Marriage and Happiness

I just finished reading Jen Abbas’s Generation Ex, a study of the impact of divorce on adult children of divorce. This book was particularly interesting to me, because my parents are still married. I am not an adult child of divorce, and this book helped illuminate some of the sorrows I didn’t have to endure that most people my age have.

While the harm of divorce is well documented for kids and the adults they eventually grow up to be, there is a false assumption that it’s a trade-off when the parents seek their own happiness. Abbas puts divorce into the context of the greater struggle in our lives to defer gratification.

Divorce rates skyrocketed at a time when popular psychology taught our parents that institutions such as church, family, and even marriage hindered their “true-self.” Happiness, however they chose to define it, was the ultimate goal, and to be healthy, they needed to pursue whatever might bring about that satisfaction, even divorce. Without an understanding of the ultimate fulfillment that comes through delayed gratification and the sacrifice of struggle, our parents divorced in droves, teaching us that marriage is disposable and families exist in flux.

I’m not sure there’s a policy solution to this deep societal problem that may be quietly impacting us more adversely than the things that capture the most media attention. This may come down to the individual couple. My parents are heroes for having stayed together. No doubt that’s hard for anyone, and that was no exception for my mom and dad. If you’re trying to make the world a better place, but you’re planning to get divorced, think more carefully about what you’re doing to your future self and society.

Eric Shierman lives in Salem and is the author of We were winning when I was there.