It’s OK That Our Long, Mostly Good Marriage Ended

Opinion|We Had a Long, Mostly Good Marriage. It’s OK That It Ended.

When I got married, more than three decades ago, I did not want to promise to love my husband until death do us part. I did want to try; Dan was my soul mate and sweetheart, and I felt lucky and excited to start a life and family with him. But death — we hoped!— was light years away (we were 29), and a part of me rebelled against vowing my entire life to a monogamous, cohabitating partnership. I’d lived alone in my 20s and loved it; I’d always needed private space to fully unfold. I’d also enjoyed dating and sleeping odd hours; I’m an obsessive thinker and writer. Love or not, I worried marriage might suffocate me.

So I told Dan I couldn’t swear to what I couldn’t predict. He countered: People won’t come to our wedding to hear, “I’ll give it my best shot, but….” He had a point. I said the vows.

We were both right — he in his confidence, me to think twice. Now 33 years later, I’m proud of our long, loving marriage: nurturing children, homes, friendships, pets; collaboratively writing and editing books and articles. We laughed and learned and lived, first struggling financially (but together! as artists!), later finding our footing. We were a connected, compatible team for a charmed, exciting, mostly happy chunk of our lives.

But every marriage has its issues, and the empty nest catapults them to the surface. We had different ways of feeling and expressing intimacy. Dan was working harder than ever, but now with a new team that didn’t include me — and the more he (understandably) devoted himself to that world, the more I both escaped into my own projects and expanded into the sweet peace of autonomy again. When we did hang out, we didn’t want to do or talk about the same things. A couples therapist suggested we might not make it. “No!” we said, stunned.

Still, we drifted further, each feeling less loved and less loving. We had always laughed, and now we didn’t. At least, not enough.

No one was cheating, swearing, slinging plates. We could’ve tried to put Band-Aids on our issues until they healed, or didn’t-heal-but-whatever. Instead, we made an increasingly common choice: We hugged, apologized for our shortcomings and freed each other. To me, it was — and still is — less a failure than the end of a long, productive, good marriage.