How many PSers have divorded parents?

[monarch64]

Date: 3/25/2010 10:48:44 AM
Author: megumic
My parents will be divorced at some point in the near future. After 40 years of marriage, it's over. My dad is a cheater and has been for years. Pathetic. I'm not sure how you recover from that or understand your life again as something other than what it has always been. 40 years is a long freakin time.

I wanted to quote LadyJane as well, but the mention will have to do.

Megumic--my parents have also been married 40+ years. And they shouldn't still be together, but they are. There has been discontent from day one, and I really don't have one positive memory of my parents as a couple, even when I was little. My brother, who is 4 years older than me, was (and is) my rock. I remember every time my mother told me she was going to take us kids and leave my father, talking to my brother and him telling me, "hey, they aren't going to divorce, this happens all the time and they never follow through" or something to that effect. The constant roller-coaster was just as damaging as a divorce would've been, kids are very aware of what is going on with mom and dad.

On my wedding night, my mother (as usual) worked herself into an anxiety-ridden frenzy and ended up in the ER overnight and should not have left the hospital the next day to attend the wedding. That night, my father and I went to dinner, and instead of him offering comforting words and good advice on my impending marriage, he told me he didn't know how much more he could take of being married to my mother. I wanted to crawl under the table and die for a minute. I love them and cannot stand to see either of them in pain, but it has been that way all of my life and will never change. They hate each other, yet they are completely co-dependent. It is very sad. At this point, I do not think they will ever divorce, because I honestly don't think they would survive without each other. The underlying animosity is just horrible, though. They don't even fake it anymore and they are both very bitter people.

I ended up marrying someone and perpetuating a lot of the negativity that had gone on with my parents' marriage. A couple years in and after failed attempts at counseling I knew that we were not going to work out for various reasons. I simply could not bring myself to have children with my former spouse because I refused to repeat that part of my life. I divorced, and felt like a failure for several months, but I'm so much more at peace now and happy living my life even though I don't have children and I don't have the lifestyle to which I had been accustomed for the first 30 years of my life. So many people stick together for kids or financial reasons and it just wasn't worth it to me. Thanks for letting me share. I hope your parents are able to find peace one day, I know I truly wish that for mine.

ETA: Callisto, just saw your post as well. It seems like there are many cases of people staying together for the wrong reasons. I believe in marriage, but I don't agree with the "divorce is not an option" attitude. There was a great discussion about it recently in either LIW or BWW...I kept typing out responses and deleting them because I felt too strongly about the issue. I digress. I hope your family finds peace also, and anyone here who has gone through the demise of their parents' marriage my heart goes out to you too.

 

[LGK]

My parents divorced when I was 17. They should divorced much, much earlier. I have no idea how my mom put up with my dad for as long as she did. I didn''t- I took off at 16 after a year of mostly couch surfing. Came back when she finally kicked him out, for a little while at least.

My father had bipolar disorder in a really bad way and refused to ever take meds for it- his manic spells would involve serious delusions, paranoia and all sorts of delightful stuff. He was convinced... lets see, that the smog in Seattle was the cause of every problem in his life including his mood swings (no joking), that he was going to get rich by gambling (and stealing money from me to do it, when I had a job as a teenager), and he had this enormous stack of notebooks filled with some weird code in black and red ink. Never did figure out what that was about. He last held a job when I was 9, then after that it was occasional- very occasional- work at Labor-Ready. (And lots of other unpleasantness.)

I really am proud of my mom for finally standing up for herself- and for me- and kicking him out. She finally married someone who loves her the way she deserves to be, and is really happy- she and I are very close and I love having a mom who is so awesome. She adopted my husband totally and he adores her. Our relationship dynamic is more like sisters than mother-daughter, which works well for us.

