But you are moving the goalposts, the statement in discussion is this:
> I got absurdly lucky when I found my wife, but I spent every day without her more or less miserable.
This is not healthy, doesn't matter how much you care about your partner and relationship. Feeling miserable every day without someone is not a good sign.
You can be much happier when you are with your partner, you can enjoy to spend most days with your partner, that's natural. Not enjoying a single day without them is pretty alarming.
I feel like you're reading that text differently. I don't think they're saying "if my wife or I are apart for a few days [business trip or something], then I'm miserable", but rather "I was miserable before I found the relationship with my wife, but we can perfectly well be apart for normal business trips without issue."
>Feeling miserable every day without someone is not a good sign.
I would guess that the main issue here becomes the tendency for folks to become housebound. Retirement is no joke in terms of becoming inwardly focused.
> I was a bit of an oddity in that I was anticipating marriage since early adolescence; that outsized-value for relationships came with what I feel were comparably overgrown feelings of loneliness. I got absurdly lucky when I found my wife, but I spent every day without her more or less miserable. It’s arguable she’s the only reason I’m able to be happy. I imagine some of these men are similar to me in the loneliness and not as lucky in finding someone, and it’s impossible for me to not feel something.
> I got absurdly lucky when I found my wife, but I spent every day without her more or less miserable.
This is not healthy, doesn't matter how much you care about your partner and relationship. Feeling miserable every day without someone is not a good sign.
You can be much happier when you are with your partner, you can enjoy to spend most days with your partner, that's natural. Not enjoying a single day without them is pretty alarming.