January 8, 2025 • 53 mins
Divorce is often difficult and painful, but there are positives too. We delve into the complications of getting a divorce in the US, especially for women, research about the impacts and how the conversation is shifting.
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome stuff. Never
told you production of by Heart Radio, and today we're
coming in Swinging in the new year. We are talking
about divorce in the United States and specifically how it
(00:28):
impacts women. It is a topic we have been meaning
to do for a while. I appreciate so much your
patients because a lot of times I'll be like, yes,
we're gonna do that, and then a year later and like,
here we finally are We do take care your suggestions.
We absolutely do. Sometimes it just takes us a minute.
(00:49):
And several of you have written in about it and
thank you for sharing your experiences about your divorce. And
recently I have gotten so many cold call emails about it.
This is what we call emails where people are like,
you should do a topic on this, and I was
getting so many about divorce. I didn't know that the
(01:11):
first Monday of January is divorce day? Did you know that?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
I did not know. That seems so sad at the
same time, why.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
I'm depending on you, Samanthy. You're the one who tells
me about cuffings. Heason. I don't know, but I based
on what I read, which, by the way, as of recording.
Divorce Day was this past Monday. People hold off on
getting the divorce until after the holidays, especially if they
have kids, so it's sort of the it's a new year.
(01:45):
I'm done with this. I would like to move on.
Situation disclaimer. We are not lawyers. Neither of us have
ever been married. Unless you have something to tell me.
Speaker 3 (01:57):
Unless you have something to tell me, no, between the
two of us, you would be treated into a marriage.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Before I was.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
I've been proposed to more than one, I'm sure, but
I have never ever ever been married. I do have
a friend who surprised me that she had been married.
I didn't know that. My dad also was married before
my mom, and I didn't know that. But anyway, I
do not get your legal advice from a podcast.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Please God, don't do it.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Don't do it, even if it's a legal podcast. No,
just look up other films.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Different states have different outlines of yes they're allowed to do.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Oh my gosh. So originally I wanted to do how
to get a divorce like step by step. I didn't
realize how vastly that varies in the United States. So
we're going to put that on hold for a minute.
(02:57):
I do want to come back and talk about it.
Because this is a huge topic. We are primarily focusing
on the US. Listeners from other countries please write in,
I'm really curious and yeah, we're definitely gonna have to
revisit it because the history of marriage, the religious aspects,
the legal aspects, how it has changed, and how it
(03:18):
hasn't changing. Your insurance, is your finance, is maybe your name,
your will, splitting your assets if you have them, child custody,
the history of racism, of homophobia, of ableism. See our
recent episode on disability and marriage. Like it's there's so
much to unpack in this episode. We have done past
(03:43):
episodes on some of these issues, but just know there
are so many of these histories and influences enshrined in
our laws in the US that still remain when you're
trying to get a divorce. We are going to touch
on LGBTQ plus divorce, but briefly, that's a whole separate
episode in itself, And frankly, when I was researching it,
(04:05):
I mostly just got law websites that I I wasn't
sure I could trustfully, to be honest, and that's not
a great place to be in when you're trying to
get a divorce. Yeah, so today we are mostly going
to be talking about divorce in the heteronormative sense. You
can't see our book where we did a chapter on
(04:30):
the legalization of gay marriage and all of the conversation
arguments about that, so check that out. You can also
see the episode we did on Glennon Doyle's book Untamed,
and you can see our episode on some research that
does single women are happier. Another thing to keep in
(04:53):
mind as we go through this, and we are going
to expound on it more, but divorce is hard emotionally, financially, legally,
it takes up a lot of your time. Sometimes legally
as in by law, it takes up a lot of
your time. But it's not always bad, and we often
frame it as a failure, especially for women. And you
(05:15):
can see our Religious Trauma episode on divorce for more
about that. Oh my, sometimes it is a good thing.
That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt or it isn't difficult,
but sometimes it's a net positive. On top of that,
marriage isn't bad. Many people have happy marriages, but marriage
has historically systemically favored men. And yes, the Internet will
(05:37):
tell you otherwise we will talk about that more later.
I personally haven't. I don't have a lot of experience
with divorce other than a friend, one of my very
close friends, her parents got divorced and it was really emotional.
(05:57):
I at one time, which I'll talk about a bit
more later, really wanted my parents to get a divorce.
I thought it would have been better. But through media,
I will say, I thought it was a negative thing.
I thought it was always bad. And through doing this research,
I have read many accounts by women where that is
(06:20):
not the case. But what about your Samantha, do you
have experience thoughts? Before we get into.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
This experienced thoughts, I will say, as a person who
did work for CPS to help protective services man, if
you don't know if your marriage is not gonna last,
or if you have doubts about your marriage, don't have children, Well, like,
that's the way they use a lot of cases, especially
(06:47):
when it comes to divorce, the way that children are
used to manipulate a lot of honestly women, I mean
both both sides. I guess we can say both sides,
but like we know that, uh, it's doing pregnancy and
divorce that is the highest risk for the death of
a spouse, the woman, specifically the wife. So like all
(07:10):
of these things and even with growing up in a
household that said, you do not divorce no matter what,
no matter what, like the only reason is for cheating,
and even that you need witnesses to the cheating, and
like he has to agree to the divorce as well,
biblical level of like how to get a divorce is
(07:30):
insane anyway, but like really coming and understanding as a
person who didn't have many relationships growing up, that wasn't
the most important thing for me watching family members around
me really trying to stick to that, even like condoning
that life, Oh gave me the biggest dick. So I
(07:51):
will say, as gross and as hard as divorce can
fill or you know, break ups, but divorce is a
whole different conversation. Being stuck in a miserable relationship where
you feel like you're trapped is even worse. And I
can't imagine fifty sixty years ago when people were really
really harping on that you have to stay together no
(08:12):
matter what is death do you part, even if it's
your death that he caused or they caused, Like it
doesn't matter, it's so absurd. I'm glad to see that
narrative changing a bit. I know everybody's still harping onto
the but the divorce and the fifty and his cause
of sin.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Yeah, but with that, I think.
Speaker 3 (08:40):
Marriage is not overrated, but it's not for everyone. And
I think that's a great reminder. This episode is a
good reminder things changed.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
That's what I'll also say. Yeah, and we're gonna get
into that because, as I said, this is a huge topic.
This is actually more of a kind of an update
on where divorce is in the United States, which we
are going to talk about kind of differences that are
really interesting between breakups and divorce when it comes to gender,
(09:14):
because you know, divorce involves you going to core to
file a document to like dissolve your marriage legally. It's
actually pretty difficult to track divorce rates in the US,
and that's not even accounting for separated couples, because for
a lot of reasons, people will separate but not get divorced.
(09:36):
The estimate is currently around forty percent. A lot of
times it's quoted at fifty, but they think it's actually
closer to forty. Most sources indicate that divorces are less
of a specific event and more often one partner deciding
to leave. And historically the increase has gone up with
women's evolving role in society. So there are a couple
(09:59):
of reasons behind this. Why this might be some of
them we're gonna get into a bit more, but just
off the top of my head, I was thinking about
like the history of marrying young older men marrying younger women,
so like, as you grow older, maybe this isn't for you.
The woman usually having to sacrifice for your family and
(10:22):
for your children, being kind of indoctrinated with this idea
that happiness is silly, You're not good enough to choose
your own well being. That would be selfish. That ideal
is kind of shifting. I think, who will care for
your kids if you have them? Can you afford childcare?
Who is getting paid more? I think these questions are
(10:44):
more prevalent. I did see this. I'm going to talk
about this more later, but when when we were researching this,
I saw a bunch of like magazine articles that were
(11:05):
like how to save your marriage, and a lot of
them were like, have we just tried being sexier? Though
I don't think that's flying anymore. I don't think that's working.
And also just a reminder, marital rape was legal till
disturbingly recently. So a lot of reasons why women couldn't
get divorced. Uh, we're it was difficult. There were financial
(11:30):
especially which we're going to talk about reasons why. And
now that's a little that's changed a little bit and
we're seeing more divorce and angry men on the internet
like to say it's women's fault, which I'm just like,
I think maybe, I think maybe things have just changed
and women have the option now and they didn't earlier.
But Okay, there have been a lot of headlines about
(11:54):
women and divorce in recent years. A twenty fifteen study
from the American Sociologicalnociation found that women initiated seventy percent
of divorces. The same was not at all true of
non marital breakups, which is interesting. A twenty thirteen study
out of Kingston University tracing the before and afters of
(12:15):
big life events found that women were generally happier after divorce.
I mean, if you're making that choice to get a divorce,
and I feel like that makes sense to me, right.
Speaker 3 (12:27):
I mean, and not again, we don't know for sure
when it comes to the lines when it comes to gender,
but typically big decisions like this, We talked about this
with like finances and stocks and how a lot it
has been noted that women have been a lot more
successful because they are patient and think through before they
make a decision. It's kind of the same with like
(12:49):
big life decisions like divorce, and they've gone through a
lot first. Like it's a TikTok trend to see how
people are, Like we've talked about weaponized and competence in
this life of stuff and women responding when they see
these types of things happening being like, yeah, and it's
going to come to that. I don't know, she's left
(13:10):
all of a sudden, and in natuality it has been
in a long time making that same kind of conversation.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Yes, yes, we're going to get more into that later.
