BTW, it is not just a money thing...later in life divorces are emotional tsunamis, especially if either person is vulnerable.

I just got back from taking my DV buddy to clean out his safety deposit box. He went through a bitter, unanticipated, divorce a few years ago (I had a front row seat, he is 67) and, while it cost him a few million, he has plenty more.

Doesn't matter. Everything to him is colored in failure, a bitter shroud that frankly permeates his life post divorce.

He never wanted to be, "that guy".

It is tortuous to watch play out...the safe deposit box was like opening the Ark of the Covenant.

Sacrificed for her and got burnt in the end. Sad. Should have divorced sooner. Cloudiness of love.

Maybe introduce him to one of those websites/ phone apps ever you pay some 22 year old's rent and well you know.....

file under "why get married if you hate your spouse?"

i dont get why men think there is no alternative to escalating relationships. you can just say no. seems pretty clear early on this was what she wanted, and he didnt. he could have just said no.

once in a conversation with my coworker who hates his wife, generally his entire life, and he said "well you know, it was either get married or break up, and so you know what happens then ..." and i was like "yeah you break up" and he was like "if that ever happened to you, you'd know you get married instead of break up" and i said "remember a couple of company picnics ago, katlyn? thats why we broke up" and he was flabbergasted. like it had never even occurred to him that you could just say no to be married.

also gotta love the passive aggressive boomer logic that exist here. i get rapped on all the time in PARF for being unmarried, as if it makes me unsuccessful, and then in divorce threads everyone is like being married sucks. same posters most of the time.

For sure. I might be a part of 'Bill'. but I look at each day and say, "FU, I'm going to get through no matter what you think.

Can you explain that? Is that a generalization? (not logical, from a philosophical POV.)

Man, I am sooo lucky! Life may be boring married to the same woman for 46 years, but it sure beats hell out of that kind of "excitement".

Forget who said it...maybe a pool pro..."Every so often I should just find a woman I can't stand and buy her a house."

idk, ive only ever heard it from boomers.

i get **** on a lot in the political forums for being a middle aged man who is unmarried. its implied im gay, feminine, undesirable, unsuccessful, etc because im not married quite commonly. i shrug it off because im happy to not be married, and my personal life is quite good.

and then in thread after thread about marriage, or divorce, is filled with men who felt trapped in marriage, stuck on the escalator, unhappy, hate there spouse, or know someone who does. this points out the obvious issue with using marriage as some kind of status symbol, some kind of indicator of success etc.

so i find it pretty dumb to judge someone based on their marital status, and no one i know besides boomers does so.

A sad story for sure. Can you help him find or rediscover a hobby he's passionate about?

I've posted my 3 rules for survival here before......

Had a good friend that lived in Alabama - married for the second time to a woman from europe. She came with a daughter. He loved the wife, the daughter was a hellion with a drug problem. One day he had enough and kicked the adult (mid 20's) daughter out of the house (she stole and pawned for drugs the last thing from him apparently) - The wife packed her bags and left and took most of what he had left with her.

He ended up with a brain tumor shortly there after - surgery was successful - but he started drinking a lot and ended up loosing his job a few years later.

Now he is in a home with alcohol induced dementia.....

You won't live as long as a married man but he will be much more willing to die.

^^^lol
That reminds me of Frank Barone telling his kids that him and Marie were 'just waiting for death' :D

generalizations like this are foolish at best.

be married, don't be married, i dont care. assuming everyone is the same, wants the same things, operates the same, and feels the same is massive boomer logic. if you want to be married, be married, if not, then don't, i wont judge you either way. i will judge you based on if you are happy with your life or not. and i will absolutely judge you based on the health or not of your marriage.

i think i'd like to be married at some point in my life. now is not that time. the women who wanted to marry me earlier in life, were not women i wanted to marry at that time.

A famous punchline:

"... it'll make those 90 days feel like five years!"

I did not get married until I was in my mid 30's.

It had zero to do with the women I dated; some were great, all conference or better...I just saw the detritus of how hard the military is on relationships and decided to wait for the right person or accept the results of my indecision.

Mattered little to me.

I got lucky.

Now, should I goon my marriage after over 30 years, I go Shaolin Temple.

Boomer logic is simply about making good choices and having the discipline to see those through to fruition. If you make a less wise choice, you own it and work twice as hard to overcome the imact. It sure beats the time wasted feeling sorry for yourself and blaming everyone else. If you married a crazy drug addict with three delinquent children, took out. $200k student loan for that degree in gender studies and then quit your job at McDonalds because you are vegan, or if you live on a fixed income and drive a lot/commute and voted for a guy that would shut down pipelines and usher in massive inflation and a huge increase in gas prices…you can only blame yourself.

A good marriage is usually beneficial to one’s health, wealth, and one’s children. A good divorce (from a really bad marriage) might be the same. The answer (to this and most choices in life) is to make good choices.

If people insinuate a lot of bad things about you and include your being single as one…it may well be because of other things you have said/done and have little to do with marriage (most likely you dispatched their marriage/situation).

Some folks really shouldn’t marry or procreate…just sayin’.

I have a High School friend that was about the same with his luck and choices.
Finally, he had to move out-of-state because of debts and child support cases.

Last time I talked to him..he was working as a mechanic at a small auto garage in CO. (told me to never mention where he lived)
He threw a lot away.

the boomer logic being pointed out is that boomers shame and judge people based on there marital status, and then are the first to say that people wrongfully think that leaving a marriage is a failure and they shouldn't feel like a failure. if you dont want poeple to feel like a failure when leaving a ****ty marriage, then probably don't judge people as failures who arnt married.

so this post doesn't really speak to the issue being pointed out.

Nothing wrong with being unmarried. I’d certainly rather be single than miserably married.

But there’s a lot to said for having a committed partner who has your back as much as you have theirs.

Do you really think people “shame” you for not being married? I have never seen that. Perhaps you misunderstand. I don’t think I have ever seen anyone “shamed” or “judged” be their marital status…at least not in the last 20-30 years.