My husband left me
My husband left me
Photos by the Ever so Talented Michael Troutman
Ghosted me actually. I still can not comprehend how that is possible, how a 40 year old man can write and speak the vows he did multiple times during multiple ceremonies we had only to completely disregard his vows less than a year later?! How do you ghost your WIFE?!
On New Years Eve.
On NYE after arriving back in SLC from a cross country trip in the van. At 4pm in the afternoon, Mark said he was going to his friends house. It was NYE and his friends like to sit in a garage and drink beer so I decided to stay home and enjoy my solitude. The tone was light… normal? He was going to visit friends and added he would pick up dinner on the way home for us. In and out… my favorite quick meal. I was grateful to not have to cook. We both said our standard, ‘Love You’ as he got in his Van to leave.
I settled into my bed after the long drive excited for in and out when I woke up from my nap.
At 10:30pm I was watching a movie and realized it was late when my stomach growled… it was NYE so I assumed he had been drinking with those guys and lost track of time. Sent a text asking if he was still coming back with dinner… while warming myself up a cup of beef broth.
At 11:30pm on NYE he message me back the he was not coming home and that we needed a ‘Seperation’
Wait what?
Then radio silence.
What followed was the most devastating separation I have ever experienced. He gave no reason. He was unresponsive to messaging. Showed up in the afternoon Jan 1st and dropped off ALL my things. I had moved my life across the country from California to Utah to his storage when we got married. Jan 1 he went and cleared most of my things out of his storage and dropped them at the south side in the snow where I had my camper parked.
Would not talk to me
Or tell me why
He was so angry
I don’t know why
I guess this is what being married to a combat vet is like..?
I was SUDDENLY alone
In sub freezing temperatures and a snow storm on its way
…For better or worse
To figure out my life…
My life that I had spent the last year intertwining with his. Planning a future together. Thinking this man was my ride or die. Through thick and thin. Knowing that he was hard. Knowing that I am hard, I am fully aware that I am a hole ass hand full of a woman.
Sure we have had disagreements, fights even, but NOTHING I would end a marriage over. A marriage is a promise to put in the work. Weather the hard times, grow through adversity together and come out stronger together.
When I married this man, I married him because I thought he was strong and honorable. A man that would stand by my side in the fire. A warrior, just like me. A worthy partner who would fight for our union through the hard times and the good. I married him because I had seen his soul, his inner light, and it is so beautiful. He is so worthy of love! This amazing man shines through all the hardship, pain, and horrors he has seen as a combat veteran. Although he is broken he still has a capacity for love, patience, and learning.
Paragliding saved his life. He is now an instructor and he is one of the most dedicated instructors I have seen. All the best truly shine when they are teaching and helping others. I fell in love with him watching him teach others and take them tandem. I fell in love with him when he had so much patience with me and my own struggles with PTSD from my bus accident. I fell in love with him everytime he spoke his marriage vows to me.
I was shattered.
I thought something had triggered him externally to our marriage? I hoped he was just going to take some space, ‘a break’, and we would be fine. Better than fine… growth together in marriage. Stronger after weathering hard times.
I still don’t know why he left.
Two years later he is still no contact.
He called after 7.5 weeks of the initial no contact, simply asked for a divorce. I stayed calm even though my heart was breaking into a million searing pieces… trying to burst from my chest. I answered him, ‘What ever he wanted’ calmly. I reiterated that this was NOT what I wanted… that I did not understand. He said ‘he knew that’. He still gave me no reason as to his behavior.
He emailed me divorce papers a few days later.
Email blank.
Attachment - ‘Divorce Papers’
Reason for separation: ‘irreconcilable differences’
In my opinion one must first try to reconcile for something to be irreconcilable?
I signed everything and mailed all of the paperwork back to him as he refused to see me.
I would never want to be in a relationship with someone who doesn’t want to be with me. I also have no interest in acting foolish and making a separation hard for anyone.
I am however dumbfounded by his ability to completely ghost and cut me out of his life. His inability to communicate and even tell me what caused this irreparable rift in our beautiful marriage. One day living together, planning our future travels, looking at property to grow old on, falling asleep in each other’s arms. The next stark nothing, complete radio silence.
I have never been treated like this.
I don’t understand this avoidant behavior.
I am friends with most of my ex partners, some still very close some less so but we still check in from time to time with love and understanding.
