“Just Wondering If You’re Feeling the Same.”
In my younger and naïve years, I used to think that divorcees were, “Someone’s leftovers”. Before my 30s I hardly ever saw divorcees but now in my mid 30s, the amount of divorcee profiles I see or match up with have risen to about 20% on the dating apps. (Widows are still 1% of my profile prospects). Based on word of mouth I hear from older friends that are on dating apps, the divorcee profile rate exponentially increases with older age ranges.
I hardly ever batted an eye towards divorcees or profiles who had children with other partners. Thankfully I have wonderful friends over the past years who have married a divorcee or remarried after being a divorcee. Reasons why they all have divorced vary but I’ve come to conclude from a very high level, these divorcee friends have all married and or hopped into a relationship that wasn’t fit for them at a time they didn’t know any better and or evolved to no longer love their partner. I don’t know exactly when I shed my naïve labeling and negative associations with divorce, though witnessing friends finding new love has been so beautiful and hope giving, giving me faith that we’re all resilient lovers and can always love anew.
Relationships and or marriages are so hard. After seeing so many people in my network in long term relationships and or marriages that end, I recognized that I had to stop the labeling of “failure”, “someone’s leftovers”, and other terms that indicate them being broken or unloveable. God knows, I’m more broken. Older-Heidi, I’ve evolved. I’m now open to meeting, marrying divorcees, and or divorcees with children. I’ve had to change up the labels and the narratives I’ve created around divorcees. Instead of calling divorcees broken or someone else’s left overs, I now call them, “they know better now” and or “they will learn to love better now”.
It was our second date and we were sharing our romantic histories, with me divulging first. During his turn, he shared that he recently officially divorced but had been separated a few years. Mentally I was already questioning if he was even ready for dating again, but even if he was ready, I wasn’t so sure if I liked him enough to psycho-analyze if he was really ready to date again. He directed a lot of attention towards me. Remembered small details, sent me constant encouragement about perking up after a long hard day at work, and buying me meals. I couldn’t get over the fact that I felt disconnected from him, and the cultural barrier might have been a culprit for that as he has been in the states for less than a decade. Towards the end of the date, on top of the vulnerability of sharing his divorce, he asked, “I’m having such a great time but just wondering if you are feeling the same.” I was so shocked by the sweet candid and direct nature and told him in that moment, “I don’t know”. With the pandemic leaving me in a constant brain fog, I told him a month later that I didn’t quite feel the same.