During our marriage, I always felt that my love for you grew every day. It was a feeling I believed we were supposed to feel. But was it really love, or was it what we had become used to? Separating is a learning process, a learning process filled with experiences, we should have been aware of during our marriage. It could have prevented those painful days we are going through. Today, love means something different to me.

At one point, shortly after I filed for divorce, I discussed with a friend a possible friendship with another woman I had met, and the possibility of more. He asked me if I wasn’t afraid that I would have an experience that would be similar to the one with you and if I knew how she was different to you. It was an obvious question, but a question I was not prepared for.

The question came because I had met this new woman in a similar way I had met you and the conversation with that woman evolved similarly fast as the conversation between you and me 13 years ago.

The pain of the divorce gave me the gift of meeting many different people and gave me an opportunity to talk to people that had personalities with an enormous range. From suicidal to violent to shy and careful to amazingly heart driven. And I found people that I felt compatible with, compatible without compromises. People who were willing to give themselves up for another. People who have similar values as I do. People who make similar decisions as I do. People who deeply care for the things I care.

So, was I able to find what I was looking for?
I was afraid that my fairy tale of a perfect marriage had burst like a fragile soap bubble. My feelings for happiness were tied to the children and the question how long I would have to be alone in a country I was not born [...]

There are two things about your family I was never able to understand and I carefully kept distance to as a result. It was your distance to your mom and dad and the relationship to your biological parents. And then there is your other brother you lost in a car accident before we got married. I agree that we did not communicate in a great way about these topics, but it was never my intention to keep distance, I just felt uncomfortable and was hoping that you would be breaking out of your shell at some point and talk about it when you wanted to. I never rejected the conversation about either topic as far as I can remember.

I was married before the ripe-old age of 24.
Before that, I was one of those girls who always had a boyfriend. Always.
And I liked it that way. Safe. Knowable. Predictable. Easy. Neat. Comfort Zone.
So now, here I am at the age of 38. Newly-single. Grabbing and enjoying life in new and amazing ways.  And constantly [...]

Except that now I give off the “vibe.” The Single Vibe. For 15 years, no one so much even looked my way.

Now, everywhere I go, guys are smiling, talking, nodding and, yes, starting with me. Asking for my number, and my email, and my Facebook friendship and my twitter name.

There was someone I felt I could trust when I learned about your cheating. It was your dad. He had given me advice more than a year before this had happened, when I told him about what you were doing on Facebook and when he told me that he would consider it cheating.

For some reason, I had a special relationship with your dad. Never emotionally close, but a connection with a very respectful interaction. You know that it always bothered me that he needed to teach everyone about everything. That it was his word that counted. I learned that he enjoys sharing his experience and I did not mind listening for the sake of the family, but sometimes it was just too much. I just don’t need to be told how often I need to fertilize my lawn. I do not need to be told how long you have to bake a turkey or ham. And I certainly do not need to be yelled at and be lectured when he feels that wants to see our children, on my time with them.

I found that there are many positive things that have come out of this divorce. We both have met other people and I hope that you are making similar experiences as I do. I am sharing with friends some of the experiences I make as, I am sure, you do as well. And there is one particular experience, which I am infinitely grateful for, beyond learning that I can go out, open up my heart and talk to people and that I am perceived as a decent human being who can find new friendship, a type of friendship I had forgotten exists. That experience relates to the question and answer of: Did I give you the attention you wanted?

Don’t assume everyone does things, makes decisions and exists for the same reasons you do. And for heaven’s sake, if you are going to make assumptions based on your world view, don’t push them on me. Especially when they have to do with the power — emotional, financial and otherwise — of women.

I do not understand how you can destroy me emotionally and then be allowed to take everything else I have done and created for you. At this point, I am willing to agree to the money aspect which, if you are honest to yourself, is important to you. If it wasn’t, and if I am so terrible you claim I am, you would have left a long time ago. It is the money, we both know it. Take whatever you want.

Just as every couple is unique, so too is every divorce.

We decide to split (or our partner decides to split) for a million different reasons.

Some make sense. Some don’t. Some are real, some kind of made up to hide the real reasons.

Whatever they are, chances are there is some component of “I cannot deal with this person” or “We do everything differently” or “We are total opposites” mixed in there.