I Heard You Got Divorced? Congratulations!

Two women in their thirties meet unexpectedly at a gathering and realize that they are seeing each other after fifteen years. The last time they spent time together was when they were in high school. Then the paths of their lives diverged and they did not keep in touch. Now was a good time to catch up. Their names are “Unhappily Married” and “Happily Divorced.” The following dialogue ensues:

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: God, I can’t believe running into you like this. So nice to see you after such a long time. How’s life treating you?

HAPPILY DIVORCED : Life is great. I have no complaints. Tell me how your parents are? I can still remember spending the long afternoons at your house during summer break. Your mom used to make the best lemonade. How is she? How is your dad?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: My mom is doing great. She has some health issues now and can’t take care of things like she used to but we take good care of her.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: and your dad?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED : He passed away two years ago. Sudden, massive heart attack. Wasn’t even alive when the ambulance came.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Oh I’m so sorry to hear that (eyes welling up.) I can’t believe it! That’s so sad. He wasn’t even that old? And he was always physically so fit?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Yes I know. None of us saw it coming. It still feels like yesterday.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: How’s your husband? And kids?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Oh we are OK. My husband got a promotion. He isn’t home a lot. But that can be a good thing. The kids are doing well at school. Sara is now in high school can you believe it? And Adam is now in seventh grade.

HAPPILY DIVORCED : I remember them being so little! I have such a cute picture of both of them that I have framed. You need to come visit us some time very soon.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I know. I’m just so happy to see you again. You tell me. How are your husband and kids doing?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: We are doing amazing. Actually we got divorced last year and currently sharing custody of our kids.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED : Oh my God, I’m so sorry to hear that. I didn’t even know! How awful! My heart is breaking! How did that happen? (puts hand on her chest.)

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Actually this is not a sad life event for me so I would rather that you congratulate me rather than commiserate…

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Oh I’m sorry, I know it can be very traumatic and this is your way of coping but really I’m sorry.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: No really! I’m very happy and getting divorced was as happy of an event for me as the birth of my kids or my graduation from College.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED : That’s a very odd way of looking at it. I have never heard anyone congratulate anyone for being divorced. It is always thought of as a tragedy.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: That’s true. I always used to think that way too. Until it happened to me. I realized how important a divorce can be for some situations. It can be a blessing and an event to rejoice for many.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Well  I can understand your point but it’s still very tragic. After all, a house gets broken. A family gets shattered.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Yes that happens but it’s not always a time for all remorse. You have a to look at the bright side. Just like anything else in life.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I’m still not so sure about that.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Well let me ask you this. You remember when your grandma used to live with you? Remember how sick and debilitated she got towards the end? She had cancer for the longest time and she was in extreme pain and misery and your family could not see her like that? When she finally died, you had secretly told me how everyone was sad for her to go but relieved internally that her misery ended. From that view, it was a happy moment in a way that you had wished would come sooner.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Yes I do remember and in that sense I agree that all of us were waiting for her suffering to end. Some things just don’t come out right even if you try to put them into words tactfully. Some things are actually best left unsaid.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: I know but some thoughts should be shared with those who are closest to you. If you don’t, they lead to a buildup of negative emotions in your head.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: OK well thanks for sharing your true emotion with me. I knew that although I’m guilty of not remaining in touch but you were always the kind of a friend who I knew that if I met even after a hundred years, it would feel as if I could share anything with you.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Thanks and I feel the same about you.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: So what actually happened? Why did you guys break up?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Where do I start?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I know but something major must have happened?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Lets just say that we didn’t get along.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Isn’t that true for a lot of marriages though?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Yes it is but sometimes the differences become too strong and unacceptable.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Well isn’t that what marriage is about? It’s a compromise. No couple is perfect. You have to learn how to live with your partner and have mutual respect.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: People who divorce understand that concept. But it’s not possible always for two individuals to achieve that state of compromise. Do you think that people who end up being divorced don’t try to compromise?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Yes but it’s a life long struggle. For some it’s easy, for others it’s difficult. But you have to keep trying. That is what marriage is all about. You have to put in a lot of effort to live happily ever-after.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: For some people, life doesn’t roll like a fairy tale.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Who said every marriage is like a fairy tale. There are issues and struggles in every marriage.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: I feel that every time someone tries to enlighten me with the “marriage is a compromise between two individuals” idea, they are implying that this concept is somehow alien to people who get divorced.  Some differences become uncompromisable, wait, is that even a word? 

