Surprised how the tone has changed from save it to divorce

[Anonymous]

It could be a combination of things. For me, my parents divorce used to shape 100% of my opinion. My dad initiated the divorce to be with his girlfriend. Back then, there wasn’t this great dating market for a divorced mom with two kids, dads didn’t really have 50/50 custody, and there was a bigger financial impact because a lot of moms didn’t have the type of careers that would really support them. So all this gave me a pretty high bar for divorce. Basically other than the three A’s - adultery, abuse, or addiction, if both people want to make it work, you need to make it work. However staying together for the kids doesn’t necessarily work if both people aren’t willing live in a loveless marriage while giving up sex with other people or agree to an open marriage.

Fast forward to when my friends started divorcing in late 30’s - they had good careers making good money, and sometimes had families that could comfortably help them out while rebuilding finances. The had 50/50 custody so they had more free time than I did and would hang out on non-custody days, take short vacations with friends etc. With internet dating, they always were meeting guys and had dates, though how many were quality is a different story. Almost all of them ended up either remarried or in long term relationships within a few years. So I no longer had this dire future in my mind as the picture of divorce. I will still lean towards the make it work because the experiences as a kid shaped me more than observing the life of friends from a distance but in the world of COVID and political polarization, it adds the questions could you live in whatever your situation for the next 20 years and is this really the person that you can make it through tough times through sickness and health and through quarantine lock downs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IMO the tone has changed because social media has become prevalent in the last decade. Twitter was founded in 2006. Facebook founded in 2004.

People can now see what kind of stress their friends, family, relatives are under with pictures and videos of all the incidents. They can also see what life is like in a happy and unhappy marriage.

Honestly - look at this video of a mother and child interacting and tell me this family is 'healthier' than someone who decided to divorce an argumentative spouse and take the children to a healthier environment.

Don’t be ridiculous.

Other than Conway’s daughter, people only post the happy or fabricated stuff.

Nobody can tell what is going on in anyone’s life from social media. It’s a farce.

Really? Go on Instagram and moms of my generation have made a habit of posting pictures of themselves looking harried, stressed, crying, frustrated. Also posting blogs or FB content with complaints or litanies about how much they do, how tired they are, etc

Less than a month ago a mom I follow died suddenly at the breakfast table. You know what one of her last Instagram posts was? Complaining about her five-year-olds.

“To my sleep deprived mama friends in the trenches of the seemingly-no-end-in-sight nighttime desperation shift..”

You can read the whole post at the link, but the point is all this endless complaining and suffering that used to be private? Not so much anymore.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CEAF_dTJcQQ/?igshid=99cxgvansihm

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's been that way forever. I'm divorced for 7 years now and my ex-wife would foolishly come here for relationship advice. She got some of the juice to instigate a divorce (as well as horrible legal advice) right on this forum. I post here to try to give a wake-up call to women who think divorce is going to be great, and a judge is going to hand them everything. My ex is currently 100 pounds overweight, single, living in a home that smells like cat urine, and the kids don't respect her.

If you value marriage at all I'd leave this place and never come back.

Wow, I value marriage and I'm divorced. A judge awarded me indefinite alimony - alimony for life. I am slim I guess because I run a lot, and I'm engaged to be remarried - a decade after my divorce. When that happens, I'll lose my alimony, and I couldn't care less.

I lost no friends in my divorce and made many new ones. I have a new career. And my kids not only respect me, but love me.

Was it easy? NO. Would I wish it for other women? NO. But I had no choice, and I'm thankful.

What a nasty thread to start, OP. Some people need to get divorced. Most women thrive afterwards - after a lot of going through hell. Frankly, nowadays young people aren't even getting married in the first place, so you're seriously behind the times. And most of my married friends are now struggling; several are divorcing themselves. I'm thankful I was forced to do it when I was 40 so I could start a new life.

For those who are bitterly waiting until their kids go away to college, I'm really sorry but you probably won't find another partner at that point. Flame away, but it's very true if you're a woman. Your husband has taken ALL the best years of your life away from you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Posters trash people that reconcile after an affair. Even if somebody was faithful for 20 years, the family/marriage was happy, the cheater is extremely remorseful and in individual therapy. They call the woman (oddly not the men) all kinds of names...spineless, weak, etc. 80% do not divorce and many of those are women that are working and successful.

