Why do marriages fail?

[Arieswoman]

Cocorico,

 

 

"I'm not sure marriage prep classes are the answer. Before my first M, we discussed all those "big" questions, and agreed pretty well on everything. We knew all the theory. We could have aced a class, or an exam.

 

But the marriage ended pretty anyway"

 

 

That's a shame.

[Tayla]

Since OP chose to turn this around and looking at the success of marriages, I must concur. Most ones I have seen are founded on mutual joy for the other and the ability to regard their differences. Matter of fact that celebrate their differences!

 

I think Pre-marital counseling does shed light on the big issues, but just like school, you can be educated, but until its applied, we don't know how well it will succeed.

 

I met a couple that was celebrating 40 years of marriage! He was down right smitten with his wife. I was seriously skeptical ...no one can be that overjoyed ! Then I sat with his wife, and strange as this sounds, She was charming in every way. And it was genuine!! Quiet and demure, and she thru her behavior cherished him as well. Theirs was a lovestory. Wish I could bottle up their marriage and send it to people who need it. It was refreshing to know that they had such endearment.

[Summer3]

This is an interesting thread and I thank all who responded.

 

Now I'm going to turn this around and look at it from the other point of view. Should we really be amazed at how many marriages actually succeed?

 

Marriage is a challenge.

 

You take two people with different personalities, hopes, aspirations, careers, temperaments and life experiences and ask them to live together in harmony.

 

Each spouse needs to try and satisfy most of their needs within the marriage while allowing the other party to do the same. Then both have to find a way to satisfy their other needs outside the marriage in a way that doesn't threaten the marriage.

 

Each needs to find a way to grow and develop as a person while allowing the other to do the same. At the same time both need to support each other and keep the marriage moving forward and not stagnating.

 

It's a continual balancing act.

 

Throw into the mix life events such as kids, bereavements, redundancy, illness, problems with in-laws, awkward neighbours, other hurdles and it's a wonder so many couples can stay on an even keel.

 

So perhaps we should celebrate those marriages that do succeed rather than decry those that fail?

 

Great Valentines Day post! Lots of wise reflection here.

[brothers343]

I have learned many things during my thirteen years of marriege, The first one is that marriege is dam hard at times, and at times you just want to quit......but what I think makes a marriege last is that both of the people involve in the marriege have to keep telling themselves that this is part of the process to make it. I also think that when you have kids, you do try harder, you want to succeed and that can be a common goal to push you through. But I do also understand that some people just don't have what it takes becouse of different circumstances. Some people believe there marriege is going to be beautiful....fool of roses and champagne dreams. But we all know that when the dream is over you have no choice but come back to reality. I love my wife and kids and I love being married with my companion but I also understand that some marrieges are not for the faint of heart.

[sandylee1]

It's very fulfilling to do the course actually and because I've become aware how rampant infidelity is..... During the breaks... I chat on an informal basis and show them some painful stories of BSs. That's quite an eye opener for them. They can't believe the devastation it causes.

 

There are no guarantees of a lasting marriage.....but recent research has shown a much lower divorce rate in those who took a marriage prep course, as opposed to those who didn't.

 

Perhaps it's also because for catholics marriage is a sacrament and see it as until death parts them. If they've been raised as catholics....there won't have likely been divorce in their FOO either.....so in the face of problems they work through them.

 

The classes help you think about where to focus and the areas of potential conflict. If one partner becomes abusive..either physically or emotionally you can't stay with them and no prep can anticipate that. If you're spouse breaks their vows...despite it being for better for worse..... many will simply be done at that point.

 

It also goes through how we change with age and when you have kids .....so that men don't complain they're not getting attention when a baby comes along...but they celebrate together and both put in the work required with the baby...not just moaning you're not getting sex when your wife is totally beat and feeling like a zombie.

[sandylee1]

I work with a wonderful couple in discussing hopes and fears of marriage in schools and when asked if their feelings for each other have changed...The husband says yes ....that he now loves his wife a million more times than he did when they got married over 55 years ago.

 

The love between them is amazing. They are so devoted to each other. They respect each other and are equals in every way in their marriage.

[normal person]

I think it's extremely difficult to find the right person to begin with. Ideally the person you marry should be the person you get excited to see all the time, don't grow tired of, laugh with, don't want to be without, etc. That's incredibly rare. That's the person you should marry, in my eyes. Maybe there are a few hundred or thousand people like that spread about on Earth that you're compatible enough with to spend the rest of your life with sans any major issues. The problem is most people never meet any of those people. Let's say you live in a town of 60,000 and interact with people only in that population. Your odds of ever meeting "that" person are slim to none. So they marry someone they're attracted to who they can tolerate.

 

Circumstances, geography, hormones, religion, ticking biological clocks, lack of options, etc all affect and cloud peoples' judgment and lots of people end up marrying someone they're attracted to whose personality they can just tolerate. That isn't enough in the long run. You both need to actively enjoy each others' company. Most people settle not because they want to, but because they may never actually encounter the right person and marry them and they don't even realize it. It's circumstantial. Then, as someone said brilliantly before, missed expectations lead to resentment and it snowballs from there.

