The word "divorce" is a romantic proxy for many people. For love, to go to the mountains, to marry a man is to marry a city。
But when you're really a married woman, after 10 years and 20 years, you look back and it's probably not romantic anymore。
I interviewed 10 middle-aged women who were married for more than 10 years. They were married for love and are now mostly divorced. But when i asked them, "do you regret it," their answers silenced me。
They regret it, not marry the wrong person. It's away from a place that's never going back。
It's..
First of all, the first woman。
Ya, 39 years old, married from hunan to shandong for 11 years. She stated that the moment she regretted, not when she had a fight with her husband, not when she had a conflict with her mother-in-law, was the day her father had surgery last year。
"my mom called and said, "your dad has surgery tomorrow," and i said, "i'll go right back." then the call began to check, and the fastest high iron was found to take eight hours. Plus the time to go to the station, the time to wait for the car, the time to get from the station to the hospital - the operation was done when i arrived.”
She stopped here and cried. "my dad woke up when i got here, and the first thing i said was, "what are you doing here, so far, so far away?" he doesn't blame me, but the worse it gets for me. I'm his daughter. I'm supposed to be the first to come when he's sick. But i can't be around. Because it's too far."
She said, "when you marry far away, filial shun becomes empty words. All you have to do is make a phone call and ask, "is it better?" you can't even send the congee."
It's..
And a second woman。
She was married from guizhou to the northeast, 15 years away. She said the worst thing about her parents was that they couldn't get back. Last year her mother called to say that the neighbor's daughter married in the next town was brought home every week to eat. Her mother said that without complaining, but without saying anything。
"i cried in the kitchen a long time after i hung up. I know my mom didn't blame me, she just said. But that pain is worse than being scolded. How many times a year can i go back? Up to two. How many years will my mother live? How many times can i see her? Every time she goes back, she's old and i can't count it."
She said that even going back to her mother's house became a luxury after marriage. The child needs money for school, for remedial classes, for mortgages — a ticket home, she has to hesitate for months. Every time she goes back to her mother's house, relatives ask, “when will she be back,” and she laughs, and she knows, in her heart, how long。
"i married the right man, but i lost my home."
It's..
After interviewing the 10 women, i found out that the real pain was not a contradiction with the mother-in-law, nor was it a dispute, but a long-term, slow and irreparable “deficit”。
You owe your parents a bowl of steak soup. You owe them every time you need company to get here in time. You owe them those holidays you were supposed to spend together. The money is not enough, the telephone is not enough, and the promise to return is not enough。
More cruelly, your children are repeating your loop. Your children and your parents are 1,000 kilometres apart and meet once a year. The relationship between grandkids was filtered by high iron votes。
What is the essence of distant marriage? It's you who spends your whole life paying for love. Some feel worth it, some feel worthless. But it is neither worth nor worth it, and once it is paid, it will never come back。
So i'd like to say something that's not good but true。
For the young girl who's still wondering whether she'll marry far away: love can cross the mountain, but the distance is real. What you're facing in the future is not the problem of meeting once a year, but when your parents need you most, you probably won't make it. Think carefully about this cost before you decide。
You don't have to feel guilty about your decisions. Your choice was the best you could have made. What you can do now, not regret it, is go back as many times as you can. One or two. When you went back, it was the happiest day of their year。
It's not natural for your wife to be with you. She has uprooted herself from her own family and planted it on your land. Please understand her occasional silence, occasional thoughts and occasional “for no reason” tears. It was not a tuning. It was the softest place in her heart, touched by surprise。
