[X&Y] What Makes Dating After Divorce So Tricky?

Published: Sat, 03/11/23


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WHAT'S INSIDE: Today we're talking about divorce. That
doesn't mean you have to be divorced to read this newsletter.

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WHAT MAKES DATING AFTER DIVORCE SO TRICKY?


My parents have been happily married for over 60 years.
They met in high school and got hitched while still teenagers. 

This is contrary to the naysayers who no doubt told them they
were too young. 

Ever since, my parents have always been the paragon of
health and happiness in a relationship.

So leave it to me to be the first on either side of the family to
get a divorce.

After that happened I got plenty of "advice" from my parents
and other family members. But since none of them had ever
experienced divorce, it wasn't necessarily all that helpful.

After all, people who are happily married for years can't
relate to what it's like.

Dating again after divorce is a whole different ball game than
what happened in high school and your young adult years.

It gets even more complicated the longer one has been
"away from the scene" before dating again.

Why is that?

Well, it all starts with what I call "The Divorce 50/50 factor".

Let's face it. A marriage between two good, healthy people
doesn't result in divorce that often, does it? Maybe you can
think of an exception. Or two. But definitely not more than
you have fingers on one hand, right?

Right. 

Because divorce is difficult on people, it is therefore typically
the result of someone irreparably betraying the relationship in
some way. 

It's unusual that a couple calls it quits because they "just
don't feel like being together anymore". 

Typically it takes violence, habitual disrespect, substance
abuse, considerable infidelity, tragic mental illness or the like
to bring about the divorce.

Simply put, when divorce happens someone has not been
a very nice person. He or she hasn't kept his or her end of
the commitment.

So, consider for a brief moment that you are divorced (which
for some of us isn't difficult). Short of some miraculous
"amicable" parting as allowed for above in rare instances,
there are only two sides of the table you can be on when
that divorce happens:

 
1)  The Victim


You wanted a happy, shiny marriage. You tried to make it work,
but in the end it was either too much of a weight to bear, the
physical danger became too much and/or your spouse left you
first anyway.

If this description fits you, there is going to be pain. 

The pain may influence caution at best, and outright distrust at
worst, when considering future relationships.


2)  The Aggressor


You blew it. The proverbial straw that broke the camel's back
was yours, and if it was the kind you drink out of, well...you
sucked. 

The running around, cocaine habit, drunken fits and/or whatever
else that was not co-habitable is now a dark secret you must
hide from anyone else you date, especially if you ever expect
to be married again someday. 

This is, of course, unless you are willing to end up with
someone with utterly zero self-confidence. Nice.


This adds up to a dramatically different landscape than when
we were all much younger and busy sizing up the fresh dating
pool around us.

At BEST, only 50% of divorced people can possibly be "innocent
victims" done wrong by a bad, untrustworthy ex-spouse. 

And at LEAST 50% of divorced people were "aggressors". 

Yikes...you can see how rough it can be sorting all of this out on
first dates with divorcees.
      
Oh, and please don't think I am about to sway the odds by
assigning gender specificity to the equation. Stop dreaming. 

And here's more: the number of purely "innocent victims" is in
actuality considerably smaller. 

Why? Because there is nothing stopping two "aggressor" types
from getting married and making each other miserable, is there?

Those marriages end also, spilling both ex-spouses back into the
dating pool. 

And wait a minute...even if one ex-spouse is purely a "victim" rather
than "aggressor", haven't we talked recently about how poverty
mentality is closely associated with victimhood? 

Yeah, well...that's not a healthy way to enter a future relationship,
either.

Worse, if both ex-spouses were "aggressors", that typically means
that BOTH are also "victims", complete with finger-pointing and
utter denial. 

And if you're thinking what I'm thinking, you're thinking that last
paragraph was scary.

So what if you are divorced like I am? 

Are we dating fellow divorced people? Well, why wouldn't we?

We can relate to one another MUCH better, even often at the
single parent level.

But meanwhile we've shed some light on why even more second
marriages fail than first marriages..

You don't want yours to be one of them.

With that in mind, here are the hard questions to ask ourselves
if divorced and dating again.



1)  Was I an "aggressor"? If so, was it a simple mistake or a
habitual pattern that MUST be corrected in order for me to
contribute to a successful relationship in the future? If a simple
mistake, can a future spouse forgive me for that past history
more than my ex-spouse was able to? If a habitual pattern, can
I own up and get it handled--forever?


2)  Was I a "victim"? If so, do I see myself being abused as
such over and over? Can I ever trust someone again? Do I
know how to recognize the traits of an aggressor and not
settle for someone who will cause history to repeat itself?


3)  Do I know how to get down to the bottom of which category
(or both) the new person I am dating is in? Or WAS in? What
kind of skill does that take? How finely tuned a B.S. detector
do I have to have? Am I confident that whichever category it
is, my new friend has put the error of their ways in the past?
If she is still struggling, am I settling? 

Hint:  When it comes down to it, most of your divorced dates
will position themselves as having been the "victim",
especially now with the easy scapegoat of "toxic masculinity"
available to them.


4)  What are reasonable expectations for a couple to have
when both are considering marrying a second time? What is
the difference between having "been around the block" a few
times and/or having been to the "school of hard knocks" vs.
carrying truly destructive, deal-breaker traits? Can you
recognize these? 

Hint:  It has nothing to do with what is hard to hear about the
past, and everything with how the future would potentially
play out.



I know I used to ask myself these sorts of things on a daily
basis.

I tried following some people's advice to find a nice, smart,
attractive mid-twentysomething who didn't have any
"baggage" (whatever that means, right?).

I wasn't happy. 

Hey, I liked being able to relate to whom I'm dating. So that
meant dating a woman who had been divorced and was a
single parent was a good thing for me.

And that's who I married the second time around. 

But you know by now that I am about deserving what you want
in a relationship, which means I see the importance of handling
the issues that being divorced brings.

And you can be sure I've learned how to appreciate a woman
who has done the same. How about you?


 
 



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