My Divorce Disease

According to a study I read about tonight, divorce is contagious.  If you haven't seen it, you can read an article about it for yourself:

Is Divorce Contagious?

I doubt anyone will be surprised by their thoughts on the matter, but I HOPE that my divorce doesn't rock the foundation of any marriages. When my parents got divorced, the negative reaction from quite a few people from church disappointed me. My family had been faithfully going there for almost 10 years. Once they split, several adults (near my parents' ages) treated us like we had a disease. I literally saw a former friend of my mom's obviously go way out of her way to avoid my brothers and me right after she had seen us. I was about 25 years old. I guess some people think the kids can spread the disease too. I saw her several times again when I was in Texas and she still clams up and has NEVER said one word to me since. Weird, right? Perhaps, I should have gone out of my way to announce my divorce to her last year. hahaha.

I must admit that as news of my divorce spread there was a lot of sympathy for me and sadness for the situation. Discussing details of the extreme stress, financial burden, general future worries, dealing with lawyers, and all that goes along with the ordeal probably opened some of my friends' eyes to the fact that divorce is NOT as easy as many assume it is (even smooth ones like mine). There are many reasons it is considered one of the top stressors someone can experience in life. The stereo type that a lot of people do it simply because they fall out of love is probably an urban legend - or perhaps that kind of laid back attitude makes for a boring and stressless divorce. Most of my close friends in Texas that were there for me through this seem to have very solid (ideal) marriages and seeing me deal with this turned them off of divorce. -at least I hope it did.

However, there were friends (not in Texas) and a couple bloggers that reached out to me to say their marriages were on the rocks too. Some of them said they admired my strength for pulling out. In fact, a friend who got divorced a few years ago said that to me recently. She said she would still be with her "bum of a husband" if he had not walked away.

If divorce really is a disease, it is a HELLISH one that should be avoided any way possible. Fortunately, I didn't have a long drawn out, ridiculously expensive, no holds barred, full-on battle. Those kinds are normal though and should be enough to scare most bickering couples away. If you have a friend or sibling going through a divorce, remember to ask them about the things that will scare you away from catching anything harmful.