E61: If We Get D.I.V.O.R.C.E.D, Has Our Marriage Failed?

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[00:00:00.000] - Oliver (Host)

Almost half of marriages in the UK end in divorce. It's one of those statistics we've all heard so often that it's almost lost its power. But for the people living through divorce, it rarely feels commonplace. It rarely feels ordinary. For some, it's truly devastating. The end of years, sometimes decades of shared romantic history. For others, it's confusing, liberating, or both at the same time. And beyond the couples themselves, there are families, friends, and most importantly, children, whose lives are also reshaped by the separation. Despite this, every year, 250,000 UK couples still enter marriage full of hope, convinced that theirs will be different. It's curious, really, how we embark on something that fails in half of cases with such optimism. But perhaps that's part of the appeal, the promise that love can beat the numbers. Of course, it is important to remember that half of marriages don't end in divorce. Some couples stay together for decades happily, but many others also stay together unhappily for different reasons: habit, convenience, fear of change, or simply the belief that staying together is what decent people do.

[00:01:20.920] - Oliver (Host)

So when we look at the statistics, we have to ask how many of the successful marriages, the "successful" marriages, are truly happy ones? How many of them should maybe also end in divorce? And for those marriages that do end, the reasons and the reactions are as varied as the people involved. Some divorces are painful and emotionally fraught. Some are calm, almost administrative. The slow and simple acknowledgement that something once good has simply stopped working for them. But although people rarely say they found their divorce easy, it isn't always destructive. For many, divorce becomes a turning point, a difficult one, but also a chance to rebuild something more fulfilling. Even for children, that can sometimes mean a calmer, cheerier home life than the one that they had before, full of arguments. So perhaps we should consider the divorce isn't always a failure at all. Nevertheless, although we cheerfully celebrate beginnings, weddings, engagements, we still struggle with endings that don't fit into neat categories of success or happiness. The idea of celebrating a divorce, though increasingly common, still seems bizarre or in bad taste to many people.

[00:02:43.380] - Oliver (Host)

Today, we're talking about a big contradiction, why we continue to idolise marriage in a world that maybe knows better, and why divorce, despite being so common, still carries so much shame for many people. Is divorce really the worst possible ending for a relationship? Or is it just another form of growth for many people, another way of beginning again? But to start, I had to ask the César a simple but uncomfortable question: have you ever seriously considered divorce?

[00:03:17.900] - Oliver (Host)

Hello and welcome to English and Beyond, the Advanced Level English podcast, where we explore culture, ideas, and personal stories through natural conversation. My name is Oliver. I am an English, Spanish, and Latin teacher from the UK. And as always, you can find the free transcript of this episode, plus vocabulary flashcards to help you practise the difficult vocab at morethanalanguage.com.

[00:03:42.280] - Oliver (Host)

So, César. We have been married for two years, a little bit longer than two years. Have you ever seriously considered divorce?

[00:03:53.040] - César (Guest)

No.

[00:03:55.980] - Oliver (Host)

Today?

[00:03:57.580] - César (Guest)

No. Seriously, no, I haven't. Okay.

[00:04:02.560] - Oliver (Host)

Is that seriously like, No, really, I haven't, or I haven't in a serious manner, in a serious way?

[00:04:10.380] - César (Guest)

The first one.

[00:04:11.500] - Oliver (Host)

Oh, that's nice. Yeah. Well, that's okay. That's nicer than it could be.

[00:04:14.960] - César (Guest)

Okay. I'm not one of these people who give up very easily.

[00:04:20.280] - Oliver (Host)

My sister used to say that my mum was a fair-weather mum, fair-weather mother. That basically, if you were being a great child and, you know, performing well academically and keeping out of trouble, then she was like the best mother and very proud of you and everything. But then if you were a failure, she didn't want to know. Definitely not true. But an explanation of fair weather. You're not a fair-weather husband.

[00:04:46.820] - César (Guest)

No, exactly.

[00:04:48.640] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. Okay, fine. So hopefully, therefore, our marriage won't end up in the 45% of people in the UK whose marriages end in divorce.

[00:04:58.820] - César (Guest)

But at first I want to ask you, have you ever considered seriously divorce?

[00:05:05.420] - Oliver (Host)

I think in my family, we have a lot of divorce in my family, so divorce is no big deal. So of course, yeah.

