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Four Lessons Divorce and Dating Have Taught Me About Relationships
What can you really expect from a partner?
My ex and I separated just over five years ago. It was a difficult time for me. We’d been together since high school — for nearly 15 years. My relationship with her was all I’d ever known.
But, our lives had twisted themselves in different directions. It’s not that our relationship was terrible, there were just aspects of it that weren’t great. In a sense, it was quite simple: we didn’t understand ourselves and we didn’t know how to communicate with each other. This caused us to fight. A lot.
We went to couples counseling, which helped us both understand where the other person was coming from and why we’d behaved as we did. I think this was instrumental in allowing us to maintain our friendship and love for each other even while we moved toward divorce.
But, as all of this drew itself out, the inevitable question was, What’s next? I hadn’t been on a date in half my lifetime — how did it even work? Are they going to be as awkward as I feared? What was I looking for? What qualities in a person make for a great relationship?
I couldn’t answer any of these questions at the time. I was lost and had no idea what I was doing. But as I dated and had more and more…