Share Heights nineteen eighty seven Work Women in Love found
that four five hundred women aged fourteen to eighty five
that four fifths reported feeling their relationship was unequal. I know,
around ninety ninety percent of divorce women said they were
(13:39):
lonely in their marriages, and a whopping ninety five percent
said they experienced quote, emotional and psychological harassment. Her research
and the respondents were attacked by men who believed it
couldn't possibly be true. That can't be the case. I
am interested in how many cases I have of friends
(14:02):
who have been together for years getting divorced and breaking
up very quickly after getting married, like they were together
over a decade in more than one case, got married,
broke up within months.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
Yeah, I wonder again, it could be like the setup.
They've already had things planned, things taken care of, ready
to go, and then they're like, yeah, by tuggar, Yeah,
we'll see. Liz Lynd's, author of The American ex Wife,
How I Ended My Marriage and Started My Life, wrote,
these weren't just stories of women falling out of love,
(14:37):
but of political, cultural, and romantic institutions that asks too
much of wives and mothers and gives too little in return.
As one mother of four who runs her own small
business said, I'm a divorce single mom. Leaving my husband
didn't increase my workload. He wasn't doing much. My workload
is the same, but I have more peace now. I've
(15:01):
seen that a lot like essentially where the husband was
the other child that was making it more difficult.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Yeah, and that goes back to what you were saying.
Several studies did find that men claim they were surprised
by divorces, like she sprung this out of nowhere, right,
it came out of nowhere.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
That nagging that you've been complaining about that she does
was her trying to fix things.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Yeah. I read some really for me upsetting stories of
women pretty much just like outright asking for help, like
I need your help, and the man in this relationship
saying get it together. I don't know why you can't
(15:46):
get it together, and basically like gaslighting them and.
Speaker 4 (15:52):
Being right, I don't want to deal with whatever this
is that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Some research has found that women are financially worse than
men after divorced, sometimes by double percentage points, often due
to things like gender wage gap. Women are less likely
to remarry and frequently take on the soul burden of
childcare if children are in the mix. However, the same
studies found that women were happier in doing better at
(16:27):
their jobs than they had been pre divorced. Many women
reported feeling positive about taking that step the initiative, so
kind of like what you were talking about that here's
something on my to do list. I'm going to take
care of it. All of that comes with an important caveat.
Studies are usually focused on short term impacts of divorce.
(16:49):
A few of the long term ones indicate that women
over time actually do better financially post divorced, too. I
can say another caveat. Some women reported some objective satisfaction
of making or having their own money, even if it
was less than what their husband made. This is part
of why these things can be tricky to measure, because
(17:10):
our experiences shade our understanding, but also the subjective cannot
be measured fully but reported being happy that you know,
I'm making my own money, right, I like it?
Speaker 3 (17:22):
I mean subjective could be like getting away from the
mental abuse, emotional abuse, constant berating or scared of, you know,
saying the wrong thing.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Type of things you know really measure that.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
So other studies have found that many women reported higher
levels of happiness, a better social life, increased feelings of
control and self confidence after divorce, and often went on
to pursue creative career paths. They've also shown an increase
in sexual desire. I've actually heard that as a conversation
I don't know like the level, but like all of
(17:56):
a sudden they're ready to hit the road again, cited
for the new challenges and I've said it challenges.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Well, and to clarify, like a lot of the women,
a lot of times it's like, oh, she must not
have any sexual desire anymore, therefore there was no sex
in their marriage, and therefore their marriage ended. But a
lot of times, you know, they weren't maybe sexually attracted
to that person anymore, But that doesn't mean they don't
(18:25):
have sexual desire.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Right.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
Again, this is that whole conversation of like what is
sexy to certain people? Yeah, and it could be like,
I mean, we talked about affairs, so this is completely different.
But like why people get into affairs is the newness
and excitement of it. That could be something that's different,
or it could be that you're just especially like if
we're talking about the weaponized incompetence or any of those
(18:49):
types of levels where you're just finally done taking care
of your husband, they no longer look like a partner
to you, but more of something that you are stuck
with and orn care of constantly.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yeah, yes, and yeah, I mean I think again, not
to say that divorce is like all fantastic, but to
highlight that for so long we have framed divorce as
emphatically bad, and our studies have only looked into the negatives.
But recent studies have looked into the positives too, So
(19:22):
that's why conversation is changing a bit. Some research does
indicate that after divorce from a man, women may start
dating women for the first time, and this is what
happened in Glennon Doyle's book Untamed. You can see that episode.
But I did find that like a research paper, So.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
I've seen this in persons, Like I've seen this of
people who have been in long term marriages with children.
They get divorced and their next pecture is, this is
my new girlfriend, And I'm like, oh, congratulations, wait to
step it up. Like that's a you found who you were,
and you did not have that chance, possibly when you
(20:04):
first were in relationships and didn't understand who you were
or couldn't I like come to terms with who you
were at that time. I don't know, whatever the reason.
And now you're here like in a whole different level
of yourself, you know, and I'm like, go ahead, But
like I've seen that it could be that our generation,
that people who've become the divorces or getting divorced are
(20:27):
now a lot more open than they could have been before.
Like that could be the different changes honestly timing.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Yeah, but also going back to a lot of women
got married very young, so I think you might not
have known at that time. And it is like I said,
I mean, I don't want to downplay the divorce is
(20:54):
painful and we're going to talk about it more later,
but it's also it can be it can be something
that is good, and so I think we need to
talk about both sides, all of the shades of why
of how divorce can look. One of the things that
has grabbed a lot of attention in recent years is
(21:15):
something called gray divorce, which I had not heard of.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
I haven't either, This is new to me.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
Well, I think it got a lot of attention because
a lot of celebrities started doing it.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
But yes, okay, yeah, okay, I think I know the
terms without knowing. But going on, So, starting around twenty
twenty three, a lot of articles started coming u about
how women over fifty were initiating divorce. According to PE
Research and the American Psychological Association. Between nineteen ninety and
twenty ten, the divorce rate of people over fifty increased substantially,
(21:50):
while younger people still account for the most divorces. In
twenty nineteen, divorces initiated by people over fifty reached thirty
six percent, up from around at nine percent in nineteen ninety.
The media started calling this grey divorce.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Yes, and there are some key differences in great divorce
in how finances look. When it comes to getting divorced
at this age, there are typically more assets involved. On
top of that, if the couple has been together for
a long time, there are friend groups, communities, and possibly
children involved. So why is this happening? Researchers believe it
(22:31):
reflects changes in our society, especially when it comes to
women and their opportunities. Divorce and living in general is expensive,
and we've talked numerous times about financial abuse and especially
how that impacts women. Now that women can have jobs
and credit cards, because reminder that's fairly recent. The gender
(22:53):
wage gap is still a thing, but it is more
feasible for women to get a divorce in it had
been a couple of studies have found that women who
advance in their careers or are the breadwinners are more
likely to get divorced? And this raises several questions, including yes,
so who can afford to get divorced? How the narrative
(23:15):
would be presented flipped? But also it brings to mind
the nightmare of all the ambitious woman who is two
career obsessed. She goes home for Christmas and she doesn't understand.
This largely ignores the fact that ambitious men with families
were able to do it because they had wives at
(23:37):
home taking care of things. A lot of these arguments
are also conveniently ignore statistics around domestic abuse and partner violence.
And also people are living longer, so you might be like,
I've got a good thirty more years. Do I want
to spend it like this? So do I want to
(23:59):
get a divorced?
Speaker 3 (24:00):
Or you could do like me where you forget what
it is and how old you are and you're like nah, Also,
well I'm too young for that. Also until I realize, oh,
it's coming up to you can't have babies.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
Yeah, I'm okay with that too.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
Moving on, the person who is credited with terming the
term great divorce, A sociology professor Susan Brown said women
seem to be maybe a little bit more likely to
initiate divorce, but many would argue that they could actually
just be reflecting the fact that women are the ones
who have to do these types of tasks within relationships.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Hmmm, which is what we've been saying. So I think
that's important to keep in mind too, is like maybe
maybe the woman is usually just the one who fills
out the.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Baby, has to do the paperwork for them and be
like just sign for the love of Jesus science.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Oh, we're going to talk about some media portrayals soon
that brought that men of Twister. While there's a lot
of work to be done societally, we have moved towards
(25:16):
equitable marriages when it comes to things like domestic work
or something at least closer to equitable marriages. This means
that more women have reported being unwilling to settle for
quote empty shell marriages, especially after their kids leave home.
That being said, studies have been done on if things
(25:38):
like children leaving the home or catalyst for these later
in life divorces, and while they have been found to
be factors statistically, they weren't the main cause. Economic stability
was much more of an issue, but it still wasn't
there was no like way outlier. It was a lot
of things, I would say a lot of things. We've
(26:01):
also talked before about the health effects of divorce. Studies
indicate women typically have stronger support groups outside of their family,
meaning that they are more able to move on. Studies
have also found that women post divorce are more likely
to do rewarding activities they've always wanted to do, like travel,
(26:22):
or rely on their support groups, seek out therapy as
opposed to harmful coping mechanisms like drug and alcohol abuse.
But similar to what we discussed earlier, most studies are
on short term effects of divorce. Longer term studies suggest
that men recover just about as much as women, although
other studies found the opposite. So grain of salt is
(26:46):
always with these Social science surveys also found a really
great essay about kind of comparing the pandemic what we
saw in pandemic of where a lot of women were
having to stay at home and maybe quit their jobs
(27:06):
to take care of the kids. And the author was saying,
you know, like, if I had gotten divorced earlier, I
would have done this and this, and this, and who
knows how much creativity we've lost out on. So I
do think that's an interesting question of since women are
(27:31):
still tasked more with a child rearing and domestic stuff
on top of jobs, like, how much are we losing
from those women in terms of innovation and creativity?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
But what about the children?