[00:05:11.990] - César (Guest)

Every day.

[00:05:14.160] - Oliver (Host)

I'm someone that likes to consider their options. I think that - it's not something I intend to do. Let's leave it at that.

[00:05:25.320] - César (Guest)

César hasn't done the dishes: divorce.

[00:05:27.580] - Oliver (Host)

Divorce. I think that in my family, divorces is not taboo in the same way that it might be in some families. At least two of my siblings have had divorces. Both of my parents had a divorce before they met each other. Then my parents are not divorced, but they may as well be in the sense that I'm not gossiping in a horrible way about the terrible state of their marriage. But instead, my parents separated when I was about 13. But interestingly, they never actually got divorced, and they have what I would call a very happy separation. They go on holiday together. I guess that they are by default each other's best friends. They've never had any other partner. So in a way, it's basically a divorce, but in another way, it's basically a happy marriage.

[00:06:22.260] - César (Guest)

Yeah, very modern of them.

[00:06:25.600] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah, I suppose so. Why do you think so many marriages do end in divorce, though?

[00:06:30.520] - César (Guest)

Well, people live longer than before, right? So I guess-

[00:06:34.440] - Oliver (Host)

They look at their partner in the morning, and they're like an entire lifetime with you?

[00:06:38.080] - César (Guest)

Exactly. I guess back in the day when the average life expectancy was like, I don't know, 50, 60 years, people could hold onto it or could just, you know, wait. But I guess nowadays, I think there are so many different factors. I think the increased life expectancy is one. Also people, we expect more from life. That's why we change jobs or careers as well, more often than before. We change houses, we want to live in different places. I think it -

[00:07:21.500] - Oliver (Host)

People want more variation.

[00:07:22.080] - César (Guest)

- a generational thing as well.

[00:07:24.280] - Oliver (Host)

I think that's a really good point that I think in general societies in the West now put much less store in, let's say, they're much less concerned about the value of of endurance, kind of, just hanging on because it's the right thing to do in inverted commas. I think now people value, and I'm not saying that I think society is worse because of the change that I think that we've seen, but now I think people value personal autonomy much more. They value trying to prioritise certain aspects of your life to be happy. Whereas I think in the past, lots of the time, people stayed married because they had the attitude of like, what would the neighbours say? Or what would the church say if I tried to get divorced?

[00:08:10.570] - César (Guest)

Yeah, well, also women didn't have much options either. Many options.

[00:08:15.800] - Oliver (Host)

They didn't have the right to ask for divorce, did they?

[00:08:18.000] - César (Guest)

Financial independence is also very important when it comes to deciding, divorcing your husband or your wife.

[00:08:25.580] - Oliver (Host)

Well, that's actually an interesting thing as well, because when I was doing the research for this episode, people - well, it's still a preoccupation for lots of women. It's still a concern. It's still anxiety or worry what they're going to do financially. Because lots of women, whether it's because of personal choices, whether it's because they're paid less in their careers, whether it's because they've had to take a step back, while they, while, because if they've had various children, then they might have found that it's affected their career negatively. All sorts of different reasons mean that women often still worry about the financial side of divorce. Because there are lots of studies that show that women, after a divorce, are affected financially significantly, and men are affected significantly in other aspects of their lives. Obviously, there will be, in general, I think men are richer than women, no, so there will be a payout. But other than that, men often suffer from loneliness and problems with identity after a divorce because it's well known, no, that - there has been a spate of articles recently about the fact that most men don't have friends or have very few friends because they don't, there's not, the kind of cultural expectation of male friendships is very different. They don't have friends to talk to in the same way as lots of women do. I think that they rely on their wives more socially than women rely on their husbands. And so after a break up, I think that men who are already quite lonely end up even lonelier.

[00:10:00.560] - César (Guest)

That's why it's very important to have a good social network, even if you have a partner and a family.

[00:10:06.940] - Oliver (Host)

And a family, yeah.

[00:10:07.750] - César (Guest)

Well, they say that men struggle more with breakups, right? In general. I guess because we've not been brought up to show our emotional and all that, so women find it easier to go through that process of that grieving process and all the stages of depression or sadness, angriness, and acceptance.