My father, unfortunately, has been homeless ever since. He mostly hung out in public libraries during the day and homeless shelters at night. His health has deteriorated a lot the last few years, and he took off to the midwest to sponge of relatives. I always hope he''s doing better but then I get these weird things in the mail from him- Brancusi''s Techonolgical Nightmare was one of the Interesting Things he sent to me over the years. It was this polished chunk of airplane aluminum that he''d named that. Interesting, indeed. He sends me letters that I make my husband read sometimes- the last one I read was all about how he had named me after his first girlfriend without telling my mom. Nice. Now DH gets to screen them. I''ve seen him once since they got divorced and it was awful- he showed up at work randomly one day and met my husband for the first time, and when I introduced him to a co-worker he said "You can see where my daughter got her ugly nose from." Ah yes. That would be why I don''t talk to him! Nice to be reminded

My dad is definitely case in point as to how intelligence is freaking meaningless sometimes. He has an IQ of something like 170, and is very clever and educated. For all the good it ever did him.

Well that''s my cheery story for the day

 

[HopeDream]

My parents divorced more than a decade ago when I was 13, after they had been married 16 years.
They should have divorced much sooner but were "Staying together for the children" (bad idea, don''t do it !)

Mom cheated, and had my dad arrested and dragged out of the house by police officers at 3am - real classy mom.

Both are now in long term, comitted adulterous relationships. Hypotheticaly I wouldn''t mind inviting their SOs to my wedding (if I get married one day), but i think it would be awkward.

I hope I can have a successful relationship after their bad example.

 

[Haven]

My parents divorced when I was 27. My father left my mom about six weeks after my wedding. They had been married for 30 years.

I had a momentary panicky situation where I freaked out about marriage upon hearing the news. DH was out of town, so I called him crying and told him he didn''t want to be married to me because I was the product of divorce and thus we were doomed. As I said, I was momentarily panicked. DH was wonderful, of course, and calmed me down.

I don''t believe I''m otherwise affected. My father had cheated on my mom five years before he left her. My sister discovered the cheating, it was ugly and sad and my parents went to a therapist to work it out. He continued to cheat. He''s always had issues setting appropriate boundaries, and I think my mom is better off without him.

My father''s parents divorced after 55 years of marriage. My grandmother was a chronic cheater, but the tipping point for them came after their youngest son (my uncle) died of a brain tumor at the age of 42. They''re now back together, but that''s another story.

 

[pinkstars]

My parents aren''t divorced, but they never married. They weren''t together too much when I was younger, but then my dad moved to be with us when I was around 5. Then they were mostly together with him leaving occasionally(he was an alcoholic.) Then they were seriously considering getting married when I was around 14, not too long after my mom found out that my dad cheated on her and got some woman pregnant. So they didn''t get married.

My parents have always loved each other and I believe they always will, so it''s never been an issue for me that they weren''t together. I think if my dad didn''t have his 3 other children and was also sober like he is, than he and my mom would be together. But now as much as my mom loves those kids, she''d rather wait until they''re out of the house to get back together with him.

 

[junebug17]

Such sad, painful stories, I am so sorry for all the hurt my fellow ps'ers have had to endure, you are all survivors, and all of you are very strong...

My parents never divorced, but certainly should have. My mother did go to a lawyer for a consultation and seriously considered divorce for a short period...didn't follow through, not sure why. Maybe fear of being on her own, religious beliefs, not really sure. My father was an alcoholic who was in denial and didn't think he had a problem (or at least wasn't willing to admit to it). My reaction to their possible divorce was a little different from the norm...I was thrilled. No more screaming, no more fighting, no more drunken tirades, no more physical altercations between my father and brother. I was around 12 when my mother, sister and I went to look at apartments...again, I was elated, I would actually live in a place that wasn't filled with anger, tension and hostility. But she never went any further, and my brother still has anger and resentment about it to this day. My sister is more forgiving, and I am somewhere in between. So we all just muddled along, and my father only gave up drinking when he became too weak and sick to go out and buy it. He eventually developed dementia, and ironically became very sweet and child-like in his final years. I now understand he was a very sick man with many problems who just couldn't cope with life.

 

[FrekeChild]

My parents never got divorced, but my dad was married and divorced before he met my mom.

