Cindy Sheehan wrote about her husband filing for divorce the other night in her Kos diary, but today it is really hitting the mainstream news. And, of course, everybody’s a pundit, armchair psychologist, what have you, and we’re going to hear a lot of speculation in the news, blogs, etc. about what should really be a private matter. And, in addition to being a private matter, the decision to end a marriage is a complicated one that often defies simple placing of blame or identifying just one cause.
For example, it is not unheard of for a divorce to be precipitated by the death of a child. On the other hand, when I was trying to research statistics about this, what I’ve found is that statistics tend to be grossly inflated, but not based on anything in reality. So, couples who lose a baby to SIDS or an older child or adult to a drunk driver, face additional heartache when they hear this grim statistic cited.
Also, if you ask any couple that has been through a divorce how they came to that point, the people involved will probably give very different answers. We can’t help but be biased in the way we remember and recount the stories of our lives. It’s perfectly normal to cast yourself as the hero in your own autobiographical memories. And people looking in from the outside will be influenced by their feelings about the parties involved. Or if they don’t know the people that well, they might latch on to one piece of “evidence”–something one spouse did, some change that took place in their lives, and point to that one thing as the reason.
Another thing about statistics–maybe someone can help me out here, because, although I remember hearing this somewhere, I have no idea where. But the 50% divorce rate we often hear about–didn’t someone determine that the way that is calculated is flawed? I remember hearing that the rate isn’t quite that high. But on the other hand, there are more divorces in the U.S. today than there were, say, 100 years ago, simply because people are living longer. There are plenty of other reasons too–women, for example, more often have jobs and money of their own, so they are not trapped in a bad marriage the way they would have been in times past.
I also think our expectations of marriage are different. Although I am not one to wax nostalgic about the “good old days”, I imagine that low expectations might have helped keep spouses from being disappointed. These days, whether we express them or now, I think people have a lot of expectations associated with marriage. We expect to be “in love” (and stay in love), we expect to be happy, we expect spouses to play many different roles. These roles may include any or all of the following: life partner, lover, co-parent, playmate, counselor…
Well, those are just some of my first thoughts on this complicated topic. I will probably add more later after I read what some of you have to say.
