I divorced my husband on a whim when he was on a boys’ night out – we are happier now

AFTER blindsiding husband Rob Durrant with divorce papers, free-spirited Anu Verma discovered the grass wasn’t greener and asked him to try again… seal the deal with another baby.

As she typed the word ‘divorce’ into the search engine, Anu Verma felt an overwhelming sense of relief.

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Despite being in love, she had been deeply unhappy in her marriage and thought the grass would be greener if she were single.

But when her husband Rob Durrant received divorce papers 24 hours later, he was completely ‘blindsided’ by her decision.

“We had problems, but I don’t think Rob ever thought it would end in divorce,” she says.

“He was visiting family when I applied online and paid £500 on my credit card.

“The papers were sent to his mother’s house and he was shocked and devastated.

“He kept asking, ‘Is this really what you want?’ But I did.”

While most women divorce their partners because they are no longer in love or because their partner is difficult to live with, is adulterous or abusive, Anu had none of these complaints.

“People find it hard to understand – and I didn’t realize it at the time – but it wasn’t about leaving him, it was about leaving the marriage,” she says.

“I have always been a free spirit and never dreamed that the knight in shining armor would come to save me.

“As a little girl I had no fantasies about a bride. I saw marriage as an outdated institution that I didn’t want to be a part of.

“We got married and had a child in quick succession.

‘While I lost my identity, he was able to carry on pretty much normally – and I was angry.

“That evening, as I sat at home with a baby and he was out with friends, my frustration surfaced.

“I felt like I would feel happier knowing I wasn’t tied to him anymore.”

When Anu, 44, met Rob, also 44, in a bar during a trip to Ibiza in June 2015, she initially saw the ‘kind and caring’ stranger as a friend.

“I had been through a number of toxic relationships and was tired of the love bombing and cheating,” she says.

“Rob wasn’t like that; he was a really nice guy and we had a lot in common.

‘It wasn’t even a holiday novel. I thought we could keep in touch as friends when we got home.”

But the pair started traveling between Anu’s hometown of Coventry and Rob’s home in Portsmouth at the weekend and she was won over.

“I pushed him a lot and had a guilty-until-proven approach because I had been hurt in the past,” says Anu, a trauma therapist and podcaster.

“But Rob was completely different and genuine.”

The couple bought a house in Bournemouth and in August 2016, Rob proposed.

“He had secretly bought a ring,” she says.

“I was totally surprised, but I don’t think it was unexpected.

‘One of the first things he told me when we met was that he wanted to settle down and start a family.

‘But I had never really believed in marriage, even though I came from Indian Hindu culture.

‘FELT STRANGE’

“I went to extravagant weddings and found them superficial. I was a bit of a hippie.

‘I didn’t think getting married was something I would ever do.

“So when Rob asked me to marry him, I accepted, but subconsciously knew it probably wasn’t ‘me’.”

Despite being engaged, Anu says she didn’t even think about wedding until she discovered she was pregnant a year later.

“I cried when I found out because it wasn’t planned,” she says.

“I had had such an adventurous life and I saw my freedom slipping away.”

Anu felt pressure to make things official and in October 2017, when she was four months pregnant, the couple married in a registry ceremony.

“My parents said, ‘You can’t have a child out of wedlock’; that was a reputation issue,” she says.

And while many women cry tears of joy on their wedding day, Anu felt a tinge of sadness in her.

“Saying the vows felt strange.

“It was the double whammy of becoming both a wife and a mother. It made me cry,” she says.

“But Rob was over the moon, it was all he ever wanted. Part of me was happy that I could make him happy.”

Deep down, Anu regretted the wedding, just like 54 percent of married women, according to a survey by Illicit Encounters.

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Their son Noah was born in May 2018 and Anu left her job as a business development manager to become a stay-at-home mom.

“Everything changed so quickly and in retrospect I had undiagnosed postpartum depression,” says Anu.

