Do You Regret Ever Marrying Your Ex? 

When I was young, my mother always taught me that mistakes are worthwhile only if you learn from them.  I look at divorce in the same way.  It’s difficult to think of a chunk of your life, years usually, having been wasted.  And it got me thinking…were those years really wasted?

Throughout your marriage with your now (or soon-to-be) ex-spouse, didn’t you learn something?  Didn’t you learn something that now, even though the marriage is over, makes you all the wiser?  Or do you just regret ever marrying the person?

I only have two friends who’ve been through a divorce, and one of them said that they regretted ever marrying their now ex-husband, and the other one said they didn’t regret it, but only because of “the children.”  But what if there weren’t children?   Does that mean that at the end of, say, a ten year marriage, your divorce is finalized and you spent the last ten years wasting valuable time?

I find that too painful and sad to adhere to.  Everything we go through in life, all of our experiences, shape us, like we are bowls on that spinning pottery wheel and our life experiences are the hands that shape us.  You learned a lot throughout your marriage, even if it didn’t work out.  You learned what not to do, what not to put up with, and most of all, that you can survive hardships.

If you did learn something, what was it, and are you better off having learned it even though your marriage didn’t work out?  I think you are.  I saw a woman on a talk show once, I think it might have been Dr. Phil, who had been shot in the head and left for dead by her abusive stalker ex-husband.  She said that she didn’t regret marrying him (because of her children but also) because she said she’d been feeling “dead inside” and that surviving that fatal ordeal made her really want to live again.  I found her to be incredibly brave.

Does anyone have any tales of what they’ve learned?  Any regrets?