Speaker 1 (27:47):
Though? Okay, so this is not not not an episode
on child custody when we're an episode on children whose
parents went through a divorce. But it is pretty impossible
to talk about a divorce that involves children without talking
about the children. We do not have the time to
go into the history, but very briefly, pregnancy could and
(28:08):
still can lead to death. So the person who was
pregnant often had to stay at home and the person
or persons caring for them provided shelter, food, and whatever
they needed. So this whole thing is still present in
our modern day systems of marriage and divorce and in
the workplace with things like pregnancy discrimination, which now we
(28:30):
have birth control and abortion ish family planning tools, but
all of that is being more and more restricted, so
it's sort of going back into the whole you have
to stay at home with the kids thing. The narrative
often solely puts the blame on women for divorce, especially
(28:53):
children are involved. She failed, and it is very complicated. Absolutely,
children can usually tell when you're miserable. They generally want
you to be happy. Women staying in a relationship and
using children as the reason why can be harmful not
just to the women but to the children. The narrative
also has been that women steal their children from men.
(29:18):
This is largely not true, but there are nuances that
get lass. It's a whole mess. It's a different episode.
I was overwhelmed looking to it. But yes, some divorce
women have spoken about how anxious joint custody made them,
not because of abuse or anything like that, but just
like having that time away from their children and actually
(29:42):
finding more time to relax do things for themselves, but
also reporting that it helped form a better relationship with
the father in this very heater norm of case, because
she had previously been taking care of everything and now
he had to actually deal with the kids. And this
for my of a Jimmy Kimmel bit where it's very uncomfortable,
(30:05):
but it's like a man on the street bit where
they just ask fathers to with their kids to like
name basic facts about their kids and they just fail,
and like who's to know. I'm sure they pick out
the worst ones, but it's like shocking, and then they
bring in the mother and she's like, oh, yes, this, this, this, this,
(30:27):
She's like she knows everything. So it just reminded me
of that in terms of like now you have to
actually learn about this kid.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
Oddly enough, I've seen skiits like that, except as about uh,
pet parents, I would to get that content literally, like
a lot of them are vets talking about how oftentimes
if it's not the woman in the heteronormative relationship heteros relationship,
then they don't know the information that they have to
(30:58):
call them, Like that's the skit is essentially if it's
the dude that always oh no it's him, he's not
gonna know anything. Can you please just have your wife
write down or all the information about the dog or
the cat. And I'm like, really, I've seen this before
and actually right like you were like what but that's
so funny to me because I can't believe it would
(31:20):
also translate to that, and we know there's so many
like I've never looked at any status about ownership, like
gender based on gender, but I think there's plenty of
men who do who own dogs or pets in general,
So I'm like, huh, it crosses over like that.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
Yeah, yeah, and this is like you can see our
Emotional Labor episode for more on this. But like, we
are not believers in gender essentialism here, but I do
believe that in socialization of gender and expectations of gender.
(31:56):
So I think it's much more like if you look
at the comments under those Jimmy Kimmel videos, people are
horrified and they're liken't. I can't believe you couldn't take
the barest interest in your own child.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
Like.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Because they don't have to. They haven't had to, right, So,
the belief that divorce was bad for children was really
enforced by a few poorly researched but very publicized and
popular books spanning from the eighties to two thousands. I
bet some of you know who which ones, along with
historic and systemic governmental and religious pressure that were layered
(32:33):
with racism and misogyny. In twenty fourteen, Florida Senator Marco
Ribau said that marriage was quote the greatest tool to
live children and families from poverty, and honestly yeah, going
back to our religious conversation around marriage and divorce, it's
a doozy, no wonder we had a twelve plus partner
on religious drum on my fault. It's not your fault
(32:56):
at all. Oh wow. But a twenty twenty study found
that women repartnering had no significant impacts on her adult children.
Other studies have found women are less likely to repartner
due to things like the fact that they are caring
for the kids, or they're older women, which you know
(33:19):
is the worst so who or that men just don't
like the idea of dating a woman who makes more
than them as much as they might like to say
that they're cool with it. Which was that an actual
study that I found?
Speaker 3 (33:35):
Of course, it is a to be fair. I think
if my current relationship, whom I'm very happy with.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
We do really well.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
We had like he knows everything about peaches, so we're good.
Like he could take car to the vet and he'd
be fine. I would put that out there, but like,
I'm like, I don't want to date I think in general,
just like for me in general, might.
Speaker 1 (33:59):
No, I'm good, Yeah, I just hang out with my dog.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
Thanks.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
Yeah, Oh, I think we're going to talk about that
in a little bit more at the end, but I
think that's kind of the general vine.
Speaker 3 (34:10):
Right, I'd rather be alone to those who who are dating, ye,
god speed, let us know what's going on.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
How are you?
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Oh so we're gonna get into laws? Yeah, yeah, you're
ready for it. So, by and large, it is easier
to get married than it is to get divorced in
the US.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
Yes, even at fourteen.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Yep, it is not easy.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Even if a lot of people like to paint this
as a oh you're quitting or you're giving up to
get divorced, it's actually a very long process. Uh. The
history is regionally specific. According to Investipedia, the first divorce
on record in America was granted in sixteen thirty nine
in the Massachusetts Bay Colony because a man named James
(34:58):
Luxford had married two wives. Luk's first punishment was to
relinquish his possessions to his second wife as alimony and
was put in the stocks, fined, and banished. So did
he get divorced from both people?
Speaker 1 (35:12):
Though?
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Which one?
Speaker 1 (35:14):
Yeah? I think just the one. I almost again this
episode I could have been so long because I wanted
to do famous examples of like how they changed parts
of Catholicism. Yeah, around the world.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
Henry the eighth, isn't that the whole story? He did
this because he a new wife, but then he just
killed all of them something.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
Yeah, I mean this is a simplification, yeah, but I
mean it's and looking at all the history is a
lot of men being like, I don't want to be
with you anymore. I want this other person, and that
has guided a lot of our laws. But okay, we
(35:59):
are not lawyers, as we said, And to be really honest,
I had no idea about how hard it was to
legally get divorced. So here are just a few examples.
And to be clear, these laws very by state. Here
in the United States, most states have waiting periods of
twenty to one hundred and eighty days, not to mention
(36:20):
the fees on top of that, this means for an
amount of time you're in sort of a painful limbo,
especially financially from what I read a lot, and emotionally absolutely,
but that financial part can be really difficult. Certain religions
require or strongly pressure you to get religious counseling. Marriage
(36:40):
is often given incentives, but single parents do not receive
anything close to that some marriage counseling and seminars are
text funded. Currently and unfortunate emphasis on Currently, no fault
divorce is legal in all fifty states. This rose in
popularity in the seventies and eighties in the US, after
(37:02):
first being legalized in California in nineteen sixty nine. And
I know some of you are like shouting out the computer.
We'll get to the fun effect behind that. At the end.
It means that you don't have to prove fault to
get divorced. Legal experts believe it was necessary to correct
a system that incentivized concocting plane to justify the divorce,
(37:22):
so like everybody was lying. Essentially. That being said, some
states require that the broken up couples spend a year
and one day in separate living spaces, which is not
so easy. This is often called the cooling off period. Obviously,
it can be painful and intimidating to prove fault in
(37:43):
an abusive marriage. Research has found a significant decrease in
suicide and women where no fault divorce was an option.
They've also found lower rates of domestic violence, which makes
sense to me. Apparently, in Texas you cannot finalize the
divorce while pregnant if the divorce seeing question is the
biological parent. Like I said, LGBTQ plus marriage and divorce
(38:08):
separate episode, but a lot of it is similar to
no fault laws in the US, but further complicated by
gendered laws and language like who is the biological parent?
Who is the quote mother? It can get really really messy,
so that future episode. And then this brings us to
(38:33):
just a brief venting session. Oh the internet, because when
I was looking this up, a lot of the first
results were men being real mad about how in their
minds divorce favors women, men blaming women for divorce, asking
what state they should go to to get divorce that
(38:55):
will favor them the most. And then, of course, as
per usual, the whole goal and make me a sandwich thing,
because yeah, like when do you stop and think about it?
Like men were working, they were getting to own things,
they were controlling their finances, they were getting out of
the house. But women were doing unpaid, unnoticed labor, cooking, cleaning,
(39:18):
chowd hearing and being made fun of her having frivolous
relationships outside of the house, like how we used to
still do make fun of like oh, she's always talking
with her friends, like it's so frivolous or useless. Other
studies have found that women work harder to receive less
in their jobs due to biases. So add that to
(39:39):
the pile. So for these angry men on the internet, Yeah,
the marriage is great. You come home to a meal,
you don't have to deal with the kids other than
like acknowledging that they're kids. Meanwhile, she's been working all day. Still,
I was working when you get home, and then it's
mocked if she's too tired for sex.
Speaker 3 (39:58):
You know, which is interesting because the level of women
coming back round to yeah, I'll be a stay at
home mom, and I will.
Speaker 2 (40:06):
I will serve you and.
Speaker 3 (40:07):
Cook you if you provide for everything else, and I
don't do a damn thing after this fact, Like that's
that conversation because from like maybe the seventies and probably
more so, and this is very like white perspective, heteronormative
ideals to like about what the nineties they said. They're
(40:28):
saying that the uptick of divorce happened in the nineties.
