AIBU to wonder why more Baby Boomer marriages haven't failed?

[ComposHat]

I was talking to my dad about divorce and they commented about the high rate of divorce amongst his age group.

I am actually surprised that it isn't higher given the 'typical' marriage pattern of baby-boomers. Very early marriages (my parents were engaged at 17 and married at 21 without having serious relationships with other people.)

They'd had no experience of living together or even being an independent adult - both moved straight from their parents homes to their marital home. Several of their friends 'had' to get married as the bride was pregnant (yet a surprising number of these marriages have lasted too)

Late teens seems absurdly young to pick your life partner, I couldn't pick a pair of socks to wear at that age. It seems that the 'typical' baby-boomer marriage was a bit of pot luck and keeping your fingers crossed for the best.

AIBU to be surprised that so many marriages made in these circumstances have turned out to be successful (or at the very least endured!)

Like a lot of people here, DH and I met the day before my 19th birthday, bought a house together 3 years later and married at 22. We have only been married for 10 years but DH has supported me through a nervous breakdown & several suicide attempts as well as bowel cancer & chemotherapy and supported my desire for DC3 ( who arrived on Friday), when he was absolutely content with two.
I have supported him through a relocation with work from the north east to the south east and now into a field based role, which once his paternity leave ends might see him spending 2 weeks out of every 4 away from home.
We have worked through a lot of tough decisions and still do. He is my best friend. I can't imagine life without him.

I've been with my dh since I was 19. Had my first baby at 22! I think what suits one person, may not suit another.

years ago I asked my Grandmother what made her marriage to my Grandpa so happy (always seemed so in love) she laughed and told me it was because they made a conscious decision very early on that they both wanted to stay together til the very end. She told me it wasn't always easy, indeed there were times they hated each other, but they endured and went onto enjoy almost 70 years of marriage before dying within weeks of each other. She also gave me the most important words of wisdom before i married DH. She told me that there there is never such a thing as a 'new man', they've always and will always just be 'men'. She also told me never go to bed without a nightie cos it ruins the mystery and anticipation (never stuck to that one)

Thanks for all the responses - I hope I didn't want to upset anyone and I wasn't implying any value judgements. I find it fascinating that people made such life chaging decisions at such a young age.

I'm also interested in how far and fast things have changed in the last 40-odd years.

we have more life choices now and most people expect more from their life

I am not sure they are happier especially women, never having had any independence it is very daunting to give up a comfortable yet unhappy life. better the devil you know and all that

I have always been encouraged to not tie myself down by a woman (my nanny) who would have lived a very different life if she was of a different generation

All my relatives, parents of friends, are all still together. But then, so are all my friends and similar aged relatives (early 40's). So don't see any real generational difference in my experience.

Ouch OP I read 'I find it fascinating that people made such life chaging decisions at such a young age.' as a pretty patronising comment. You didn't mean it like that did you?

I agree with NorthenLurker, the majority of the people in my family have strong marriages and are still content together after 40-60 or so years.
At least three cousins are in long-term relationships (20+ years) but not married, and are happy
It's a choice for some, depending on circumstances and the severity of the problem, when you get to a rough patch, do you split or do you work through it?
If you have examples of how to resolve conflicts equitably, then you are possibly more likely to see it as an option. My brothers and sisters and inlaws are all in long-term marriages as well.
Others choose to split, and that's their choice. There is a current boom in divore with the over 50s I believe, as the children leave home and they realise that they are no longer a couple.

Maybe it balances out, for some they may find it took them years to be ready and find 'the one,' but others may find that if they pair up young they are more likely to find a 'keeper' before all the good ones are gone.

My parents have been married 52 years, myself almost 27 years and DD married this year at aged just 22. I was not worried she was too young, and they have not lived together before marriage. (Not did I or my parents.)

Like someone said to me - if you have found someone you want to spend the rest of your life with, why wait? :)

I think when people get married when they are older, then there is more to be dissatisfied over. Harder to merge two ways of thinking than develop them together in your early twenties.

I also think that if you meet someone when you are 30, then you are perhaps in more of a hurry to get married and have kids than if you meet them when you are 20. I know some people who have seized onto a new relationship and rushed it forward, for things to fall badly apart once the focus of the wedding planning is removed (SIL, you utter bitch for what you have put my DB through :()

Much talk of romance and making it work on here - and not much acknowledgment.of the fact (some posters have mentioned it) that a lot of women "of a certain age" would also have stayed in abusive or unhappy relationships because there was little or no support if they left. It's not that long ago, historically speaking, that women were able to have their own bank accounts (without a mans permission) or get a mortgage in their own name. So in a lot of cases it was put up or shut up.

