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This question came up at a talk I was giving in Washington, D.C. A young man in the audience, due to wed in six weeks, wanted to know if there was anything he could do now to avoid a disastrous divorce, should the marriage end.
“Uh, don’t tell your fiancé you’re thinking about divorce?” I suggested.
But actually, a quick nod to the reality of divorce in modern life could bring more security to the marriage. While we know that having a shared vision for marriage matters, a shared understanding of divorce does, too.
We’ve probably all heard married people say, “Oh, if we ever divorced, it would be all out war.” They voice this idea almost as a way to honor the marriage. Perhaps they want to assert its permanence, to proclaim that the marriage is such a pillar of their lives, if it ended, armageddon would descend. This forecasting of doom may be uttered in good faith, but it carries a real risk. It contributes to the bad divorces we see by setting an expectation for enmity and mistrust. It establishes a limit to the relationship, parameters around respectful, caring behavior reserved to this one form.
While there isn’t any one way to divorce-proof a marriage, there are steps we can take to protect our relationship and the wellbeing of our children. One small step: make a verbal commitment, along with your undying love, to part with decency and respect, should the ardor of now give way to irritation and incompatibility at some future date.
Whenever I write about commitment and divorce, someone will write back, insisting that since a couple didn’t stay married, they can’t be trusted to stand by any promise. I understand this reaction; we all want reassurance that no promise ever will be broken, no circumstance ever alter our convictions. But people divorce from all walks of life, all socio-economic backgrounds, all religious traditions and no religion at all. The highest divorce rates during the last three presidential elections were in the Bible Belt states, where so-called "traditional family values" reign, as law professors Naomi Cahn and June Carbone write about in their book, Red Families v. Blue Families.
As sad and disappointing as divorce is, facing one does not mean that you or your spouse can’t be trusted to uphold any of your best intentions. We all have a vision of our highest self, and we can reaffirm it again and again throughout our lives, even in the face of something as trying as divorce.
In Splitopia, I write about another way that language around divorce can corrode marriage. Two different women in unhappy marriages told me their husbands had threatened to sue for sole custody of the children if they pushed for divorce. Even if this threat works, and the wives stay, the idea now lies in bed between them. The wives know that these men, supposedly dedicated to protecting their family, would instead pursue a path of destruction if the format of their relationship changes.
Both of the wives in question were caring, dedicated, intelligent women. But the husbands, in their myopic quest to preserve marriage at all costs, didn’t see their own children’s happiness is too high a price to pay if it failed.
As Johhs Hopkins professor Andrew Cherlin writes, while Americans love and revere marriage, we don't need it for basic survival as we once did. Because marriage in the modern world exists largely as a choice, we will continue to choose out of ones that make us miserable. While some states, such as Arkansas, are passing retroactive laws to make it harder to divorce, these steps don't actually protect marriage; Arkansas has one of the highest divorce rates in the country. One better, more realistic approach to family stability? Make a private commitment to keep our partner's best interest at heart—as a human being and as a friend, not only in the role of spouse.
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