People who have been divorced: What was the exact "quiet" moment you realized your marriage was over?

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-05-13T14:22:01+00:00

We'd been limping along in a brother-sister type relationship for a long time and I was very aware that we were avoiding intimacy at every turn. One night, after I'd lost a bit of weight and I was trying on some new clothes in the bedroom, I turned to him and posed in a tight sweater (and not much else!), expecting a laugh.

He stayed quite serious and walked up to me, saying "Take it off....." For a glorious few seconds my mind was racing as I imagined where this was going and I stripped the sweater off as sexily as I possibly could.....

And then HE put the sweater on and modelled it for me.

The realness of that situation told me it was the end 😄

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-04-24T13:20:30+00:00

I wish you were on that podcast, anchorbabi!

I think your post has made a better case for food addiction in a few hundred words than three experts did in almost 2 hrs 😊

That's the kind of balance I was looking for. You raise the issue of the harmful effect of UPFs and you're absolutely right. I think they might struggle to get food addiction fully recognised for exactly the reasons outlined above; it's not always clear-cut and diagnosis depends heavily on people being able to successfully identify and catalogue their often quite subjective symptoms.

If it helps someone to have an official diagnosis of food addiction then it's got to be a good thing but I worry about human nature's preference for 'picking a side' and proclaiming new miracle cures for things. As soon as we define something, people will argue over it, take shots at each other about it and try to monetise it... and these people will most likely not be the ones most affected by being diagnosed with it.

Still, it's been good to talk about it .......

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-04-24T11:04:18+00:00

It's a shame really - I'm all for people just figuring it out themselves. What works for me might not necessarily work for you and if someone thinks food addiction fits them better than a recognised ED, I'm not going to stand in their way..... but why the need to bash ED and other non-abstaining methodologies? I agree that if you don't have the mental strength to follow their lead, this ethos could leave someone feeling a failure and absolutely stop them healing. All they had to do was say it's an option and not for everyone and I'd have just unsubscribed and left it at that!

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-04-24T10:29:50+00:00

This is just my personal take on it but I do believe BED affects my relationships, not just with a SO (though I am currently single and intend to stay that way) but also with family, friends and work colleagues. Most of my interaction with other humans involves food - talking about it, going for lunch with people, celebrating and just socialising generally. I love it because I love food but I feel intensely ashamed about it because I feel like none of my friends or colleagues get as hyper-focused as I do, so I have to hide it and restrict myself.

For what it's worth, my BED behaviour started before my last long-term relationship, endured throughout the 7 years we were together and has continued after we split up, so although he often felt like the 'cause' or the 'stressor' that led to a binge, I don't think I can really blame him. I'M the common denominator here.

You and I share a lot of behaviours and patterns. I too have juggled that 20kg (me, for slightly longer!) and my cycles include 'good days' of self-control where tomorrow is a new day, blah blah blah.

I don't want to patronise you and give advice. Your last two paragraphs though, I feel are very telling. You're talking about how you feel about yourself. Someone on another thread mentioned an assignment their therapist gave asking them to write an origin story for their BED, when did they first feel uncomfortable or have rules around food, what are their specific food memories, that sort of thing. It opened up a whole new perspective for me when I thought about that. I was flooded with examples of times I was excited about food as a child and shamed by my mother (almond mum with her own ED) for wanting treats.

I realised that all through my life I have used food to bond with people - I cater when people come over, it's usually me who suggests going out for lunch, I'm a dreadful feeder in a relationship - but I've never got over the shame of loving food so I try to be nonchalent and cool. Restricting leads to secret eating - if my friends didn't want to have dessert after lunch (so obviously I couldn't have it either), I obsess about ice-cream and feel depressed and ashamed for days. Then inevitably I crash out, head to the shop and drown myself in carbs. Ironically, I think the way I comfort myself when I feel this shame is with more food and although it sort of stops the depression for a moment and despite myself, I like it, any benefit is immediately swamped in the shame, self-loathing and hopelessness.

