Dec 18, 2008

About divorces

(This is a slightly long post and lifted from personal blog)

Hmm this should be hard. But I have wanted to write about it for sometime. To put it in one question – Is it a wrong act?

A generation back, divorce must have been the last thing thought of when a marriage fails and unless dire scenarios came up, people chose to stick with the marriage. There might have been exceptions. But today, divorces are not that rare and doesn’t always tell the story of “another man or woman”, or a lunatic-spouse deal. A divorced couple may give the reason “cause we didn’t get along well” or “it just didn’t work out, there was no love”

But was it as easy as that? No, no and no. Divorce is still heard of as a condemned word. “Divorce? Are you crazy? No way am I letting you. You are living with him/her no matter what” – the typical responses of a parent/a relative/friends.

Agreed, marriage calls for a lot of adjustments and understanding – you cant expect two different individuals to agree upon every deal on earth. But that’s not what I am talking about. When a marriage goes to a level where you find yourself unhappy all day and night long, when you realize beyond doubt you can never work it out –what was the point in clinging on? Why was it so important that you had to stick with the person till end of life no matter what? Wasn’t marriage all about making your life happier by spending it with someone you love and care about? When that love and care is not there, why would you choose to ignore it and go on with your lives unhappily?

Cause divorce was still “evil”, unheard of and a shame to kith and kin. People choose to make their own lives unhappy to have the world around them believe they are happy. An idea that always goes above my head.

The argument against this was that young people didn’t really need a reason anymore to divorce, they separate for the silliest reasons heard of. Why I am against this argument was that – whatever silly reason called it for, would they have gone ahead with the separation if there was love in the marriage? Wouldn’t they be the ones who should hate the idea of a divorce more than anyone else if they still cared for each other? Why was this so hard to understand? It was not the silly fights or reasons that was important – it was their decision – they wouldn’t be able to take it if they didn’t really want it! And they wouldn’t be able to proceed if they didn’t want it! Divorce was not a momentary deal! It gives you months to rethink, to reconsider – if all those months didn’t make them want to come back together, it simply means one thing – there is no love!

And then of course the most-fought-upon subject – what about kids? “Cant you live together for their sake?”
What do people think about kids who see their parents fight all day and night? Would kids be happy watching that or would they rather have their parents away and happy with each other? There need not be any pretense about this – kids who watch their parents fight each other shut themselves off in rooms and never find happiness at home. They seek comfort in friends and school and in worse cases, bad influences.

I know a girl who saw a psychiatrist as part of her parents having problems – the first thing the doctor asked her was “do you have an affair?”. The stunned girl said no and wondered why he should ask her this when the problem was with the parents. The doctor explained “Usually kids who face such problems at home end up having boyfriends/girlfriends at a very young age”
I know, no business of his, but well it showed that doctors expect kids to go “in the wrong direction” (since he obviously considered an affair wrong for a 17 year old) when their parents were having trouble with each other.

I strongly believe that kids would be much happier if parents who fought each other stayed away and still managed to spend enough time with them individually.

Divorce is not really a hard deal to understand. Cause what reason prompted it was not all that important unless it’s a case of serious misunderstanding – even then if there is love in the marriage, things sort out. But if there is no love, please don’t live frustrated lives forever – you had a choice. If you wanted to avoid divorce, take a lot of care on whom you marry – that’s where your decision really matters. But then humans make mistakes and a mistake may be hard to avoid, but not so hard to correct.

1 comment:

Ekanthapadhikan said...

This sure is a matter of concern. Let me tell you what I think about this issue. I'm not against 'divorce' and I see nothing "evil" in it. But a more pertinent question here is - why are people getting into relations when they are not capable of handling it? The answer is obvious. DESPERATION. Yes! That's the answer. In these present times people find too little time for each other. They deny to themselves and to the others around them, the much needed companionship. Parents finding too little time for children and siblings finding too little time for each other. People started living under one roofs as 'individuals' lost in their own private worlds little realizing that their poor soul is crying for a company. And when you come across the first person you think you are comfortable with you get involved.

Now, look at this. You get into a relationship not because you really know and like the other person but because you were in need of something and someone offered you just that. You get into a relationship thinking of what you can get and not thinking of what you can give. And all through you'd keep expecting the other person to satisfy your needs and never even think about what the other person want from you. Then sprouts the question of "not meeting demands" and "too many demands" and people have to part ways...

Stopping at this note, I just want all of you think what is the root cause of this problem and not argue endlessly about whether 'divorce' is a social evil or not. Let us begin from the beginning. 'divorce' is the result of 'something' and unless you find out and correct that 'something' you reach nowhere. The argument will continue li9ke "it's coffee... no, it's toffee... it's Coffee... no, no it's toffee..."