Eleanor had been with her partner for nearly a decade.
They’d been through good times and bad times together.
Nothing in their relationship made her suspect that he wasn’t committed.
But last week he dropped a bombshell on her.
He wanted out.
He told her that the love wasn’t there anymore.
Maybe he’d never really fallen in love with her in the first place. Their relationship just kind of happened. He’d gone along with it.
Now he was waking up and realizing that this isn’t what he wanted for the rest of his life.
Eleanor was devastated.
She told me that she was sure he’d been having an affair. What else could explain his change of heart?
When a Good Thing Isn’t Enough
It takes so much work to find the right person, get into a relationship, and build a good life together.
Once you’ve put in all that hard work, you should be able to relax.
You should be able to let down your guard, trust each other, and enjoy life.
But that doesn’t always happen.
About 1 in 3 divorces occur in couples over the age of 50.
These couples have worked so hard to create a life together. Why would they throw it away?
One possible answer is this:
They’re getting older, and that has changed the way they see things.
Midlife Reassessment
There’s been a lot written about the “midlife crisis,” but I think it’s more accurate to talk about a midlife reassessment.
Many of us start to think differently about our lives as we get older.
We look back on the relationships we tolerated in our teens and twenties, and we wouldn’t tolerate situations like that now.
We’re more aware of time passing. No longer does the future stretch out before us in a glorious cloud of possibility. Each life gives us only a certain number of years on this planet. What do we want to do with those years?
Do we want to spend our remaining years in a relationship that isn’t meeting our needs?
This growing sense of the finitude of life can lead us to make different choices.
Sacrificing ourselves for our family and loved ones may have made sense when we were younger. It was okay to not have everything we wanted, as long as everyone else was happy.
But now we’re wondering…
“What do I want for me?”
What Men Miss Most
For men, this midlife reassessment can be particularly poignant.
As much as the media likes to portray women as obsessed with looking young, men are just as concerned about aging.
For them, it’s not necessarily so much the wrinkles and gray hairs as it is having a weaker, less resilient body.
Men miss feeling young.
They miss the ability to stay up all night and go to work the next day with no consequences.
They miss that muscular, agile body they took for granted.
Men also miss that feeling of invincibility they had when they were younger.
Back then, they thought they could do anything. They felt on top of the world.
They didn’t have to be careful or baby their aching joints.
And there’s one thing they miss most of all…
They miss feeling alive.
Life can be so monotonous. You go through your days on autopilot. You know exactly what will happen next week, next month, next year… because nothing ever changes.
Men miss the excitement and unpredictability of their younger years.
They miss waking up each morning to a life where anything could happen.
Falling in Love Is One Solution
And you know what meets all three of these powerful needs?
Falling in love.
When a man falls in love, life becomes magical and exciting again.
He feels younger, stronger, more powerful, and on top of the world.
Love gives him the energy to stay up all night and go to work whistling the next morning.
No wonder so many men think the answer lies in a new relationship.
Not because they’ve stopped caring about their partner, but because they miss the person they used to be.
He Doesn’t Need a New Partner To Feel That Way
Ideally, couples would go through their midlife reassessment together.
They’d talk about how growing older is making them see things differently. They’d recognize the need to shake things up. They’d take steps to recharge their connection.
But for others, the midlife reassessment is a lonely path.
He thinks she’s content with the way things are. He feels alone in his struggles, never realizing that she would like to feel invincible, youthful, and incredibly alive, too.
For Eleanor, I suggested that she start thinking about her own future. What could she do for herself to bring back the magic and spontaneity and sense that anything is possible?
As she makes those changes, she can share her new direction with him. He can see that she isn’t going to continue on the way things were. She wants something better, more expansive and fulfilling.
Their old relationship is over. But if he chooses to try again, he’ll get the best of both worlds: a woman he’s loved for nearly 10 years and the fresh energy of falling for her all over again.
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