[00:10:33.220] - Oliver (Host)

Let's talk then about the other party to divorce, the children. What do you think of that?

[00:10:41.720] - César (Guest)

Are you going to say that we have children as well now?

[00:10:44.000] - Oliver (Host)

Oh, yeah. Come on in, kids! No, we do not, and hopefully never will. Well, probably never will.

[00:10:51.440] - César (Guest)

The eldest is at the university right now.

[00:10:54.820] - Oliver (Host)

You look great. You don't look old enough to have a 20-year-old. Yeah. You actually could have a child who's... Because you're 36, so you could have had a child at 16, I suppose.

[00:11:06.600] - César (Guest)

I mean, I know people in Spain who was, who became a father as a teen.

[00:11:12.410] - Oliver (Host)

As a teen, yeah. And so your child genuinely would be at university. Anyway, you don't have kids, to my knowledge.

[00:11:20.640] - César (Guest)

As far as I know.

[00:11:22.840] - Oliver (Host)

What do you think about... And your parents never got divorced?

[00:11:30.000] - César (Guest)

But they never got married.

[00:11:31.130] - Oliver (Host)

They never got married. They were never really long-term together.

[00:11:34.230] - César (Guest)

Do you want me to tell the story?

[00:11:35.600] - Oliver (Host)

No. Okay. No, I'm not.

[00:11:37.800] - César (Guest)

They met, my mum got pregnant very quickly, and they were together for a few months, basically.

[00:11:46.440] - Oliver (Host)

Well, to make a very British observation on this, you talk about children coming from divorced parents, coming from a broken home, right? And neither of us actually came from a broken home because my parents never got divorced and your parents were never to get...

[00:12:01.090] - César (Guest)

Yeah, that's true.

[00:12:01.680] - Oliver (Host)

Your home was never intact to be broken.

[00:12:04.980] - César (Guest)

Yeah. But if we're going to talk about children, I got many friends - I don't have many friends, so I've got many, I've got some friends and an instances that they wish their parents got divorced.

[00:12:20.660] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah.

[00:12:21.160] - César (Guest)

That's like a constant narrative I hear from people saying, I wish my parents got divorced when I was a teen, when I was a kid, because I've been living in a house where everyone was angry all the time. You know, constant tension, constant shouting.

[00:12:39.080] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. I mean-

[00:12:40.970] - César (Guest)

Many parents, I think they don't get divorced because of the children.

[00:12:43.420] - Oliver (Host)

Exactly. They stay together for the kids. It's so common in the very nice town that I'm from with all of the parents - my parents never did this, but they were all members of the tennis club, and they'd go to tennis club socials and things like that. So my parents, maybe because of the dysfunctional family background that we had, we never did that thing at all.

[00:13:05.640] - César (Guest)

Tennis club socials.

[00:13:06.930] - Oliver (Host)

Exactly. I wouldn't know. I've never been. But...

[00:13:09.290] - César (Guest)

Bloody privileged brat.

[00:13:11.220] - Oliver (Host)

Rugby club socials, too. Also never got invited to those. But my point is that, I mean, that's probably my fault. It's not like I was a strapping rugby player. I can't blame my parents for that. But speaking of blaming your parents, this is the point that I want to make. If I were to have therapy and talk about my family, I could not honestly say that I blame my parents at all for the separation because I definitely found it positive. I think it was definitely the right thing for them to do. I think lots of people do stick to stay together for the children. And I do think that that can be an error.

[00:13:48.920] - César (Guest)

Do you find any benefits on having divorce or separated parents, like living in two houses?

[00:13:57.460] - Oliver (Host)

No, not really, because my parents were so-

[00:13:59.160] - César (Guest)

Were they spoiling you more?

[00:14:00.670] - Oliver (Host)

Not at all. No. My dad, I think, has never been one... When my dad gives a gift, it's a big gift, you know so it's not like - I'm sure that my dad, at Christmas, for example, had no idea what Father Christmas had brought us. I'm sure he was as surprised as we were when we pulled it out of the black plastic bin bags that my mum used to wrap our presents in. You can go and listen to the Christmas episode to hear more about that. But there was absolutely... My dad, who does listen to this podcast occasionally and sends me horrible messages about it, which I'll talk about next week, he'll be disappointed to hear that if he did spoil me to kind of win my favour, I don't remember it.