 

Why is the divorce rate so high? Because most of the time, we think being with someone is better than being without someone -- without much more consideration than that. Think about all those people who pledged their lives to another person on their wedding day, talking about soul mates, how they were the only person on Earth for the other, etc. Totally wrong. They married someone they tolerated. Some can tolerate more than others, some can't. "Love" is really a relatively modern social paradigm. It's part of the fairy tale we tell ourselves as a society. "Soul Mate," "The One," etc, is all hooey in my opinion. There are only so many character traits out there. You just have to go looking. Your small town isn't conducive to finding the person. Scale your search. Find one of the few thousand people on Earth you connect with, that you're amazingly attracted to, who you don't want to be without, who feels the same about you. Marry one of those people and be happy. Or marry someone else and be less happy or quite possibly unhappy.

[cocorico]

Cocorico,

 

 

"I'm not sure marriage prep classes are the answer. Before my first M, we discussed all those "big" questions, and agreed pretty well on everything. We knew all the theory. We could have aced a class, or an exam.

 

But the marriage ended pretty anyway"

 

 

That's a shame.

 

Actually it was a relief. I felt increasingly inauthentic in the role. But it was concern for my kids, and the environment they were living in, that made me walk away.

 

I have learned many things during my thirteen years of marriege, The first one is that marriege is dam hard at times, and at times you just want to quit......but what I think makes a marriege last is that both of the people involve in the marriege have to keep telling themselves that this is part of the process to make it. I also think that when you have kids, you do try harder, you want to succeed and that can be a common goal to push you through. But I do also understand that some people just don't have what it takes becouse of different circumstances. Some people believe there marriege is going to be beautiful....fool of roses and champagne dreams. But we all know that when the dream is over you have no choice but come back to reality. I love my wife and kids and I love being married with my companion but I also understand that some marrieges are not for the faint of heart.

 

I'm not sure how I feel about this post... Cognitively, it makes sense. But my lived experience has been completely different.

 

I found my first M to be "work". I wanted to quit at times (and did, in the end) but tried to do all the "right things", compromising, carrying the burden alone "in sickness and in health" when his demons came, believed no we needed to work at it as a team, to get through it... Until I realised my kid da were living in fear, and it wasn't healthy for them.

 

My second M... has been utter bliss! Literally rainbows and unicorns material. We've faced challenges aplenty - but it's all been external stuff which we've dealt with together without ever doubting that were on the same side about anything. We just click - everything is so easy. That doesn't mean we're lazy about our R - we do prioritise it, and each other - and we're lucky because our kids have all grown, so we don't have that to handle (though his were still in HS - living with us - when we got together). So, it doesn't *have* to be hard.... At least, IME

[Popsicle]

Actually it was a relief. I felt increasingly inauthentic in the role. But it was concern for my kids, and the environment they were living in, that made me walk away.

 

 

 

I'm not sure how I feel about this post... Cognitively, it makes sense. But my lived experience has been completely different.

 

I found my first M to be "work". I wanted to quit at times (and did, in the end) but tried to do all the "right things", compromising, carrying the burden alone "in sickness and in health" when his demons came, believed no we needed to work at it as a team, to get through it... Until I realised my kid da were living in fear, and it wasn't healthy for them.

 

My second M... has been utter bliss! Literally rainbows and unicorns material. We've faced challenges aplenty - but it's all been external stuff which we've dealt with together without ever doubting that were on the same side about anything. We just click - everything is so easy. That doesn't mean we're lazy about our R - we do prioritise it, and each other - and we're lucky because our kids have all grown, so we don't have that to handle (though his were still in HS - living with us - when we got together). So, it doesn't *have* to be hard.... At least, IME

 

You're so lucky cocorico. I admire you.

[dichotomy]

Because people don't feel like they have to continue to put in the same effort/energy/emotion/energy/acts - to stay married as they did to get married.

 

The fact is it takes more -much more - and you won't "feel like" giving more......but you need to because thats love ....loving when you don't feel like it.

Edited February 14, 2016 by dichotomy

[Mr. Lucky]

So perhaps we should celebrate those marriages that do succeed rather than decry those that fail?

 

Every marriage gets to the moment when the pedestal we've placed our partner on falls away. Once I've seen my partner at her best and her worst, watched her under grace and under fire and have seen the real person behind the facade we all put up, there's a question to answer - do I like what I see?

 

A "yes" answer gives a foundation to build on, it's at least a beginning. Successful marriages start from there...

 

Mr. Lucky

[WasOtherWoman]

IMHO is big reason why marriages fail.

 

My H and I both have "big" careers. Yet, still the most important job of my life is being his wife. He feels the same about the most important job of his life.

[dichotomy]

I'm not sure marriage prep classes are the answer. Before my first M, we discussed all those "big" questions, and agreed pretty well on everything. We knew all the theory. We could have aced a class, or an exam.

 

But the marriage ended pretty anyway.

 

Ha ....