My first husband and I initially separated in May of 2013. I flew to Australia to break up with him, I would have never even considered breaking up via text message and never talking again. Our separation was extremely hard on both of us. I was the one leaving and it took me months to get up the ability to finally make the right decision to leave. He was my soulmate… I had also planned my life with him. He worked offshore on an oil platform and I was increasingly seeing him less and less and he was also pressuring me into having a family. It was heart breaking… but I flew to Australia and did it like a big girl. Months later he flew back to the states and we separated our lives out. He helped me move to Monterey, into my own apartment. He stayed with me for almost a month there. We BASE jumped together and explored the area. He bought me a boujee espresso machine as a house warming gift. We still talk from time to time over a decade later… reminiscing on amazing memories and adventures shared. Also about his new beautiful family and children.
I have no interest in being married to someone who will not come to me and have a discussion about their feelings and needs. Who thinks it’s OK to just ghost me and never talk to me again. There’s nothing I could have possibly done that would warrant that behavior. So in the end, it saved me from something that was not for me. I am grateful to be free of that marriage and a partner who is incapable of showing up for relationship.
After two years of silence it is clear to me that I was only collateral damage in Mark’s life trajectory. I do not regret the time we spent together, I love him and my heart breaks for him. While his behavior almost broke me and was wildly unnecessary and inappropriate, I agree with his decision to separate. I am grateful we separated early and not after intertwining our lives and hearts further.
I learned so much in relationship with him and in the growth that came from the separation. I am grateful for the ways he did show up for me and our marriage. Grateful to have met his inner child whom I doubt many have had the honor of holding in their hearts. I wish him nothing but the best. I hope one day he heals enough to approach me and tell me why he behaved the way he did… but I also will hold love for him in my heart regardless.
As you do with any relationship, friend, parent, lover, marriage I learned so much in such a short time with Mark. I learned that I AM ready again to be married, I am ready for a life partner to walk this earth with. I learned a HUGE lesson of character, something that was hard to pinpoint before it happened. In showing me that the constitution of marriage, sacred wedding vows spoken many times, and an agreement between a man and a woman made in love can be thrown out in the winter wind with zero attempt to reconcile or even have hard face to face discussions.
To me marriage is no idol thing, it is not just a piece of paper to be crumpled and thrown out when the going gets tough. It is tears at midnight, it’s seeing and being a part of another’s humans ugly parts, it’s getting triggered over and over again, it’s showing up, having the hard discussions. It’s a commitment to pulling your weight and theirs sometimes as well, it’s a commitment to doing the work on yourself to show up in the best way possible…. and also failing. It’s failing hard and knowing that your partner will be there to catch your fall. Even when it hurts. It’s knowing that I love you no matter what…. And the deeper we go down this rabbit hole the harder and deeper the triggers arise.
The story has a happy ending … for me at least.
I spent the better part of my thirties taking lovers. Some I lived with longer term, most I would keep my distance. None that I regret, always learning, grateful for the connection.
After I rolled my Skoolie home and was on the other side of that trauma I became aware that I was ready to settle into a long term real relationship again. When I met Mark I was not totally ready but the man just kept showing up for me and being the wonderful human he was. I saw some of his darkness and flaws but I signed up for it anyway. Like I said I am glad he left me because I would have died for him… I would have tried over and over again with all my heart to show up for our marriage. Him leaving the way he did gave me no option but to move on.
My standard heart break move is to find someone safe and take a lover to ease the pain. Generally I separate my heart from the carnal needs of my body. I was at a fly in gathering - The Flying Circus - when Mark emailed me divorce papers. I was spending time reconnecting with a few old BASE jumping friends and finding myself through aerial stunts, BASE jumps, and Paramotor flights. I connected with a man whom I have known for over a decade, had lived with multiple times, and gone on countless adventures with over the years. Two of his ex girlfriends were friends of mine as well and spoke lovingly of him. He was a prominent figure in the BASE community and team ill vision. I trusted him …. With my body…. And after about six months with my heart.
In understanding a much better picture of what I unequivocally NEED and require in a relationship I was far better equipped to lay my ideals of marriage and life partner out for this man. Whom after considering other options and what he in fact wanted and needed from a partner decided that I was his best match as well.
So here in one sad story becomes the beginning of a new and consistently beautiful adventure. We fight more than I have with any other relationship in my life - but we fight to RESOLVE. We never loose sight of the goal. We are still learning - and plan to always be learning and changing… growing to be better versions of ourselves through relationship.
My vows are the same - To always show up in relationship with the same love and respect as the first easy moments of our relationship. As our love and understanding for each other grows that love and respect only deepens. Mick is far from perfect - as am I. I didn’t marry him because he is perfect… I married him because he will always be there for me, a safe space…. The safest of spaces. Even when I am at my absolute worst. He has already shown me his honor and determination many times…. That’s all I can ask for and it’s all I need.