Marry again? No, thank you

Anna (not her real name), a 34-year-old sales manager and single mother, is done with men and marriage, having gone through two failed marriages.

"Before, I always felt it was good to have someone to grow old with and talk to every day. But now, it's no, thank you," she said.

"I realised I don't need a man and I can raise my daughter alone."

Anna has a daughter, eight, with her first husband.

She decided to end the marriage of over a year as her husband, a restaurant manager, was "financially irresponsible" and in debt.

Because of his credit card debts, she took over payment of the household bills. She also gave him a few thousand dollars to help him pay off some of his debts. But he failed to do so and the amount owed grew to about $20,000.

She said: "I don't know why he owed money. But I don't want to be married to or stuck with a man who is financially irresponsible."

Anna saw how her mother suffered going through life with a gambler. Her mother slogged in various jobs to help her father, a taxi driver, pay off his gambling debts.

Anna said: "I don't want my daughter to suffer like I did when I was young."

After her divorce, Anna met her second husband, who is also divorced, but with no children. The businessman in his 40s got along well with her daughter and the couple dated for about two years before taking the plunge into matrimony again.

But after their wedding, Anna said, he became increasingly short-tempered, "was very mean with his words" and often came home drunk. He also accused Anna of fooling around with other men, when she did not.

But what really hurt was that he kept calling her daughter fat and greedy. This affected the girl so much that she started to starve herself and was miserable.

"It was impossible to talk to him. He would just insist he is right," she said. "My daughter asked me if I could leave him. I saw the hurt in her eyes and I decided to leave him."

Earlier this year, she filed for divorce after eight months of marriage.

He asked for a second chance, but Anna decided she had had enough.

"When he's drunk, the devil comes out," she said. "I'm not going to put my daughter through another marriage again."

This article was first published on July 24, 2016.
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