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Actually I don’t blame you. I can totally understand why something like that could happen to you. You had an arranged marriage. How can you marry someone who you don’t even know. It’s very obvious that if you don’t know the personality of another person and are forced to marry them, it will not work normally.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Well if that is a valid reason for divorce, then arranged marriages generally would not be so successful. But we all know that the rate of divorce is very low in places where there are more arranged marriages.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Yes but the rate of living unhappily for the rest of your life, stuck with a person who you don’t get along with is equally high in those apparently intact marriages.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: You are right. In the West, there are seldom any arranged marriages but the divorce rate almost approaches fifty percent. That is a flip of a coin. It means that there is a fifty-fifty chance of you getting divorced. Isn’t it crazy? But after having gone through divorce myself, I can tell you that a marriage being “arranged” by family versus getting married by falling in “love” has nothing to do with your happiness after you get married.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: How can you say that?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: The critics of “arranged” marriages often mistake these marriages for forced marriages, which they are actually not. Matchmaking has been around since forever. If you research marriage, you will come to find out that this is one of the most enduring practices of humankind since the beginning of times. Humans have not yet found a superior and more acceptable arrangement for a man and woman to live together and procreate.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Interesting view.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: I actually read some books about the history of marriage after I got divorced. Trying to figure out where did I go wrong.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Maybe you should have read those books before getting divorced! Just kidding.

HAPPILY DIVORCED:  No but seriously, I found out that the concept of falling in love to get married to a person for the rest of your life is a relatively recent concept over the last few centuries. Marriages were not always like that. It was always sort of a contract between a man and a woman being assigned certain roles in life which both were happy with. It was supposed to be a symbiotic relationship with well-defined duties and responsibilities along with rights and perks. Somehow somewhere, the roles started blending and we were sold this idea that all marriages should be based on nothing else but love and if you marry the person who you fall in love with would be some sort of a guarantee that you will remain happy ever after. But guess what?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: What?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: That narrative totally misses the point that humans can fall out of love as commonly and easily as they can fall into love. Sometimes you don’t have any control over it. Your mind keeps telling you that you are still supposed to love the person who you are married to, but your heart has fallen out of love. You don’t have any control over it. Then you have to live the rest of your life with a person who you do not love anymore. That’s where the “compromise” word comes into play!

UNHAPPILY MARRIED:  I think you may have hit the nail in the head. I have not said this to anyone but since I have known you for so long, I know that you can keep a secret. What you are describing is exactly what I’m going through.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Listen please don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t really talking about you. I’m sorry if I…

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: No you didn’t say anything wrong. I’m just telling you that we have been married for twelve years now. I don’t love him the same way as I used to when we initially got together. And I know that he keeps telling me that he loves me every now and then but deep inside I know that he has lost the spark too. We say “I love you” to each other when we have to. But it doesn’t come to our lips as naturally as it used to. It can be an effort to say that at times.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: But you guys look so good together. Always smiling and looking so good as a couple. I follow your Instagram profile and the parties that you host, the fun times you guys have as a family, the vacations that you take… We are always talking about how you guys have a perfect marriage.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I know. We are happy in that way. God has given us more than we could ever ask for. He still respects me and gives me my space. He is a great father. He is so good to my family. But he somehow is not the same person that I married. There is no warmth in him towards me anymore. I could see it in his eyes, in his touch. Now even his hugs have become very cold. The sex that was so passionate and soul-fulfilling, is as if it’s a duty. Both of us are happy to stay away from it and often when one of us initiates it, the other feels like when you have to eat when at the dinner table but not wanting to eat from a full stomach.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: But does that matter? If you have your family intact and you are giving a loving home to your kids and have a respectable place in the society, you are succeeding in your marriage. Love becomes a second hand emotion in this situation. Something you can live without when all the other needs are being fulfilled.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Yes, but that was not the only reason why we got married in the first place. Plus, it’s hard to live like that. I wish that he could love me like he used to again but then I think why should I expect him to do that if I don’t have those feelings towards him anymore.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: If it’s that bad, then why don’t you guys talk about it and get separated?

