Woman Feels Hurt After Her Husband Says He Would Pick His Deceased First Wife Over Her
She wants to know why her husband married her if he feels that way.
Dikushin Dmitry | Shutterstock It can be difficult to be married to someone who’s lost a previous spouse. Without intending to, it might feel like you’re in an impossible competition with another person. And to make matters worse, they never truly ended the relationship. They just couldn't be together anymore.
One woman shared that she knows this feeling well in a Reddit post in which she asked for advice after her husband said something that hurt her.
A man told his wife that he would choose his dead first wife over her.
In the post, the woman explained that her husband had been married once before to his high school sweetheart. “She passed away unexpectedly at age 26 from an aneurysm, and it obviously devastated him, especially because they were extremely young,” she said.
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“He contemplated remarrying because he was so heartbroken, but we ended up meeting about four years after that,” she continued. “We got married when I was 31 and he was 34 and have two children.”
Her husband basically told her that if his deceased wife suddenly came back to life, he would 'pick up where we left off.'
Everything seemed fine in their marriage until now. “Last night, we were at a friend potluck gathering,” she said. “Everything was going well until one of our friends brought up a new topic that had to do with relationships. She is newly divorced, so it was about her divorce.”
“Others were chiming in with past relationships from high school, college, etc,” she recalled. “I had said I never thought I would get married because my luck with men has always been terrible until I met my husband and I said I felt very lucky to have met him.”
That was when her husband said something that left her speechless.
“After a little while longer, my husband brings up his deceased wife,” she wrote. “Everyone knows he was married before me and that she passed. He was talking about her and then drops a bomb and goes, ‘If she walked through that front door right now, I’d pick up where we left off.’”
Naturally, this woman was heartbroken, and their friends were shocked.
“If I am being honest, it felt like someone put my heart into a blender and punched me in the gut as hard as they could,” she described. “Everyone in the room could sense the awkwardness that followed.”
“To avoid making a scene, I just laughed it off even though I think it was still obvious that it hurt me,” she added.
“I just felt that if you still felt that way, then why are we married?” she asked. “I’ve never asked him to get over his wife. I have never had a deceased spouse or even a deceased partner, so I am unsure how that feels. But I would never say that in front of my new spouse.”
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Now, she’s not sure what to do. “After the gathering, we left and I did not speak to him the entire car ride home or barely the entire night,” she said.
Being married to a widow or widower is an incredibly tough situation to be in.
It’s easy to come to a quick judgment about this woman’s predicament, but that really isn’t fair to her or her husband.
On the one hand, it is natural for her husband to continue grieving his loss. VeryWell Mind pointed out, “A widow or widower may experience fluctuating periods of sadness and even longing for their late spouse.” They also said it is normal for the widower to even feel like he is cheating on his previous spouse.
However, what was said was obviously very hurtful to this woman. Her husband should have considered the impact of his words and how they would affect her. “If the new significant other starts feeling more like a consolation prize than a romantic partner, it’s time for a heart-to-heart,” AARP noted.
Clearly, this wife feels like she is not being put first in her relationship. This seems like a situation in which counseling would be helpful.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.