Why did it end?
While Not Just What You Said listed ten of the most common reasons marriages break up (first and second and so on), it is not easy to list them in a Top Ten. The biggest part of the reason is judgment. When asked why the marriage broke up, participants were not likely to be wholly forthcoming, for fear they would be judged on their answers.
Your answers may vary.
While researching this topic, one thing became brutally obvious: Married people, divorced people and single people all three think marriage ends for a different reason.
Married people guessed the things which would make them leave Mate in a millisecond. Divorced people cited faults in their own relationships and those of friends. Single people cited things married people thought were no big deal. Except for three: Abuse, abandonment and infidelity. All three groups picked at least two of the three. Only divorced people picked all three.
1. 2. 3.
Abuse
Most everyone will bobblehead when you mention abuse as a reason for divorce. Hold your horses. When abuse is an issue (It is never the only issue.), fewer Mates divorce than stay together. Abuse is far more than just fisticuffs.
Words hurt forever.
Sticks & Stones
Verbal abuse is a form of emotional abuse. When Mate hears the same degrading remarks over and over, eventually Mate will believe them and act to make them true or leave. Mate will do the former faster (for longer) and with more conviction than the latter.
Do not be mislead by the picture. Verbal abusers come in both sexes. The abuse is about all subjects, but especially:
- Physical appearance
- Intelligence
- Sexual habits and/or performance
- Employment
- Money
- Family
- Children
- Friends
- Events
- Ambition
- Truth
- And many more
Equal Opportunity Bully
Verbal abuse is mostly committed to show superiority and to denigrate Mate. Destroying Mate’s self-esteem shifts the balance of power in the marriage. The more intense or pervasive the abuse becomes, the more self-doubt Mate has. The more doubt Mate has, the more Mate relies on Abuser, ceding control.
With the concession of control goes the will to end the marriage. Abusive marriages do not dissolve of their own accord. They require a dose of self-esteem from an outside source or another reason to leave.
For the purposes of this discussion, verbal abuse will be the only one featured. Although other significant forms of abuse are present in marriages (with or without divorce), they will not be discussed in this post. A series featuring abuse is currently in the works for M3, which includes physical, emotional and sexual abuse.
Abandonment
Disappear Into Suburbia
Cut and dry, right? Wrong. Not all abandonment leaves Mate standing in the driveway watching the family car disappear into suburbia.
Abandonment is another multifaceted reason for divorce. Mate may wake up in bed with the abductee or simply realize the Leaver is sitting across the table, but is truly a million miles away.
Healthy marriages require both Mates to contribute. When Leaver is not pulling sufficient weight, Mate gets tired. The numbers are not consistent as to which Mate finally calls the marriage quits. Sometimes, Leaver exits stage left in search of greener pastures. Other times, Mate decides living alone is best done without a married roommate.
You did what? With whom?
Time to consult Merriam Webster:
Infidelity:
1. : lack of belief in a religion
2 a : unfaithfulness to a moral obligation :disloyaltyb : marital unfaithfulness or an instance of it”
Despite the popular myth, infidelity is not merely sex with a partner other than Mate. Definition one falls under a different post, but definition two is the one which applies to marriage and divorce today.
To determine disloyalty, we have to look back at the wedding vows. The couple must know the limits and requirements of the marriage. They must both agree to a standard set of moral tenets (a) and agree not to violate them (b).
Cheating is more than adultery.
Cheating has many connotations and definitions. The second definition of the intransitive verb is to be sexually unfaithfully. This is much broader than adultery which specifies the act of voluntary sexual intercourse.
Each couple will have a different interpretation of what the vows mean to them because each person views cheating differently. Some examples the survey group gave of cheating were:
- Sex with a friend, colleague, stranger, ex
- Non-intercourse sexual contact with someone other than Mate
- Rape (perpetrator or victim)
- Drinking/Eating with a friend/colleague/ex
- Confiding in someone else about sensitive, marital subjects or spouse
- Confiding in someone else about sensitive, personal subjects
- Physical contact, any type
- Physical contact, affectionate (hug, kiss)
- Spending the night away from marital home (with/without sex)
- Flirting (verbal or body language)
Since many couples view emotional contact with others of the same or opposite sex infidelity, merely subscribing all marital infidelity to adultery is a mistake. Couples pointed out they were certain they could more easily overcome extramarital sex than emotional infidelity. The number of spouses who admit one spouse had had extramarital sex, but did not divorce, bares this out.
Statistics are no longer reflective of the true number of marriages which end due to adultery, as most states no longer require grounds for divorce (no fault states). The numbers which do exist vary significantly by region, age and group. Theories on the discrepancies include honesty of survey pool, fear of judgment, personal tenet system and prevalence of other factors contributing to divorce.
