Why Did You Stay So Long in Your Marriage? 20 Years? Why Wait Until Now to Separate?

Welcome to Wednesday’s Q&A with OEV! This is a space where I dive into your questions about love, leisure, pleasure, and everything in between. Thank you for trusting me with your thoughts and letting me be part of your journey. Today’s question is directed at me personally and therefore shall I answer and take my time doing so. Let’s Geaux!

This week’s question:

“Hey OEV,

I’ve been following you for years, all the way back to when you and your husband used to teach about marriage and relationships on the Truly Faithful page. I remember looking up to you both, not just for the wisdom you shared, but for the transparency and authenticity in how you talked about your marriage. You two seemed so strong, so connected, and I adored how you worked together to inspire others. I also loved seeing how much you both poured into your children. It was beautiful to watch how dedicated you were to your family and faith.

But I have to ask, and I hope this comes from a place of love. Why Did You Stay So Long in Your Marriage? 20 Years? Why Wait Until Now to Separate? From the outside looking in, it seemed like you had such a healthy and supportive partnership.

Now, with everything you’ve been writing about lately, why did you stay in your marriage for 20 years if it was as you've been writing about lately? All the job losses and quitting. I do remember some of your write-ups on job loss but never to the extent that you’ve written about in your newsletter. Was it hard to leave a marriage that so many of us admired?

Your journey has always inspired me, and I’d love to understand this part of your story”.

My Answer:

Hey Love,

Your question is so real, and I deeply respect you for asking it. Why did I stay so long in my marriage? Why didn’t I leave sooner, especially with all the quitting, getting fired, and the weight of carrying so much responsibility?

I thought my marriage was fine, healthy and normal. I thought these were normal marital issues compared to the things other wives had shared about their marriages such as infidelity, physical abuse, verbal abuse, overt financial abuse, emotional unavailability...all the things I taught from a biblical perspective. So I'm seeing that hey, my husband treats me right, (treats me right as in not doing the normal things many divorce over), he's protective of me and our children, he stands up for me when others come at me sideways, he's a gentleman opens doors, pulls out chairs etc.

He's an active and involved father, and all those positive qualities make it easy to overlook things like the constant job losses. You tell yourself it’s just a man’s struggle in a world that can be especially hard on men, particularly Black men. What you don’t immediately realize is that it’s covert financial abuse, with some emotional manipulation sprinkled in, where you’re expected to cover for him.

For most of the marriage, I was genuinely happy. Happy to be married and happy to have a husband who supported my dreams, goals, and aspirations. In that time, I was able to get my life and health insurance licenses, real estate and mortgage licenses, and later become a certified life coach, sexologist, relationship coach, author, and even a bestselling author while staying home to have, nurse, raise and homeschool our babies.

Many times, he would come home after a long day at work and cook when I was too tired from being a "keeper at home" all day. This was something he did consistently, from when we had just one child to all five, and it was very considerate. To me, I was living the life, especially as our children got older, started helping with chores, and I gained more freedom to pursue my goals while still being at home as he worked.

So that version of me was happily married all those years and fine with taking on the duties of a wife at home while helping him with his struggles. I also fell for the guilt trip of staying home while he worked outside the home, which he wanted even before we married and I agreed to, viewing men and working moms as having the harder jobs. I felt it was my responsibility to help him with his emotional dumping at the end of the day and find solutions to his job problems as well as support his goals and dreams, all while pursuing my own.

Many days, he would complain about working all day and night, being so physically tired that he couldn’t focus on the things he loved because the little energy he had left went to our children when he got home. I would feel so much guilt that I had found a way to pursue my dreams while keeping the home, and I would downplay how hard my role was. So, I took on his baggage every time with every job, finding ways and solutions so he could still provide for our family, which he took seriously, and also pursue his dreams and goals. I too was torn about this for him. That version of me, so in love and deeply devoted to this hardworking man, went above and beyond to “help” as the helpmeet I loved being.

But eventually, as you level up in self-improvement, you realize the old version of yourself is dated and no longer serves you. It then becomes a fight to embrace the new, improved version of yourself and leave the old one behind. This fight shows up in your marriage because what you once did out of love, duty, responsibility, empathy, and a little guilt, you now do with annoyance, resentment, and inner questions like, "Why tf can't he do this himself?"

And you're also fighting inside with, "Girl, you are his wife and at home. Why can't you do this" and "But I'm sick of this shit. He keeps getting fired and I got to help him find another damn job all because he wanna draw for a living? Then I gotta fill out all this damn paperwork again? We lose benefits with every firing or job he quits and he bout to bring them damn papers again for me to fill out for 7 people. This shit is getting old". The more children we had, the longer the paper work got and the longer it took for me to fill them out for every…single…child…him…and me. whoosah. And I did this for every single job he had before and after we had children.

In the summer of 2024, after I left and he got his 21st or 22nd job, I’ve honestly lost count after 20, he sent me the link to fill out the papers for all of us again. As much as I wanted my children to have health insurance, I just couldn’t do it. He kept reminding me, and even my therapist and friends said, "It affects your children, so go ahead and fill them out." Despite all the counsel and support, I never did. I told him to handle it, and he never did. So, the kids went without insurance, and during that time, any health care they needed was paid out of pocket or provided by free clinics.

The point I’m making is that for the first 12 years of my marriage, up until 2016, I was happily married and did everything I felt I was supposed to do with the joy of being a wife, mother, and woman of faith. In 2016, I started to see things differently but still persisted in my role. By 2017, I was more awakened but continued to push through. By 2018, I was more in tune with a newer version of myself that had to say, "I’m not okay with doing all this." I still felt guilt but became more vocal about my frustrations, especially when I had to cover for another one of his job losses. I covered that loss well because the company was on TV as going out of business. What people didn’t know was that he was fired two months before it closed. 😆 IJS. But Dallas saved us because he got a great job there and moved. I’ll share more of that story later, but for now, to finish answering your question, I was never looking to separate in the way I ultimately did at any point in my marriage.

The first separation, everything was still intertwined, our names on everything, our lives still connected. This separation is different. My name is mine, we live apart, and we now have completely separate lives while co-parenting, something we’ve never truly done before. Even when he moved to Texas for a year before we joined him, everything was still "as one." Today, it’s truly him in his life and me in mine. The only thing that connects us now is our children.

So, even though it seemingly took 20 years, I actually don’t regret how I moved or the timing. I needed the wake-up call. By the time 2019 hit, I was much more vocal about our finances than I had ever been. By 2020, I started making getting my own income a priority, and yes, we argued about that too, but that’s another story for another day. Almost losing homes several times over the course of our marriage was one thing, but actually losing them hit different.

I realized that the current version of me, the one who would never have put up with the stories I just shared, didn’t exist back then. I wasn’t HER yet. But I am now, and she is happily separated because she no longer depends on a man. It didn’t matter what year she became HER, as long as she did. Point blank, I left because it was time. 😉 

The version of me in July 2024 took the action to separate, and the version of me in 2025 went into the New Year having cut off every co-dependent relationship I had, something I’ll be sharing more on very soon. So, stay tuned.

I hope that answers your question and gives clarity to others who also asked the same thing. ☺️ 

Always Much Love,
Octavia E. Vance (OEV) 💋 

P.S. If this resonated with you or sparked questions about your own journey, I’d love to help you navigate your relational or sexual challenges. Let’s work together to uncover what’s holding you back and create the life and love you deserve. Click here to schedule a private one-on-one session with me. Your breakthrough starts now. Feeling blessed by my writings, well you can bless me right back right here. 💝