“Quitting work was the worst thing I could have done because I lost my career and independence.

“My life was all about raising Noah and I had to rely on Rob to take care of us.

‘I was deeply unhappy and began to resent him.

“For Rob, nothing had changed, while my life was completely unrecognizable – and the opposite of what I had dreamed of.”

The family moved to Coventry, to be near Anu’s parents, in an attempt to make things work, but she found herself growing increasingly distant from her husband.

“I blamed Rob for everything, but I couldn’t explain what was going on,” she says.

“He started going to his parents in Portsmouth at the weekend to give me space.

‘I WAS SO ANGRY’

“But knowing he was partying with his friends while I was taking care of a baby made me hate him even more.

“One Sunday night I had had enough. I was so angry and within 30 minutes I filed for divorce.”

Despite Rob’s devastation at the June 2019 split, which he initially said he would contest, the couple kept things amicable for Noah.

The divorce was finalized in January 2020, with Anu insisting she did not want a financial settlement and ensuring Rob had adequate access to his son.

But things changed in March 2020 when the country went into lockdown.

“The restrictions meant that the only other adult I could spend time with was Rob, as my co-parent,” says Anu.

“We were both isolated from everyone else and feeling lonely, so we went for a walk with Noah or sat in the garden, as the rules allowed.

“I was probably a little selfish and encouraged it because I was having a hard time.”

As the world opened up further, Anu started dating again, as did Rob, a civil engineer.

“I would often sit and eat with these men and think, ‘He’s not Rob,’” she recalls. “The grass was certainly not greener.

I had to be honest with him and say that I had never felt the connection I had with him with anyone else

Anu Verma

“Dating felt so shallow and shallow, and no one was as funny, kind, handsome, or well-educated as my ex-husband.

“When Rob came to visit us, we had a wonderful time, listening to the music we loved and talking very openly and honestly.

‘They were magical moments – and the penny dropped.

“Why did I date all those losers while Rob was here?”

It took Anu six months to work up the courage to tell her ex-husband that she wanted to try again, mainly because she “felt like a wally”.

“I had to be honest with him and say that I had never felt the connection I had with him with anyone else.

“And that connection never went away,” she says.

“He had his defense mechanisms going, which I completely understood, and didn’t respond to for a while.

“It took him a few months before he agreed to try it.

‘Rob was afraid his parents wouldn’t support him after what I had done to him.

“But most people said they weren’t surprised because they knew we were good together.”

Being stronger as a couple, they decided to get a sibling for Noah, and their daughter Eva arrived in August 2022.

‘Makes me cringe’

While 10 to 15 percent of couples reconcile after divorce and six percent remarry, Anu says marriage isn’t for them, according to Psychology Today magazine.

“It confuses people, but I don’t want to remarry. I’m such a free spirit and the thought of it makes me cringe.

“Maybe one day we’ll do something small, like a vow renewal or civil partnership, if we need the paperwork.”

Despite the divorce, Anu does not regret trying marriage.

“Adversity can bring you closer together – and it has,” she says.

“We never became bitter and that helped us rebuild our friendship.

“The space is healthy and our separation has given us that.

“Now I know we are together because we choose to be together, not because we are legally bound.”

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ROB SAYS: “My parents have been happily married for a long time and I wanted to follow their example.

“When I met Anu, she was very wary after bad experiences.

‘I wanted to show her that good men and good marriages existed.

“But when she became pregnant, there was a lot of pressure on us to get married quickly and that didn’t suit her.

“I did my best to make it work. I’m not a quitter.

“So it was totally disheartening when she sent me the divorce papers. I was devastated that our family broke up.

“When it became clear that she wanted to try again, I knew I had to give it a try.

‘I didn’t know any couples who had gotten back together this way, but it felt like something for adults.

‘Now we make it work and we have Eva. We are much happier together.

‘But I don’t think we’ll remarry.

“I couldn’t go through that again and a piece of paper doesn’t change our commitment to each other and to the children.”