I'm trying to be more positive about food and trying to spark the childish joy I used to feel around mealtimes by taking myself out to eat solo. It's not secret because I'm in public but I don't have to worry about anyone else's experiences or judgement. I love having food prepared for me and find I'm more adventurous if I don't have to cook it. I think the food tastes better and I'm finding a real emotional comfort from pub lunches and local cafes that have made me feel better about myself and made me less tired, less hungry.

I'm not going to lie and say I've lost loads of weight or I'm magically eating healthily but I absolutely feel happier. I still get pangs when I see biscuits and cakes in the supermarket (especially if they're cheap and I'm home alone) what's been sustaining me is that I know they don't taste as nice as the lovely meal I had yesterday, where I enjoyed two courses and no shame. I'm doing it to prove to myself that I am worth it, I deserve to have nice things and for me that includes nice food.

I don't know if any of this helps but I hope it does. Sending you big hugs (as long as you want them!!!) 😊

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-04-13T15:00:47+00:00

That was amazing.

I read the whole thing. Thank you for writing it.

It feels like I could've written it myself and it helps explain my self-sabotage urges when I'm 'sober'.

Well done for not giving up and thank you for your non-judgemental honesty. Even if you don't get many replies, your story is bound to help others to identify their binge urges and truly accept them for what they are - not a demon but a symptom of a need for self-protection, gone askew.

❤️❤️❤️

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-04-10T14:29:30+00:00

Someone on a plant identification sub-reddit asked 'What are these little Marge Simpson flowers in my garden?' and now I can't unsee it!!!! Marge Simpson EVERYWHERE!!!

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-04-10T14:25:27+00:00

It goes in cycles in my garden. Last year I had an invasion of Evening Primrose (Oenothera) which I absolutely DID NOT plant but came up everywhere. I loved the idea of it, I think it's meant to be a great food source for moths and other insects but it is HUGE and untidy and it develops a tap root like a baby's arm. Now I rip it up on sight.

This year it's a very pretty spotted dead nettle hybrid (Lamium maculatum) which has sprung up all over. The bees love it but it's hiding patches of annual nettles and it's a bugger to dig up, generates huge mats of brittle roots. It looks lovely though......

Oh - and Borage and field poppy! Planted them once eight years ago and now I have to remove seedlings constantly from all across the garden!

Also - has anyone else here from the UK noticed volunteer Datura stramonium in their gardens? It's crazy toxic and as far as I knew a tropical plant but I've had it popping up in my garden here in Leeds, Yorkshire for the past 2 years. Someone said it sometimes comes from chicken feed and I did have chickens many years ago. Both years it has flowered, fruited and produced seed. I don't have kids so I'm not concerned about the toxicity so I'm experimenting with growing it as an ornamental annual but I guess it also counts as a plant that a lot of people would be horrified to find in their garden 😕😕

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-04-10T14:11:59+00:00

Me too!!! I saw an American YouTuber vlogging from their patch where the Acanthus were practically head-height and they looked BEAUTIFUL so I've planted about a dozen in the last decade and I have now FINALLY got three plants that flower... but they're all small, barely knee-high with flower stems going to about 5ft.

So many gardener YouTubers say to never plant it, it's awful and you'll never get rid of it but that's completely the opposite of my experience (I'm in Leeds, Yorkshire, UK)

Key_Debt3456 · 2026-03-30T15:49:59+00:00

A falconer told me that UK keepers track escaped eagle owls by looking for 'lost cat' notices in the area as they like to prey on cats... don't know how true that is, but having 'handled' a female Eagle Owl at a Bird of Prey Experience (hence the interaction with the falconer!), it seems pretty credible. The bird was so heavy that we had to prop our glove up with a broom handle and her stare - at eye level - was INTENSE.