Marriages can end up being stronger and more fulfilling in the 2nd half when blown open and rebuilt. Not all situations are the same yet this board comes at it as if all cheaters/people and type of affairs are the same. Some cheaters are awful, some are not.

I agree there is a real delusion from some women about how great divorce will be financially for them. They often are shocked at the financial situation after.

The grass isn’t greener a lot of the time.

DCUM will trash a guy that cheats but I think a woman that cheats gets it worse - they get the woman plus the incel men. As for reconciling with a cheating spouse, I don’t think many guys post about that as far as I’ve seen. There could be less guys posting on DCUM, plus I believe less guys take back the cheating wife and likely fewer will admit that they have.

I don’t agree with having a sliding scale of cheating. It doesn’t matter in the sense if was a one night stand, a long term affair, OW baby, a sex addiction, after 3 years of marriage or after 20, because there are people that are willing to work on changing from any of those things, and there are some that are not. There are some people willing to move past any of those things no matter if the partner does the work or not, and there are some that cannot. I learned long ago that people make different choices than I would given the exact same situation and we can both be happy with those choices. So it’s possible that the grass is really greener for me on the other side while it wouldn’t have been for you and your marriage is better than ever while that wouldn’t have been true for me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posters trash people that reconcile after an affair. Even if somebody was faithful for 20 years, the family/marriage was happy, the cheater is extremely remorseful and in individual therapy. They call the woman (oddly not the men) all kinds of names...spineless, weak, etc. 80% do not divorce and many of those are women that are working and successful.

Marriages can end up being stronger and more fulfilling in the 2nd half when blown open and rebuilt. Not all situations are the same yet this board comes at it as if all cheaters/people and type of affairs are the same. Some cheaters are awful, some are not.

I agree there is a real delusion from some women about how great divorce will be financially for them. They often are shocked at the financial situation after.

The grass isn’t greener a lot of the time.

DCUM will trash a guy that cheats but I think a woman that cheats gets it worse - they get the woman plus the incel men. As for reconciling with a cheating spouse, I don’t think many guys post about that as far as I’ve seen. There could be less guys posting on DCUM, plus I believe less guys take back the cheating wife and likely fewer will admit that they have.

I don’t agree with having a sliding scale of cheating. It doesn’t matter in the sense if was a one night stand, a long term affair, OW baby, a sex addiction, after 3 years of marriage or after 20, because there are people that are willing to work on changing from any of those things, and there are some that are not. There are some people willing to move past any of those things no matter if the partner does the work or not, and there are some that cannot. I learned long ago that people make different choices than I would given the exact same situation and we can both be happy with those choices. So it’s possible that the grass is really greener for me on the other side while it wouldn’t have been for you and your marriage is better than ever while that wouldn’t have been true for me.

Maybe people shouldn't cheat.

And there's no such thing as sex addiction - see the DMS V.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posters trash people that reconcile after an affair. Even if somebody was faithful for 20 years, the family/marriage was happy, the cheater is extremely remorseful and in individual therapy. They call the woman (oddly not the men) all kinds of names...spineless, weak, etc. 80% do not divorce and many of those are women that are working and successful.

Marriages can end up being stronger and more fulfilling in the 2nd half when blown open and rebuilt. Not all situations are the same yet this board comes at it as if all cheaters/people and type of affairs are the same. Some cheaters are awful, some are not.

I agree there is a real delusion from some women about how great divorce will be financially for them. They often are shocked at the financial situation after.

The grass isn’t greener a lot of the time.

DCUM will trash a guy that cheats but I think a woman that cheats gets it worse - they get the woman plus the incel men. As for reconciling with a cheating spouse, I don’t think many guys post about that as far as I’ve seen. There could be less guys posting on DCUM, plus I believe less guys take back the cheating wife and likely fewer will admit that they have.

I don’t agree with having a sliding scale of cheating. It doesn’t matter in the sense if was a one night stand, a long term affair, OW baby, a sex addiction, after 3 years of marriage or after 20, because there are people that are willing to work on changing from any of those things, and there are some that are not. There are some people willing to move past any of those things no matter if the partner does the work or not, and there are some that cannot. I learned long ago that people make different choices than I would given the exact same situation and we can both be happy with those choices. So it’s possible that the grass is really greener for me on the other side while it wouldn’t have been for you and your marriage is better than ever while that wouldn’t have been true for me.