I don't remember. But all of that to say is
like women were working and doing the nine to five
coming home clicking and cleaning, taking care of the children
because they're also having children still at that point, and
the men were just working, coming home, putting their shoes up,
telling the kids to stay out of the way while
(40:49):
they watched their show. So this is all stereotype obviously
according to sitcoms, but like they were living their best life. Yeah,
and they're really mad that they had for a period
and they're like, why can't I have that again? And
it just doesn't make this to be.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
Like, yeah, it's I mean, it was upsetting and kind
of funny. They're like it would be like you know,
the Yahoo asked and it'd be why are you with
my woman not doing this anymore? And they're like, oh, wow,
you have.
Speaker 3 (41:22):
Whoa And this is kind of like and then it's
the basis of the red pill. And in so many
ways when we talk about that content, when we talked
about religious trauma, we're talking about Project twenty twenty five,
even which we haven't really talked about and we're going
to come back to, but all of these narratives of
like going back to the good old days, is that
(41:44):
that ideal of oppressing marginalized people for this specific look.
They're like I want to get back to where a home.
It was a home where two with a man and
a wife and two to three children, and the woman
came in as subservient to the man, but of course
the man protected her. Yes, that's us our job, that's
our duties. And it's kind of that beginning of, yeah,
(42:07):
that used to be such the golden days, as they
would claim, and it's it's the beginning of a narrative
for the red pill and having that level of if
we can get back to that, then all is right
with the world. And this is the whole point, and
this is the decency and the godliness that they are
talking about. And this kind of ideal for young boys
(42:29):
was like, yeah, why can't I have that? And it
slips into these are my rights when it never was.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
Right absolutely, And I think a lot of this was
in part missing the point of a twenty nineteen US
Census Bureau report that come through numerous studies and found
women do have more to benefit from divorce, like leisure time,
career time, time to relax less chores, less childcare. But
(42:57):
I think they took it and saw that as I'm
getting punished more for the divorce Coincidentally, this report also
found that areas that had more social nets and easier
access to divorce at higher rates of marriage. Interesting. But yes,
(43:26):
the media, we must also talk about that, because when
you talk about divorce and women, there are a lot
of tropes. The evil ex wife, the mean mom who
punishes her ex. I thought about missus stubtfire for that one,
nagging sitcom, wives, men complaining about the old ball and chain.
(43:46):
And then this whole idea of women changing or chaining
their man, which a lot of people who have written
about divorce have said, like, here's how you failed. You
should have changed him in this way. And I think
that's a problematic. No, No, you can work together on things,
(44:06):
but that whole idea. In nineteen seventy two, sociologists Jesse
Bernard wrote quote, there are a few findings more consistent,
less equivocal, and more convincing than the sometimes spectacular and
always impressive superiority on almost every index, demographic, psychological, or
social of married over never married men. Despite all the
(44:29):
jokes about marriage in which men indulge, all the complaints
they lodge against it, it is one of the greatest
boons of their sex because they always made fun of it.
They're always like, it's all bothering me. But a lot
of women have reported feeling like failures at first after
(44:51):
a divorce, but over time realizing that they made the
right decision and were happier. And a lot of them
have reported finding a community of other divorce women, not
even purposefully, always like you know, you'd be calling up
to cancel your insurance and like I'm getting divorced and like,
oh yeah, I would do that, or you know, something
like that, and how that helped them. Another Pew research
(45:13):
study found that most women are unsure about remarrying, while
most men want to. I do think this is pretty
telling in terms of who marriage largely benefits, as do
the study authors that found seventy percent of divorces are
initiated by women, but not breakups. One of the study authors,
Michael Rosenfeldt, said, I think that marriage as an institution
(45:37):
has been a little bit slow to catch up with
expectations for gender equality. Wives still take their husband's surnames
and are sometimes pressured to do so. Husbands still expect
their wives to do the bulk of the housework and
the bulk of the childcare. On the other hand, I
think that non marital relationships lack the historical baggage and
expectations of marriage, which makes the non marital relationships more
(45:59):
flexible and there far more adaptable to modern expectations, including
women's expectations to more gender equality.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
You know, what we haven't really talked much about is
the common law.
Speaker 3 (46:11):
Yeah, we have, which and Georgia has that I believe,
which is kind of concerning, why is this the thing?
Speaker 2 (46:20):
It seems very misogynistic.
Speaker 3 (46:21):
We haven't looked into it, very patriarchal, because I also
think if you're in that same level, like you, no
matter what you do, you're stuck type of conversation.
Speaker 2 (46:30):
But probably a different episode.
Speaker 1 (46:34):
Oh, absolutely definitely a different episode. And all of these
I mean, I hope we've been clear throughout. We did
research this, but it is you know, a lot of
it's not everybody's experience at all these things we're talking about.
But it's also interesting in terms of our media, where
the X or the single bomb is a failure, but
(46:55):
in fairy tales your dream come true as finding the
husband and getting made. Uh. This is also a conversation
of unrealistic expectations of love. But the point stands because
it stops when you get married, so you don't see
all the work or all the discord that might be
in it. I will say this brought back a memory
(47:19):
of when I was first starting as a host for Saver.
We were recording at a bar and there was a
group of divorced women who were there having the time
of their lives and we got into chatting. They were
just talking to us and they're telling us all their stories.
But it was I remember being like kind of moved
(47:43):
by how they were having this camaraderie and this. They
were like, oh, yeah, once a month we meet up,
and like, I really liked it. I thought it was great.
But they were very open about it. And one of
them gave me your business card and was like, after this,
I got to divorce law.
Speaker 2 (48:02):
That's amazing.
Speaker 1 (48:05):
It honestly was. It honestly was. And then my mom,
Like I said, I I reached a point where I
wished my parents had gotten divorced. I don't blame my
mom for not getting divorced, and I don't want to
get into it too deeply, but I've reached a point
(48:27):
where I was like, I think it would be better.
But after my dad died. She's been very open with
me about like, I don't want to remarry again. I
don't want to date again because I was always putting
his needs first. I was always worried about him and
what he wanted and what he wanted to do. And
those are like larger conversations to have about how we're
(48:48):
as women, socialized people please and put ourselves second. But
it's just been interesting to hear her be like, no,
I'm good, I am good. Things are changing, though, some
speculate that the whole idea of marriage is shifting, and
the data we're seeing here is very reflective of boomers
and gen X, but the younger generations won't follow the
(49:09):
same patterns. As Joey said in our recent episode on
being gen Z and dating, the goalposts and desires aren't
the same anymore. Necessarily, some countries have introduced laws around
divorce that recognize the value of domestic work, which is
interesting and on a less serious note, I have seen
a lot of recent conversation about being the stay at
(49:29):
home partner and having that scene as more of an
equal partnership, like actually recognizing the work I personally, I am
still grappling with some of the ways those conversations are phrased.
But I do like that, you know, I'm glad we're
taking that step of there is value in that work.
You should have known that all the time. But the
attitude around divorce has also changed. It's no longer ashamed
(49:52):
as it once was. That's not to say there isn't
still that aspect, but that is moving. I do want
to say. The flip side of this whole thing is
people who want to get married but can't for whatever reason,
and who long for partnership or might even need it
if they want to have kids. To afford kids, kids
(50:14):
are expensive. On top of that, it isn't always the
woman initiating divorce, and even if it was, there is
pain involved. So just to say I think it's good,
like I said, to recognize the full spectrum of it
doesn't always have to be bad. But it's also you know,
some people I read an article about, like I wish
(50:38):
I could get married before I could talk about divorce.
But anyway, and yeah, see things again like our disability
and marriage episode and unfortunately in our climate, oh, our
political climate. US House Speaker Mike Johnson called no fault
divorce a scheme VP jd Vance said it is an
(51:00):
salts on marriage. A few states have put forth proposed restrictions,
and to be clear, the restrictions are largely targeted at women.
And yeah, my fun fact tased earlier then Governor Ronald
Reagan was the one to legalize no fault divorces. He
was the first elected president to have a divorce. He
(51:20):
later said it was a mistake. Trump was the second
president to be elected to have a divorce, so a
at least one. So yeah, we clearly have a lot
to return to.
Speaker 2 (51:39):
His ex wife.
Speaker 3 (51:40):
He's now ex deceased wife was kind of like the
inspiration for the first Wives Club?
Speaker 2 (51:46):
Can we talk about.
Speaker 1 (51:46):
That, yes, which did come up in my like do
you need a movie about older women in divorce? And
we have an episode on it we have so you
can go check that out.
Speaker 3 (51:59):
A lot he makes a she does, don't get mad,
take everything.
Speaker 1 (52:06):
A lot of a lot of threads past episodes we've done,
in future episodes we need to do on this one.
But yes, listeners, please write in if you have any
experiences you want to share, our resources you want to share.
We do want to dig into this more deeply and
(52:26):
go in some other directions with it, so let us
know where you'd like us to go. You can email
us at stuff Media, mom Stuff at iHeartMedia dot com
or Hello at stuff one Neever Told You dot Com.
You can find us on blue Sky at mom Stuff podcast,
or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff one Never told You.
We have YouTube page, a tea public store, and a
(52:49):
book you can get wherever you get your books. Thanks
as always to our super producer Christine or Exective Duc,
to my and your contributor Joey, thank you, and thanks
to you for listening. Stuff never told you the propections
of Iheartradia. For more pod guest from My Heart Radio,
you can check out the art radio app, Apple podcast,
or where you listen to your favorite shows
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome stuff. Never
told you production of by Heart Radio, and today we're
coming in Swinging in the new year. We are talking
about divorce in the United States and specifically how it
(00:28):
impacts women. It is a topic we have been meaning
to do for a while. I appreciate so much your
patients because a lot of times I'll be like, yes,
we're gonna do that, and then a year later and like,
here we finally are We do take care your suggestions.