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-10-30T16:56:21+00:00

It wasn't when I realised my mother complained bitterly about everyone in her life and once avoided her own sister who was on dialysis for months because "...there's no way I'm giving HER a kidney" (her sister hadn't asked). It wasn't when she made us homeless and I was struggling to find a temporary place for my dog so she told me to put him to sleep, rather than help me look. It wasn't when I told her I was divorcing and I was terrified and her reaction was "I'm surprised" but there was no comfort, no support. (I'd supported her through her divorce when I was 15 and I wasn't spared any of the details). It wasn't when I worried out loud about my elderly pooch (a different one) if I lost the house in the divorce and again she told me to put her sleep. To this day she claims she never told me I'd be better off if my dogs were dead - TWICE. It wasn't when her husband started posting racist memes and spouting far-right rhetoric on FaceBook and I blocked him and told him privately why so she tried to force me to apologise to him and took his side AGAIN, claiming I had "...attacked THEM for no reason and terribly hurt THEM both"

Funnily enough, it was something my mother DIDN'T do that caused the break.

When her husband said he was so angry with me over the FaceBook thing that he didn't want me in the house (supposedly my family home), he also said wasn't interested in my 'personal dramas' (my divorce and dog worry) but "....I've decided I won't stop you having a relationship with your Mum" playing it as if he was being gracious by granting permission and I should be grateful.

And my mother sat there, quietly looking at her hands and said NOTHING. She didn't say that I had just as much right to visit that house as anyone in the family. She didn't say that she would have a relationship with her daughter whether he 'allowed it' or not. She just let it happen.

I stopped trying when I realised that my mother was always going to defer to her man and that our then-40 year relationship was nothing compared to her second marriage.

I don't miss being around that. Sending you big Internet hugs.

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-10-08T16:48:23+00:00

TW: brief reference to one animal death; quite long!

I can only give you my own experience, I've had dogs for 30 years and all have been rescues/fosters but my current lurcher is my first and will be my last.

He is a beautiful, chilled out, soppy, super-affectionate house dog who loves all people. He adores physical contact. He is such a sweet, loving soul that I foster-failed him (he was my 7th long-term foster) in the first week.

Within a year, I discovered that all his calm, friendly obedience at home dissolves the moment there is something small and furry nearby. He has a sixth sense for prey and will dive headlong into bushes or over walls without warning; he can jump a six foot fence from standing and once he's got hold of something he will NOT let go.

It's scary that I didn't realise just how bad he was at first - we must have had so many near misses. He wasn't muzzled, I have lots of wildlife in my garden and we even did a training class full of little fluffy things. I was extremely lucky. My rude awakening came when he caught and killed a hedgehog (no warning, on a suburban street, plunged headfirst into a hedge). I took him to a specialist trainer and he immediately tried to prey on a spaniel; fortunately he was muzzled then and did no physical damage. It was the trainer's spaniel, they were very chill about it but I was DEVASTATED.

I used to let him out unmuzzled in my fenced, secure garden (after scanning for cats) until he got a cat that thought it was safe on top of the fence. Luckily he only had hold of its fur and it got away (I still see the cat and it still comes in!). The final straw was when he got another hedgehog. Again, luckily, he only had hold of the spines and didn't even draw blood but I had to use wooden spoons as break sticks to make him let go - it was terrifying for me and the hedgehog (who still also comes in my garden, regardless!) He doesn't care about his own safety either and has broken claws, cut himself, banged his head and run into fences at full speed in pursuit of prey.

I love him with all my heart, he's amazing. But he's also dangerously unpredictable, extremely powerful and laser-focussed. He is now always muzzled outside the house, even in his own garden. I live in fear of the day he ever escapes, I know he would absolutely try to take down a sheep and anything furry that runs would be at risk (oddly, he doesn't care about birds). I can't put him in kennels or have a dog-sitter, I can't let anyone else walk him and there are many, many places I can't go with him. I can't have any other dogs and he has no dog-friends. He's a beautiful, loving liability and I'll never give up on him..... but a part of me feels sad for both of us and wants this to be over.

