Romance is for life, not just for Valentine’s Day

A reporter from a local newspaper called me to discuss top tips for Valentine’s Day. She wanted to know what a divorce lawyer would recommend to keep a marriage together.

I’ve seen some interesting clients recently, whose experiences enabled me to give an opinion.

The first was a lady in her late 40’s. She was complaining about the breakdown of her marriage which she attributed to her husband. He drinks too much, he is usually down at the pub, he pays her little attention, he always watches TV when he is in the house and they have no sex life. She added as an afterthought that the lack of a sex life was due to her- she is going through the menopause and finds that she has no interest in sex and most especially not with him. She can’t bear the thought of another 30+ years with her husband.

Then a new client experiencing a severe downturn in his business came to tell me how his wife of 20 years had suddenly “prettied herself up” - she started having regular hair and nail appointments, she was buying nice clothes and had lost weight. He knew she was having an affair, and as this clearly very proud man told me about all his problems, to which he could see no way out, he broke down unable to stop his tears.

Another client came to see me who had done more or less the opposite. He had made a lot of money in his business and his wife of 25 years was no longer attractive in any way to him. He claimed she took no interest in her appearance, she was overweight, she had no interesting conversation and she bored him rigid. He wanted out of his marriage because he couldn’t imagine spending the rest of his life with her.

Another client and I were in court last week. As I watched him, and then saw his wife surrounded by her lawyers, I couldn’t see how they had ever been a couple. They looked so completely different.

So with all these people going through crises in their life, to which I am a witness, what positive comments did I make to the reporter?

I started from the basis that at some stage all these couples must have been happy. They must have been in love, must have been sexually attracted to each other and must have enjoyed their relationship sufficiently to marry and have children together. Years later the thrills have gone and for one of them in each of these marriages, they considered the end had come. Yet their spouses did not. They were still anxious to remain together in their marriage.

But in the face of obvious reluctance by one spouse to save their marriage, is it still possible to do so?

I think it is, but I think it’s tough.

It’s too trite simply to say “Try harder” or “Keep your sense of humour” or “Respect each other”

What these individuals are experiencing is a feeling that their marriage has stalled because of its everyday sameness and they hate it. They are living every single day in the same routine with the same inability to get off the constantly turning treadmill and they have no wish to rekindle a flame that had once burned so brightly. Yet their partners all think differently and are prepared to continue their marriage.

That, for me, is the tragedy of marriage breakdown. It doesn’t often happen that both people agree the marriage has broken down and go their separate ways. Often it is happens only to one person and the other has no choice and with greatest possible sadness, but to accept that decision.

So I suggested to the reporter, a positive step for her readers is this;-

Put together a few mantras in your mind and keep repeating them to yourself over and over again.

Tell yourself first the grass is not greener on the other side. All my years of working in divorce suggest that within a few years the same patterns repeat themselves.

Tell yourself: There is a difference between doing right and wrong.

Tell yourself:  You are going to hold your head high and set your family a standard.

Tell yourself: Throwing away an investment of 10, 15 20 years or more, is madness.

Tell yourself: You can’t have everything you want.

Tell yourself: Life is about how you react to a challenge.

Tell yourself: accept what you have, and cherish it.

 Tell yourself: value the good that is in your life already.

Not everyone is emotionally strong enough to take the pain for continuing gain. Not everyone is able to see that the ups and downs of the years spent with a spouse, an equal partner in the marriage is worth preserving at whatever cost. Not everyone is able to realise that sometimes what we have only becomes really valuable when we are about to lose it.

Happy Valentine’s Day.

Related Posts

Here is a list of other related blog posts that you may be interested in:

• Cohabitation v remarriage: what’s a breadwinner to do?
• Adultery, divorce and a modern-day “epidemic”