I am coming to you this week from vacation with a heavy heart. It's not how I wanted to start this week's True Romance, but I don't have much of a choice.

I go where the romance leads me. This week, on a Wednesday of all days, it was announced that Dakota Johnson and Role Model are no longer together.

TMZ confirmed the stomach-churning, tear-jerking news. Not only have the couple broken up, they haven’t been together for some time. Again, this isn't how I wanted to kick this week off.

Take a moment. Do one of those extended eye close half squeeze things that helps clear the tears if needed. Let's try to make something of this week's column. Something that can take us through the rest of the week.

I can't guarantee that I'll be able to land safely by the end of this one. That's the goal each week, but sometimes there isn’t enough out there to accomplish that. I'll never force it, that's not how we want to conduct business of the heart.

We have unfortunate news of an open marriage that crashed and burned and a woman who helped her best friend find love with her sister's ex-husband. It's a story that gives us hope. Light amongst the darkness.

Let's get to it. Go follow True Romance on Twitter and Facebook. Send your emails here: ** sean.joseph@outkick.com** (anonymously if you prefer).

An open marriage somehow leads to regret, but did it have to?

A couple in their early thirties had love slip right through their fingers after six years of marriage. They had a once strong relationship with amazing chemistry. It wasn’t enough. Could it have been?

That seems to be the answer that the husband who agreed to an open marriage is looking for. Somehow, agreeing to an open marriage leads to regret. It all started innocently enough.

"A few months ago, she started talking a lot about her new colleague, like how good looking he is, how funny he is, etc.," the husband wrote on Reddit.

His wife got drunk during a team building trip and texted her husband that she wanted to hook up with this new colleague of hers.

"I was surprised, but I appreciated her honesty. Instead of cheating, she asked for my permission. I said yes," he continued.

"After they slept together, we talked about it and agreed to open our marriage with one rule: each of us could have one person on the side."

That, on paper, appears to be a beneficial arrangement for both of them. He still hadn't acted on finding his one person on the side when his wife was constantly seeing her colleague.

A recipe for disaster? Not necessarily, they had an agreement in place. So one of them starts having second thoughts and isn't even acting on the open marriage arrangement.

This is something that can be stopped as quickly as it got started, right? They have what was referred to as a strong relationship with amazing chemistry.

"After the first talk (where I told her that we are cancelling open marriage) my wife got aggressive, tried to connect me with her friend, when I rejected her friend she left to stay at her parents’ for the weekend," he wrote.

"When she came back home, nothing was changed, I tried to talk, but she treated me like garbage. Something in me finally broke that moment and I told her to pack her things and get out as I want a divorce. She broke down but I still told her to leave and she left. Haven't seen her since then."

He ignored her attempts to communicate with him. He instead contacted a lawyer and got the ball rolling on the divorce.

"It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done as she is the only woman I’ve ever truly loved and I still love her. I know a lot of people will call me weak or stupid for still feeling this way, but I don’t care anymore," he admitted.

"Loving someone deeply isn’t a crime, even when they hurt you. I love her and can't change that, that's bad I know, but this isn't changing."

You know people say they love their spouses all the time. But did this guy or was this all the excuse he needed to end his marriage. He could have said no when she drunk texted him from the work trip.

Not only did he not, he agreed to an open marriage then proceeded not to hold up his end of the bargain even when his loving wife offered to connect him with a friend of hers.

This has all the markings of a well-set trap by the husband. The worst part of it might be his attempt at trying to get sympathy from it. Not on my watch, buddy.

This Week In True Romance

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Woman hooks her best friend up with her cheating sister's ex-husband

An attempt by a wife to find herself and walk away from her marriage turns into a classic tale of one woman's trash being another woman's treasure.

The part of the story that restores a small piece of my faith in humanity is the person who connected the dots and made it all happen.

It was the sister of the wife who walked out of her marriage to "find herself." She saw the two people through the fog and acted for the sake of romance.

"He was a devoted, hardworking guy who treated her like a queen and stayed completely respectful even through the divorce," she said of her sister's ex-husband.

A year after her sister and the devoted, hardworking guy who was her brother-in-law were divorced, her best friend was discussing with her how hard it was for her to find a good guy.

"My best friend was talking about how exhausted she was from dating toxic men and just wanted a reliable, good man. I set them up," she said. "Fast forward to today: they’re happily married with a baby on the way."

The sister could have done nothing. She could have decided the stories about her best friend's dating struggles were too entertaining to set her up with the good guy her sister had tossed into the trash.

She chose a different path. One where her sister found out, blocked her and called her a traitor for "giving away her husband."

She didn't sit back and take that. She let her sister have it, "I told her plain and simple: 'you threw away a good man. You don’t get to leave someone in the trash and get mad when another woman sees their worth.'"

I don’t know about you, but I like these sisters. The one walks out on her marriage, then gets mad at the other for hooking her ex up with her best friend.

That takes some nerve, but so does setting your best friend up with your sister's ex-husband in the name of romance.

What's the dumbest reason you have heard for a couple getting divorced?

I'm wrapping this week's edition up with dumb reasons couples get divorced. You could argue that getting mad after refusing to hold up your end of an open marriage agreement belongs, but it doesn't make the cut.

More important issues, like preferring the windows open and a golf addiction make the cut. Good luck out there and don't for a second think that you can't have your marriage end over something extremely idiotic.

• One likes to keep the windows open and the other likes ac.
• I saw something on the news about a woman who divorced her husband because he didn't "understand her like chat GPT does."
• Cousins friend was so addicted to golf that his wife divorced him for it. Apparently she gave him a chance to play less but he just flat out refused.
• One week after the wedding she told him she didn't love him anymore, but felt like she deserved the wedding and that that is why she didn't say anything sooner. They got their divorce finalized a month after their wedding.
• To quote him "because I didn't realize marriage would mean I'd actually have to be faithful."
• My sister was with her partner for over 10 years with an 18-month old son when her husband was laid off during COVID. He rode his motorcycle around during the day and would frequent a local bar. That led him to joining a motorcycle gang (Hell’s Angels style). After months of pleading, she gave him the ultimatum of his family or the gang. He chose the gang.
• Not divorced, but I know a couple that separated because she dreamed that her husband was cheating on her, and she could no longer trust him.
• A psychic told my sister they will find their true love, so she decided this was the call to divorce her husband.
• One of my neighbors wife knew the dog pooped in the house before she left for work. She just left it in the house all day because she knew he’d be home first. He came home cleaned it up, aired out the house, and asked for a divorce
• My parents knew a couple that got divorced because of which way the toilet paper roll should go. Obviously there were other things going on, but that was the straw that broke the camel’s back
• Read a story out of Florida (of course it's Florida) where a couple divorced because the husband wanted to keep a pet alligator. Out of all the Florida-Man stories, this is the most tame and "normal."
• A week after getting married the guy decided that the wedding ring doesn’t suit him after all
• My parents almost got divorced because my dad farts in bed
• my mom wanted more attention from my dad so she threatened him with a divorce, my dad wasnt gonna beg or anything so they got divorced, 20 years later they both regret it

Song of the week

That's it for this edition of True Romance. I'll be back from vacation next week. A vacation, I might add, started with romance in the form of an out-of-town wedding.

Thanks for reading. Keep the song of the week suggestions coming. You can reach me, anonymously if you prefer, at ** sean.joseph@outkick.com**. And go follow along on