I know I'm new at this but in my opinion you never give up. If you give up what were you fighting for in the first place. I hope my marriage never ends in D but if it does (against my will) the door will always be open for my H to walk back in at any time. My love for him is too all-comsuning for it to be any other way.
Me 43 XH 45 M 2.7.88 Divorce 7.10.09 Kids D20,S17 & D15
I agree with Alison, if you truly love your S then you will never give up on them. If you follow the DBing strategies then even if you get a legal D then there is always a chance of rekindlling at a later date. I know that my W wants to file for D, and I am moving on, but I will never give up on her, I love her and the kids way too much to let that happen.
Quote: when do you give up on your relationship or lack of one
I disagree with the other posters. For me, I just had a moment when I decided I didn't want to do it anymore. I could DB my @ss off...my STBX may have eventually come back...but I was tired of living with my life "on hold" for a relationship that may never be realized.
The bottom line is (I think) that one day you'll just know that you're finished.
I'd have to agree with April. I don't think that's fair to yourself to say "I'll never give up. The door will always be open for my X".
I'm not saying, once you're divorced or going down that road that you should walk away and never look back, but you need to have a life. You need to be complete, happy, and content with what you do have. If the XS chooses to come back then you can decide if they are a person that can enhance your life or not, because that's what marriage is, being more than the sum of the parts.
But we each have to reach the point of moving on or not at our own pace. It's a stage in the divorce process. But there is life after divorce and there is love after divorce if you are willing to grasp it. But it won't come if you don't heal. Your XS won't even come back to you unless you heal. Honestly, who really wants an incomplete person? Even your WAS/XS can see that you aren't strong enough, complete, or happy without them. No one wants the burden of completing another person's life. It's hard enough taking care of your own.
You don't have to lock the door, but it's my opinion that you do have to close it and walk away from it. If your XS has a desire to try again, they can knock and talk to you from outside the door. It's not fair to just let them in, no questions asked, as though it was entirely your fault that they left and they somehow don't have to prove themself to you.
In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years. Abraham Lincoln
It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. Theodore Roosevelt
I'll throw my 2 cents in... I'm in between these two extremes right now. I have been going through this for a year now. I still go through the I will wait / I am done cycles. The one constatnt is that I have detached, and have let her be. She is slowly beginning to show signs of remorse. It takes time for the WAS to take in their new life - for better or worse. It was difficult for me to understand at first, but now I do see it. Time is your ally.
Focus on you, try new things, make new friends. You don't need to be in a relationship to be fulfilled. I am just now realizing this. I have not had a relationship, and am not ready for one. This has allowed me to focus on myself, and IF she changes her mind about US, there is no third person to muddy the water. I learned in my Divorce Care class, that it takes 3-5 years to fully move on. In that time, they strongly suggest you not be in a relationship.
In the end, you must do what is right for you. I am sure, as many of us have, you will sway back and forth. It is only natural. Decide what is best for you at the moment, and take it one day at a time...
M: 35; Together 14 years - married 5.5 no children Bomb 22-JAN-2005; D a few months later First real relationship post D just ended ( 7 months ):(
From the variety of the responses you see answers are all over the board. I think it's personal. At some point we need to move on but keep loving. One of the barriers is our co-dependency. It's hard to fill the void in a loss of a loved one. But, if you don't you appear desparate and undesirable. Fix you, don't worry about your spouse everything will work out in time. We just now the definition of what constitutes "will work out." As Father Allendar says "pray to God that the worst happens and give you the strentgh to survive it." That was my prayer, it happened, and I fell a whole lot better about myself. Lance Armstrong won 7 Tour de France after stage 3 cancer and said the best thing that could happen to him was cancer and he prayed it would be the worst. See, in some strange way the counter intuitive works. Believe in the force Luke!
