Can A Marriage Be Saved After A Divorce?
by leslie cane: Much of the time, I hear from people who are trying to save their marriages before a divorce is final. Often, they know that they have a finite amount of time to get their spouse back before the marriage officially and legally ends. Many see the final divorce decree as the end of their marriage when there is no longer any chance to get their spouse back.
Occasionally though, I hear from folks who are still holding out hope that they can actually save their marriage or get their spouse back even after a divorce has already happened. I recently heard from a wife who said, in part: “our divorce was final two months ago. I didn’t want a divorce. My husband said he still loved me but felt that we would be better off divorced. We actually get along better now than we did when we were married. Sometimes, my husband will say things like ‘maybe in the future there will be another time for us’ and this always confuses me because I don’t know any couples who saved their marriage or reconciled after a divorce, although I’d like that more than anything. Is it possible for a marriage to be saved even after a divorce? If so, how does this happen and how can I make it happen for me?” I’ll try to address these concerns in the following article.
Statistics On Couples Who Remarry Each Other After A Divorce: I spent a lot of time trying to find any statistics that would tell me how common this truly is. Unfortunately, there’s no national agency that keeps track of this. However, I read several articles which indicate that getting back together or saving a marriage even after a divorce is not at all uncommon for every day married couples (since we all know of celebrity couples in Hollywood who have married and remarried one another more than once.)
I found an article which interviewed divorce attorneys and court personnel. The article indicated that these professionals admitted to seeing several cases of couples getting back together after a divorce each year. This is pretty much in line with what I see on my blog. It doesn’t happen every day and it’s not as common as couples remaining divorced, but it most certainly does happen and it doesn’t really shock me when it does.
Why Couples Would Want To Save Their Marriage After A Divorce?: I discussed this topic with a couple of people in the course of my research and a few of them were confused as to why this would happen. I heard comments like “if things were so bad that a divorce was necessary, then why would the couple want to get back together and save their marriage? It doesn’t make sense.”
Well, it can make a lot of sense if you’re one of the people intimately involved. Much of the time, as in the case of the wife above, one or both people really didn’t want the divorce. Sometimes, people go along with this because they think it’s what their spouse wants, or they don’t know what else to do, or they feel that there’s really nothing that they can do to save their marriage, although they’d like to.
Other times, people find that their feelings change once they’re no longer right in the middle of volatile emotions and the pain that a failing or ending marriage can bring about. As time passes, anger and resentment can fade. People realize that they were either wrong or that they overreacted. And it’s not uncommon to see your spouse in a new light once you begin to miss them or realize just how much you’ve lost after the divorce.
What Is A Marriage Like When It Was Saved After A Divorce? Do The Problems Just Magically Go Away? Do You Just Pick Up Where You Left Off?: It’s not at all uncommon for me to hear from couples who regret the divorce. But, many believe that their problems were insurmountable. Others figure that a relationship that ended in divorce is doomed to fail the second time around, especially if nothing ever changes.
Many of the couples that I’ve known or read about who remarried after their divorce will tell you that they now have a new relationship and a new marriage. Those who are successful and who remain married after they get back together will often tell you that one or both of them needed to work out some things on their own so that they could return to the relationship in a healthy way. And many will tell you that they are more willing to get counseling or some sort of self help for any issues that remain because they saw the damage that delaying or neglecting this help caused the first time around.
The vast majority of couples who remarry will tell you that they both found that the grass was definitely not greener on the other side of the fence. Many will be lonely or will date again, only to realize that they actually miss, long for, or have a very different opinion of their spouse once that spouse is no longer around or feels lost to them. And this is one reason why couples will tell you that they are more motivated to try much harder and to make things work after they’ve been given a second chance.
But most of these couples will tell you that they are most definitely not just picking up where they left off. Many want to do everything in their power to make sure that they never divorce or lose their spouse again so they are very motivated to work through those things that caused the divorce in the first place (and some agree that they realize their problems weren’t as dire as they seemed in the past.)
I’d like to make one last point. I read a few comments from counselors which indicated that many professionals and couples agree that getting back together after a divorce is actually easier for some than starting all over with someone else who is essentially a stranger (since you already intimately know and have deep emotional ties with your former spouse.) Although you’re forging a new and better relationship, you’re not starting from scratch since you already deeply know and have experienced life with this person. You are therefore in a better position to avoid the pitfalls that caused the divorce while embracing those things that keep bringing you back together.
Although my husband and I were going through a divorce, it never became final. However, when we did get back together, it did feel like a shiny, new, and better relationship. We did have to rebuild, but once we did, neither of us regretted it. If it helps, you can read more of that story on my blog at http://isavedmymarriage.com
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