moving on?

Lifestyle Relationships
1

Reading some of the posts here where a majority of people tell oothers to move on and find someone else.

I want to hear from women and men who actually did divorce. Where were you in your life and where are you now? Were you a 25 year old single person in the US or were u a 40 year old with 3 kids? Are you happier now then before? Did you get married again and if so how long did it take to find the other person? Did you take time to heal? How did u find the new spouse and did ur new marriage turn out better? Were u able to prevent the mistakes u did before? Finally for the ones in the U.S., did u get or pay the haqmehier? did you face alienation from ur friends and faimily? Was ur divorce fast and easy or did your spousr drag you through the mud?

I see so many posts here about marriage problems and like 80% responses are divorce. But i never read divorce stories. I feel if there were stories to read one would be better educated to make a decision.

Also for the ones who were able to make the marriage work out,spite of very hard situations, lets here ur stories, looking back would you have left? What did u do? Were you just patient. And prayed. Did you get separated and reconciled?

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Re: moving on?

I was 24 when married, and divorce before I turned 26 in the US. Wife was simply the worst mentally/emotionally unstable person I had ever been acquainted with. I felt the family had duped me. Ive been happier. Accomplished a lot since then. It was a trial and blessing. All financial obligations were fulfilled immediately with mutual understanding. Divorce was swift. Turned out she immediately remarried within a month. I am still trying. its been 7 years. :slight_smile: There is no alienation with friends or anyone close to you. If you are not the messed up zalim, then people don’t alienate you. I was disturbed for a couple of years and wasn’t ready to remarry.

I might have taken a little long to getting remarried, but couple of my guy friends were able to get remarried within 2-4 years of their divorce. The world doesn’t end with divorce, only the pain does. Things work out, but one should remarry as soon as possible. Remember, divorce is still the last…last option. I mean literally try everything under the sun and moon to reconcile, counseling, medical help, gifting, more sex, distance-arrangement, whatever you can think of, only then one must resort to divorce if there is no signs of improvement.

hope it helps

3

Re: moving on?

to answer a few of your questions..

I was nowhere in life when I got divorced. I had moved out of state to be with “him”, and then came back home with less than $50 in my pocket. I had to literally pick myself back up and start all over, on my own. I had no kids. I was 24. I went back to school, got a job, and stood up for myself. my (immediate) family was against me coming home, and i had to fight with them everyday for a long time before things finally settled down. my dad said I brought him shame. he would rather me be treated bad and miserable yet married, than free and divorced.

I got officially divorced a year later after returning home. no reconciliation was made on his family’s part. Have not remarrid since, due to a lack of rishtas and not accepting the ones that did come my way. And now, as the desi plague story everyone knows of, I am getting old, so my pool of rishtas, just got smaller.

anytime someone sees me (this was moreso in the past when it freshly happened, not so much now) I get the “pity” look.. of oh, “YOU” are so and so, the one who moved and came back? oh puhlease, people get one with your lives.

I am happier than before in the sense that I don’t have to deal with him and his family drama anymore, but sad in the sense, that I see no possible prospect of getting married again in the future.

I did not get my haq meher simply because I did not want it. my mom fought with me on that one. it took her a while to understand why I made that choice. my reasoning was because I did not want to live off of his money. at the end of the day, it was fully my haq and everything, BUT again - I wanted to be able to buy my own clothes, pay for food with my money, I did not want him to say that I am living off of what he gave me. when the rishta is over, there is no place for anything from him (even something like haq meher) in my life.

I am not seeing anyone, not talking to anyone.. it has been yearssssss since my divorce.. yet, he was married with a kid within a year.. good for him, I hold no grudges. my motto is - live and let live

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Re: moving on?

all I have to say to that - is WOW. that is actually unbeleivable.

5

Re: moving on?

@ bigda nawab…In a month …? irrevelant now but i was just curious didn’t she observe Iddah?

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Re: moving on?