Maybe people shouldn't cheat.

And there's no such thing as sex addiction - see the DMS V.

Yes, sex can be an addiction. They treat it the same as alcohol and the cycle of addiction is the same. It’s a shame society is still 30 years behind in believing sex can’t be an addiction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ve been on this forum more years than I care to count. The relationship discussion was a big draw for me when my kids were little and even beyond that. I really wanted to divorce DH. However, there was so much logic and push here to stick it out, etc and I’m glad I did. Now I see posts with similar problems and the majority of advice seems to lean towards divorce. What changed?

More options career-wise for women. Women see more friends and kids thriving post divorce. I was the second divorce in my social circle. There was so much pessimism and misinformation about what would happen to me. 15 years later, 1/2 are divorced. No one had that knee-jerk doom and gloom prediction anymore.

In earlier generations, there were several factors that kept women in bad marriages for longer. They typically did not have the skills or career to earn a good income to support a family and the stigma of being a divorcee. Fortunately both of those are not as prevalent as they once were.

My parents are divorced and it was really the best thing all around. I sometimes post in these thread to provide a point of view that divorce is not always going to be devastating to the children. It is a false but commonly held belief that children are always traumatized by a divorce. My parents are now happily remarried to other people and my siblings and I are all in healthy long-term marriages. Why be completely miserable in life if your spouse is a jerk or you are just fundamentally not compatible.

Just to offer a different perspective, my parents divorced and it had a huge affect on me, in ways I still don't fully understand. I hated the separate families, the step mom/brothers/sisters, the split holidays, the hurt is caused our family, the financial stress it put on everyone. Sure we looked fine on the surface, but i was (and still am) really torn up about it - that was over 20 years. My relationship with my father was never the same, especially after he remarried. As other PPs have mentioned, every situation is different, it's really difficult to know how it will affect your kids. PP, it's great that everything worked out well for you. I've never shared my feelings with my parents, so it's very likely they felt everything worked out well for them too.

I am sorry that you have continued pain. But happy marriages do not end in divorce. What is your counter factual? A fantasy of a different marriage for your parents? Divorced but not remarried?

Different poster here. It is possible to improve a marriage instead of divorcing. LOTS of people divorce who could have stayed married and worked on their marriage. Often it is one person in the marriage who leaves for greener pastures and of course then the other spouse is not at fault if they had been willing to work on the marriage. But the person who goes off for greener pastures without really good reason is making a choice that can hurt their kids considerably.

I stay married for my kids despite finding my husband boring and annoying at times. I put in effort to foster love between us and be kind to him even when I don’t feel like it for that very reason. It does work if you aren’t dealing with abuse or cheating or addiction on either side - I don’t have the marriage of my dreams but by treating it as sacred it has still become a good enough marriage and we have a loving family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posters trash people that reconcile after an affair. Even if somebody was faithful for 20 years, the family/marriage was happy, the cheater is extremely remorseful and in individual therapy. They call the woman (oddly not the men) all kinds of names...spineless, weak, etc. 80% do not divorce and many of those are women that are working and successful.

Marriages can end up being stronger and more fulfilling in the 2nd half when blown open and rebuilt. Not all situations are the same yet this board comes at it as if all cheaters/people and type of affairs are the same. Some cheaters are awful, some are not.

I agree there is a real delusion from some women about how great divorce will be financially for them. They often are shocked at the financial situation after.

The grass isn’t greener a lot of the time.

DCUM will trash a guy that cheats but I think a woman that cheats gets it worse - they get the woman plus the incel men. As for reconciling with a cheating spouse, I don’t think many guys post about that as far as I’ve seen. There could be less guys posting on DCUM, plus I believe less guys take back the cheating wife and likely fewer will admit that they have.

