Why are so many marriages ending in divorce?

[jackslife]

I still think that the official divorce statistics are misleading as they don't show those who feel trapped either emotionally or financially in a marriage.

 

Depending which statistics you choose to believe 34% of marriages will end in divorce before their 20th anniversary. So arguably 2/3 succeed which is a pretty good hit rate.

 

But these 66% won't all be happy marriages.

[loveboid]

My opinion:

 

Marriage is a financial/property contract. People marry for financial reasons, not for love or because they like the person. If they can do better financially with the less or same work, they leave.

 

Some people manage to marry for or grow both love and financial security and are lucky.

[jackslife]

I

That's the truth. Marry four times and EACH time you will go through all 3 stages of a long-term relationship.

 

Why not learn it the first time around?

 

If every divorce ended in a remarriage and then another divorce it may be "the truth".

 

Second marriages are often very successful. Most people having learnt from the previous marriage and also finding someone they are more compatible with, beyond the early and immaturity of their 20's.

 

I can remember an old friend of mine telling us his parents were divorcing, when we bumped into his Dad with his OW when we were teenagers. 36 years later his Dad is still with her. Clearly he was happier with his first wife than his second.

[TheBladeRunner]

With the exception of numbers 6 and 7.....and I hate to even include #6 in this....all others are communicative and negotiable in a relationship, so you have to bear 50% of the responsibility for the marriage's demise.

 

#6 can be worked out with proper professional help....so can #7 IF the narcissist is willing to seek help.

 

#8? You only believe that IF you would rather bail than seek it out long term...excuses do not get you to the 30, 40, 50 year mark.

 

Thanks Spark, you are so right.....and you said it best with #7: "If the narcissist is willing to seek help. It kills me to read this as I am just like you, it's 50/50, but when the other person refuses to participate there's not much you can do. Mine chose the "A" rout to solve her issues, I chose what you are suggesting.

 

There's a young couple upstairs that asks me a lot about what happened with my marriage. I tell them to keep communicating no matter what.

 

No blame here from me, but what happens happens.

[SJC2008]

This just in: Marriage is the leading cause of divorce!

 

People get married too young, before they know themselves. They don't have morals, they cheat. They are stubborn, can't admit they're wrong. How can you grow in a relationship and as a person if you'd rather be dead than wrong? People get married because society "tells" them to. Ask youu this question: " What makes me so awesome that someone would want to spend the rest of thei life with me?" Then ask this question about someone else!

[SawtoothMars]

Lots of reasons, but one of the best I've heard is that women are no longer dependent on men, so they no longer stay in a bad relationship to protect themselves from being screwed over. Also, the stigma is much lower now (for men and women).

 

I know this is incorrect because the vast majority of divorced women live in abject poverty dragging their kids down with them.

 

I think the high divorce rate represents a cultural shift. People are simply more focused on themselves and less on their children. This shift is particularly strong for women since before they were expected to be very selfless in generations past.

 

I personally do not try to prevent divorce in advance. It's best to just understand it is a possibility.

Edited September 19, 2014 by SawtoothMars

[HermioneG]

If every divorce ended in a remarriage and then another divorce it may be "the truth".

 

Second marriages are often very successful. Most people having learnt from the previous marriage and also finding someone they are more compatible with, beyond the early and immaturity of their 20's.

 

I can remember an old friend of mine telling us his parents were divorcing, when we bumped into his Dad with his OW when we were teenagers. 36 years later his Dad is still with her. Clearly he was happier with his first wife than his second.

 

Unfortunately, the divorce rate is even higher in second marriages. Higher than first, and well above 50%. That does not support the use of the term "often".

http://m.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-intelligent-divorce/201202/the-high-failure-rate-second-and-third-marriages

Edited September 19, 2014 by HermioneG

[jackslife]

I stand corrected.

 

Alternately it could be argued that given so many reasons for marriages to fail it's impressive that so many survive for as long as they do.

[compulsivedancer]

I know this is incorrect because the vast majority of divorced women live in abject poverty dragging their kids down with them.

 

Yes, there are many women who are divorced and in poverty. There are many reasons for this, and in many cases divorce can cause this type of poverty. For those who come from a cycle of generational poverty, marriage has not always been the "norm" that the middle class likes to discuss. And in many cases, this type of poverty is due to women who are NOT self-sufficient career-wise, which is not really the group of people I was referring to.

 

As I said, there are a LOT of reasons for divorce. The ones I listed account for an aspect of a large number of divorces, but not all of them.

 

My mom comes from a rural farm family. My grandparents were married over 50 years before Grampa died. Of their eight children who have been married, once had a successful marriage, one had a marriage that was very unhappy but did not end in divorce, and six kids had divorces, at least two of them multiple divorces. Btw, none of the six women live in abject poverty, although one or two of them have played jump rope with the poverty line.

 

(Btw, while some of the grandchildren, who range in age from early forties to late teens, have divorced, some of them seem to be very happily married for a few decades.)

 

I asked my mom recently what happened, and she told me her parents' story. It wasn't a happy-ever-after 50-year marriage story.