What happened during the divorce proceedings, how did you handle it financially? What was the improvement in your life aftemeaning better career, peace,happpy?Why not try getting married now? Did ur extended family take it when ur parents inforned them?

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Re: moving on?

Have you completed a bachelors and are u working now? Do u still live with ur family? When u divorced did your exhisband like make up rumors to make u look bad? I guess u are looking into the arraiged marriage route again? What kind of ristas r u getting? I you trying to find someone on your own as well?

Also thank you both for sharing ur stories as this may help others. Its very brave and may Allah give u both happiness

8

Re: moving on?

for anymore advice, please call 1-800-NawabSaab. $100/hr ONLY

9

Re: moving on?

Glad to hear you guys are doing better! Thanks for sharing the personal stories :k:

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Re: moving on?

I am working on my bachelors because I wasn’t “allowed” to go to school while married. so I had to do that on my own when I got back, yes I live iwth my family. and of course, he and his family did bad mouth me alot, and I suffered due to it, with the backlash received from my parents.

I don’t mind an arranged marriage, but I would want to do it different next time. that is, get to know the guy more BEFORE saying yes for example. and to have that mutual understanding that every relationship desperately needs.
i have not had any luck finding someone on my own either. most guys end up lying to me, or don’t want to commit blah blah.. it’s tough.

and the rishtas I have recieved are not exactly quality ones either..

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Re: moving on?

No personal stories to share, alhamdulillah. But someone I know … this guy had an arranged marriage to an American citizen (of pakistani background). His parents arranged everything and the first time he talked to her was on the day of their engagement. He found out she is just a high school grad in the US. He himself had done his Masters from the States. He also didn’t find her attractive but went ahead with the engagement and nikah anyway. 10 years and two kids later, they still were not happy with each other and eventually, the girl took all his savings/kids/gold jewelry etc, went to her parents’ and sent him divorce papers.

It was a messy divorce. The guy fought for child custody and was able to get shared custody. There were fights over money and other accusation that were made by the girl and her family. Anyhow, it took a couple months to settle.
But the guy got married within a month of finalizing his divorce. He is in early 30’s. The girl he married was 24, single / never married, college graduate from Pakistan. From what I can tell based on our little interaction, they seem very happy.

12

Re: moving on?

I have not still married due to the similar horror stories I have heard about couples in and outside of family. The stories I have heard mostly involved around family politics which spoiled marriages. Jealous relatives / friends brainwashing the husband & wives against eachother by magnifying the faults / weaknesses in them. It gets complicated when the constant ill feeding coming from someone the husband or the wife trusts to be their well wisher. 3 such divorce cases. In all three, both the wives & the husbands married within 1-2 years period. In one case though the girl was disowned by her parents because people spread rumors about her that she had an affair with her husband’s friend. Dont know how much of those rumors were true. I think she was loyal to her husband. But could not cope with constant family politics. The husband took custody of their son. In other 2 cases, there were no children. In another case, a guy divorced first wife because she liked someone else but married due to childhood engagement & divorced second wife because she could not produce any offspring (actually his mother wanted him to divorce her). He married 2 years later and now has 3 children.

The most pathetic case of divorce which disgusts me was in which the guy divorced his wife of 30 years with 3 grown up children. The wife was so pretty & madly in love with her hubby. The guy was very egoistic, said he had girls lined up to marry him (actually his parents fed in that belief to his head). I think this marriage also spoiled due to jealous relatives of the husband because he was overly generous with his wife and children. He also loved them alot but at the same time, was involved in extra marital affairs. I heard about some of the things his parents did to his wife which disgust me. I also heard that after the divorce the wife went through quite a mental trauma, almost lost her sanity. Quite a bad case of divorce. They had 3 lovely children. The husband married a fat & ugly woman soon after (he himself is quite a good looker. He and his first wife made a great couple). The wife has not. They share custody of the children.

