To think divorce is selfish?

[Readyforafallout]

( Totally different for abusive relationships so not including those in this post)

Am I wrong to think that the following are excuses for basically gaining a moral green light for being selfish and swapping your own discontent for a child’s upheaval and distress ?

’ Kids are resilient’
‘ they will pick up on it so you are better of to divorce !’ ( even if the parents DO hide it well, people being convinced they will notice feels again an excuse)
‘ You only have one life OP! …’ ( so do the children)

it just seems that people ‘ grow apart…’
‘ want different things’ and put themselves ahead of their children…. I know this is likely an unpopular opinion
but hearing how ‘ brave ‘ people are for ‘ having the guts to do something about their situation’ seems selfish to me ….

because the children’s world are being opened to who knows who!…. As potential step parents !…. Complete upheaval And emotional distress … That’s worse than ‘ picking up’ on not much in my opinion .

it’s not a post intended to be unkind to divorces but more to not hold it in the highest regard like some achievement of braveness. It feels selfish ?

Hope the film was good - what did you go to see?

With regards to divorce - your musings are not worthy of responding to.

I think every circumstance is different for each person.
I stayed with my dh after he had an affair, mainly because I couldn’t bare the thought of a stepmother with my dc and for stability. I’ve worked hard to keep my family together and as happy as possible. I sometimes read the comments on here about step-mums & think I’ve made the right decision although it has not been easy.

@BeautyGoesToBenidorm you could just scream.

Divorce is horrible for children and they are likely to be living in circumstances that are less comfortable than if their parents had stayed together (though not in all cases, I appreciate that if you're divorcing a gambler or alcoholic etc).

I agree that some people don't try hard enough to make their marriage work and throw in the towel too soon.

I am getting divorced but it is not my choice. My husband left for another woman. I would have tried to make it work but he wasn't willing.

We used to have a lovely house and the kids went to private school. We will lose all of that now. My eldest daughter cries most days about the situation.

I'd find that really hard. Your kids having to move school and make different friends on top of everything else.

Once you have committed to marrying someone at the right time for the right reasons and therefore commit to for better or for worse, I feel you actually have a "duty" to try and be happy and make the other person happy.

Totally agree it is not pleasant to be around unhappy parents.

However I must admit when I was younger I didn't appreciate the love between my parents as there was a lot of bickering and sniping. However as an adult I could appreciate that life is stressful and you can even snap at people you love. So PP may have been experiencing this with their own parents and misunderstood???

@IWantOutDoI 'I don’t know what planet you live on but I have not met a single divorced person, not one at all, that had not been in a marriage were some sort of abuse was happening.' My parents. Absolutely no abuse but my dad wasn't really right for my mum. This is from her. She left because although he was a really nice guy, they didn't have much in common.

Friends Sue and Tom seemed to have a great marriage, but Sue had her head turned by a doctor at work and left. Huge shock to everyone including Tom. According to Sue she still loved Tom and he would still be her best friend but she was in love with Dr. This was most definitely not the best thing for her DC who then had a mix of step siblings coming and going. DS called their son Sam the saddest person he had ever met. Unfortunately he still is 13 years later.

It isn't clear cut. In an unhappy marriage you are modelling that for your children. Setting their expectations for what marriage looks like. I'm fortunate in that both of my parents had very happy second marriages so I knew what I was looking for.

@ArabeIIaScott said 'Children need happy parents, not married parents.' Unhappy parents are definitely not good for children but it doesn't automatically mean that happy parents mean happy children; particularly when it means blending families. Mum might be happy with her new guy having great sex and feeling fulfilled but her DC are shifting between homes, lose their safe space and have to share their lives with another man's children. This was the situation with my neighbours growing up. The 'blended' siblings absolutely hated eachother.

I'm not sure what the solution is. We all only have one life so shouldn't waste it in misery. Split and divorce if necessary. However don't rush in to setting up home with someone else.

Once you have committed to marrying someone at the right time for the right reasons and therefore commit to for better or for worse, I feel you actually have a "duty" to try and be happy and make the other person happy

That's fine as long as it's BOTH parties doing this. Most people get divorced, as did I, because one of the parties does not care about the other person enough to be bothered that their actions are making the spouse very unhappy indeed.

So I had a "duty" to be happy when my ex was fucking someone else?

He refused to divorce and made life hell if my mum tried to separate. Controlling narcissist. There was a huge power differential. I was the driving force behind the eventual successful divorce, even landing my mum money from a student luan to afford it. It was the best day of my life when the degree absolute came through.

