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Ok forget the sex part. It's kind of hard to comprehend people being together for 10, 20, 30 years and breaking it off. I would think people would find out they didn't want to be together sooner. Especially getting to 50 and over.
It's kind of hard to comprehend to those of us it happens to, as well. If you get along well and seemingly all is well with the marriage, then being told that you will be getting a divorce feels like getting hit by a truck.
My children have had a very hard time comprehending what happened. I can't really help them out with an explanation, since I never got a coherent one from my then-husband.
It's a "twilight zone" kind of experience, for sure.
Ok forget the sex part. It's kind of hard to comprehend people being together for 10, 20, 30 years and breaking it off. I would think people would find out they didn't want to be together sooner. Especially getting to 50 and over.
The simple answer to me is people change. Also, I think for people who raised kids(I didn't) while they are at home they can be a big distraction and when they leave you realize you are with a stranger...at least that is what several people have told me.
A man who is a close family member described his situation to me. He and his wife had married immediately after college graduation, and both had gone into teaching. They led busy lives, and raised two children. Their relationship was always difficult, probably because both had very strong personalities.
When it came time to retire, they went looking for a retirement house to move to. It was at that point he realized he and his wife no longer had the distraction of careers and kids to buffer their relationship. He saw a bleak future, so he decided he wanted a divorce. He said he felt he had a right to be happy.
She was blindsided, she said, and bitter, and made the divorce proceedings as difficult as she could. She turned their grown daughter against him, to the extent that the daughter stopped speaking to him and refused to invite him to her wedding. Their grown son was much more reasonable, and maintained a relationship with both parents.
Despite all the bitterness, my family member maintained that the divorce was the best thing he could have done. He led a happy life, eventually remarrying (a woman with a much more pleasant personality), and also eventually reconciling with his daughter.
Ok forget the sex part. It's kind of hard to comprehend people being together for 10, 20, 30 years and breaking it off. I would think people would find out they didn't want to be together sooner. Especially getting to 50 and over.
It takes time to come to the realization that "this problem will never be resolved". It takes time for that to even be true, because how do you know until you try?
It takes time to come to the realization that "this problem will never be resolved". It takes time for that to even be true, because how do you know until you try?
Does it appear as though as though it is usually men who suddenly realize they need a divorce? Women may sense the sickness in the marriage and want to talk about, get counseling, try something else before talking divorce?
Does it appear as though as though it is usually men who suddenly realize they need a divorce? Women may sense the sickness in the marriage and want to talk about, get counseling, try something else before talking divorce?
Or maybe women are more concerned what people will say if she files for divorce if it isn't for adultery or abuse.
Just because she can't stand the XYZ, might not cut it.
But it does for me - lol. Sometimes things just get to be so irritating that you just want to get away from it as soon as possible.
What I was curious about is how many couples that are still married after 30 plus years are STILL happy with each other? I do have one classmate on Facebook who very, very seldom says anything about her husband that she's been marred to since the mid 70's. My wife's sister's marriage has been pretty non-existent for the last 10 yrs and they've been married over 40 yrs. Sometimes it's just never really known how good or bad the marriage is, even with couples that have been married for years and years!
My husband and I have been married for 47 years and we still like each other. Though we both have numerous illnesses. And that does affect the relationship to a degree. For instance I am in constant pain and it makes me grouchy. He is sometimes in pain and always exhausted, [as am I] Makes him angry and grumpy.
Married people can want to no longer be in the marriage at any time. One may no longer love the other or there are a myriad of reasons.
I've so often heard people say they cannot understand how a couple can divorce after 15 or 25 or 30 or 40 years. But it is not inexplicable at all.
Saying wouldn't you have known sooner that you do not want to be together is not recognizing that people fall out of love, feel miserable or not appreciated, or they change in what they want out of life, or the feelings are dead and the relationship seems empty. Or the communication is poor and they feel lonely in the marriage. Or they meet someone else.
People can change all the time, and certainly change over the course of decades. There really is not the security in marriage that once existed before divorce became more accepted, leading to around 47 to 50 percent of marriages ending in divorce.
Last edited by matisse12; 12-24-2015 at 01:24 PM..
I decided it was time to divorce him when he wanted to live with me (both of us worked f.t. jobs) Monday through Friday as brother/sister. On the weekends he wanted to be with his lover. He did marry her after the divorce. Not long after, she divorced him and he married another.
He could not understand (I don't think he does yet) why I didn't want to do that.
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