Fessing up to my divorce

[Northern_Piper]

Leading cause of death for women in their teens and twenties used to be childbirth.

Women who survived child-bearing years tended to live longer than men.

[Northern_Piper]

Best wishes, Cairo Carol.

[TimeWinder]

@dropzone

The old fashioned way was a spouse, usually the woman, would die.

@D_Anconia

Hasn’t the life expectancy of women pretty much always exceeded that of men?

And historically women would marry much older men? This seems…unlikely.

[Kimstu]

@TimeWinder

And historically women would marry much older men? This seems…unlikely.

Depends what you mean by “much”, and it varied between cultures.

“Western European marriage pattern”

In 1965, John Hajnal discovered that Europe is divided into two areas characterized by a different patterns of nuptiality. To the west of the line, marriage rates and thus fertility were comparatively low and a significant minority of women married late or remained single and most families were nuclear; to the east of the line and in the Mediterranean and particular regions of Northwestern Europe, early marriage and extended family homes were the norm and high fertility was countered by high mortality. […]

In Yorkshire in the 14th and 15th centuries, the age range for most brides was between 18 and 22 years and the age of the grooms was similar; rural Yorkshire women tended to marry in their late teens to early twenties while their urban counterparts married in their early to middle twenties. In the 15th century, the average Italian bride was 18 and married a groom 10–12 years her senior. […]

[…] where in the old indigenous religions, women married between 12 and 15 years of age (coinciding with puberty) and men married in their middle twenties, as Christianity expanded men married increasingly earlier and women married increasingly later […]

So if by “much older” you mean “at least 10 or 15 years older”, then yes, in most cultures for most of history women were marrying much older men. (And of course, the age gap was considerably greater in many cases where a well-off middle-aged widower was looking to remarry.)

The modern trend of women tending to marry (a) a decade or more after puberty, (b) a man significantly closer to her own age, or (c) not at all, seems to have originated in late medieval Western Europe and spread from there along with other characteristics of “modern” society.

[TokyoBayer]

My mother should have divorced my father early on, and probably would have except for the pressure from family, religion and society to not get a divorce. I knew many Mormons who had unhappy marriages but couldn’t get divorced. Likewise, there are many Japanese who are in similar situations.

Contributing to the hijack, the pattern among polygamous Mormons (starting with mainstream Mormons in the 19th century) is for the age of the first wife to be closer to that of the husband, but the ages of subsequent wives to drop to where patriarchs in their 50s, 60s, and 70s marry child-brides.

These girls then grow up and marry lower ranked men after the death of the patriarch.

[Voyager]

Best of luck to you.
When my brother got divorced - and there were good reasons - he lived only a few houses from his ex-wife and they still shared the cat. There was zero bitterness.
Hope yours is like that.

[nearwildheaven]

@TokyoBayer

My mother should have divorced my father early on, and probably would have except for the pressure from family, religion and society to not get a divorce. I knew many Mormons who had unhappy marriages but couldn’t get divorced. Likewise, there are many Japanese who are in similar situations.

I’ve heard the same thing about Ireland, where divorce is no longer illegal but can be extremely difficult to get.

[Spoons]

I’m divorced. It was her idea, not mine. I dealt. You will too.

Time heals. Best wishes.

[TokyoBayer]

@nearwildheaven

I’ve heard the same thing about Ireland, where divorce is no longer illegal but can be extremely difficult to get.

Its the same in the Philippines where people can only get annulments.

Having a low divorce rate does not mean that more marriages are happy.

There are a lot of divorces in Japan which happen after the husband retires.

For Carol, don’t worry about having posted about the good in the marriage. People can understand that there is more than the brief snapshots from the posts.

[Sunny_Daze]

I hope that time brings you peace and healing. Good or bad (or both), 36 years is a big part of your life. It must be wrenching to make such a big change. My best wishes to you.

[Maastricht]

I got an amiable divorce at 50 two years ago, and all has worked out well for all concerned. Best wishes for you Carol!

[Nava]

@TokyoBayer

For Carol, don’t worry about having posted about the good in the marriage. People can understand that there is more than the brief snapshots from the posts.

And I can’t speak for anybody else, but I think 30+ years of shared happiness which eventually end up splitting because you’re simply not walking parallel paths any more are a lot, lot, lot…*30+ better than however long of bitterness.