Navigating the Complex Decision to Divorce or Stay Together |
The Challenges of Divorce
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Ambivalence and opposing realities are central to divorce decision-making.
Rational and emotional evaluations often diverge and make it harder to achieve clarity.
Turning points emerge after cycles of reconsideration.
Deciding whether to divorce or remain in a marriage is typically framed as a rational choice in couples counseling, wherein individuals are expected to evaluate their relationship, weigh advantages, disadvantages, and alternatives, and arrive at a decision. However, the reality of divorce decision-making often shows a markedly different actuality, which is based not on a discrete, linear decision, but on the process of an ongoing negotiation of opposing forces. These may manifest as coexisting realities rather than alternatives, including commitment versus withdrawal, emotional attachment versus dissatisfaction, and hope for change versus anticipation of continued distress. This iterative process of revisiting the same questions repeatedly, usually cycling through periods of doubt and reconsideration, helps explain the tendency of relationship decisions to wax, wane, and waver, reflecting the dynamic nature of relationship evaluation over time.
Steps in Deciding to Divorce or Stay
Based on my extensive experience as a couples therapist, research findings, and my own ongoing research on online (remote) couples therapy, I have outlined a few steps and considerations involved in the decision-making journey for divorce or reconciliation.
Appraising the Relationship
Individuals assess the state of their relationship, reflecting on past, present, and future aspects. They evaluate the challenges, such as recurring or critical issues or chronic problems, and this typically leads to considering alternatives, including the possibility of divorce or seeking help.
Navigating Tensions While Deciding to Divorce or Stay
Simultaneous opposing internal tensions inherent in the process are so-called dialectical tensions, comprising four interdependent dimensions, including time, space, logic, and dialogue, each introducing its own set of tensions. To navigate them, the relationship tends to move along one of three trajectories: temporary states of growth, entropy, or maintenance. Growth is about engagement and attempts at repair, entropy involves reduced effort and disengagement, and maintenance is simply the preservation of the status quo without substantive change.
Dialogue: The divorce versus staying decision-making process is shaped by internal and external dialogue. Internal dialogue involves self-reflection and questioning personal values, identity, and commitment, as well as evaluating possible future scenarios, while external dialogue involves discussions with partners, input from friends, family, or professionals, and engagement with broader cultural narratives about marriage and divorce. Notably, much of the decision-making process occurs internally and may not be fully communicated within the relationship, contributing to asymmetries in awareness between partners.
Time: In the context of divorce versus staying decision-making, time is not experienced as a straightforward progression from past to future. Partners revisit past events and evaluate current dynamics and possible futures, often non-sequentially and repetitively, which complicates a decision and may return the process to earlier stages of consideration. For example, it's possible to be clear about wanting to leave the relationship, but have a lack of clarity about the future.
Space: Deciding whether to divorce or stay in a relationship is grounded in concrete realities of spatial considerations, encompassing living arrangements, financial resources, parenting logistics, etc., which shape both the feasibility of separation and the perceived consequences of staying.
Logic: This dimension manifests as an ongoing tension between logical, sensible evaluation and emotional experience. On one hand, individuals may engage in rational assessments of the relationship, considering the advantages and disadvantages of staying together and divorcing, comparing the current relationship to potential alternatives, and identifying barriers to marital dissolution (e.g., financial, social, or emotional costs).
The Challenges of Divorce
Take our Relationship Satisfaction Test
Find a therapist to heal from a divorce
On the other hand, there are emotional considerations comprising feelings: love, happiness, appreciation, rejection, betrayal, fear, anger, disappointment, sadness, etc. These rational and emotional assessments do not always align neatly, as the relationship may be evaluated as unsatisfactory from a rational standpoint while remaining emotionally significant, which complicates reaching a clear decision.
The decision to divorce or remain in the relationship involves considering the tensions of the opposing dimensions, including rational versus emotional logic, past versus future considerations, and individual versus collective needs. As such, it is an evolving process of reinterpretation.
Understanding divorce decision-making as an analytical process challenges the assumption that couples therapy should facilitate a clear and timely decision. Rather, the primary therapeutic task is to identify and explore how the tensions are managed, and to recognize patterns of movement between growth, entropy, and maintenance.
During the process, partners may reach a tipping point that catalyzes a decision, whether it be divorce, reconciliation and repair, or staying together without resolving issues (e.g., for convenience).
Sometimes, the decision to either leave or stay is influenced by specific circumstances, events, or moments that help partners find clarity, if even temporarily. Interestingly, research has found that these circumstances or pivotal moments seem to encourage couples to choose to stay in a relationship, and this decision is often related to something one spouse did.
Couples counseling is concerned with both preserving relationships and supporting their optimal conclusion. However, in my work with couples trying to decide whether to divorce or stay, I focus less on directing them toward a particular outcome and more on helping them engage with the complexity of their experience in a reflective manner.
Allen, S., & Hawkins, A. J. (2017). Theorizing the decision-making process for divorce or reconciliation. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 9(1), 50–68. https://doi.org/10.1111/jftr.12176
Harris, S. M., Crabtree, S. A., Bell, N. K., Allen, S. M., & Roberts, K. M. (2017). Seeking clarity and confidence in the divorce decision-making process. Journal of Divorce & Remarriage, 58(2), 83–95. https://doi.org/10.1080/10502556.2016.1268015
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