The Divorce (and SJ Therapy) Thread

Remarrying becomes infinitely easier when your first one is a total sham from the start.

Or, you know, so I've heard.

 

On a long enough timeline, even good marriages turn bad.

 

Well, shit. I've been with my wife for damn near 20 years, and I'm not even 40 yet.

Seriously, though, I feel for people who go through that shit. My parents divorced when I was in high school and it was not pretty. My last post was mostly poking fun at myself, but I'll do my part to make sure I never have to be single again. Fuck that.

 

Look on the bright side, human lifespan is relatively short, so some people die before their marriages turn bad.
My parents were married for more than 50 years and died about three months apart.

 

I think the weirdest trick to marriage is that most people change, and you have to change in ways that your partner, also evolving, still likes. If you get together with someone in your 20s, you'll be a different person in your 40s, and even more different in your 70s. I've been at least three different versions of myself over the course of my marriage. My wife would probably choose Husband No. 1 if she had her druthers, but she seems to tolerate the current version fine. It's like how changing gears can either make a car run better or stall. I imagine that sometimes people change in ways that don't fit within the pre-existing laws of the union, and that's when couples break down.

 

Buck - first, sorry for your loss.
I saw that pattern happen to some elderly neighbors down the farm road from us. It's an interesting phenomenon that makes me firmly believe in both the power of love and the will to live.

 

I think if my 20s were husband 1 and my 30s are husband 2, my wife would choose husband 2. Probably because we can afford shit now.

But that's a great point, type. Although I haven't changed all that much. My career has. But I'm still the same dipshit I've always been. There's still hope for my 40s, I suppose.

 

Thank you. It's coming up on two years now, and they both lived long, good lives.
I appreciate the sympathy.

In my dark sense of humor, I was trying to joker that had they lived in to their 140s, the marriage may not have lasted.
Long enough timeline and all ...
Seemed much funnier in my head,

 

It requires work - every day.
I lovingly tend fig trees in the yard and their maintenance taught me more about marital wellness than anything.

 

So what's everyone's opinion on why divorce happens? Selfishness, lack of impulse control, anger issues, inability to manage money, etc.?

 

the same reason breakups happen without marriage. Pinkie swearing and signing a piece of paper doesn't change human nature.

Divorce is a good thing. Bad marriages are a problem.

 

I think sometimes people marry the wrong people. That's some percentage of divorce—unions doomed from the start. In my experience as a witness to them, those are the ones that usually end ugly. And I think, like I said above, some people change in ways that the other person doesn't like and can't live with. That's the other kind of divorce: marriages that just lose the battle against evolution. So long as the breakup is respectful—and not the result of an affair, for instance—those ones can probably also be amicable. Two people who just realize they ran their course as a couple. They agree to be friends, and good parents if they have children, and away they move to two smaller houses.