Did you find a good relationship in mid-life?

I was 32 when I met my current husband, 38 years ago. He was 24.

What do you consider midlife? I was 29 and he was 40. Does that count?

I consider the 40s and 50s to be mid-life, but that’s negotiable.

Yesterday was 23 years and he was midlife then. :-)

Yes, me early mid-life and my other half 50s, better late than never!

Yep.

I met my wife when I was 47 and she was almost 52.
We’ve been together for almost 20 years.

Yes I did. I was around 42 when I met my SO. We were friends first and great friends too. I found my 40s to be the best years of my life in terms of fun and flirting and being hit on! Maybe I had just settled into being me and was less hung up about things. But I truly loved that decade. I am 50 now and I still think if I was single I would meet someone. To me it is about giving off a certain vibe, being OK with oneself. I do feel the age difference at times with my SO as he is much younger.

In a lot of ways though he is much older! Love has no time limit.

Still looking….

I haven’t looked much but I had a couple dates with one man, and then dated someone else for a minute. Never got sexual (blech) and they were both totally weird and I don’t know if I will ever date again or not.

I personally did not, but I know several people who did. Two couples got married. One who was in their 50s and one couple in their 60s.

And this happened about a year and a half ago after the stormiest years for both of us. While it may be late to have a family and enjoy life youthfully, it was well worth the wait!

I was sixty when I started dating the woman, then fifty-six, who now has been my wife for twenty years.

I’m in a relationship with a 55 year old man and I’m 42. We met 18 months ago and have been together for 15 months.
What I noticed about this relationship compared to the ones in my 20s:
1. We both come with baggage and histories. It’s ridiculous to think we should be baggage-free at this age. The important thing is to not make him become accountable for my own history/hang ups and vice versa. You know in Rent where Mimi says, “I’m looking for baggage that goes with mine…” That’s pretty accurate for me as well. In other words, understanding and flexibility go a long way.
2. I learned that there are different types of arguments and disagreements. There’s the type that builds up over time, is never really solved or the issues fixed and is destructive. My ex marriage was fraught with those. Then there’s the type that clears the air, fixes misunderstandings and causes improvement. I never knew those could exist!! What a relief!!
3. There wasn’t any dancing around, game playing, checking out, covering up flaws, playing nice, etc. We both weren’t looking so were both real and honest from the start. We went into this with nothing to lose because we didn’t expect anything and that was the best thing ever. That’s probably how it should be at any age, but I didn’t see it until now.
4. We do have our challenges because both of us have histories with depression—whoo… But I feel like our ages and experience have given us more depth, patience and understanding, and less judgement and we balance out well.

Now, will this last? Only time will tell. It’s still quite new and I have a long way to go to catch up with @Brian1946 or @Bill1939

Depending on what midlife is, I was 26 when I met my boyfriend, he was 41. Obviously he was more midlife than I, I would like to think he thinks he has found a good relationship.

Still hoping to…

My mother hooked up with her boyfriend when she was in 66. They stayed together, regular love birds, until he died some twenty years later. They kept separate apartments, first in the outside world, and then in a staged retirement community, which allowed the romance to flourish as they got older.

No chores, no cooking, no debates on who took the trash out, or forgot to put the toilet seat down. They split every bill, even for Starbucks, down to the last penny. My sister and I used to roll our eyes.

Not a relationship that I would have wanted, but it made them both happy.

I was in my late 30s and he was in his late 40s. We weren’t looking for anything serious, let alone love…but we ended up married. Eight years this august!

I did when I was 51 and she was 45. Most meaningful relationship in my life to date, much more than my marriage, which was also started late (I was 35 when i got married).

My sweetie and I met 4 years ago in our mid-40s. We crossed paths on a social network and interacted there for a while, then continued our friendship via emails, text and phone. We lived about 90 miles apart, and met in the city a few times as platonic friends. We weren’t looking for a relationship, but our compatibility and chemistry were too strong to deny. We spent most weekends together and started looking for our own home after about 6 months. We’ve lived together for nearly 3 years now and we’ve only ever had had 1 tiff, which blows my mind because my previous relationships involved so much fighting and drama.

Mid-life doesn’t guarantee maturity. I’d previously dated others in the same age range that were far from ready for a serious relationship. The key is that both people have reached a level of self-actualization where they are comfortable and confident in themselves whether single or coupled, and where they don’t have insecurities that cause so many of the neediness or control issues that can destroy relationships. The relationship I was in a year before this one really tested me because of the indecisiveness and instability of the ex. In my 30s or younger, I would have gotten all caught up in the game of him pulling me closer then been destroyed when he pushed me away. I surprised myself because I was able to maintain my dignity and to express patience and concern with his flip-flopping, and not be distraught when he rejected me. Although it didn’t work out, I learned that I had developed a mature sense of integrity and stability so that I could choose a relationship or not and I didn’t have to settle for anything less than I deserve.

So my advice is always to work on oneself to become the person you want to be. Work on resolving whatever personal issues that may be holding you back from happiness. If the past had troubled relationships, consider what mistakes were made, what patterns have been repeated, and what you could do differently if similar situations arise in the future. Pursue your interests and live your life today by finding groups and organizations based on the things that are meaningful to you. In doing so, you will meet like-minded people and develop new friendships and build your confidence. Perhaps a new friendship will become a new romance; but even if it doesn’t, you’re out having fun and not sitting home staring at a screen.

I was 37 when I started dating my husband (who is ten years younger than me). We have been together 8 years now.