We absolutely do. Sometimes it just takes us a minute.
(00:49):
And several of you have written in about it and
thank you for sharing your experiences about your divorce. And
recently I have gotten so many cold call emails about it.
This is what we call emails where people are like,
you should do a topic on this, and I was
getting so many about divorce. I didn't know that the
(01:11):
first Monday of January is divorce day? Did you know that?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
I did not know. That seems so sad at the
same time, why.
Speaker 1 (01:22):
I'm depending on you, Samanthy. You're the one who tells
me about cuffings. Heason. I don't know, but I based
on what I read, which, by the way, as of recording.
Divorce Day was this past Monday. People hold off on
getting the divorce until after the holidays, especially if they
have kids, so it's sort of the it's a new year.
(01:45):
I'm done with this. I would like to move on.
Situation disclaimer. We are not lawyers. Neither of us have
ever been married. Unless you have something to tell me.
Speaker 3 (01:57):
Unless you have something to tell me, no, between the
two of us, you would be treated into a marriage.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Before I was.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
I've been proposed to more than one, I'm sure, but
I have never ever ever been married. I do have
a friend who surprised me that she had been married.
I didn't know that. My dad also was married before
my mom, and I didn't know that. But anyway, I
do not get your legal advice from a podcast.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Please God, don't do it.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Don't do it, even if it's a legal podcast. No,
just look up other films.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Different states have different outlines of yes they're allowed to do.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Oh my gosh. So originally I wanted to do how
to get a divorce like step by step. I didn't
realize how vastly that varies in the United States. So
we're going to put that on hold for a minute.
(02:57):
I do want to come back and talk about it.
Because this is a huge topic. We are primarily focusing
on the US. Listeners from other countries please write in,
I'm really curious and yeah, we're definitely gonna have to
revisit it because the history of marriage, the religious aspects,
the legal aspects, how it has changed, and how it
(03:18):
hasn't changing. Your insurance, is your finance, is maybe your name,
your will, splitting your assets if you have them, child custody,
the history of racism, of homophobia, of ableism. See our
recent episode on disability and marriage. Like it's there's so
much to unpack in this episode. We have done past
(03:43):
episodes on some of these issues, but just know there
are so many of these histories and influences enshrined in
our laws in the US that still remain when you're
trying to get a divorce. We are going to touch
on LGBTQ plus divorce, but briefly, that's a whole separate
episode in itself, And frankly, when I was researching it,
(04:05):
I mostly just got law websites that I I wasn't
sure I could trustfully, to be honest, and that's not
a great place to be in when you're trying to
get a divorce. Yeah, so today we are mostly going
to be talking about divorce in the heteronormative sense. You
can't see our book where we did a chapter on
(04:30):
the legalization of gay marriage and all of the conversation
arguments about that, so check that out. You can also
see the episode we did on Glennon Doyle's book Untamed,
and you can see our episode on some research that
does single women are happier. Another thing to keep in
(04:53):
mind as we go through this, and we are going
to expound on it more, but divorce is hard emotionally, financially, legally,
it takes up a lot of your time. Sometimes legally
as in by law, it takes up a lot of
your time. But it's not always bad, and we often
frame it as a failure, especially for women. And you
(05:15):
can see our Religious Trauma episode on divorce for more
about that. Oh my, sometimes it is a good thing.
That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt or it isn't difficult,
but sometimes it's a net positive. On top of that,
marriage isn't bad. Many people have happy marriages, but marriage
has historically systemically favored men. And yes, the Internet will
(05:37):
tell you otherwise we will talk about that more later.
I personally haven't. I don't have a lot of experience
with divorce other than a friend, one of my very
close friends, her parents got divorced and it was really emotional.
(05:57):
I at one time, which I'll talk about a bit
more later, really wanted my parents to get a divorce.
I thought it would have been better. But through media,
I will say, I thought it was a negative thing.
I thought it was always bad. And through doing this research,
I have read many accounts by women where that is
(06:20):
not the case. But what about your Samantha, do you
have experience thoughts? Before we get into.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
This experienced thoughts, I will say, as a person who
did work for CPS to help protective services man, if
you don't know if your marriage is not gonna last,
or if you have doubts about your marriage, don't have children, Well, like,
that's the way they use a lot of cases, especially
(06:47):
when it comes to divorce, the way that children are
used to manipulate a lot of honestly women, I mean
both both sides. I guess we can say both sides,
but like we know that, uh, it's doing pregnancy and
divorce that is the highest risk for the death of
a spouse, the woman, specifically the wife. So like all
(07:10):
of these things and even with growing up in a
household that said, you do not divorce no matter what,
no matter what, like the only reason is for cheating,
and even that you need witnesses to the cheating, and
like he has to agree to the divorce as well,
biblical level of like how to get a divorce is
(07:30):
insane anyway, but like really coming and understanding as a
person who didn't have many relationships growing up, that wasn't
the most important thing for me watching family members around
me really trying to stick to that, even like condoning
that life, Oh gave me the biggest dick. So I
(07:51):
will say, as gross and as hard as divorce can
fill or you know, break ups, but divorce is a
whole different conversation. Being stuck in a miserable relationship where
you feel like you're trapped is even worse. And I
can't imagine fifty sixty years ago when people were really
really harping on that you have to stay together no
(08:12):
matter what is death do you part, even if it's
your death that he caused or they caused, Like it
doesn't matter, it's so absurd. I'm glad to see that
narrative changing a bit. I know everybody's still harping onto
the but the divorce and the fifty and his cause
of sin.
Speaker 1 (08:33):
Yeah, but with that, I think.
Speaker 3 (08:40):
Marriage is not overrated, but it's not for everyone. And
I think that's a great reminder. This episode is a
good reminder things changed.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
That's what I'll also say. Yeah, and we're gonna get
into that because, as I said, this is a huge topic.
This is actually more of a kind of an update
on where divorce is in the United States, which we
are going to talk about kind of differences that are
really interesting between breakups and divorce when it comes to gender,
(09:14):
because you know, divorce involves you going to core to
file a document to like dissolve your marriage legally. It's
actually pretty difficult to track divorce rates in the US,
and that's not even accounting for separated couples, because for
a lot of reasons, people will separate but not get divorced.
(09:36):
The estimate is currently around forty percent. A lot of
times it's quoted at fifty, but they think it's actually
closer to forty. Most sources indicate that divorces are less
of a specific event and more often one partner deciding
to leave. And historically the increase has gone up with
women's evolving role in society. So there are a couple
(09:59):
of reasons behind this. Why this might be some of
them we're gonna get into a bit more, but just
off the top of my head, I was thinking about
like the history of marrying young older men marrying younger women,
so like, as you grow older, maybe this isn't for you.
The woman usually having to sacrifice for your family and
(10:22):
for your children, being kind of indoctrinated with this idea
that happiness is silly, You're not good enough to choose
your own well being. That would be selfish. That ideal
is kind of shifting. I think, who will care for
your kids if you have them? Can you afford childcare?
Who is getting paid more? I think these questions are
(10:44):
more prevalent. I did see this. I'm going to talk
about this more later, but when when we were researching this,
I saw a bunch of like magazine articles that were
(11:05):
like how to save your marriage, and a lot of
them were like, have we just tried being sexier? Though
I don't think that's flying anymore. I don't think that's working.
And also just a reminder, marital rape was legal till
disturbingly recently. So a lot of reasons why women couldn't
get divorced. Uh, we're it was difficult. There were financial
(11:30):
especially which we're going to talk about reasons why. And
now that's a little that's changed a little bit and
we're seeing more divorce and angry men on the internet
like to say it's women's fault, which I'm just like,
I think maybe, I think maybe things have just changed
and women have the option now and they didn't earlier.
But Okay, there have been a lot of headlines about
(11:54):
women and divorce in recent years. A twenty fifteen study
from the American Sociologicalnociation found that women initiated seventy percent
of divorces. The same was not at all true of
non marital breakups, which is interesting. A twenty thirteen study
out of Kingston University tracing the before and afters of
(12:15):
big life events found that women were generally happier after divorce.
I mean, if you're making that choice to get a divorce,
and I feel like that makes sense to me, right.
Speaker 3 (12:27):
I mean, and not again, we don't know for sure
when it comes to the lines when it comes to gender,
but typically big decisions like this, We talked about this
with like finances and stocks and how a lot it
has been noted that women have been a lot more
successful because they are patient and think through before they
make a decision. It's kind of the same with like
(12:49):
big life decisions like divorce, and they've gone through a
lot first. Like it's a TikTok trend to see how
people are, Like we've talked about weaponized and competence in
this life of stuff and women responding when they see
these types of things happening being like, yeah, and it's
going to come to that. I don't know, she's left
(13:10):
all of a sudden, and in natuality it has been
in a long time making that same kind of conversation.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Yes, yes, we're going to get more into that later.
Share Heights nineteen eighty seven Work Women in Love found
that four five hundred women aged fourteen to eighty five
that four fifths reported feeling their relationship was unequal. I know,
around ninety ninety percent of divorce women said they were
(13:39):
lonely in their marriages, and a whopping ninety five percent
said they experienced quote, emotional and psychological harassment. Her research
and the respondents were attacked by men who believed it
couldn't possibly be true. That can't be the case. I
am interested in how many cases I have of friends
(14:02):
who have been together for years getting divorced and breaking
up very quickly after getting married, like they were together
over a decade in more than one case, got married,
broke up within months.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
Yeah, I wonder again, it could be like the setup.