His kids were younger when she left. She cheated on him, and ended up marrying the "mister". The mister was about 22 when they got married, and my oldest brother was 10, my dad's ex was about 37. She had my brothers say that the mister was their father, and denied my dad's existence. She also completely changed everything about herself that had anything in common with my dad. She had taken my brothers away from my father (and this was possible because divorce was still frowned upon and a social taboo, so no one really practiced family law) to another state. She had custody, and my dad's visitation rights were dependent completely on her whims, which, more often than not led to one 15 minute visit a year, that he flew across country for, and saved every penny he could to afford. She also bled him dry with child support, he depended on the generosity of family and friends to live for the first couple of years, because every penny he made went to child support. She did a lot of horrible things to my oldest brother, and he left at 18 and didn't look back, until he was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer at 21. He passed away at 22.

Both of my brothers have a lot of issues stemming from what they went through, with both of them in less than perfectly healthy relationships--one in a marriage with someone who is...not very nice, and one with serious anger management issues. My dad's relationship with his sons is...trying at the very least.

My dad's ex died last year, and my dad considered going to the funeral for the sake of his sons. He wanted to show that he was there in support for them. He didn't end up going because he didn't want to make anyone feel uncomfortable.

 

[Dreamer_D]

I do

No big story, it was before I remember.

 

[LadyJane83]

Callisto- I think there are a lot of us out there. I think it must be very hard for a lot of people to leave relationships/marriages that they have been in for 20 or 30 years, especially if there is the whole Catholic guilt thing mixed in lol. I can''t even imagine...

My parents got married when I was 6. Before that, my dad lived in another state and I saw him only a few times a year. Then one day he just moved in and they got married shortly after. Very weird and confusing for me. I think they must have thought that it would be ok b/c we had a biological tie... but he was a stranger to me. It would have been the same if my mom had just met some random guy, introduced me to him a few times and then moved him in.

My mom also used to tell me that they were married when they had me, got divorced, and then got remarried. I found out the truth when I was 10 or 12, but this was also a little weird... I had no concept that it was "taboo" to have a child out of wedlock, and grew up in an area where divorces and having kids out of wedlock was pretty common.

Basically, my parents got married b/c they had a kid (me) together. My mom had me sort of young, so she sort of treated me more like a friend and would drag me into the middle of these things and ask me for advice when I was a teenager.

They used to fight all the time, it has calmed down a lot though. Basically my mom just denigrates my dad now, and says how she could have done better, rolls her eyes b/c he is "slow" etc., says she can''t really give me any advice b/c her marriage isn''t happy. I know that she loves him, and sometimes I think it is more a matter of her just liking to b*tch and complain. I have a brother who is much younger than me and he hates my dad, says how he''s so "stupid" etc. I wonder where he gets that from?

Anyway, that''s my little bit of drama.... felt sorta good to get it off my chest! I really try to make a conscious effort not to mimic my parents'' behavior in my own relationships. When I see myself getting snappy or condescending it scares me.

I think we can all learn things from our parents'' marriages/relationships (either what to avoid or what to emulate).

 

[Callisto]

Date: 3/26/2010 10:57:15 AM
Author: LadyJane83
I really try to make a conscious effort not to mimic my parents'' behavior in my own relationships. When I see myself getting snappy or condescending it scares me.


I think we can all learn things from our parents'' marriages/relationships (either what to avoid or what to emulate).

Me too... I try so hard not to bicker and fight like them, but it''s a constant internal battle for me. Even if you recognize the errors in your parents ways its hard not to be like them when that''s what you grew up with for 20 odd years. SO is very patient with me. It''s not that his parents didn''t fight, they do, but they don''t bicker about stupid things like my parents do, that''s what I have the hardest time avoiding.

 

[MustangGal]

My parents divorced when I was 1.5. My brother remembers it much more than I do, he''s 4 years older. My mom got remarried when I was 3, and has been with my step-dad for 27 years now. I don''t remember it at all, but I did see a difference in how my half siblings were treated. It wasn''t too bad, and I turned out just fine

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