Normal Marital Hatred

Oct 27, 2022

Anger Divorce marriage

recent article has people talking about the expectations we all carry into marriage and how we react when they are invariably unmet. According to the marriage therapists and researchers quoted in the article, a degree of difficulty and hard feelings is inherent in even healthy marriages.

As a divorce attorney, I certainly hear people clients discuss the dynamics and feelings that brought them to my office. Some stories have clear events that lead to the divorce such as infidelity, addiction, or abuse of some sort. Others relate stories of fundamental incompatibility or deeply seeded conflict over basic values such as financial stewardship or co-parenting differences.

But the most common reasons I hear from clients seem to fall under this idea of normal marital hatred. There is no one thing or event they can identify. Instead, the relationship has slowly eroded under the pressure of accumulated small events that went unnoticed and frequently unaddressed by one or both spouses through the years.

The article seems to suggest that this may be normal and not a sign that a marriage is terminally defective or that a divorce is necessary. If that is so, it makes one wonder what level of this normal “hatred” we need to be willing to accept in order to preserve what is typically the most important relationship in our lives.

Related posts

What Divorcing Couples Can Learn from The Psychology of Money

What Divorcing Couples Can Learn from The Psychology of Money

When most people think about divorce, they think about heartbreak, legal fees, custody schedules, and dividing property. But few realize that at the heart of many divorce disputes lies something more primal: our relationship with money. That’s where Morgan Housel’s...

The Most Important Envelopes of Your Life

The Most Important Envelopes of Your Life

When I help clients improve communication with their spouse, I often use a simple analogy: every message has two parts—the envelope and the letter inside.The letter is the core message—what you want the other person to understand. That can be a simple fact or it can...

Collaborative Divorce and High Conflict Couples

Collaborative Divorce and High Conflict Couples

When people hear the term "Collaborative Divorce," they often assume it’s only for couples who get along well and are amicably parting ways. While it’s true that Collaborative Divorce is a great option for low-conflict families, it can also be an incredibly valuable...