Oh yes, one more case in which the husband accused his wife of being schizophrenic, first lived separately for several years then divorced. Both were educated. But I think both had schizophrenic tendencies. Weird couple. 3 children. I think they share custody.

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Re: moving on?

one of my close friends got divorced at 22 when we were still students. the worst thing was that guy humiliated her a lot and she used to cry telling me about it. it was a hard time for her. she was remarried after her education.

and also she prayed a lot

she was not also given haq mahar

14

Re: moving on?

I was divorced in my twenties. My children were still little. I chose not to remarry as I’m happier as a single person. It’s strange how other people have such a problem with me living on my own, while it’s my own life and I am actually happier without a life partner. Happiness in life is different for everyone. For me it means enjoying the company of my children, having contacts with some friends every now and then, reading, writing, seeing interesting places, etc. If all that makes me happy and I want nothing else in life, I don’t see why other people complain about it.

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Re: moving on?

This happened to a good friend of mine. It was really hard to watch for all of us and really traumatized some of the younger girls in our group since she went through a really tough time. The guy treated her like **** and left her but she bore the burnt of the gossip from the aunties in the community. She remarried a year after to a cousin in Pakistan and she’s a lot happier now.

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Re: moving on?

I had a totally arranged marriage. didn’t really like the girl at first but worked hard to change that. The 15 months marriage were truly a nightmare. we didn’t go along quite well. the families were total opposite. I tried everything under the sun to mend things but they got really ugly in the end when one day i received khula notice from the court. I divorced her and tried to resolve the issue as humbly as possible. People who knew the details say that they haven’t seen such an amicable divorce and everyone was blaming the girls family for wrecking the situation.

A few days ago (start of 4th month after divorce) I got the news that she has married again. It was a love marriage.

Meanwhile I am still struggling to find a good proposal even though my parents immediately started looking. Just wasted the last 2 years of my life and ended up miserable. Sure I can get married to a cousin or a typical desi girl and lead an average typical life, but I want to be awesome instead. hopes are high but my emotions and feelings are like a rollercoaster. Allah Swt has been kind enough to save me from depression.

Please do not get divorced unless its absolutely absolutely absolutely critical, or if you have solid backup plans. The bad people will find their way by deceiving, lying and cheating. Its usually the good ones who struggle.

17

Re: moving on?

People on these forum have heard my tale a billion times so I won’t share the entire ordeal all over again.

But I’ll answer a few questions of yours:

I was happier after the divorce…it was like being let out of a cage. Freedom.

Yes, I did marry again. It was about 4 years before I bumped intoq the guy…but I wasn’t exactly aggressively hunting. I was talking to people sure, but also busy with other projects in my life. I wanted to take some time to heal and have fun. I think once you find a happy place in life…you’re ready to accept someone else. If you’re still bitter, its best to not get involved. I met a lot of bitter people during my time in the rishta pool.

My new marriage did turn out better…yes. And I learned a lot from my previous marriage…would never repeat those mistakes nor would I tolerate the things that happened to me. I did not get any haq meher…never asked or wanted it. Why would I want his money?

It was a trial to convince my family to be on my side because parents never want to see their kids divorced. Eventually, they all got on board too. Yes, he dragged my name through the mud, its what a lot of people do when they’re still bitter. My divorce was fast n easy…and when a friend decided to alienate me…I decided I needed new friends! So I made them! :slight_smile: I surrounded myself with people that made me happy and decided that if someone cannot contribute to my happiness, they cannot contribute to my sadness either. Simple.

18

Re: moving on?

Wrong. It was YOUR money he was holding.

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Re: moving on?

I know what you mean…I think at that time…my priority became simply to get through it somehow. If he didn’t want to give me my mehr, fine. But let me keep my sanity.

20

Re: moving on?

I totally understand what u r saying but just mentioning that girls should keep it in mind. Mehr is a debt to husband just like a CC debt and wife can (and should) claim. Its not HIS money.