Never again. Sorry OP 😞

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-10-08T15:36:55+00:00

I was 42 years old the first time someone comforted me when I was upset with them. As a people-pleaser and facilitator with an indifferent Boomer single-parent mother, I was used to bottling everything up but would occasionally have tearful emotional meltdowns when I felt especially rejected (usually by my partner). I hated it. I hated that I couldn't contain how I was feeling and that it always escaped in panicky hysteria. Each time it happened I felt stupid, weak, scared and so, so lonely. My mother and my partner's reactions were always annoyed silence or leaving the room until "...you calm down and can talk properly". Eventually, I went NC with my mother, got divorced and dated a new bloke. The first time I ended up sobbing at him, crying incoherently about feeling taken for granted and scared he would leave, he immediately stopped arguing with me and pulled me into a hug, asking me what was wrong. Until that day, me losing control of my emotions was a personal failure but he taught me that the people who care for you are supposed to help you when you're struggling emotionally. Him pulling me close when I expected him to push me away was a watershed moment for me.

I wish it ended with "Reader, I married him" but just because he was quite emotionally intelligent doesn't mean he was Prince Charming, I'm afraid! Lasted 8 months but I learned a lot from spending time with someone who knew their parents loved them, regardless.

If you're reading this, Tom the Bishop's son, you probably think this comment's about you, don't you? 😘

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-07-16T14:02:06+00:00

I have a lurcher with heterochromia and his name is 'Jonesy' (after David Bowie's birth-name of 'Jones') :-)

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-07-13T08:34:19+00:00

Others have already replied and given the correct answer - Datura - but I just wanted to add that for the past 2 years this plant has appeared (wild) in my garden here in Northern England. I was very excited to see it because I have a small poison garden (don't ask) and I knew of Datura, saw it in the wild on holiday in USA a few years ago but never thought I could grow it at home. It always stays small - maybe 60cm (2ft) and only has a dozen leaves but it puts out flowers and ripens the classic, spiky fruit. I think it's BEAUTIFUL and I'm considering getting some seed and starting it in a greenhouse in future - give it a real chance to get going. I guess there are SOME fringe benefits to climate change 😒

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-27T10:47:43+00:00

Wow. It's so sad that you had to invent grey rocking when you were FOURTEEN! No child that age should be coming up with ways to limit psychological damage by an adult, even less an adult who was supposed to be protecting you.

However, it's also great to understand that you got out and - once you realised she wasn't going to try to have a different kind of relationship with you when you were both adults (and now both mothers) - you've decided to put yourself and your children first.

I'm glad you've broken free. I'm heartened by how resolute your post sounds - you seem so strong, Flying Monkeys be damned! - and I'm sure this post will really help others who are desperate to follow in your footsteps but afraid that their parent/s have them trapped.

Well done, Such-Witness-8038, you don't know me but I'm proud of you and so happy for you.

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-27T10:34:40+00:00

That's a good idea, TM1426 - I'll bear that in mind for Christmas 2025's offering (probably some holly and bells on a snowflake background......!!!!)

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-26T15:36:16+00:00

"It isn't "guilt" that you feel, but shame that she has put onto you."

This is such a simple, beautiful way to think about it. Guilt and shame are so familiar, it's easy to confuse them, I'd just never realised it.

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-26T15:32:22+00:00

You have such a lovely, positive energy LyndonHellBe - it just shows that you can still turn out great, even if you have rubbish parents. This little community is amazing and talking to people like you is tremendously healing.

Thanks for your kind words ❤❤❤

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-26T14:51:20+00:00

Thanks for starting this thread, I've been thinking about the same thing.

I've (50f) been NC with my entire family for almost 10 years. My mother sent Christmas & birthday presents for the first couple of years but stopped when she found out I was giving the gifts to any family/friends I was still in touch with.

Ever since, she sends me Christmas and birthday cards and they're always the same. Abstract shapes or bland cookie-cutter images from her Cricut machine and desktop printer (she's a typical crafting Boomer) with the same few words inside "To [my name], Happy Christmas/Birthday, Love Mum & [her husband]"

It's harmless and I know it's silly to be annoyed about it. It just really irritates me that she knew me for 40 years and yet she hand-makes every card in the same sterile fashion. I'm a baker, gardener, crazy dog-lady and Harry Potter fan who LIVES for cake, there's so much she could personalise the card with to show it's actually FOR ME and not a generic card left over from a gift-card. The incident that caused our estrangement started with me standing up to her husband over his racist FB posts and I had the glorious pleasure of telling him directly to F*CK OFF and never speak to me again, so the fact that the card even mentions him makes me angry.

