Choosing Myself Meant Ending My Marriage 🥹

5 Reasons I Decided To Get a Divorce

Writing a post about my decision to get a divorce after 13 years of marriage and two kids is not easy—especially when 2.6 million people follow me on Instagram. But one thing you should know about me is that I don’t shy away from talking about hard things. It’s very easy to share the picture perfect relationship, the pretty vacations, the white picket fence suburban family, and presenting a perfect-seeming life. Quite literally, all you have to do is snap some pics and post with a captivating caption. People eat up what they see. But that way of living (or sharing my life on social media) has never been for me.

In fact, when I started my Instagram 10+ years ago, I was openly talking about my journey recovering from binge eating and bulimia—eating disorders that literally stole 15+ years of my life that I can’t get back. Of course sharing wasn’t (and still isn’t) easy—there is shame and stigma around topics like mental health, eating disorders, and to a certain extent, divorce.

But my purpose has always been the same; and that is, to remove shame around discussing uncomfortable topics so that we can grow, heal and live our best lives. So today I am not talking about my ED recovery journey. Today I am talking about the decision I made to end my marriage—a marriage that was fine.

You see, nothing was particularly bad. There was no abuse or domestic violence or cheating or alcoholism or things that would otherwise make it easier to walk away. At times I prayed that something would be terribly wrong to justify my reason for wanting out. But nothing ever presented itself. This was a decision I made because my gut intuition kept gnawing at me—for years—that something was off and I wasn’t living in alignment. I couldn’t exactly put my finger on it, but I knew in my heart of hearts that my ex was not my soulmate. Our marriage felt like a transactional business relationship with zero joy or happiness. It was something that we just did. And I felt selfish and guilty for wanting more, to the point that I kept blaming myself for not being content enough or grateful enough.

Before diving in deeper, many of you have asked me why I put some of my writing behind a subscription. The honest answer is that I’m uncomfortable as a motivator and vulnerable storyteller. I expect there to be a raw conversation in the chat and comments, and that itself, deserves a wall as our safety gate. 

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