“I never loved her”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think this could happen when the person wonders if what they feel that might be called love isn't really love, or at least isn't nearly the same as how the other person in the relationship felt which they called love. Or maybe compared to other people they know and how they experience love.

I think it's not uncommon at all for some people, maybe especially men, to question what their feelings really are. Love vs companionship, admiration, attraction, protectiveness, appreciation, or just plain strong like.

I think it's also possible if someone decides or discovers they didn't love their spouse of 30 years, the mother of their children, it's also likely they aren't going to be able to really love anyone else either.

I'm a woman, and I feel this way about my husband. "Love" is a very western construct. The word doesn't even exist in some other languages. I have affection, respect and loyalty for my husband (and other times, frustration and scorn!). It's perfectly fine to question whether or not you "love" someone when the very word is so fraught, so loaded by American standards.

However this person really has to express some sort of positive feeling about their ex, otherwise it is a red flag. He stayed for years. I suppose he did feel some loyalty and sense of duty. Also apathy, probably, perhaps financial insecurity until he could feel secure enough to leave? Lots of different reasons and feelings. It's normal for such situations to be complex. Simplifying them would be silly.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:red flag to me. a healthy divorced person will acknowledge that they loved their ex at one point but it is in the past.

He’ll start singing that tune soon whether he agrees with it or not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Big red flag. Either he’s engaged in revisionist history (but to what end?), or he’s so disengaged from his own emotions that you two will never have a truly emotionally intimate relationship. If he were in therapist working on his emotional health, I might feel differently.

He is (in therapy).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is such a red flag to me. This is just rewriting history and not taking responsibility for what happened. He seems very manipulative and don't think that he didn't sell that "oh, I never loved anyone before you" crap to others before you. This is narcissistic behavior and he will play hot and cold until he will exhaust you. Did he tell you that you're the only one who understand him, too?

Okay h, I don’t know where you’re getting this from what I wrote but not a single thing you wrote here has actually happened.

NP here. This is where my brain went to as well. Once you end up with a malignant narcissist, it is easy to see it everywhere. I get triggered by things. For example, was dating a guy until yesterday who was sweet until he made me defensive and started gaslighting me that his version of events was true. Done. Nope. I am out.

NP. I hope you're happy when you end up alone after deciding everyone is a narcissist.

[Anonymous]

So he married her and stayed 30 years but never loved her? Yup, red flag.

[Anonymous]

I honestly don't see how this is a red flag. We all know about people who get married too young and don't know what they're getting into. We probably all have boyfriends/girlfriends from high school/college that we thought we were super in love with but it turns out we really weren't. All kinds of people stay in unhappy marriages for decades, especially if they're confused about why they're unhappy.

Someone said above this indicates OP's boyfriend is not "taking responsibility" for his part in the end of his marriage. I don't see that at all. It looks like he did some self reflection and realized his feelings weren't what he thought they were.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Big red flag. Either he’s engaged in revisionist history (but to what end?), or he’s so disengaged from his own emotions that you two will never have a truly emotionally intimate relationship. If he were in therapist working on his emotional health, I might feel differently.

He is (in therapy).

Is he aspergers too? That’s very difficult to be in a relationship or live with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is such a red flag to me. This is just rewriting history and not taking responsibility for what happened. He seems very manipulative and don't think that he didn't sell that "oh, I never loved anyone before you" crap to others before you. This is narcissistic behavior and he will play hot and cold until he will exhaust you. Did he tell you that you're the only one who understand him, too?

This. I would respect someone who would have said, we loved each other, but after 20 years and 3 kids, the love was eroded, we grew into different people, we no longer are compatible, whatever… just not this tired “I never loved her/him” refrain. If he didn’t love her, why did he stay so long, and how does he know he loves you?

People keep reading into this. He hasn’t said he loves me. We aren’t there. He did say “kids keep you together,” and theirs had special needs so he also stayed for that.

