Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

How can a couple get divorced after a year of marriage?

110 replies

googlenut · 31/12/2013 21:25

Ok put this here because not sure where would get a response. Close family member lived with her partner and had two children, big fancy wedding just over a year ago and have now announced their divorce. I'm genuinely trying to understand here, not be judgy. How could this happen in such a short space of time. No other people involved just said they were arguing too much.

OP posts:
GoodNewsGrinch · 31/12/2013 23:03

This time last year I was eagerly anticipating my upcoming wedding to my DP of over 11 years. We'd had problems but things had been going really well since we had our DC (oldest 4).

I could never have predicted that a year later, after our lovely wedding, that we would be seperated.

A woman called me just three months after our wedding to say they'd been sleeping together. But that wasn't all. I also started a new job a few weeks after the wedding. Up until then if been happy as a SAHM but he really didn't like me having financial independence and not being around as much to clean his house.

The hardest thing about it all is knowing that people are judging me for my very short failed marriage. The thought of having that judgement was almost enough to keep me there. If it hadn't been for MN talking sense into me, then in all probability, I would still be with him.

I loved him, I genuinely thought it would work, I meant my vows. I had no idea about the infidelity and was blinded to the fact that he was quite EA which intensified after marriage and a new job. Please don't judge your fiend. It's really hard to be in this situation. I don't believe anyone would go through with a marriage if there wasn't at least a part of them that believed it would work. I bet nobody is more upset about it than them.

Fluffycloudland77 · 31/12/2013 23:11

3 people asked my dh if he had doubts before he married me Shock, two confessed on their wedding days they knew it was the wrong thing to do but went ahead anyway.

It's not quite the romantic idyll some imagine it to be.

YellowTulips · 31/12/2013 23:15

18 months for me.

Got married after a 3 year relationship. Early 20's.

Found he had been shagging our flat mate at uni (we wed post uni) for a year after she tried to contact him for a "reunion".

Ran and didn't look back. Fast forward, happily married with kids to a great DH.

So why? Generally because they get married to fix an issue. Not that both parties think this. My ex thought he would fix his lust for the flat mate etc Grin she dumped him a year after I divorced him...

paulapantsdown · 31/12/2013 23:15

My mate was separated 3 months after her 20k wedding. She had been shagging her boss for months.

paulapantsdown · 31/12/2013 23:16

My mate was separated 3 months after her 20k wedding. She had been shagging her boss for months.

ilovewelshrarebit · 31/12/2013 23:17

My friend met someone mid December, he proposed on New Years Eve and she married him the following August!

They went on honeymoon and she slept on the settee when they got back and they never shared a bed again.

The night before the wedding I asked her if she was sure, she said no but went ahead.

It was awful to watch on the day Sad

LuciusMalfoyisSmokingHot · 31/12/2013 23:21

There was a poster who said they were at a wedding and the bride went to same random guys room at the hotel venue, groom went looking for her, staff were forced to admit where she went. he left early in the morning and she had to endure going to the reception still in her wedding dress (she passed out on the guys bed) to get her room key, witnessed by the wedding guests.

I wonder if that poster knows if they stayed married.

Twattyzombiebollocks · 31/12/2013 23:21

A year is nothin, I know a couple who were at the solicitor before they got their cases unpacked from the honeymoon!

LuciusMalfoyisSmokingHot · 31/12/2013 23:22

the poster was a worker at the venue actually not a guest.

MikeLitoris · 31/12/2013 23:23

I have friends that are considering divorcing after 3 month of marriage.

They have had issues for a while as I think they thought making a big show of a wedding would make it all OK. She expected him to change and he expected her to stop nagging once she had the wedding she wanted.

They look like the perfect couple on the outside.

loveolives · 31/12/2013 23:23

Easily really. My best friend is. Things haven't worked out.

MrJollyLivesNextDoor · 31/12/2013 23:24

My best friend got married in her early 20s, one day after about 12 months her husband came home from work and dropped the bombshell that he didn't want to be married any more, he didn't love her, wasn't sure if he had ever loved her.

Twat begged her to come back to him about 2 weeks later, she didn't Grin

MrsKoala · 31/12/2013 23:24

You can't get divorced till you've been married a year - otherwise lots would be divorced earlier i reckon i know i would have been .

MrsOakenshield · 31/12/2013 23:26

9 months for me first time round, after being together for 7 years. I knew it was a mistake but just got carried away with it and really felt I couldn't pull out. Regretted it from the moment of touch down from honeymoon. Never ever regretted ending it.

now very happily married with DD, and I believe he is also happily married with 2 DC (my mum sees him around).