They've already had things planned, things taken care of, ready
to go, and then they're like, yeah, by tuggar, Yeah,
we'll see. Liz Lynd's, author of The American ex Wife,
How I Ended My Marriage and Started My Life, wrote,
these weren't just stories of women falling out of love,
(14:37):
but of political, cultural, and romantic institutions that asks too
much of wives and mothers and gives too little in return.
As one mother of four who runs her own small
business said, I'm a divorce single mom. Leaving my husband
didn't increase my workload. He wasn't doing much. My workload
is the same, but I have more peace now. I've
(15:01):
seen that a lot like essentially where the husband was
the other child that was making it more difficult.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
Yeah, and that goes back to what you were saying.
Several studies did find that men claim they were surprised
by divorces, like she sprung this out of nowhere, right,
it came out of nowhere.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
That nagging that you've been complaining about that she does
was her trying to fix things.
Speaker 1 (15:25):
Yeah. I read some really for me upsetting stories of
women pretty much just like outright asking for help, like
I need your help, and the man in this relationship
saying get it together. I don't know why you can't
(15:46):
get it together, and basically like gaslighting them and.
Speaker 4 (15:52):
Being right, I don't want to deal with whatever this
is that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Some research has found that women are financially worse than
men after divorced, sometimes by double percentage points, often due
to things like gender wage gap. Women are less likely
to remarry and frequently take on the soul burden of
childcare if children are in the mix. However, the same
studies found that women were happier in doing better at
(16:27):
their jobs than they had been pre divorced. Many women
reported feeling positive about taking that step the initiative, so
kind of like what you were talking about that here's
something on my to do list. I'm going to take
care of it. All of that comes with an important caveat.
Studies are usually focused on short term impacts of divorce.
(16:49):
A few of the long term ones indicate that women
over time actually do better financially post divorced, too. I
can say another caveat. Some women reported some objective satisfaction
of making or having their own money, even if it
was less than what their husband made. This is part
of why these things can be tricky to measure, because
(17:10):
our experiences shade our understanding, but also the subjective cannot
be measured fully but reported being happy that you know,
I'm making my own money, right, I like it?
Speaker 3 (17:22):
I mean subjective could be like getting away from the
mental abuse, emotional abuse, constant berating or scared of, you know,
saying the wrong thing.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Type of things you know really measure that.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
So other studies have found that many women reported higher
levels of happiness, a better social life, increased feelings of
control and self confidence after divorce, and often went on
to pursue creative career paths. They've also shown an increase
in sexual desire. I've actually heard that as a conversation
I don't know like the level, but like all of
(17:56):
a sudden they're ready to hit the road again, cited
for the new challenges and I've said it challenges.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
Well, and to clarify, like a lot of the women,
a lot of times it's like, oh, she must not
have any sexual desire anymore, therefore there was no sex
in their marriage, and therefore their marriage ended. But a
lot of times, you know, they weren't maybe sexually attracted
to that person anymore, But that doesn't mean they don't
(18:25):
have sexual desire.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Right.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
Again, this is that whole conversation of like what is
sexy to certain people? Yeah, and it could be like,
I mean, we talked about affairs, so this is completely different.
But like why people get into affairs is the newness
and excitement of it. That could be something that's different,
or it could be that you're just especially like if
we're talking about the weaponized incompetence or any of those
(18:49):
types of levels where you're just finally done taking care
of your husband, they no longer look like a partner
to you, but more of something that you are stuck
with and orn care of constantly.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yeah, yes, and yeah, I mean I think again, not
to say that divorce is like all fantastic, but to
highlight that for so long we have framed divorce as
emphatically bad, and our studies have only looked into the negatives.
But recent studies have looked into the positives too, So
(19:22):
that's why conversation is changing a bit. Some research does
indicate that after divorce from a man, women may start
dating women for the first time, and this is what
happened in Glennon Doyle's book Untamed. You can see that episode.
But I did find that like a research paper, So.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
I've seen this in persons, Like I've seen this of
people who have been in long term marriages with children.
They get divorced and their next pecture is, this is
my new girlfriend, And I'm like, oh, congratulations, wait to
step it up. Like that's a you found who you were,
and you did not have that chance, possibly when you
(20:04):
first were in relationships and didn't understand who you were
or couldn't I like come to terms with who you
were at that time. I don't know, whatever the reason.
And now you're here like in a whole different level
of yourself, you know, and I'm like, go ahead, But
like I've seen that it could be that our generation,
that people who've become the divorces or getting divorced are
(20:27):
now a lot more open than they could have been before.
Like that could be the different changes honestly timing.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Yeah, but also going back to a lot of women
got married very young, so I think you might not
have known at that time. And it is like I said,
I mean, I don't want to downplay the divorce is
(20:54):
painful and we're going to talk about it more later,
but it's also it can be it can be something
that is good, and so I think we need to
talk about both sides, all of the shades of why
of how divorce can look. One of the things that
has grabbed a lot of attention in recent years is
(21:15):
something called gray divorce, which I had not heard of.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
I haven't either, This is new to me.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
Well, I think it got a lot of attention because
a lot of celebrities started doing it.
Speaker 3 (21:28):
But yes, okay, yeah, okay, I think I know the
terms without knowing. But going on, So, starting around twenty
twenty three, a lot of articles started coming u about
how women over fifty were initiating divorce. According to PE
Research and the American Psychological Association. Between nineteen ninety and
twenty ten, the divorce rate of people over fifty increased substantially,
(21:50):
while younger people still account for the most divorces. In
twenty nineteen, divorces initiated by people over fifty reached thirty
six percent, up from around at nine percent in nineteen ninety.
The media started calling this grey divorce.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
Yes, and there are some key differences in great divorce
in how finances look. When it comes to getting divorced
at this age, there are typically more assets involved. On
top of that, if the couple has been together for
a long time, there are friend groups, communities, and possibly
children involved. So why is this happening? Researchers believe it
(22:31):
reflects changes in our society, especially when it comes to
women and their opportunities. Divorce and living in general is expensive,
and we've talked numerous times about financial abuse and especially
how that impacts women. Now that women can have jobs
and credit cards, because reminder that's fairly recent. The gender
(22:53):
wage gap is still a thing, but it is more
feasible for women to get a divorce in it had
been a couple of studies have found that women who
advance in their careers or are the breadwinners are more
likely to get divorced? And this raises several questions, including yes,
so who can afford to get divorced? How the narrative
(23:15):
would be presented flipped? But also it brings to mind
the nightmare of all the ambitious woman who is two
career obsessed. She goes home for Christmas and she doesn't understand.
This largely ignores the fact that ambitious men with families
were able to do it because they had wives at
(23:37):
home taking care of things. A lot of these arguments
are also conveniently ignore statistics around domestic abuse and partner violence.
And also people are living longer, so you might be like,
I've got a good thirty more years. Do I want
to spend it like this? So do I want to
(23:59):
get a divorced?
Speaker 3 (24:00):
Or you could do like me where you forget what
it is and how old you are and you're like nah, Also,
well I'm too young for that. Also until I realize, oh,
it's coming up to you can't have babies.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
Yeah, I'm okay with that too.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
Moving on, the person who is credited with terming the
term great divorce, A sociology professor Susan Brown said women
seem to be maybe a little bit more likely to
initiate divorce, but many would argue that they could actually
just be reflecting the fact that women are the ones
who have to do these types of tasks within relationships.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Hmmm, which is what we've been saying. So I think
that's important to keep in mind too, is like maybe
maybe the woman is usually just the one who fills
out the.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Baby, has to do the paperwork for them and be
like just sign for the love of Jesus science.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Oh, we're going to talk about some media portrayals soon
that brought that men of Twister. While there's a lot
of work to be done societally, we have moved towards
(25:16):
equitable marriages when it comes to things like domestic work
or something at least closer to equitable marriages. This means
that more women have reported being unwilling to settle for
quote empty shell marriages, especially after their kids leave home.
That being said, studies have been done on if things
(25:38):
like children leaving the home or catalyst for these later
in life divorces, and while they have been found to
be factors statistically, they weren't the main cause. Economic stability
was much more of an issue, but it still wasn't
there was no like way outlier. It was a lot
of things, I would say a lot of things. We've
(26:01):
also talked before about the health effects of divorce. Studies
indicate women typically have stronger support groups outside of their family,
meaning that they are more able to move on. Studies
have also found that women post divorce are more likely
to do rewarding activities they've always wanted to do, like travel,
(26:22):
or rely on their support groups, seek out therapy as
opposed to harmful coping mechanisms like drug and alcohol abuse.
But similar to what we discussed earlier, most studies are
on short term effects of divorce. Longer term studies suggest
that men recover just about as much as women, although
other studies found the opposite. So grain of salt is
(26:46):
always with these Social science surveys also found a really
great essay about kind of comparing the pandemic what we
saw in pandemic of where a lot of women were
having to stay at home and maybe quit their jobs
(27:06):
to take care of the kids. And the author was saying,
you know, like, if I had gotten divorced earlier, I
would have done this and this, and this, and who
knows how much creativity we've lost out on. So I
do think that's an interesting question of since women are
(27:31):
still tasked more with a child rearing and domestic stuff
on top of jobs, like, how much are we losing
from those women in terms of innovation and creativity?
