Bride & Groom: Namrata and Vinay
On September 24, 2021, as Namrata waited in Mumbai traffic to pick up her son, she matched with Vinay on Bumble. Both of them had kids. Vinay had 2 girls while Namrata had 1 son. His profile photo attracted Namrata’s attention, and when they exchanged numbers, they immediately uninstalled the app. By that point they had realised they are not dating app people. Getting into a serious relationship was never the goal.
However, 2 days later, Vinay was in front of Namrata in a Starbucks with his laptop after they started talking nonstop. Since introducing their children was the biggest step for both of them, they gradually worked together outside of their respective homes and spent their weekends with the kids.
In February 2022, Namrata and Vinay moved in together, and on May 9 of that year, they tied the knot.
This story is a great example of how failure in your relationship doesn’t have to describe your whole life. A second chance at love is maybe your way of getting that happiness.
A candid letter
Dear Second Marriage,
I think maybe I’m not supposed to talk to you, or about you, and probably not in an open forum. It could be easier to let people assume that this is my first marriage, but I don’t want that. Second marriage, I’m proud of you, and I’m proud of the role I play in you.
I believe it’s OK to fail — that is how we learn. But I often feel hesitant to take that advice to heart. An acknowledgment of you means an acknowledgment of all the ways I failed the first time. I’m well aware of the statistics on you, second marriage. We are even more likely to fail than a first marriage because, to summarize the hundreds of internet articles on the subject, we have even more complexities than does a first marriage, with even less of the “glue” that can hold together this kind of union.
But I’ve learned a lot in the preparations for you and even more in the past year. It turns out that marriage involves a million moments in which one feels held together at the end of a long day by nothing more than mere threads. Most importantly, you realize it is true love — not the idea of love, but of a love built on hard work and mindful partnership.