 

It was the story of two people who married young after the woman became pregnant (in the 40s). The man went off to war, and every time he came home, she got pregnant again. By the time they actually lived together, she had three children and was pregnant with a fourth.

 

He was not an easy man to live with, and she had no career to support herself (she was a very young mom). She couldn't go back and live with her parents with four children, so she made do.

 

They eventually found peace together, but their marriage was not a marriage most people I know today would stay in. But that was her only reasonable choice at the time - to stay married. Today she would have other options.

 

There are plenty of women who still stay married out of convenience. I have a friend in her second marriage, with two kids and no skills who does this.

 

But when you have your own career, or -gasp- make more money than he does, you have the option to leave. That doesn't mean you have to; it means you can. Most of the divorced women I know fall into this category. They aren't in poverty, they support themselves and their children, whether or not their exes take an equal role in the kids' lives.

 

Despite all this, I definitely think there's value in sticking it out and trying to work through things. It's easy to give up and move on when you have options, but that doesn't lead to a lifelong partnership and the consequent intimacy of someone who knows you better than anyone in the world. I think it's a balance. You have to figure out what you are your partner are looking for, then work together to make it happen in your lives.

Edited September 19, 2014 by compulsivedancer

[compulsivedancer]

Alternately it could be argued that given so many reasons for marriages to fail it's impressive that so many survive for as long as they do.

 

^^ this

 

You said it better than I did.

[compulsivedancer]

Unfortunately, the divorce rate is even higher in second marriages. Higher than first, and well above 50%. That does not support the use of the term "often".

The High Failure Rate of Second and Third Marriages | Psychology Today

 

And once you get divorced a second time, the chance of a subsequent marriage failing only goes up from there.

 

This does, however, skew marriage statistics a fair amount, as many of these failed marriages are the same people trying again and again and failing. A better statistic would be the percentage of first marriages that fail (50%, according to this article). Or maybe the percentage of people who eventually find a marriage that doesn't end in divorce.

Edited September 19, 2014 by compulsivedancer

[karnak]

And once you get divorced a second time, the chance of a subsequent marriage failing only goes up from there.

 

This does, however, skew marriage statistics a fair amount, as many of these failed marriages are the same people trying again and again and failing. A better statistic would be the percentage of first marriages that fail (50%, according to this article). Or maybe the percentage of people who eventually find a marriage that doesn't end in divorce.

 

Yup. The statistics don't take into account the psychological factor that most people don't really learn from their mistakes.

 

I know a guy who always dates "psycho" women. Guess what: his relationships always end in disaster (his marriage was an utter disaster).

Most people tell him that his priorities are wrong and that he should look for other types of girls. But the imbecile always says "yeah - I guess you people are right". But keeps dating them anyway.

I guess he's just as messed up as they are.

[Thegameoflife]

This just in: Marriage is the leading cause of divorce!

 

People get married too young, before they know themselves. They don't have morals, they cheat. They are stubborn, can't admit they're wrong. How can you grow in a relationship and as a person if you'd rather be dead than wrong? People get married because society "tells" them to. Ask youu this question: " What makes me so awesome that someone would want to spend the rest of thei life with me?" Then ask this question about someone else!

 

What makes me awesome? My man card was forged in the belly of a volcano by Thor. Most men are often intimidated by my intellect and skills.

[central]

I do not care WHO you marry or WHY you did.....

 

Limerance, that amazing, hormone fueled, can't stop touching each other lasts 2 to 4 years....

 

then we move onto disillusionment, also known as reality....We start to see our partners faults and weaknesses and start to power play, BIG time, especially if we have unaddressed child hood parental issues: He leaves the toilet seat up; she spends too much money. The list goes on. Arguments, power plays, adnauseum.... Most marriages divorce here, but it is a BIG mistake.

 

The last stage: Mature love. You are you and I am me and we now ACCEPT our differences. We are no longer fighting, no longer agonizing over our incompatibilities and what we do NOT have in common. We communicate well, love each other, accept each other's differences and still have sex, good sex, and a lot of fun together....

 

That's the truth. Marry four times and EACH time you will go through all 3 stages of a long-term relationship.

 

Why not learn it the first time around?

 

This is far from always true. The disillusionment stage doesn't always occur. If you are either lucky enough or wise enough to find a truly compatible partner - like I did the second time - limerance becomes mature love, and even after 14 years we still have some of the limerance persisting. We've seen some other couples who go this route, too, but it's somewhat rare. Many marital problems are insoluble because one or both partners will not or cannot change or compromise. It's not worth staying in a bad relationship for any reason.

 

 

As for second or subsequent marriages failing at a higher rate, that's true. I think that may be due to learning that divorce isn't so bad after the first time, and so you know that you don't have to put up with a bad partner if you can't negotiate needed changes. The real problem is that people don't always learn enough from their past marital mistakes, or make new ones.

[compulsivedancer]

Yup. The statistics don't take into account the psychological factor that most people don't really learn from their mistakes.

 

I know a guy who always dates "psycho" women. Guess what: his relationships always end in disaster (his marriage was an utter disaster).