Speaker 2 (27:46):
But what about the children?
Speaker 1 (27:47):
Though? Okay, so this is not not not an episode
on child custody when we're an episode on children whose
parents went through a divorce. But it is pretty impossible
to talk about a divorce that involves children without talking
about the children. We do not have the time to
go into the history, but very briefly, pregnancy could and
(28:08):
still can lead to death. So the person who was
pregnant often had to stay at home and the person
or persons caring for them provided shelter, food, and whatever
they needed. So this whole thing is still present in
our modern day systems of marriage and divorce and in
the workplace with things like pregnancy discrimination, which now we
(28:30):
have birth control and abortion ish family planning tools, but
all of that is being more and more restricted, so
it's sort of going back into the whole you have
to stay at home with the kids thing. The narrative
often solely puts the blame on women for divorce, especially
(28:53):
children are involved. She failed, and it is very complicated. Absolutely,
children can usually tell when you're miserable. They generally want
you to be happy. Women staying in a relationship and
using children as the reason why can be harmful not
just to the women but to the children. The narrative
also has been that women steal their children from men.
(29:18):
This is largely not true, but there are nuances that
get lass. It's a whole mess. It's a different episode.
I was overwhelmed looking to it. But yes, some divorce
women have spoken about how anxious joint custody made them,
not because of abuse or anything like that, but just
like having that time away from their children and actually
(29:42):
finding more time to relax do things for themselves, but
also reporting that it helped form a better relationship with
the father in this very heater norm of case, because
she had previously been taking care of everything and now
he had to actually deal with the kids. And this
for my of a Jimmy Kimmel bit where it's very uncomfortable,
(30:05):
but it's like a man on the street bit where
they just ask fathers to with their kids to like
name basic facts about their kids and they just fail,
and like who's to know. I'm sure they pick out
the worst ones, but it's like shocking, and then they
bring in the mother and she's like, oh, yes, this, this, this, this,
(30:27):
She's like she knows everything. So it just reminded me
of that in terms of like now you have to
actually learn about this kid.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
Oddly enough, I've seen skiits like that, except as about uh,
pet parents, I would to get that content literally, like
a lot of them are vets talking about how oftentimes
if it's not the woman in the heteronormative relationship heteros relationship,
then they don't know the information that they have to
(30:58):
call them, Like that's the skit is essentially if it's
the dude that always oh no it's him, he's not
gonna know anything. Can you please just have your wife
write down or all the information about the dog or
the cat. And I'm like, really, I've seen this before
and actually right like you were like what but that's
so funny to me because I can't believe it would
(31:20):
also translate to that, and we know there's so many
like I've never looked at any status about ownership, like
gender based on gender, but I think there's plenty of
men who do who own dogs or pets in general,
So I'm like, huh, it crosses over like that.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
Yeah, yeah, and this is like you can see our
Emotional Labor episode for more on this. But like, we
are not believers in gender essentialism here, but I do
believe that in socialization of gender and expectations of gender.
(31:56):
So I think it's much more like if you look
at the comments under those Jimmy Kimmel videos, people are
horrified and they're liken't. I can't believe you couldn't take
the barest interest in your own child.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
Like.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Because they don't have to. They haven't had to, right, So,
the belief that divorce was bad for children was really
enforced by a few poorly researched but very publicized and
popular books spanning from the eighties to two thousands. I
bet some of you know who which ones, along with
historic and systemic governmental and religious pressure that were layered
(32:33):
with racism and misogyny. In twenty fourteen, Florida Senator Marco
Ribau said that marriage was quote the greatest tool to
live children and families from poverty, and honestly yeah, going
back to our religious conversation around marriage and divorce, it's
a doozy, no wonder we had a twelve plus partner
on religious drum on my fault. It's not your fault
(32:56):
at all. Oh wow. But a twenty twenty study found
that women repartnering had no significant impacts on her adult children.
Other studies have found women are less likely to repartner
due to things like the fact that they are caring
for the kids, or they're older women, which you know
(33:19):
is the worst so who or that men just don't
like the idea of dating a woman who makes more
than them as much as they might like to say
that they're cool with it. Which was that an actual
study that I found?
Speaker 3 (33:35):
Of course, it is a to be fair. I think
if my current relationship, whom I'm very happy with.
Speaker 2 (33:43):
We do really well.
Speaker 3 (33:44):
We had like he knows everything about peaches, so we're good.
Like he could take car to the vet and he'd
be fine. I would put that out there, but like,
I'm like, I don't want to date I think in general,
just like for me in general, might.
Speaker 1 (33:59):
No, I'm good, Yeah, I just hang out with my dog.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
Thanks.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
Yeah, Oh, I think we're going to talk about that
in a little bit more at the end, but I
think that's kind of the general vine.
Speaker 3 (34:10):
Right, I'd rather be alone to those who who are dating, ye,
god speed, let us know what's going on.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
How are you?
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Oh so we're gonna get into laws? Yeah, yeah, you're
ready for it. So, by and large, it is easier
to get married than it is to get divorced in
the US.
Speaker 2 (34:32):
Yes, even at fourteen.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Yep, it is not easy.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Even if a lot of people like to paint this
as a oh you're quitting or you're giving up to
get divorced, it's actually a very long process. Uh. The
history is regionally specific. According to Investipedia, the first divorce
on record in America was granted in sixteen thirty nine
in the Massachusetts Bay Colony because a man named James
(34:58):
Luxford had married two wives. Luk's first punishment was to
relinquish his possessions to his second wife as alimony and
was put in the stocks, fined, and banished. So did
he get divorced from both people?
Speaker 1 (35:12):
Though?
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Which one?
Speaker 1 (35:14):
Yeah? I think just the one. I almost again this
episode I could have been so long because I wanted
to do famous examples of like how they changed parts
of Catholicism. Yeah, around the world.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
Henry the eighth, isn't that the whole story? He did
this because he a new wife, but then he just
killed all of them something.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
Yeah, I mean this is a simplification, yeah, but I
mean it's and looking at all the history is a
lot of men being like, I don't want to be
with you anymore. I want this other person, and that
has guided a lot of our laws. But okay, we
(35:59):
are not lawyers, as we said, And to be really honest,
I had no idea about how hard it was to
legally get divorced. So here are just a few examples.
And to be clear, these laws very by state. Here
in the United States, most states have waiting periods of
twenty to one hundred and eighty days, not to mention
(36:20):
the fees on top of that, this means for an
amount of time you're in sort of a painful limbo,
especially financially from what I read a lot, and emotionally absolutely,
but that financial part can be really difficult. Certain religions
require or strongly pressure you to get religious counseling. Marriage
(36:40):
is often given incentives, but single parents do not receive
anything close to that some marriage counseling and seminars are
text funded. Currently and unfortunate emphasis on Currently, no fault
divorce is legal in all fifty states. This rose in
popularity in the seventies and eighties in the US, after
(37:02):
first being legalized in California in nineteen sixty nine. And
I know some of you are like shouting out the computer.
We'll get to the fun effect behind that. At the end.
It means that you don't have to prove fault to
get divorced. Legal experts believe it was necessary to correct
a system that incentivized concocting plane to justify the divorce,
(37:22):
so like everybody was lying. Essentially. That being said, some
states require that the broken up couples spend a year
and one day in separate living spaces, which is not
so easy. This is often called the cooling off period. Obviously,
it can be painful and intimidating to prove fault in
(37:43):
an abusive marriage. Research has found a significant decrease in
suicide and women where no fault divorce was an option.
They've also found lower rates of domestic violence, which makes
sense to me. Apparently, in Texas you cannot finalize the
divorce while pregnant if the divorce seeing question is the
biological parent. Like I said, LGBTQ plus marriage and divorce
(38:08):
separate episode, but a lot of it is similar to
no fault laws in the US, but further complicated by
gendered laws and language like who is the biological parent?
Who is the quote mother? It can get really really messy,
so that future episode. And then this brings us to
(38:33):
just a brief venting session. Oh the internet, because when
I was looking this up, a lot of the first
results were men being real mad about how in their
minds divorce favors women, men blaming women for divorce, asking
what state they should go to to get divorce that
(38:55):
will favor them the most. And then, of course, as
per usual, the whole goal and make me a sandwich thing,
because yeah, like when do you stop and think about it?
Like men were working, they were getting to own things,
they were controlling their finances, they were getting out of
the house. But women were doing unpaid, unnoticed labor, cooking, cleaning,
(39:18):
chowd hearing and being made fun of her having frivolous
relationships outside of the house, like how we used to
still do make fun of like oh, she's always talking
with her friends, like it's so frivolous or useless. Other
studies have found that women work harder to receive less
in their jobs due to biases. So add that to
(39:39):
the pile. So for these angry men on the internet, Yeah,
the marriage is great. You come home to a meal,
you don't have to deal with the kids other than
like acknowledging that they're kids. Meanwhile, she's been working all day. Still,
I was working when you get home, and then it's
mocked if she's too tired for sex.
Speaker 3 (39:58):
You know, which is interesting because the level of women
coming back round to yeah, I'll be a stay at
home mom, and I will.
Speaker 2 (40:06):
I will serve you and.
Speaker 3 (40:07):
Cook you if you provide for everything else, and I
don't do a damn thing after this fact, Like that's
that conversation because from like maybe the seventies and probably
more so, and this is very like white perspective, heteronormative
ideals to like about what the nineties they said. They're
(40:28):
saying that the uptick of divorce happened in the nineties.