As stated above about abuse, rarely do marriages end because of one issue. Nearly all divorcees admit at least two reasons for dissolution. Many admit more than three.
~~~~~~~~~~
Why are these the three most readily identified causes for divorce? What are the precursors to all three; in other words, what do they have in common?
mommysaidaswearword
/ January 27, 2012This is very thought provoking. Especially the ‘leaving’ definitition. Though I have always thought of cheating as ANY transgression, be it physical or emotional, I hadn’d considered ‘leaving’ in the same way. It is quite true- being present in a marriage is far more than a physical state of being. Thanks, Red 🙂
Red
/ January 27, 2012Leaving was one of the major concepts to come from the Loneliness segment of this eternally long series on Marriage & Divorce. The more couples I interview, the more I find loneliness and absenteeism a major facet in the breakdown of marriages, whether they ever make it to court or not.
Glad I got you thinking!
Red.
Marc Phillippe Babineau
/ January 27, 2012Great post, Red!
Of the 3, I would dare to say that “Abuse” would be the least likely single precursor to a divorce, because most abused people really do believe that they “deserved” it.
Abandonment, I have no experience with, except for those who have gone to prison for lengthy visits and lost their spouses to someone else, their spouse unwilling to wait. I even know one girl who left her husband when he re-upped to go back to Afghanistan!
Red
/ January 27, 2012True, most abused spouses feel they are at fault, which is why they permit the abuse to continue. The cycle of abuse is difficult to break, and is rarely done without intervention or an intervening circumstance.
Those who leave military personnel are hardly uncommon. For as long as there have been wars, there have been mates unwilling to wait for the treaty. Other abandonment issues are less about the physical distances as they are about the emotional and communicative distance.
Red.
valentinelogar
/ January 27, 2012The entire discussion of abandonment is a difficult one, you and I should share a space on this one. Many marriages have a spouse that is gone a large portion of the time, how the partners work through the issues or whether ultimately they can is discussion all by itself.
Red
/ January 27, 2012After some of the responses I have gotten from this particular portion, I may well have to revisit it. I do not think the original Loneliness segments brought it home as well as this one did.
bear
/ January 28, 2012As someone who has experience in this area, the leaver really is sad. To look at your mate and realize they are a million miles away, but are in the same room is so hard.
The distance is actual and extremely painful. The trick is to not let it get that far!
Red
/ January 28, 2012Many people are fooled into believing proximity is the equivalent of closeness. In a marriage, nothing could be further from the truth.
Androgoth
/ January 28, 2012I like this one Red and thank you for offering
such an interesting posting, it certainly gets
everyone thinking…
Have a wicked one this evening Red 🙂
Androgoth XXx
jennygoth
/ January 28, 2012stop thinking andro it hurts your brain if a marriage fails then its just part of our human nature that we go off our partners if we do its time to wave goodbye and move on in most cases but everyones divorce is different xxjen
Red
/ January 28, 2012Truly, they are, Jen. In all the research I have done, especially in this particular series, the only things they have in common is dissolution. I am glad so many who have never married have been reading for the lesson I teach the best…what NOT to do 😉
Red.
xxx
ansuyo
/ January 28, 2012Divorce doesn’t happen in a vacuum. I strongly suspect these:
1. Drifting. We get busy and gradually stop doing the things we did in the beginning. If we wake up in time, we can claw our way back.
2. Thought life. We begin to magify theirs while minimizing our own. Start thinking how awful it is — sometimes confirm this with others… and the changed thoughts lead to changed actions, which lead to changes in the marriage. Recoverable? Yes, but difficult.
3. Believing a lie. This lie might be that everything about marriage is hunky dory. When troubles come, they begin to believe something is wrong. It grows from there. This, too, can be overcome by going back to: commitment to keep working at it showing our love, a relearning in our thought life, and learning what lies beyond most of our marital troubles if we hang in there – together. Sounds good. Wonder if it’s true 🙂
The verbal abuse is the kind that leaves no external scars, but it leaves deep scars. Ready for the next installment 🙂 Angie
Red
/ January 29, 2012Good ideas. Some of them are later in the series and are part of other segments. I always find the opinions of functioning marrieds on the ideology of divorce. The perspective is so different.
Thank you, Angie. I hope you get something good out of Know No Better.
Red.
lorrelee1970
/ January 29, 2012I just don’t know, but I agree that there is always more than one issue at hand.
Red
/ January 29, 2012These three are precipitating events. They are all three built on a lack of communication and other issues, but are the straw which breaks the camel’s back.