Most people tell him that his priorities are wrong and that he should look for other types of girls. But the imbecile always says "yeah - I guess you people are right". But keeps dating them anyway.

I guess he's just as messed up as they are.

 

A lady I know that has been divorced three times said never again...she says she has the dubious ability to walk into a room and pick the bipolar guy. Doesn't matter how great he seems, he eventually goes off his meds.

[karnak]

A lady I know that has been divorced three times said never again...she says she has the dubious ability to walk into a room and pick the bipolar guy. Doesn't matter how great he seems, he eventually goes off his meds.

 

I suppose that some of us (perhaps all of us?) have some sort of "Relationship Karma". I've noticed that most people seem to choose partners who share certain similar characteristics. These characteristics may be physical or psychological, I guess.

 

I have a very close friend who is a very smart and assertive guy. Yet, despite all his intelligence and knowledge, the poor sucker will fall for any girl with big breasts who gives him some attention. Looking at his ex-girlfriends they all had one thing in common: they all had big boobs and were the futile, materialistic type of girls who see themselves as "smart, altruistic and artistic". Real bitches, in fact.

 

Needless to say, this friend of mine went through some terrible times and a severe depression due to dating these sort of ladies. And guess what: the poor shmuck still drools every time he sees a girl with a big rack.

 

Myself, I have to admit that my exes, despite having different features and different backgrounds, shared very similar character traits.

[dsw011]

Interesting thread.

 

I read a study a while back that stated that the marriages least likely to end in divorce were those where the wife stayed at home and the husband also did half the housework and child care, or at least a non trivial proportion.

 

This is how I've tried to steer my own marriage and it has worked. Besides a few issues we are good. No mention of divorce.

[carhill]

Back when I was a kid, the vast majority of the neighborhood mothers were SAHM's (I had a dozen 'mothers' ) and, indeed, fathers did work full time and would generally handle household repairs and outside work and do stuff with their kids. My dad was clueless about fixing stuff and he didn't like landscape maintenance so paid someone to do those things, but other fathers, and him, were very involved with their kids when not at work. From the time I was young until I moved out at 25, I don't recall one single divorce on the block, though I didn't know everyone there. In fact, some of the original owners were still there, and married (now in their 80's) when I was caregiving for my mother there. I routinely talked to some of them.

 

So, in that sense, I can see some traction for the changes in that dynamic being one impetus to increasing divorce.

 

One other area is children. As more parents got divorced and more kids were transiting from mother to father and back (this was more noticeable in my generation than that of my parents), it became more 'accepted' for kids to be from a divorced family and they weren't ridiculed or made fun of for being 'different', something which I did note, markedly, when I was a child, though I never really understood why they'd be labeled in such a manner, since they had nothing to do with their parents getting divorced.

 

Anyway, it seems, based on history, that the last 70-80 years have been a time of change, more markedly during my lifetime, in this regard, marriages ending in divorce. Perhaps, in time, we can adjust to such changes and reinvigorate the concept of the nuclear family and long-lived partnerships, or completely and without prejudice move away from the concept of marriage to something completely different and reflective of the times and culture we live in. By 'we' I'm talking about U.S. citizens, respecting that marriage and divorce are approached uniquely in cultures around the world.

[Clockwork]

Well, look at the world we live in. We have remotes for televisions, fast food, drive thrus, texting, cell phones, apps on cell phones, internet, etc. Everything in our world today revolves around us not waiting for anything anymore. Not taking the time to fix it. This is part of the problem.

 

 

The other part is that each generation has gotten worse. Now, I know our grandparent's generation (married in the 1940s) all had reasons to stay together more. Women were more dependant on their husband and there was much more of a stigma. So I get that. However, that generation and the ones before them stayed together until they died. They didn't run away when the woman got pregnant. They got married. Not like today when you can have three kid with a girl and she is magically not good enough to call your wife. No, people had more respect for themselves back then.

 

 

But I'll tell you one thing, they still had their problems. Behind closed doors wives still had their opinions. They could still be unhappy. There was abuse, there was infidelity, etc. Just like today. I think the difference is we didn't have that quick fix mentality. We always think the grass is greener elsewhere. It almost never is.

 

 

These people had children and they all got married in the 1970s or so. Well, that's my parents. They are together 40 years later, but my generation saw a lot of their parents get divorced. Just enough so that the people of my generation late 1970s/1980s got scared enough about marriage ending in divorce that the current generation of 20-30 year olds usually has this mentality:

 

 

1 - don't marry because they saw the pain the divorce caused their parents

2 - get married but don't last 5 years

3 - never get married, never want to, have children but never trust the mother/father of your children enough to marry, convince yourself it is just a piece of paper

4 - stay single, are more career driven

 

 

Honestly, we all see the amount of Golden Anniversaries today. Or longer. Some last 60+ years. This is normal for people married as recently as the 1950s. It was just expected until you died. We are so far removed from that and it isn't a good thing either.

 

 

Honestly, the people who are 30 or just recently married in their 20s today, how many of them hit 50 years together? Not many will.