as part of the ceremony. you can be "married" in your hearts and in the eyes of your friends without having to also be married in a court of law.

[Kolgar]

Thank you for the reply.

 

I'm pleasantly surprised by your idea of being "married" without actually being joined legally. A "Ceremony of Love" is a sweet idea, I think, and it's actually a whole lot more honest than today's marriages, where people stand up in front of hundreds of others at a wedding they spent way too much on and make a promise that most people simply aren't capable of keeping.

 

What's with all the bullsh*t? Why not keep it simple, and let love take center stage. I guess most of us have been raised with the idea that marriage is something we're all supposed to do, and the bigger the ring and cake and fancier the dresses, the better. I think all that fluff takes away from the true meaning of the day - from the one thing that really counts - and that is the love shared by the people being joined.

 

As for being "joined," who said that was healthy anyway? I'm my own person. I don't want to be "one" with anybody else. Why would I? If I love someone, I love them for who they are, and I don't want to reprogram them into something else, or cramp their style so they're no longer free to do the things they enjoy.

 

That's where I get frustrated: Men and women have sex because it's the natural (and only!) way to propagate the species. We're built with sex drives and chemical reactions that give us emotions of attraction. So what do we do? We give this emotion a name, "love," and invent an institution that binds us together forever, marriage. Is THAT natural? I think not.

 

Whoever said that's the way it should be? We're just animals with big brains, trying to ensure the survival of our species. But thanks in part to those big brains, we thought about it a little too much and turned this natural process into a big, romantic centerpiece with an unnatural bent.

 

I don't think human beings are built to spend their entire lives with just one person.

 

With a divorce rate of more than 50%, the statistics seem to agree. Because I'll bet there's at least another 15 or 20% of marrieds who are miserable and only staying together because of kids, or because they're afraid of the financial devastation and social stigma of divorce.

 

As I said before, it doesn't seem like a good bet to me. Not when I know that life can be so unpredictable. Not when I know that all anyone can really promise is today, because people change and people can grow apart. "Love" is an emotion, and we all know emotions can change.

 

For those of you who are married and happy, I salute you. I envy you, even. Because you did the thing that society approves of, and it worked. You beat the odds, and it would seem that you are very lucky.

 

In the words of Bill Cosby, "For two people in a marriage to live together day after day is unquestionably the one miracle the Vatican has overlooked."

 

As for me, I'll continue to grapple with my quandary and see where it goes. I think I know the answer - I think I've known it all along, but my feelings for her have made me soft. Love really is an obsessive delusion.

 

Rob

[Kolgar]

Some famous quotes about love and marriage:

 

Marriage is not a word; it is a sentence.

--King Vidor

 

I think men who have a pierced ear are better prepared for marriage. They've experienced pain and bought jewelry.

--Rita Rudner

 

The cure for love is marriage, and the cure for marriage is love again.

--Unknown

 

Getting married for sex is like buying a 747 for the free peanuts.

--Jeff Foxworthy

 

If there were something called Marriage Reserve, I'd sign up for it in a heartbeat. That way I could sleep with other women on one weekend each month and two weeks in the summer, and my wife couldn't do crap about it.

--Mike Wilson

 

If you have it [love], you don't need to have anything else, and if you don't have it, it doesn't matter much what else you have.

--Sir James M. Barrie

 

Love is a perky elf dancing a merry little jig and then suddenly he turns on you with a miniature machine gun.

--Matt Groening

 

Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards.

--Benjamin Franklin

 

Marriage is like a cage; one sees the birds outside desperate to get in, and those inside equally desperate to get out.

--Michel de Montaigne

 

I think, thereforeeeeeee I'm single.

--Lizz Winstead

 

Rob