 

We took a 150 question formal pre-marriage exam (separately) and later the counselor told us we had among the highest compatibility results he had seen. We are still together, but holly crap - what a difficult marriage this has been and what different views we had on love. At the worst of it 6 years ago - I actually tried to call that church therapist to ask WTF about that exam ! He did not return my message

Edited February 16, 2016 by dichotomy

[minimariah]

hmmm... MANY reasons, i guess... buuuuut i will go with the one i think is the deadliest - resentment. quiet resentment. & folks NOT communicating about it, just letting it become bigger and bigger and bigger over the years.

[carhill]

To put it into car terms, since I'm a car guy, cruise control and airbags.

 

When one pushes the button and lets cruise control take over, it's easy to become distracted and, if that happens, the airbag cushions the impact of the crash so one has a lesser chance of dying. Prior, people, in order to survive, needed to take a more active role in surviving and thriving because, well, most humans fear death. Now there is little fear or any attendant respect. Someone else will clean up the mess, pay for it and on to the next deal. Marriage, in general, has evolved similarly. We, the people, are responsible for both, for better or worse. How things go in life are our choices.

[Els]

I think a problem with the question is that it's hard to quantify 'failure'. People usually associate 'divorce' with 'failure' - and while that is true, I don't think divorce is the only indicator of failure. Divorce is extremely taboo in my culture, and I know several couples who stayed in extraordinarily unhappy marriages, often involving abuse (both verbal and physical) and cheating (both emotional and physical). Many are still together. Are those marriages 'successful', or are they 'failures'?

[ASG]

I think a problem with the question is that it's hard to quantify 'failure'. People usually associate 'divorce' with 'failure' - and while that is true, I don't think divorce is the only indicator of failure. Divorce is extremely taboo in my culture, and I know several couples who stayed in extraordinarily unhappy marriages, often involving abuse (both verbal and physical) and cheating (both emotional and physical). Many are still together. Are those marriages 'successful', or are they 'failures'?

 

Exactly.

My mom and my step dad are not exactly in a happy marriage anymore. It's not abusive, but there's a lot of resentment over things that happened in the last few years and it has festered a bit.

 

My mom will NOT leave my step dad, because of his age. We've urged her to leave, if she's so unhappy, and she says "my husband is 77 years old. I am not leaving him". Which is fair enough. It is her choice. And she's ok with it.

 

But if he WASN'T 77, if he was, say 57, she would probably have left a couple of years ago.

 

So... is THIS a successful marriage??

[thefooloftheyear]

When someone is murdered, the #1 prime suspect is always the spouse...That should tell you about all you need to know about marriage.....

 

TFY

[Arieswoman]

When someone is murdered, the #1 prime suspect is always the spouse...That should tell you about all you need to know about marriage.....

 

:laugh::laugh:

[dreamingoftigers]

I think there's a decent percentage of marriages that fail because one person turns out to be a total train-wreck

 

Seriously.

 

I don't believe the "oh you are responsible for 50% of the issues in your marriage."

 

A lot of times there's a pretty big gap between a functional, caring partner and one who is screwing them over.

 

We see it all the time on here. Entitled WS for example. Overspenders, passive-aggressive etc etc etc.

[Arieswoman]

I think there's a decent percentage of marriages that fail because one person turns out to be a total train-wreck

 

Seriously.

 

I don't believe the "oh you are responsible for 50% of the issues in your marriage."

 

A lot of times there's a pretty big gap between a functional, caring partner and one who is screwing them over.

 

We see it all the time on here. Entitled WS for example. Overspenders, passive-aggressive etc etc etc.

 

I agree 100% !

 

Unfortunately these dysfunctional people are pretty good at hiding their real persona for a quite a while - "frog in boiling water" situation.

[dreamingoftigers]

I agree 100% !

 

Unfortunately these dysfunctional people are pretty good at hiding their real persona for a quite a while - "frog in boiling water" situation.

 

Oh totally.

 

I think it's funny how so many people think "oh they'd never slip past me." But then we all have ideas on how "we would get away with it because I would just hide x y and z. If it came up I would just deny it."

 

Duh.

[soleilesquire]

Marriage end because spouses stop consistently taking care of one another.

 

Some marriages end because of a catastrophe on one side, but every research article with any validity indicates that is the exception, not the rule.

 

When one spouse plays the innocent victim, there is no hope for a marriage.

 

There is no such thing as a perfect spouse. There are ALWAYS things on my side of street to work on. When either spouse forgets that, the marriage is doomed.

[TX-SC]

Usually it's because one or the other, or both, stop putting any effort into it. And, some people see marriage as expendable.

[dreamingoftigers]

Marriage end because spouses stop consistently taking care of one another.

 

Some marriages end because of a catastrophe on one side, but every research article with any validity indicates that is the exception, not the rule.

 

When one spouse plays the innocent victim, there is no hope for a marriage.

 

There is no such thing as a perfect spouse. There are ALWAYS things on my side of street to work on. When either spouse forgets that, the marriage is doomed.

 

Sure there are "always things for both to work on" bit one one doesn't put the socks away and the other is sleeping with prostitutes, well......um....the socks are clearly the issue, right?