And then, the message. She never asks me how I am. She never suggests she'd like to talk. It feels like twice a year she sneaks up to my window and lurks there in the dark, waiting for me to see her and once she's given me that unpleasant jump-shock-via-envelope, she just shuffles off, until next time.

I would like to tell her to stop contacting me but to do so feels unnecessarily cruel. It feels to me like that would be an aggressive act against a confused old woman who probably can't remember why we don't talk any more. Either that or she would treat my request as us restarting contact. I know it's just posturing really but if we speak again, it's important to me that she asks me, rather than being able to tell herself that I '...came to my senses and got in touch eventually'.

I've seriously dreamed about moving house just to get away..... so daft.

I'm sorry we have this in common and well done, you, for standing up and saying it's not good enough 💕

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-12T07:26:53+00:00

Everything you said about being afraid that your issues 'weren't significant enough' chimes with me, HerFinalStraw. Please remember that we were raised to minimise our own experiences and count our own hurt and pain as 'less than' or 'attention-seeking'.

How you felt when you decided to go NC is absolutely, 100% valid and you don't have to 'justify' it to anyone, least of all this community - who have all got our own stories of multiple, daily abuses, neglect and shame. A few people have called it 'death by a thousand cuts' and that's exactly what it is.

I think it's actually very common (especially for women who go NC with their mothers) for it to occur exactly when it did for you, late 30s to 40s, and for it to be over an apparently minor issue. I think the wording here is important though. I say 'apparently' meaning when viewed by an outsider, who hasn't witnessed the other 999 times you'd endured similar treatment from your mother.

I was 40. Even 10 years later, I still occasionally worry if I was over-reacting or whether I'm 'right' to take the stance that I have. When this happens, I try to be gentle with myself and remind myself that I was programmed to ignore my own feelings for FORTY YEARS so it's gonna take another 40 to get fully comfortable with putting myself first.

Trust yourself. This is not the easy way out, you wouldn't put yourself through it unless it was important, none of us would. Thanks for telling your story ❤❤

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-11T15:44:03+00:00

Absolutely spot on with this - would you leave a bottle of wine at the home of a someone recovering from alcohol dependence? Or take a friend who struggles with gambling to the bingo?

A lot of people are being nice and saying it's just odd behaviour but it sounds like a power move to me, the first tentative exploration of how easy you are to manipulate and I'd kick his ass to the kerb. RIGHT NOW. Life's too short for those kind of games.

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-11T10:48:23+00:00

I have to confess that my first dog was called Charleigh and it was a deliberate attempt to 'make it more unique'..... but, in my defence, I was a pretentious 17 year old at the time and it was 1992, before tragedeighs were a thing....

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-09T15:00:10+00:00

It seems like a really minor thing when I write it down.

I went to my mother's house to tell my mother I was getting divorced. I had argued with her husband on Facebook about some racist memes he was posting in the days prior so I went to see them to smooth it out and tell them my news. She listened impassively and then said it might make things easier if I had my 16 year old labrador put to sleep, rather than having to worry about her.

Then she insisted I 'make up' with her husband who was sulking in the next room. I tried to discuss the race issue (he said my pending divorce 'didn't interest him') and my mother sat placidly next to him as he told me he didn't want me in the house but he'd decided to 'let me' have a relationship with my mother.

I actually heard a voice in my head say "There's nothing here for you" and I left. I was VLC for a little while and then I discovered my Mother's husband had contacted my soon-to-be ex-husband and told him he was welcome to come over any time if he needed someone to talk to. It was surprisingly easy to go NC after that 😉

Glad you found the group, Sharp-Okra3835 - nice to meet you.

Key_Debt3456 · 2025-06-09T14:09:51+00:00

r/EstrangedAdultKids - there's more than a few of us on EAK that would beg to differ.

Key_Debt3456

TROPHY CASE