Hello Friends,

I wanted to get some thoughts from people who are not invested in me or any of my situation. Will try to make it short with background info and then my question will be at the end.

I was with my ex wife for 7 years and considered her to be my best friend and possibly the best friend I have ever had. Many family members on both sides would comment that they thought we were the best couple they had ever seen.
All of that time with nearly no arguments, many fun adventures, travels and even good success together in career. Odd thing was after all that time there was still something fun to talk about, all day, every day - to the point we would have to agree to stop talking, joking, laughing or even stop being intimate for the night so we could get some sleep.

Long story short there, I am not sure how or why that came to an end, years later I still wonder.

Shortly after that I lost most of my close family members (literally all of them except 1) due to medical conditions, accidents or other unfortunate events.

Shortly after that I lost my high income top 90% type job due to not being able to handle all that had occurred in a 6 month time frame.
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Fast forward and 4 years later I have rebuilt my life, have many very close friends and a very good job once again.
I have found a new partner who is amazing and one of the best people I have ever met. I love her very much.
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With all of this said, I find that there is a spice of life missing. One that was present every single day before. I was excited to wake up every single day just for the chance to spend any time with my ex wife or any of those friends or family members I described above.
By all accounts now, my life is amazing and many people would give a great deal to have a partner like mine or any of my many close friends who would literally travel across the globe to help me if needed.
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Question -
I want thoughts on why the spice of life could seem to be missing so badly.
There is nothing of the sort that I dont want to be here or any thoughts like that.
Its just that I generally dont care about what the next day brings and I certainly am not excited for what is to come, when before I couldn't even wait for the next day to come.
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My thoughts - is this part of getting older? Have I been there and done that so many times it is all old news (with my ex wife we were top 1% income and had many hundreds of what people would call "once in a lifetime" type experiences.
Are my friends and partner not fulfilling in the same way that my ex wife or very close family members were before?

I would not normally ask such a deep question in this arena but it has been many years I have struggle with this and truly want to move on and be as happy as I was many years ago.

Any thoughts or input would sincerely be appreciated

Hello! It's a tough question and not easily answered as it lies within you. I feel like I can grasp what you're asking but I still miss a few pieces.

Did you get closure with your ex wife?
The events that played out after that are all very unfortunate events. Have you dealt with the trauma of these events?
Do you compare yourself now and then? It seems like you are in this text.

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Maybe you have been thinking about it, maybe not but we all change. I too can look back and at first it's like "Yeah, that's me.. I need to be him again" but after many more thoughts you realize you're not him anymore, you've grown to be him but in a different way, a changed man - for better or worse. It's what time does to us and we need to adapt - not dwell on the past.

If you feel sad, have a bad day, think about these things.. do it, let it be so but then move on to present time. Idk, it's deep and I hope this helped you somewhat.

Thank you very much for the thoughts, it is truly appreciated.

I did not get closure there, I was confused as can be and so were all of our mutual friends and even her family.

I have been able to deal with all of the bad events. Although I miss my father and others, I accept that and have moved on to try and live a good life.

You might have hit the nail on the head here. I always compare myself to before, when I was younger, stronger, much better off financially and all of that. Perhaps today's events with inflation have made this feeling worse but it is hard to say.

I need to move on and stop dwelling on the past as you say. It is just so difficult to remember the excitement I had towards the day and now although things are very good I cant even reach half or even 25% of that feeling as before. Even when I travel or do amazing things today.

I will continue to work on getting past this. Thanks so much.

Thank you too for sharing, it is very important to express feelings, to strangers and friends alike because it makes us think.

Have you forgiven her?

Naturally I have no idea about who you are and what you do but you seem to be a busy person? Have you tried to disconnect for a while?

Try to build good mental habits and only compare yourself to who you were yesterday. It's the small things - cheesy as it might sound, that makes a difference. A long walk in the rain, no music, no talking on the phone.. just you and your thoughts.

A great thing to distract your thoughts with is the following; Look at something without evaluating it. For example, I sat on my porch the other day, thinking.. thinking a lot. But something catched my eye and I let it be so, I let my curiousity take over.. it was an insect, I know it sounds a little bit funny but I continued for like five minutes.. to see what it was doing, where it was going and when I sat down again.. my train of thoughts were all gone. I do the same thing with birds sometimes. To be present in the moment is invaluable when these thoughts take over.

I was recently derailed and suffer too from not seeing my future for what I expected it to be from a past perspective. Nothings going to replace the security and hope I felt when I too, thought I would share a life with my best friend forever. I have nothing to offer in regard to a strategy to change your perspective but I just wanted to acknowledge that I understand your situation and you aren't alone.

We don't choose our destiny, we just react to is as it happens.

Happy travels stranger, hope the light shines brighter where you see it.

Bro......

My ex user to say

Love is not 3nough

That honey moon phase fades away,

But if u still w3re excited to bang her after 7 years,

Mayb3 sh3e the one that got away...


Maybe lov3 isn't enough, but what if it's enough for me.......

My ex was th3 love of my life, but that deep passion faded over the years , n she couldn't handle it


But I think I did the right thing, cuz maybe some1 out there is even more compatible with me; some1 who loves me n I love back

This post was edited by tonytouchtt on May 28 2022 10:44am

truth is true love does not fade away its immortal. true love is memories rather than feelings only. when you find that a mans love for a woman can be eternal vice versa cannot be said. women love different, they are not based so much on memories but emotions.

Well, you know what some people say, you can't expect things to be as good as they were at the beginning.

And I believe that romantic feelings, no matter how passionate, do indeed fade away eventually. The only thing left would be friendship with your SO. And companionship.

The way I have been told, if you can talk to your SO for hours and hours, and it's about stuff that isn't that romantic, and you cannot get tired of talking to them, then it's a very good sign you are onto something worthwhile.

To OP:

I don't know why you feel that your life is missing "spices". Maybe your current SO is too far from your physical ideal? Or maybe it's simply a part of growing older. I also feel that I don't get excited about certain things compared to when I was younger. Some people I know have also told me that as they get older, they find it more difficult to get passionate about a romantic partner.

Very much appreciate all of the input. I am reading it all and thinking very deeply.


"The way I have been told, if you can talk to your SO for hours and hours, and it's about stuff that isn't that romantic, and you cannot get tired of talking to them, then it's a very good sign you are onto something worthwhile."
This was me and my ex-wife. It would get to the point where it would be so late at night we would get 3 hours of sleep due to us talking and talking and talking all night and day about everything in the world (including romantic things too).

I am starting to think for some strange reason I lost a soul-mate level partner for reasons I dont understand or perhaps we are all just getting older and those connections are hard to find or fade the older we get.
I have never encountered another human being with whom I had so much to talk about, all of the time, every time.

This post was edited by AntiMatter5 on Jun 1 2022 05:03pm

appreciate the input. Forgot to quote the above post.