I don’t agree with having a sliding scale of cheating. It doesn’t matter in the sense if was a one night stand, a long term affair, OW baby, a sex addiction, after 3 years of marriage or after 20, because there are people that are willing to work on changing from any of those things, and there are some that are not. There are some people willing to move past any of those things no matter if the partner does the work or not, and there are some that cannot. I learned long ago that people make different choices than I would given the exact same situation and we can both be happy with those choices. So it’s possible that the grass is really greener for me on the other side while it wouldn’t have been for you and your marriage is better than ever while that wouldn’t have been true for me.

A woman that reconciled with a cheating spouse gets it the worst from people. Even more than the cheaters. It’s sick.

[Anonymous]

*reconciles

[Anonymous]

Affair recovery definitely cites the degree of cheating as a sliding scale. Long term affairs are the hardest for a marriage to recover from.

Yes- some people break up after a one night stand, but in sheer numbers and studies- the degree of cheating and marriage foundation - length, kids, etc all come into play.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Affair recovery definitely cites the degree of cheating as a sliding scale. Long term affairs are the hardest for a marriage to recover from.

Yes- some people break up after a one night stand, but in sheer numbers and studies- the degree of cheating and marriage foundation - length, kids, etc all come into play.

That would bring in the length and degree of deception. A drunken one night stand is a lot different than leading a double life and lying to someone over several years. That’s a lot of elaborate lies and gaslighting to pull that off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ve been on this forum more years than I care to count. The relationship discussion was a big draw for me when my kids were little and even beyond that. I really wanted to divorce DH. However, there was so much logic and push here to stick it out, etc and I’m glad I did. Now I see posts with similar problems and the majority of advice seems to lean towards divorce. What changed?

More options career-wise for women. Women see more friends and kids thriving post divorce. I was the second divorce in my social circle. There was so much pessimism and misinformation about what would happen to me. 15 years later, 1/2 are divorced. No one had that knee-jerk doom and gloom prediction anymore.

In earlier generations, there were several factors that kept women in bad marriages for longer. They typically did not have the skills or career to earn a good income to support a family and the stigma of being a divorcee. Fortunately both of those are not as prevalent as they once were.

My parents are divorced and it was really the best thing all around. I sometimes post in these thread to provide a point of view that divorce is not always going to be devastating to the children. It is a false but commonly held belief that children are always traumatized by a divorce. My parents are now happily remarried to other people and my siblings and I are all in healthy long-term marriages. Why be completely miserable in life if your spouse is a jerk or you are just fundamentally not compatible.

Just to offer a different perspective, my parents divorced and it had a huge affect on me, in ways I still don't fully understand. I hated the separate families, the step mom/brothers/sisters, the split holidays, the hurt is caused our family, the financial stress it put on everyone. Sure we looked fine on the surface, but i was (and still am) really torn up about it - that was over 20 years. My relationship with my father was never the same, especially after he remarried. As other PPs have mentioned, every situation is different, it's really difficult to know how it will affect your kids. PP, it's great that everything worked out well for you. I've never shared my feelings with my parents, so it's very likely they felt everything worked out well for them too.

I am sorry that you have continued pain. But happy marriages do not end in divorce. What is your counter factual? A fantasy of a different marriage for your parents? Divorced but not remarried?

"I'm sorry but...." does not come across as very sincere.

I also don't agree with you that "potentially' happy marriages don't end in divorce. it is niave to think that a marriage is always in a state of blissful happiness. I'd rephrase your sentence, and say that committed marriages don't end in divorce.

My counter factual (whatever that means) would be for them to have stayed married and made more of an effort to work through it with therapy and self improvement - that didn't happen from what I saw. If in the end, they still couldn't reconcile their differences, then so be it, at least they tried.

Normal caveats apply for adultery, abuse, addiction, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ve been on this forum more years than I care to count. The relationship discussion was a big draw for me when my kids were little and even beyond that. I really wanted to divorce DH. However, there was so much logic and push here to stick it out, etc and I’m glad I did. Now I see posts with similar problems and the majority of advice seems to lean towards divorce. What changed?

More options career-wise for women. Women see more friends and kids thriving post divorce. I was the second divorce in my social circle. There was so much pessimism and misinformation about what would happen to me. 15 years later, 1/2 are divorced. No one had that knee-jerk doom and gloom prediction anymore.

