All of a sudden!!!!
Of late there has been an escalation in Sudden Divorce Syndrome (SDS) cases. As the name suggests, it involves taking a sudden decision about going in for divorce. But the peculiarity about this kind of divorce is that it is gender specific. It is restricted to only women. Multiple factors come to play here. It’s an outcome of years of discontentment and distress in a marriage. Men and women are wired differently, they have different ways of dealing with their emotions and expressing their feelings, especially in a marriage. After the newness of a marriage wears off, the relationship has all chances of getting mundane. Monotony sets it. Expression of love and affection is taken for granted. It becomes an ‘understood given’. So when a wife feels that things are going out of hand and when she points it out, the reaction or response determines the future state of marriage. Initially she might be heard and temporarily things become better. But in no time its back to square one. It’s about communicating one’s expectations, fears, thoughts, concerns, insecurities, dreams et. al. Usually she is labelled a nag to keep talking about her feelings. Her emotional outbursts are perceived as complaints. Slowly, she stops sharing her thoughts thinking that they don’t go down too well with him. Over the years when these feelings stop getting a vent and have percolated deeply into her system, it becomes unbearable.
Husbands don’t deliberately overlook their wives’ thoughts. Given the stressful times of today even they are struggling to find a means to their ends. It’s never easy when time is the biggest constraint. When a wife stops expressing her anxieties it is often misperceived as contentment. They feel everything is hunky dory. But the sad reality is they have no inkling about their wife’s state of mind. And when the wife suddenly announces her decision to break up, they are completely caught off the cuff. They are shaken up when the reality sets in. Panic mode sets in and they scramble to seek professional help to fix their already ‘broken beyond fixing marriage’. But, the wife has made up her mind. She’s done with the marriage.
No relationship can go sour overnight. Deep seated emotions need to be expressed, heard and validated. Pent up feelings and emotions over the years lead to such a situation. A two-way communication is extremely important for any relationship to work.
As much as SDS is a universal with women, my question is why should women bear the brunt of a mundane marriage? I would also like to stress upon the factor which makes women more susceptible to this. it’s the time factor. One always tends to take people with more time for granted. But when one realises that time is a constraint even for one’s partner, one would go that extra mile to be with him/her. So, my advice to all women is to lead a busy life. Work hard and cultivate a passion for something. Why think of SDS, when there are ways and means of dealing with your situation in a much better an effective way? It’s not the fall that kills you, it’s the sudden step at the end – ergo no sudden decision about divorce!!!!