[00:14:54.560] - Oliver (Host)

It didn't pay off.

[00:14:55.860] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah, it was money wasted, I'm afraid, because I don't, I don't remember anything about anything like that. No, we had a ridiculous situation where my parents ended up living next door to each other. So they had a gate between the two garden fences. It was very serene. It was very tranquil. It was a lovely...

[00:15:17.980] - Oliver (Host)

I had an amazing upbringing. I recognise that lots of people in divorced and separated families won't have that, but I had absolutely no problems at all.

[00:15:26.280] - César (Guest)

That's good. I'm glad to hear that.

[00:15:27.900] - Oliver (Host)

What about your parents? They're actually very civil.

[00:15:32.220] - César (Guest)

I mean, they've always been like, I don't remember them together. For me, they're two completely different entities.

[00:15:41.520] - Oliver (Host)

Well, they came together for Christmas here last year. We cooked Christmas dinner in this flat, at this table.

[00:15:49.020] - César (Guest)

Did you say you cooked or we cooked?

[00:15:50.870] - Oliver (Host)

We cooked.

[00:15:51.310] - César (Guest)

We cooked, yeah. We tried a traditional British veggies Christmas dinner. Didn't work out.

[00:15:59.640] - Oliver (Host)

Not really.

[00:16:00.600] - César (Guest)

Some of the stuff we made.

[00:16:02.120] - Oliver (Host)

I don't think your dad will come again.

[00:16:04.960] - César (Guest)

But this year, we're going to spend the Christmas in the UK.

[00:16:08.540] - Oliver (Host)

Well, with my parents, who, although they're separated, I've never had a Christmas where they haven't been together, for example. So never got that - I mean, I definitely can't complain - but never got that double Christmas present dividend of separated parents. Yeah.

[00:16:26.990] - César (Guest)

Shame.

[00:16:28.260] - Oliver (Host)

Well, as a rounding off the topic question. If we were to get divorced or if anyone in your family or any of your friends or anything like that were to get divorced, would you regard that as a failure?

[00:16:44.380] - César (Guest)

I think life is a failure because you end up with death. In the meantime, while you are alive, you need to try things. If you get married thinking-

[00:16:55.020] - Oliver (Host)

Try divorce.

[00:16:56.360] - César (Guest)

If you get-

[00:16:56.940] - Oliver (Host)

It could be for you.

[00:16:57.980] - César (Guest)

No, I'm talking about marriage. If you get married, it's because you think you might spend most of your life with your partner, with your life partner. If that doesn't work out for any reason and you get divorced, well, obviously, it's a negative thing in your life, but I guess you can learn from that. At least you tried. It's like anything in life. If you want to set up a business, there's only one chance out of five to succeed, for example. If you want to have friendships, go on a trip, some of them will be successful, some of them won't. So actually, the 50% or 40% rate, I don't think it's that high.

[00:17:45.700] - Oliver (Host)

When you think of what a commitment it is, you mean?

[00:17:48.500] - César (Guest)

Yeah. Again, because life is very long. If you have spent 20 years with someone and they were happy-ish -

[00:17:59.820] - Oliver (Host)

Happy-ish.

[00:18:02.850] - César (Guest)

- why not?

[00:18:03.880] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah, fair enough. And at the end of the day as well, I think that, much better to get divorced than to be in an unhappy marriage, because I think the funny thing, the lie of those statistics, to be in keeping with the phrase, there's lies, damned lies, and statistics. Statistics always masking truths. Amongst those 45% of people or 55% of people who stay married, there will be a lot of very unhappy people who can't, for whatever reason, for financial, for religious, societal reasons, whatever, can't leave. All of those people hanging on for their children who wish that they could get divorced.

[00:18:50.480] - César (Guest)

I agree.

[00:18:51.860] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. I think that sometimes, I mean, you just have to think of that picture of Nicole Kidman leaving her lawyer's office after getting divorced from Tom Cruise. The joy. The joy of divorce.

[00:19:05.400] - César (Guest)

Yeah.

[00:19:06.780] - Oliver (Host)

Okay. Well, thank you for talking to me about this depressing topic. Thank you. And until next time.

[00:19:12.080] - César (Guest)

Bye.

[00:19:12.700] - Oliver (Host)

Bye-bye.