Young women with crumbling marriages should be thanking Kim Kardashian. She's giving each of their mother's something else to analyze 24/7.
Divorce in your 20s is horrifying enough to go through, let alone having to explain the change of your social network status to curious connections and fretting family members. For each woman on the receiving end of all those "I'm sorry," and "what happened?" sympathies is a stressed out, scared little girl wondering how her fairy tale turned into failure.
Through interviews conducted for the book I'm currently writing, Trash the Dress: Stories of Celebrating Divorce in your 20s, I've noticed common themes among women who divorced before hitting the big 3-0.
While the factors behind every relationship's demise are different, the underlying motivation behind marriage is similar for some of the women:
It was convenient. When maintaining a comfortable long-term relationship in your 20s, the next logical step is to get hitched. Madison, a 29 year-old accountant from New Jersey who is sharing her story in Trash the Dress, admits to marrying even though she didn't feel "crazy love," because was "content and secure instead."
A previous relationship left them heartbroken. They say you never really get over your first love. Tara, a 26 year-old freelance writer from North Carolina admitted during our interview, "I didn't think I would ever fall in love again so I figured it didn't matter who I married."
I can relate. Breaking up with my college boyfriend left me devastated. He wasn't just my first serious relationship; he produced the beats to my heart for years. I never thought anyone could ever make me feel that way again, so I settled for the memories and pledged my honor to someone with whom -- wait for it -- I was in a convenient relationship.
Madison also attributes a past heartbreak as a reason why she became Mrs. to Mr. Wrong. After being told over the phone by her first fiancé, "I have cancer and can never see you again," Madison had an understandably hard time trusting love. She married her ex-husband because "We were both financially stable and could have a good life. I loved him, but I'm not sure about actually being in love with him. I felt that I would never be hurt by him as long as I didn't give my whole heart."
They hoped marriage would change things. I am guilty of this mindset. I thought once we were settled into newlywed bliss, my ex-husband would be happier with his own life and able to hold a steady job and show me more affection. However, the honeymoon ended during my engagement. I brushed our problems aside, directing my efforts to tracking down black ostrich feathers for my bouquet and the perfect all-pink flower girl dress.
Casey, a 35 year-old travel correspondent and founder of GirlsGetawayGuide.net, described her ex-husband to me as "immature and insecure." She married him at age 24 and recalls "I thought getting married would fix those problems."
They had low self-esteem. When interviewing Kim (not Kardashian), a 30 year-old social worker who is now one of my best friends, she confided "I was a very insecure individual at that time. I was losing weight from gastric bypass surgery and wasn't happy with my appearance. He told me I couldn't do any better and I believed him."
During a recent interview about my divorce, the producer commented on a photo of me on my wedding day saying, "You don't look like yourself." She told me to cover my smile with my hand and look at my eyes: they were blank.
I had my doubts, but it wasn't until I was walking down the aisle that I realized the person I was about to marry was not my soul mate. I wasn't overwhelmed with joy taking steps towards the man of my dreams, father of my future children. I was seriously hoping everyone loved my dress. Emotionless, I read my vows and listened to my groom recite the sentiments I wrote for him- red flag?
Of her pending second divorce, 31 year-old Kardashian (who was married in her 20s to music producer Damon Thomas) wrote to fans on her official site, "I want a family and babies and a real life so badly that maybe I rushed in to something too soon. I believed in love and the dream of what I wanted so badly. I felt like I was on a fast roller coaster and couldn't get off when now I know I probably should have."
There's not one main reason that I, Kardashian, or any of the women I'm interviewing for Trash the Dress, can blame for why we got married. Some of us had inklings that our marriages were not meant to be but went ahead with it anyway. Others were over the moon in love. The one thing everyone does have in common, however, is that the end of our marriages were just the beginning to the rest of our lives as strong, independent, successful women.
Follow Joelle Caputa on Twitter: www.twitter.com/HelloJoelleLisa
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Also I find it very hard to believe that every woman Ms. Caputa interviewed will blossom into a "strong, independent, successful" woman. Life doesn't turn out sunshine and roses for everybody, this is especially true of people who have a history of settling for less than that.
Oh for the love of God, when will this saying get tired?
In countries where Men get at least an equal share of custody rights if not more, divorce is significantly less.
Telling.
Breakdown of this article by Wesco, 5th comment in.
These married women think there is a better deal out there, so they bolt from the marriage stable, only to find they are now in the same position of women who had been too busy being 'strong and independent' career women for a serious relationship; they no longer have the trump card they did before, their youthful beauty and innocence gone and the sensible beta providers, having now established themselves and are more worldly wise ( with many their experience and maturity have increased their sexual market value increased) are are looking for younger, emotionally undamaged women for commitment or just wanna play the field they missed out on when they spent all their time working towards becoming 'marriage material' After all, why buy the cow when the milk is free (especially considering the risks of divorce for these men:parent alienation, spousal support, substantial asset losses etc).
Good luck. ladies. keep convincing yourself of all these reasons.
Women don't require sensible providers now, they earn their own money and have careers. That means they tend to get bored or completely overlook these kind of guys for the more sexually exciting men. Problem is women have much competition within their own gender pool for these confident masculine men because the majority of men who have grown up in modern society have become so apologetic of themselves because of feminism's demonization of masculinity. So we end up with men trying to be sensitive, akin to women and women trying act like poor caricatures of men.
No wonder society is in such a mess.
So, the choice is yours: evolve and realize that women have more to offer than a vagina...OR it's also perfectly fine to want a woman who wants to be taken care of, but she will be harder to find. HOWEVER, when you do find her you can thank feminism...feminism gave her the opportunity to learn what she really wants is you.
I have no idea why I was watching that show...
I know people who didn't get married until their 30s or 40s who made the same mistakes that the authors of this article associate with 20-somethings. Age and maturity do not always go hand-in-hand, and people of all ages get married for the wrong reasons. It's a very personal thing in each case, and not some sort of epidemic spread by young people getting married.
When you propose you should honestly be able to say - I love you; I can't see living without you; will you marry me?
But what do I know?
The feeling of being "In love" comes from a huge rush of neurotransmitters in the brain, that act like opiates, they are triggered when we meet somebody who happens to have the hallmarks of a perfect mate, they sub-consciously remind us of our parents, this is because we survived to maturity and therefore it makes sense to our primitive brain that we are "programmed" to look for people who are similar to our parents, who will help raise our kids to maturity too. This presents problems for people who have parents with psychological problems or addictions.
The output of NTs drop when we are away from our true love and we get cold turkey which brings on physical symptoms. The output lasts around 10 years. Scientists believe that this happens so that we stay with somebody long enough to have kids. We associate that feeling with our lover, like a junkie who blames his dealer when the supply of drug dries up, and this causes us a lot of problems, especially if that person decides to dump us.
We should make kids aware of this trap, everybody should know that the feelings we get from romantic love are not the basis for a marriage, it would save our society a lot of heartache and money. I know that it sounds rather unromantic and curmudgeonly but I wish I knew 25 years ago
If I get married because I want to do my best to help create an environment most conducive to the happiness of my spouse, I will succeed, and the marriage will be happy. (Goes for either spouse.)
The bottom line is, marriage is a contract relationship BASED on duty, not love...the obligation to fulfill a vow, a promise, and a pledge to do something specific (and part of the specifics of that promised something, by the way, is to love each other).
It seems hard to believe but I've spoken to several divorcees in their late 20's early 30's who got divorced because one wanted kids and the other didn't. Apparently, they are just not discussing that major issue prior marriage.