Nobody is reading into anything. This is reaction to the “I never loved her anyway” irrespective of your relationship. Someone saying “I never loved husband/ wife of 20 years” unless it was an arranged marriage and they met on their wedding night, is simply lying or revising history. At some point, he did love her and if he didn’t and willingly jumped into it, then a valid question should have been why.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is such a red flag to me. This is just rewriting history and not taking responsibility for what happened. He seems very manipulative and don't think that he didn't sell that "oh, I never loved anyone before you" crap to others before you. This is narcissistic behavior and he will play hot and cold until he will exhaust you. Did he tell you that you're the only one who understand him, too?

This. I would respect someone who would have said, we loved each other, but after 20 years and 3 kids, the love was eroded, we grew into different people, we no longer are compatible, whatever… just not this tired “I never loved her/him” refrain. If he didn’t love her, why did he stay so long, and how does he know he loves you?

People keep reading into this. He hasn’t said he loves me. We aren’t there. He did say “kids keep you together,” and theirs had special needs so he also stayed for that.

What he said to you is a red flag. But seeing how you are vehemently defending him you're going to keep seeing him and you'll learn the hard way.

Special needs like what? They are often hereditary, esp ADD, ASD, Bipolar.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I honestly don't see how this is a red flag. We all know about people who get married too young and don't know what they're getting into. We probably all have boyfriends/girlfriends from high school/college that we thought we were super in love with but it turns out we really weren't. All kinds of people stay in unhappy marriages for decades, especially if they're confused about why they're unhappy.

Someone said above this indicates OP's boyfriend is not "taking responsibility" for his part in the end of his marriage. I don't see that at all. It looks like he did some self reflection and realized his feelings weren't what he thought they were.

This. This is why people give such terrible advice on this forum. They read everything through their own distorted lens, they diagnose personality disorders from 3 sentences of an anonymous post, they assume all sorts of facts that aren’t true. It’s so ridiculous. OP, you know a lot more than anyone responding here. If you don’t know what it means, just keep talking and get to know him better. DCUM is good for what color should I paint the hallway, not things that really matter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Dating someone who divorced after a long marriage with children (stayed till kids were raised to adulthood). I asked if he still loved her and he said “I don’t think I ever loved her.” Is this revisionist history? Do people really not love someone they married while young and had three children with and stayed with for nearly 30 years? Or is this just how they remember it when it’s over? He says that he didn’t really know what love was until more recently (also stuns me).

Ahhhh, divorced guys who never know what to say or what the truth is…

[Anonymous]

See I"m not so sure about all this. I mean it is possible to marry some one and not love them. You could marry someone because you want a family, or because you have been together for a while and your (or his/her) family expects you to. I know my mother didn't love my dad, but just felt it was time in her life for her to get married.
People marry for reasons other than love, so maybe this guys is telling the truth and maybe he never really did love his wife. I would ask him why he decided to marry her OP.

[Anonymous]

I don't think my parents loved each other. They had four kids. My mom got pregnant, and so they got married. Then life just happened, and they had more kids.

I'm in my 50s, and I can see how some people might stay in a marriage for the kids even if you don't love the spouse. As long as you don't hate that person and can get along, you may stay together for the kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^ Sounds like revisionist history. If it’s true, that’s an even bigger red flag - why would ge marry someone he was not in love with? Frankly, he sounds very immature.

Terrible thing to say or believe, after the fact or not.

Sounds psycho, bitter or on the spectrum. Or all three.

I wonder if a lot of you with this opinion are still in your 20s or early 30s and from a completely different generation than us 50-somethings. By the time I was 25, I reallly had to find somebody to marry. You cannot understand what family and societal pressures were like 25 years ago when we got married. I didn't really love my husband, but I had to settle down. I really didn't feel I could stay single and be acceptable to my family or really even society. I love him now, but it took a very very long time and a very hard road raising kids, one with special needs, with somebody you don't love that much.

[Anonymous]

That’s not my 75 yo parents marriage whatsoever. Sorry PP. People ages 50-89 in America most definitely got divorced if in terrible marriages that were unhealthy for them. Yours perhaps wasn’t that so you stayed married or was dismal but the calculus made you stay.