For years, I watched people younger than me, people I once babysat, and even people over 60 find love and get married.
I was happy for them. I really was.
But sometimes their happiness caused me to look at my own life and quietly ask God, “Lord, when will it be my turn?”
Then came the harder question.
“What is wrong with me?”
I had experienced love. I had four meaningful relationships. I had loved, forgiven, hoped, tried again, and given more than a few second chances.
Yet none of those relationships became the lasting marriage I wanted.
At 52, I can finally look back and see what I couldn’t always see while I was living through it. There was nothing inherently wrong with me, but there were things I needed to learn.
One of the hardest was admitting that I kept choosing the wrong men and ignoring red flags because I wanted the relationships to work.
When I Thought Love Could Change Him
I was only 23 or 24 when I moved from Louisiana to Texas for my second meaningful relationship.
He was the father of my children, and he struggled with drugs. I believed moving would give us a fresh start. I believed he would leave the drugs behind and become the man I wanted and the father my children needed.
Most of all, I believed love, a new environment, and another chance would be enough.
They were not.
He got worse.
There was jail. There was stealing. He stole belongings from me and even from our children. Sometimes he would disappear for two weeks and suddenly return, knocking on my doors and windows at all hours, wanting me to let him back inside.
And too many times, I did.
I loved him, and loving him made maintaining a boundary harder than establishing one.
Eventually, I prayed and asked God to get him away from me because I knew how difficult it was for me to keep him away on my own.
Then one day, his sister called. He was in jail for stealing.
That physical separation finally gave me room to begin living without the constant cycle of him leaving and returning.
Decades later, some memories from that time can still affect me. But that relationship taught me something I wish I had understood at 23: You can love someone’s potential with your whole heart and still be unable to make him become that person.
When the Truth Knocked on My Door
My third relationship taught me a different lesson.
I met him online. He told me he was separated and getting a divorce.
I believed him.
We started dating, and eventually he proposed to me. I thought perhaps this was finally it.
Then I began seeing messages on his phone that suggested there was another woman. When I questioned him, he could look me straight in the face and lie.
So I started praying.
“God, reveal to me what is really going on.”
I just did not expect the truth to knock on my front door.
One night, a woman showed up and asked if I knew the man I was dating. I did.
Then she told me she was dating him, too.
I let her inside, and as we compared what we had been told, we discovered there was not just one other woman.
There was another, another woman.
The man who had proposed to me was juggling three women at once.
Later, the woman who knocked on my door, and I caught him at the mall with the third woman — the same woman whose messages I had seen on his phone.
His explanation?
She was his sister.
Sir.
At some point, even the lies need to clock out.
I ended the relationship.
I had asked God to reveal the truth. He did. The answer simply was not the answer I wanted.
Sometimes a Good Father Still Is Not a Good Partner
My fourth relationship did not involve the same chaos as my second or the elaborate deception of my third.
He had good qualities. He was a good father.
But I learned that someone having good qualities does not automatically make him a good partner for me.
The relationship often felt unbalanced. He frequently needed my help, and I experienced selfishness and meanness that made the relationship difficult.
Then I saw messages between him and another woman.
She told him she loved him.
He told her he loved her, too.
When I asked questions, I didn’t get the explanation I needed, and mistrust entered our relationship.
Later, his mother became ill and passed away. He became increasingly distant, and eventually our relationship ended.
By then, my relationships had taught me several different lessons: I couldn’t love someone into changing. I needed to trust the truth when it was revealed. And someone could have good qualities and still not be the right partner for me.
Forgiveness Does Not Mean Another Chance
For a long time, I thought forgiveness meant leaving the door cracked.
Maybe he will change.
Maybe this time will be different.
Maybe I should give him another chance.
But I have learned that forgiveness and access are two different things.
I can forgive someone and still decide he no longer gets access to my life. I can forgive and establish a boundary. I can pray for someone from a distance and keep the door closed.
Forgiveness is about what I release. Another chance is about what I permit.
Those are not the same thing.
I Had to Look at Shelly, Too
It would be easy to tell this story and make it entirely about what four men did wrong.
But that would not be the whole truth.
Eventually, I had to look at myself.
I kept choosing the wrong men, and I ignored red flags.
That does not excuse addiction, lying, infidelity, selfishness, or anyone else’s behavior. Their choices belonged to them.
But my choices belonged to me.
There were warning signs I explained away because I wanted things to work. There were times I fell in love with potential instead of paying attention to reality.
I could not make a man stop using drugs, tell me the truth, be faithful, or become the partner I needed.
But I could stop ignoring what was right in front of me.
Maybe the question was never, “What is wrong with me?”
Maybe the better question was, “Shelly, what do you need to learn?”
And I learned.
Now, About This Husband
Let me make one thing perfectly clear.
I haven’t reached 52 and decided I don’t want a man anymore.
No ma’am.
I still want love. I still want companionship. And I still want to be married.
In fact, I want marriage with full coverage.
Not the situationship package.
Not the “let us see where this goes for the next seven years” package.
And definitely not the part-time boyfriend plan with limited benefits and a high deductible.
I want full coverage.
The difference is that today I can desire marriage without believing something is missing from me because I do not have it yet.
There was a time when seeing someone else get married could make me wonder whether God had forgotten about me.
Today, I can celebrate someone else’s blessing without using her blessing as evidence that I am not blessed.
My Life Has Already Started
I have learned that I cannot put my life on hold waiting for a husband.
I have a life right now.
I have children I love. I have purpose. I have dreams. I have work to do.
Marriage may become part of my life, but it cannot be the starting point of my life.
I can enjoy my life and still pray for marriage. I can be content and still want companionship.
I have not closed my heart. I have simply learned that love should never require me to abandon myself to keep somebody else.
So if God sends my husband, I believe he will add to the life I already have instead of becoming the life I have been waiting to live.
Would I still like to walk down that aisle?
Absolutely.
Would I like someone beside me to laugh with, pray with, share life with, grow with, and grow old with?
Absolutely.
But I am no longer sitting around asking God what is wrong with me.
I am living. I am loving. I am protecting my peace. And I am paying attention to the red flags.
At 52, I have not given up on love.
I have simply stopped giving up myself to have it.
About the Author:
Shelly Lee is an author, speaker, and author coach who helps aspiring writers move from calling to clarity through her signature 5P Method™: Pray, Plan, Pen, Proof, and Publish. As a single mother who overcame financial hardship through faith, perseverance, and determination, she now inspires others to trust God’s timing, embrace their journey, and turn their stories into books that leave a lasting legacy. Shelly is the founder of Pen.Paper.Publish and lives in Beaumont, Texas.
