I don’t pretend to be an authority of any kind, but I’ve learned a lot about living with and loving people by doing it. I have been married four times and divorced three times. I did, at least, make different mistakes each time! I enjoyed a fourteen-year life partnership with Sam, which was the deepest and healthiest relationship I had ever experienced up to that time. I learned a great deal from it. My relationship with Rick is even healthier and grows deeper day by day. Of course, there were other relationships, too. My life has been blessed with an abundance of love.
Over time, I’ve been a custodial and non-custodial mother and stepmother, a step-grandmother, and a grandmother. I’ve lived in nuclear families (my parents were married for 60+ years) and blended families, on my own (before and after becoming a parent) with and without kids, as part of a couple without kids, as part of a couple whose children visited on the weekends, and as part of a vee with kids in the household. I’ve been in monogamous and ethically non-monogamous relationships. I’ve been through the remarriage, divorce, and death of my daughter’s father (my second husband). All this stuff adds up to a lot of life lived in 59 years, and that’s before all that I’ve learned from observing others’ relationships. Oh—did I mention that I am essentially related to the entire population of Alabama and most of north Georgia? Lots of material right there in the family.
Anyway, I’ve come to the conclusion that relationships that end or change are not failures. I realize that there is a school of belief that says every romantic relationship is supposed to be “happily ever after.” That notion is right up there with the whole “soulmates” myth for causing harm, as far as I’m concerned.
People change. Healthy people grow and change. Sometimes they change in ways that make them no longer compatible with their partners. The healthiest way to deal with that is to admit that things have changed, mourn the loss, and try to change the relationship into one that works for all involved. Sometimes that change has to be to one where the people involved are no longer romantic partners. That avoids the drama and hard feelings that come with assuming such relationships have “failed,” and the concomitant harm when the people involved consider themselves failures.
Relationships are not about winning, losing, or keeping score. They are successful if they contribute to the well-being of those involved. They don’t have to last forever to do so.
Healthy relationships can only be built by healthy people who know what they want, ask for it, fulfill their commitments, and live a very conscious, intentional life. Relationships take work. They take skills that are the same across all types of relationships, whether romantic, familial, business, academic, social—you name it. At one time, my dear friend Ron and I were talking about the “life curriculum” Sam and I had set up for our kids, and one of the things that Ron brought up was relationship skills. That wasn’t on my list before Ron suggested it. Such skills are a major contributor to a person’s overall well-being and happiness.
Children are best raised in environments where they can build long-lasting relationships. Family can include people of all ages, related by blood or not, who care about them. The more diverse a child’s environment is, the better. They’ll be able to connect with people who aren’t their parents, see how other families live and love, see how other people parent, and see what people with different kinds of jobs or educations live like. They can ask other adults questions they might not wish to ask their parents. I grew up with a very large extended family. My daughter and Sam’s children didn’t have that much blood family nearby, but they were surrounded by our family of choice, as we were truly blessed with deep friendships with incredible people.
Is there one true, right way to “do” relationships? No, I don’t think so. The “right” way is the way that works for the people involved at any given time. The common element is always love.
Articles in this section
- N > 2
- Coming Clean: Transitioning From Cheating to a Polyamorous Relationship
- Coping With Infidelity
- Creating Intentional Community
- Demographics Are Not Community
- Revisiting the April Divilbiss Case: Alternative Lifestyles and Encounters with the State
- Against Romance
- Are You Looking for a Unicorn?
- Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and the Death of Intimacy
- Monogamous and Polyamorous People in Relationship
- Finding Love, Being Love
- The Man Diet
- Tolerance, Acceptance, and Affirmation
- True Honesty
- Why I Don’t Like LDRs
- Recommended Reading