I don't remember. But all of that to say is
like women were working and doing the nine to five
coming home clicking and cleaning, taking care of the children
because they're also having children still at that point, and
the men were just working, coming home, putting their shoes up,
telling the kids to stay out of the way while
(40:49):
they watched their show. So this is all stereotype obviously
according to sitcoms, but like they were living their best life. Yeah,
and they're really mad that they had for a period
and they're like, why can't I have that again? And
it just doesn't make this to be.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
Like, yeah, it's I mean, it was upsetting and kind
of funny. They're like it would be like you know,
the Yahoo asked and it'd be why are you with
my woman not doing this anymore? And they're like, oh, wow,
you have.
Speaker 3 (41:22):
Whoa And this is kind of like and then it's
the basis of the red pill. And in so many
ways when we talk about that content, when we talked
about religious trauma, we're talking about Project twenty twenty five,
even which we haven't really talked about and we're going
to come back to, but all of these narratives of
like going back to the good old days, is that
(41:44):
that ideal of oppressing marginalized people for this specific look.
They're like I want to get back to where a home.
It was a home where two with a man and
a wife and two to three children, and the woman
came in as subservient to the man, but of course
the man protected her. Yes, that's us our job, that's
our duties. And it's kind of that beginning of, yeah,
(42:07):
that used to be such the golden days, as they
would claim, and it's it's the beginning of a narrative
for the red pill and having that level of if
we can get back to that, then all is right
with the world. And this is the whole point, and
this is the decency and the godliness that they are
talking about. And this kind of ideal for young boys
(42:29):
was like, yeah, why can't I have that? And it
slips into these are my rights when it never was.
Speaker 1 (42:35):
Right absolutely, And I think a lot of this was
in part missing the point of a twenty nineteen US
Census Bureau report that come through numerous studies and found
women do have more to benefit from divorce, like leisure time,
career time, time to relax less chores, less childcare. But
(42:57):
I think they took it and saw that as I'm
getting punished more for the divorce Coincidentally, this report also
found that areas that had more social nets and easier
access to divorce at higher rates of marriage. Interesting. But yes,
(43:26):
the media, we must also talk about that, because when
you talk about divorce and women, there are a lot
of tropes. The evil ex wife, the mean mom who
punishes her ex. I thought about missus stubtfire for that one,
nagging sitcom, wives, men complaining about the old ball and chain.
(43:46):
And then this whole idea of women changing or chaining
their man, which a lot of people who have written
about divorce have said, like, here's how you failed. You
should have changed him in this way. And I think
that's a problematic. No, No, you can work together on things,
(44:06):
but that whole idea. In nineteen seventy two, sociologists Jesse
Bernard wrote quote, there are a few findings more consistent,
less equivocal, and more convincing than the sometimes spectacular and
always impressive superiority on almost every index, demographic, psychological, or
social of married over never married men. Despite all the
(44:29):
jokes about marriage in which men indulge, all the complaints
they lodge against it, it is one of the greatest
boons of their sex because they always made fun of it.
They're always like, it's all bothering me. But a lot
of women have reported feeling like failures at first after
(44:51):
a divorce, but over time realizing that they made the
right decision and were happier. And a lot of them
have reported finding a community of other divorce women, not
even purposefully, always like you know, you'd be calling up
to cancel your insurance and like I'm getting divorced and like,
oh yeah, I would do that, or you know, something
like that, and how that helped them. Another Pew research
(45:13):
study found that most women are unsure about remarrying, while
most men want to. I do think this is pretty
telling in terms of who marriage largely benefits, as do
the study authors that found seventy percent of divorces are
initiated by women, but not breakups. One of the study authors,
Michael Rosenfeldt, said, I think that marriage as an institution
(45:37):
has been a little bit slow to catch up with
expectations for gender equality. Wives still take their husband's surnames
and are sometimes pressured to do so. Husbands still expect
their wives to do the bulk of the housework and
the bulk of the childcare. On the other hand, I
think that non marital relationships lack the historical baggage and
expectations of marriage, which makes the non marital relationships more
(45:59):
flexible and there far more adaptable to modern expectations, including
women's expectations to more gender equality.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
You know, what we haven't really talked much about is
the common law.
Speaker 3 (46:11):
Yeah, we have, which and Georgia has that I believe,
which is kind of concerning, why is this the thing?
Speaker 2 (46:20):
It seems very misogynistic.
Speaker 3 (46:21):
We haven't looked into it, very patriarchal, because I also
think if you're in that same level, like you, no
matter what you do, you're stuck type of conversation.
Speaker 2 (46:30):
But probably a different episode.
Speaker 1 (46:34):
Oh, absolutely definitely a different episode. And all of these
I mean, I hope we've been clear throughout. We did
research this, but it is you know, a lot of
it's not everybody's experience at all these things we're talking about.
But it's also interesting in terms of our media, where
the X or the single bomb is a failure, but
(46:55):
in fairy tales your dream come true as finding the
husband and getting made. Uh. This is also a conversation
of unrealistic expectations of love. But the point stands because
it stops when you get married, so you don't see
all the work or all the discord that might be
in it. I will say this brought back a memory
(47:19):
of when I was first starting as a host for Saver.
We were recording at a bar and there was a
group of divorced women who were there having the time
of their lives and we got into chatting. They were
just talking to us and they're telling us all their stories.
But it was I remember being like kind of moved
(47:43):
by how they were having this camaraderie and this. They
were like, oh, yeah, once a month we meet up,
and like, I really liked it. I thought it was great.
But they were very open about it. And one of
them gave me your business card and was like, after this,
I got to divorce law.
Speaker 2 (48:02):
That's amazing.
Speaker 1 (48:05):
It honestly was. It honestly was. And then my mom,
Like I said, I I reached a point where I
wished my parents had gotten divorced. I don't blame my
mom for not getting divorced, and I don't want to
get into it too deeply, but I've reached a point
(48:27):
where I was like, I think it would be better.
But after my dad died. She's been very open with
me about like, I don't want to remarry again. I
don't want to date again because I was always putting
his needs first. I was always worried about him and
what he wanted and what he wanted to do. And
those are like larger conversations to have about how we're
(48:48):
as women, socialized people please and put ourselves second. But
it's just been interesting to hear her be like, no,
I'm good, I am good. Things are changing, though, some
speculate that the whole idea of marriage is shifting, and
the data we're seeing here is very reflective of boomers
and gen X, but the younger generations won't follow the
(49:09):
same patterns. As Joey said in our recent episode on
being gen Z and dating, the goalposts and desires aren't
the same anymore. Necessarily, some countries have introduced laws around
divorce that recognize the value of domestic work, which is
interesting and on a less serious note, I have seen
a lot of recent conversation about being the stay at
(49:29):
home partner and having that scene as more of an
equal partnership, like actually recognizing the work I personally, I am
still grappling with some of the ways those conversations are phrased.
But I do like that, you know, I'm glad we're
taking that step of there is value in that work.
You should have known that all the time. But the
attitude around divorce has also changed. It's no longer ashamed
(49:52):
as it once was. That's not to say there isn't
still that aspect, but that is moving. I do want
to say. The flip side of this whole thing is
people who want to get married but can't for whatever reason,
and who long for partnership or might even need it
if they want to have kids. To afford kids, kids
(50:14):
are expensive. On top of that, it isn't always the
woman initiating divorce, and even if it was, there is
pain involved. So just to say I think it's good,
like I said, to recognize the full spectrum of it
doesn't always have to be bad. But it's also you know,
some people I read an article about, like I wish
(50:38):
I could get married before I could talk about divorce.
But anyway, and yeah, see things again like our disability
and marriage episode and unfortunately in our climate, oh, our
political climate. US House Speaker Mike Johnson called no fault
divorce a scheme VP jd Vance said it is an
(51:00):
salts on marriage. A few states have put forth proposed restrictions,
and to be clear, the restrictions are largely targeted at women.
And yeah, my fun fact tased earlier then Governor Ronald
Reagan was the one to legalize no fault divorces. He
was the first elected president to have a divorce. He
(51:20):
later said it was a mistake. Trump was the second
president to be elected to have a divorce, so a
at least one. So yeah, we clearly have a lot
to return to.
Speaker 2 (51:39):
His ex wife.
Speaker 3 (51:40):
He's now ex deceased wife was kind of like the
inspiration for the first Wives Club?
Speaker 2 (51:46):
Can we talk about.
Speaker 1 (51:46):
That, yes, which did come up in my like do
you need a movie about older women in divorce? And
we have an episode on it we have so you
can go check that out.
Speaker 3 (51:59):
A lot he makes a she does, don't get mad,
take everything.
Speaker 1 (52:06):
A lot of a lot of threads past episodes we've done,
in future episodes we need to do on this one.
But yes, listeners, please write in if you have any
experiences you want to share, our resources you want to share.
We do want to dig into this more deeply and
(52:26):
go in some other directions with it, so let us
know where you'd like us to go. You can email
us at stuff Media, mom Stuff at iHeartMedia dot com
or Hello at stuff one Neever Told You dot Com.
You can find us on blue Sky at mom Stuff podcast,
or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff one Never told You.
We have YouTube page, a tea public store, and a
(52:49):
book you can get wherever you get your books. Thanks
as always to our super producer Christine or Exective Duc,
to my and your contributor Joey, thank you, and thanks
to you for listening. Stuff never told you the propections
of Iheartradia. For more pod guest from My Heart Radio,
you can check out the art radio app, Apple podcast,
or where you listen to your favorite shows
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