In earlier generations, there were several factors that kept women in bad marriages for longer. They typically did not have the skills or career to earn a good income to support a family and the stigma of being a divorcee. Fortunately both of those are not as prevalent as they once were.

My parents are divorced and it was really the best thing all around. I sometimes post in these thread to provide a point of view that divorce is not always going to be devastating to the children. It is a false but commonly held belief that children are always traumatized by a divorce. My parents are now happily remarried to other people and my siblings and I are all in healthy long-term marriages. Why be completely miserable in life if your spouse is a jerk or you are just fundamentally not compatible.

Just to offer a different perspective, my parents divorced and it had a huge affect on me, in ways I still don't fully understand. I hated the separate families, the step mom/brothers/sisters, the split holidays, the hurt is caused our family, the financial stress it put on everyone. Sure we looked fine on the surface, but i was (and still am) really torn up about it - that was over 20 years. My relationship with my father was never the same, especially after he remarried. As other PPs have mentioned, every situation is different, it's really difficult to know how it will affect your kids. PP, it's great that everything worked out well for you. I've never shared my feelings with my parents, so it's very likely they felt everything worked out well for them too.

I am sorry that you have continued pain. But happy marriages do not end in divorce. What is your counter factual? A fantasy of a different marriage for your parents? Divorced but not remarried?

"I'm sorry but...." does not come across as very sincere.

I also don't agree with you that "potentially' happy marriages don't end in divorce. it is niave to think that a marriage is always in a state of blissful happiness. I'd rephrase your sentence, and say that committed marriages don't end in divorce.

My counter factual (whatever that means) would be for them to have stayed married and made more of an effort to work through it with therapy and self improvement - that didn't happen from what I saw. If in the end, they still couldn't reconcile their differences, then so be it, at least they tried.

Normal caveats apply for adultery, abuse, addiction, etc.

I’m so sorry that sucks. And, there may have been adultery. It wouldn’t be the first time parents keep that a hidden secret which causes the children to harbor the same trauma you do and blame both for the divorce unfairly.

[Anonymous]

The tone hasn't changed, OP. Even in this thread the majority are talking bad about divorce. Do you consider any support for divorce to be a board change? This board is quite conservative. Posters encourage others to stay in bad marriages because the marriage might improve and they view single parenthood as the worst outcome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:IMO the tone has changed because social media has become prevalent in the last decade. Twitter was founded in 2006. Facebook founded in 2004.

People can now see what kind of stress their friends, family, relatives are under with pictures and videos of all the incidents. They can also see what life is like in a happy and unhappy marriage.

Honestly - look at this video of a mother and child interacting and tell me this family is 'healthier' than someone who decided to divorce an argumentative spouse and take the children to a healthier environment.

I agree that social media has shifted the tone, but not for the reasons you say. People only post the happy stuff. So people make their lives look happier on social media. That causes other people to think that other marriages and families are happier, and I think it makes divorce seem more desirable. Why stay in an unhappy situation when look how happy all of these other people are? I think social media has actually raised the expectations of marriage and relationships in an unrealistic and unhealthy way.

Divorce happened in the 1990s. And divorce isn't bad. Sometimes problems in a marriage cannot be overcome. But I think that more people were encouraged socially to work on their marriage pre-2006ish because there were more realistic views of marriage. A lot of sitcoms portrayed all of the downsides of marriages (boredom, sexual issues, stresses of life), and that gave people reasonable expectations. You also had shows like Sex in the City that portrayed how difficult dating is.

Fast forward to the rise of Facebook and Instagram, and everyone posts their staged happy photos that make everything seem rosy. Married people make their lives seem happy and fulfilling. Singles make their lives seem filled with exciting travel and going out with the girls. Basically, anyone going through a rough patch in a marriage is going to assume the grass is greener outside of their marriage, and it makes it that much harder for them to put in effort and ride out the rough times.

I think there's been a boom in dating apps as well. I've been seeing so many more commercials than ever this past year. When there is a profit to be made, the tone shifts. So people make a lot of money off of people dating. People make a lot of money off of weddings. The incentive then is not to encourage long marriages. The incentive is to keep people getting married and divorced and dating and married again. No one makes money off of long, solid marriages. While divorce can really set people back financially, a lot of other people make money off of that, too.