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I Asked for a Divorce and My Husband Laughed at Me

Susan Kelley
5 min readOct 6, 2020

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That’s How Toxic Some Men Can Be. Leave Those Men.

Photo by Joel Overbeck on Unsplash

We were at a friend’s daughter’s bat mitzvah. Our own son was thirteen. The kids had gone to preschool together. I tried to be happy. For us, for them. But I couldn’t. I looked at what they had, and knew we didn’t have it. We didn’t have it any more, if we ever did.

Both families had three kids; we sometimes joked that we could connect us all together permanently with the right marriages among them. But I knew. I knew we would dissolve at least one marriage — ours. I told my husband that day.

“I just don’t want this any more. To be married. To you. I don’t want it. What I really want is a divorce.” I said this as our youngest son frolicked around with their youngest daughter, tossing popcorn into her mouth and young infatuation filled the air. Music wafted throughout the party. Tables of cookies stretched out along the wall.

His laugh startled and confused me.

“No you don’t,” he snorted as he cocked his head. “Be serious.”

A person with any sort of moral compass might have been taken aback. Might have seemed hurt, Might have even paused to ask why. But he did none of these. Instead, he chortled. He ushered forth a laugh from his belly. Not in confusion but a deep laugh — AT me. He…

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Susan Kelley
Susan Kelley

Written by Susan Kelley

Susan is a runner, a mom of 3 grown children, and an avid traveler. She writes about humans, and wrote a book about false accusations of sexual assault.

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