Divorce

 
 Martin Luther King Jr. once said " whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. This especially is no more true than when it comes to divorce. Divorce is a ugly thing that has the potential to affect so many people. I would like talk a bit about some of the struggles and affects of divorce. I would also like to discuss some of the protectors against divorce.
  When I was younger I loved to go to the park and throw rocks in the pond. As a child it always amazed me how I could throw a small rock and watch the ripples spread out feet away from the rock and even move and shake things such as small leaves in the water. In a way this is like a divorce. Many people may feel that a divorce doesn't matter and that is only between the husband and wife, but in reality it affects so many more. When there is a divorce in a family it is more than just the couple splitting up, it is often the whole family that gets split up one way or another. Often children in the family are left picking sides on who they want to be loyal to or spend there time with. Sadly often children may even be turned against one parent. It is not just the intermediate family who feels the affects of the divorce but often all of the extended family and friends feel at least some of the ripples and disruption of a divorce. Think about if there was a family who all went to church together and then there was a divorce. What would it be like for those members of the congregation? Do people stay friends with booth the husband and wife,or does it become awkward and soon something where individuals who were friends with booth have to take sides?And what happens to the grandparent who is the parent of the spouse who does not have custody? Most likely they will fell the affects of the divorce also and not be able to see there grandchildren as much either.
  As you can imagine there are problems other than loyalty issues. Things that are even more temporal and tangible like money. Did you know that the average distance of a divorced father lives from his teenager is around 400 miles. Thats a long distance and you can probably think of a lot of problems that would arise from that alone. One reason why this happens is because a divorce is financially draining and can be expensive. Often times booth the wife and husband will need to work more hours or even another job to get by in a divorce. The husband may have the need to work more hours or at a better job so that he can meet his child support payments. Also many traditional mothers if they have there own place to live will need to pay for there living situation which will mean the mother will have to work. Either that or she can live with relatives such as parents which will cause a move that may be a long distance away from the father.
  Sadly the list of symbolic ripples of divorce goes on and on and there is a numerous amount of problems that can come from a divorce. Sadly a study shows that 70% of divorced people in a sample reported  two years after there divorce that they should have stayed with there spouse and that they regretted getting a divorce. We can take away from this that it may be a good idea to wait a while when considering getting a divorce and think about all of the troubles that will come from a divorce instead of thinking about the troubles you may be escaping. It seems that a lot of times there may be a lot more reasons to stay together than to divorce. There are other protectors against divorce. One of theses protectors is money. Research shows that there is a high correlation between divorce and financial stress and there are less financially stable people getting divorced than the poor people. Another important protective factor is education. Couples with higher education are less likely to divorce. The final protective factor I wish to mention is religion. Religious people are less likely to divorce. Even though there are a lot of little things that may cause problems and uncertainty in a marriage there are a lot of things that will help us to stabilize a marriage that we can use to combat against divorce.
  There are of course exceptions of why a divorce may have good consequences such as leaving an abusive relationship. However, a lot of times it is the source of a lot of pain and struggles to come. Di spite popular belief divorce may be the path to more problems not the path away from them.