Also it's not that unusual for baby boomers to be divorced. My parents were (both since remarried), also my Aunt. Slightly bemused by some posters talking about baby boomers as if they lived in ye olden days; sixty isn't that old!

Sorry, I mean weren't able. Important distinction!

'I find it fascinating that people made such life chaging decisions at such a young age.' as a pretty patronising comment.

I didn't intend it as such northern sorry you took it that way. It is possibly a reflection on my own emotional imaturity in my late teens, as I mentioned in the original post.

Fair enough.

peoples attitudes have changed to

although we all believe when we are in love there is no one else who we could be happy with I think most know that if for whatever reason their marriage/relationship fell apart they could find happiness again and it also it is ok to be alone. being on your own was not something many would have considered and that fear kept them in a relationship and not everyone who is in a happy relationship wants to live with their partner this too is more acceptable (referring more to people who have had children have their own homes)

Late teens seems absurdly young to pick your life partner, I couldn't pick a pair of socks to wear at that age. It seems that the 'typical' baby-boomer marriage was a bit of pot luck and keeping your fingers crossed for the best.

Probably because people had shared interests and responsibilities.

My parents married at 18 and 21, 43 years until my mother died. I wouldn't say it was a bed of roses, they had their ups and downs like any couple, but mainly they were happy together - the difference was they worked through their differences. None of this throwing a strop, waltzing off and getting a council flat and hand outs. Maybe that's the difference? People worked at their relationships and didn't expect the state to provide an alternative lifestyle?

There's a lot of people romanticising on this thread, and I say this as someone whose parents were happily married until my Mum's death. My aunts and uncles still happily married bar one, and likewise, DH's family. I'm lucky that my template is a good one... DH and I are in it for the long haul and have been tested in ways many couples have not, but luckily have a loving and urturing base to do that from.

However, a quick look at the relationship forum on any given day seems to list the same old problems over and over again - emotional and sometimes physical abuse, infidelity and lies, and a huge amount of resentment caused by partners not pulling their weight. There are hardly any people posting about many of the issues many partnerships people on this thread have listed, like illness, redundancy, death of a loved one, etc, etc.

It's easy enough to be happily married and work through big issues if you're in a mutually supportive relationship where each part of the couple fundamentally wants to be there for the other one. Not so when when half of the couple has emotionally 'checked out' and/or is making life unbearable for the other.

We used to live in a society where women especially were told they had failed if they didn't have a relationship, work at their relationship at all costs, and make sacrifices for their relationship (give up careers/a wage, do the lion's share of housework, etc, etc).

Nowadays it is more acceptable to walk away from set-ups that make people miserable and that provide a terrible template for children.

Personally, I think this is a very good thing and fundamentally different from working through big issues together as part of a supportive, in-it-together couple.

I wonder if finances comes into it too

There seems to be so many more financial pressures now than there used to be. Don't know about anyone else but money (or severe lack of it) causes the most stress and so arguments in my marriage

My inlaws met as teens and married young
My parents met at uni

I met my dh when I was 18 and we married when I was 21. We've managed nearly 11 years so far.

Excellent post by arabesque ^^

OP, can you define who you mean by 'babyboomers' ? That term is used widely to include so many different birth years.

I think baby boomers covers the years 1946 - 1954, so people aged late fifties to early sixties.

I bet that would include a fair few MNers!

DonDraper good post, you said it better than me.

People also forget that folk have a much higher life expectancy now so marriage for life means something different than it did fifty or sixty years ago.

Ahem...mid to late sixties!

There's potentially a lot of people reading this thread who have made some extremely tough decisions, possibly feeling like total crap for not 'working harder' at it, which is very unfortunate.

If you and your spouse, or your parents, stayed together after abuse or infidelity than that's great that you/they're now happy and stronger as a result of it - and the partner on the receiving end of that is exceedingly lucky to be given a second chance. And is hopefully very, very grateful and has changed their ways.

But likewise, it takes a huge amount of strength and courage (often a great deal more) to refuse to put up with that and to walk away, and that should be recognised.

Really, generally, it is not about 'stropping' and 'waltzing off' to get a council flat and handouts...

I disagree with your view OP that most baby boomers stayed married. Certainly in my mum and dads immediate circle of friends and the people they were friendly with in their 20's and school friends my mum and dad are the only couple apart from my uncle that have stayed married.

I know this because me and mum had a conversation about it about a month ago. Most of the divorces seemed to have happened in the mid70's. and then again in the mid 80's. ( just as their children became adults). I don't know it it a typical patten or very localised.

My mum finds it amusing when she bumps into people that she hasn't seen for years. People go round the houses asking about my dad. They must think they divorced years ago or he is dead and don't like to say!