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: We have talked a little bit about it and we both kind of know how we feel towards each other. But we cannot even think about divorce. How could we do this to our children? They deserve to be raised in a loving household. Our parents and families would get devastated if we decided to get divorced. We would not have any place in the society. It would be a nightmare.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: I know the feeling. We lived like that for several years before we finally got divorced. Anytime one of us would even bring up the topic of being separated, it was filled with feelings of guilt. How could we put our own happiness above the need to give the kids an intact and loving home. How could you tear apart your own nest after having put it together, twig by twig, over so many years? It’s not easy to destroy something that you have built yourself, with so much love.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I can understand the feeling.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: I used to look around me. All these couples around me. A lot of couples were having difficulty in their marriages. To me it almost looked like out of ten marriages, only two were happy. One where the couple was truly happy, head over heels in love with each other, perfect harmony. Another which was so bad that it ended in divorce very quickly. But the rest of the eight marriages, although intact, but were mere “compromises” where the love was either lost or not there to begin with but the marriage remained intact because that was the right thing to do.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: How did your marriage break then? If you were ready for that compromise and were not selfish to break your home for your own happiness, how did it come to a point when you guys decided to divorce?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Not everybody gets that lucky. Many people are living miserable lives, stuck with each other where they really don’t want to, but don’t have a way out. Sometimes things go so bad and circumstances become so unpleasant and intolerable, that you have to part ways which is a blessing in disguise. If love is lost, that is still something you can live with, but when respect is lost and malice creeps in, then its best to get separated.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I wouldn’t argue with that. But it’s still sad for the children. If it weren’t for the children, many people would have ended their marriages much sooner, including me!

HAPPLIY DIVORCED: I think that is also another myth that needs to be broken. Who says that divorce is always bad for the kids? If it is, in what way is it bad for the children? Often times its better for them to have two separate loving parents than living under the same roof with two constantly fighting and antagonizing parents. There are many famous and successful men and women in history who were children of either single or divorced parents. For every child, that has had any problems in life due to being in a divorced household, I can show you ten children who have similar or even worse problems despite coming from intact but unhappy families. 

UNHAPPLIY MARRIED: Are you suggesting that I also get separated from my husband then?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: See that’s a knee-jerk reaction that everybody gives me when I say things in support for divorce. By no means am I suggesting that you break your family apart but the point that I’m making is that divorce can actually be good for some situations and for some couples. Usually we spend too much time in misery before we are relieved of it. I want people to understand and be more accepting of this as a good solution to many problems rather than considering it as a negative life event at all times.

UNHAPPILY MARREID: OK I get your point. But tell me, what was he doing? Was he physically abusing you? He must be cheating on you right?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Why should it matter to know the exact reason why a couple gets divorced? Isn’t it enough to know that two people did not get along. I have seen that the story is very similar in all cases of divorce. It is very natural to think of the person that is closer to you as the victim and the other person to be the one at fault. Every man is accused of cheating, beating his wife, financially crippling the wife if in a male-earning relationship, drug abuser, raging alcoholic and unloving father. Every woman is accused of being lazy, spendthrift, having mental health issues and trying to alienate her husband from his friends and family. I have not seen the word “narcissist” used with so much consistency than to describe an ex-spouse. The irony is that this is the person who was considered so perfect in many ways that one was ready to spend the rest of one’s life with. This is also the person who when described by close family or friends, is considered an amazing person in all other roles and relationships.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I can see that…

HAPPILY DIVORCED: At the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter what led to the divorce or whose fault it was. It should be no surprise to people that it is perfectly understandable for two people not to get along to a point that they eventually decide to part ways which may seem to be against the commonly held wisdom of staying together to keep the family intact.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: I have noticed some couples where one partner wants to divorce the other but the other one wants to stay in the marriage.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: That is actually not uncommon at all but you always have to see who eventually asked for the divorce. The person who asks for it is the one who wants out. He or she has had it so bad that they don’t care about staying in the relationship anymore. They feel their freedom after the divorce. Its hard on the other party in the beginning but things settle down after a while for both.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: How do you feel about getting married again?

HAPPILY DIVORCED: Ah, that is called the triumph of hope over experience!

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: (chuckles)

HAPPILY DIVORCED: I have seen many second marriages work much better. Probably because you have had time to think about your own deficiencies from your experiences and trying to rectify them in a future marriage. Also the expectations are much lower in a second marriage. You are happy if your spouse is not being negative and coexisting peacefully which is worth a lot more than constantly agonizing over the small things that they are not doing to prove their love to you. You become more forgiving and less demanding yourself.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Well I hope that you find a companion again one day. But be careful while you are promoting divorce in this way. It doesn’t sit well with society if you talk that way.

HAPPILY DIVORCED: When has society liked anyone who points fingers towards flaws in the social structure. But if nobody does that, then how do you bring improvement in people’s lives? Plus, divorce is not all fun and pleasure. There are many aspects of divorce that are uglier than staying in an unhappy marriage. But if you ever see two people really struggling with their marriage and if a relationship has been irreparably broken, it is better to facilitate an amicable divorce rather than trying to keep the marriage intact. That is the biggest gift for that family.

UNHAPPILY MARRIED: Well I understand your perspective. I know it’s sad and tragic on one level but on another level a positive life event for some. I wish that your marriage had worked but if you put your all into it and it still didn’t work out for you, I am happy for you now that you don’t have to live that misery every single day of your life. Congratulations.

September 24, 2023