Absolutely my mistake.

lisad123everybodydancenow · 31/12/2013 23:42

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

katykuns · 31/12/2013 23:46

Not actually divorced, but ExH and I got married when I got pregnant, after family pressured me into it. I knew I wasn't happy, I was devastated at getting pregnant... but I was 19 and terrified of being alone and failing at being an adult. I knew the wedding was a bad idea, but was going 'through the motions' and did have some hope that things would magically get better. I remember the sick feeling that nothing had changed at all.
I regret staying together as long as I did. I wish I'd never married him and DD is the only good thing about the entire experience.

Original poster
googlenut · 01/01/2014 02:11

Gosh didn't expect all these replies thank you. So it looks like they might have got married to try and save thing s and it didn't. I am genuinely surprised by how many people go ahead with things like this. It has caused a lot of heartbreak in our family - children involved are 7 and 3 and I wonder how they make sense of it all. Each have new partners now who have been introduced to the kids. Do kids just go with the flow at this age? Would imagine even if they feel loved (which I'm sure they do) it must all be a bit confusing. They were at their own mum and dads wedding.

OP posts:
CogitoErgoSometimes · 01/01/2014 06:55

If they both have new partners in the space of a year I think the 'arguing too much' explanation was rather over-simplified. Few people move on to new partners that fast post break-up. Hmm If I was to guess, I'd say that one or other had their eye on someone new already, got pressed into the marriage reluctantly (for obvious reasons) and then it all fell apart pretty quickly afterwards.

Children are pretty resilient and, as long as the couple involved are keeping their welfare top of mind and cooperate, they could manage the transition from one to two households fairly well.

Joysmum · 01/01/2014 09:23

I fell out with a friend who told me he was going to propose to his girlfriend despite the fact he'd left her come 70miles to ours after a row. He said it would show her how much he loved her. I said love wasn't enough and they needed to get the basics right before taking the next step or the basics would get neglected in the excitement of wedding planning and it wouldn't last. He never spoke to me again and guess what...

Misspixietrix · 01/01/2014 09:31

GoodNews I got the same. :( it's been especially hard as the the last few months have been awful (DM seriously ill etc) so have had family around that had been happy with the explanation I had given them at the time but spending more time around them they were asking more questions. The Ex has actually been brilliant recently which has led to them asking if we can't get back together. I look like a right nasty twat when telling them there isn't a chance in hell but they don't need to know the other half of it as far as I'm concerned. As someone else said, no one knows what goes on behind closed doors.

TwoCatsInTheYard · 01/01/2014 09:58

I know of three marriages that have ended within a year. In all of them, the groom was the one that wanted the marriage (one of them was very needy, one was very controlling and the other was probably somewhere between needy and controlling.)

For various reasons (that I won't go into for fear of being outed), the brides have agreed to the marriage but the marriages all occurred too early in the relationship, without any real commitment to making a long term relationship work, and in the case of the controlling groom, there was probably a certain amount of emotional abuse. In the case of the two needy grooms, there was a bit of a car-crash element to the marriages as it was clear to anyone looking in from the outside that the couples weren't really ready for marriage.

Sparklymommy · 01/01/2014 10:11

This thread is actually quite depressing. I got married on my 21st birthday. We'd been together since I was 16. We had had problems, mainly with his family and me me making a few mistakes. But when I married him I wanted it to be forever.

Even my mum thought we were only doing it for a big party, and the three-six months following the wedding were quite hard. I found it difficult adjusting, I had a miscarriage very soon after the wedding that affected me quite badly. 9 months after the wedding, after discovering I was on e again pregnant, dh turned up pissed and fell over the Christmas tree in the middle of a NYE party and I threw him out, sent him to his mothers.

But from that day on things have got better and better. We are still married, having worked on the problems and being honest with each other and will celebrate our ninth wedding anniversary in march.

Perhaps I am being judgey but I think some couples give up far to easily. We have been through the mill, but we are stronger for it.

tiredbutstillsmiling · 01/01/2014 10:44

I divorced ex-H after a year. We'd been together 6 years when we married and 4 months later found out he was (& had been having) an affair. I threw him out immediately but couldn't divorce til after we'd been "married" the year. Like a soap opera eh?

Turned out for the best as 10 years later in re-married, have a beautiful 2 year old DD and one in the way!

Bluestocking · 01/01/2014 11:04

TwoCats' post rings a loud bell. My DNiece married her boyfriend, who was both needy and controlling, and was back under her parents' roof after about six weeks. The only good thing about it was they hadn't had children or bought a house together so untangling things (on a practical level at least) seems to have been pretty straightforward.

NewtRipley · 01/01/2014 11:11

I agree with lots of other people. I know several people who, with the benefit of hindsight, should have chosen splitting up over marriage. It's the triumph of hope over reality. These were people who had been together for a number of years, and had mistaken the relationship running its course for thinking the change they needed was marriage.

It's sad and very few people set out to do it, IMO

Swipe left for the next trending thread