@greydressinggownofdoom @SpongeBobJudgeyPants

It takes two people to make a marriage work so your partners failed on their part. I meant both parties in the marriage need to make the same commitment

What is the alternative? Being quietly unhappy, unsatisfied and unloved (and your spouse feeling the same), failing to demonstrate what a loving, healthy relationship looks like?
You can try counselling but what if it doesn’t work, what if you have grown so far apart as people there’s just no connection. What if one partner changes so much that the other cannot reconcile them to the person they fell in love with?

your view is very black and and that’s just not the reality of complex human relationships.

Well, my parents didn't divorce until I was 18 (I also have an older sibling). They had a huuuge argument when I was around 5 or 6 and things deteriorated so badly by the time I was 15 that my mum got violent and demanded he left.

I was 15 and we lived in a flat so I knew exactly why my mum did that, let's just say my dad was NOT the one in the wrong.

That was 10 or so years of experiencing tensions in the house, poor parenting because of their own conflicts and stress of a bad marriage, a very bad example of what marriage looks like and zero conflict resolution. I cannot even begin to tell you how much damage that did to me, especially being a highly sensitive person. And you're getting the abbreviated version of the abbreviated version.
My mother refused a separation/divorce until that fateful night because apparently she was thinking of us 🙄

So yeah, think of the kids and what they'd actually go through!

Are you stuck in an unhappy marriage?

I wondered initially if OP was just on a wind up, but actually I'm starting to think this is it. She's in a miserable marriage but can't bear to divorce, so she's peddling some rubbish where she's not struggling with inertia or a lifestyle change, she's just a noble, selfless altruist. And anyone who did what she wishes she could do is morally inferior.

It feels more plausible than simply being a silly wind up.

OP I think you are oblivious to the significant "emotional distress" that a child can suffer living in a family where either one or both parents are unhappy, or they spend months or even years witnessing arguments, fall outs and general cold atmospheres and not-getting-on-ness. That can, and does, massive long term harm to a child.

Yes, that’s why I asked the question upthread.

I remember being so unhappy in my marriage, but feeling things weren’t bad enough to justify me leaving.

A close colleague then left her husband because they had grown apart, no sex, nothing to talk about, she just didn’t love him any more. God I was brutal about it. Full of opinion about how she should be trying harder for the kids etc. I was an utter bitch, and all because I was jealous that she had the guts to do what I couldn’t.

I really admire your honesty.

An unpopular opinion I have is that women often say they're staying for the children when really they're staying for the lifestyle. That's understandable, especially these days, but it isn't fair on the children to pretend it's for their benefit when it isn't, and it could make them feel very guilty (though it isn't their fault).

But it can take a while for people to be honest with themselves about their true feelings.

Yes that makes sense - there may be a lot of projecting going on.

I’m really proud of having the strength to walk away from a terrible marriage- it means that our lives are all so much better 11 years on than they would have been had I stayed.

Fair play to you for being so honest. I left my husband for similar reasons to your colleague and there was a whiff of that from some people alright. Again, often from those themselves in less than ideal marriages. Interestingly enough, it was those in the happiest marriages who were amongst the most supportive, maybe because they know what a good marriage can be.

Of course, for better or worse you know???

FFS! That shit… I know a woman who refused to let her husband had a divorce for 10 years as “they made her vows” even when he left her for another woman, set home with her and had more children with her.

It comes a time when the less selfish thing for you and your children is to let go, you can imagine the drama forcing the man to stay married to her. Absolutely bonkers… but within their vows.

I think comments like 'kids are resilient' are things divorcing parents say to reassure themselves that their kids will be ok. In reality, divorce is NOT ok for kids but may still be the best option, if managed carefully. No child deserves to live in an unhappy home.
I think you are underestimating the hugeness of the decision to separate. It IS a brave thing to do, especially for women, because being a single parent is tough. You'll be poor, lonely and excluded from a lot of social situations that really do favour nuclear families.
I don't believe for a moment that mothers, especially, decide to divorce for selfish reasons. They decide because they are deeply unhappy and because it's the only solution they can see that will improve the lives of everybody in the family. It feels unnecessarily cruel to blame parents when they are almost certainly already blaming themselves more bitterly.

My father wasn't abusive but he was a serial cheater. I'm bloody glad my parents divorced.

That’s abusive as well. If selfish behaviour or neglect constantly hurt the wife or the children, it is still abuse.

Staying married is more selfish because you are doing more harm to the kids by staying and creating a miserable atmosphere for them.