Should I Keep Trying to Work it Out?

Should I keep trying to work it out? Wow, How many times did I say that to myself during my 17 years of marriage.

Chapter 8 of our book reads “Faithful Latter-day Saints are hardly immune to divorce. Precise estimates of the Latter-day Saint divorce rate are difficult to obtain but one estimate is 25 to 30 percent of couples who regularly attend church experience a divorce.”

I remember being at church after people found out I was getting divorced and people would say “ I had no idea”, “you were such a perfect family”, “you always seemed so happy”. Church was the hardest place to go because people had no idea what was actually happening in my marriage and we did a really good job of not letting on that there were ever any problems. We were the perfect little family, in the perfect house with the perfect cars and the perfect life, or so everyone thought. Inside, every time anyone would comment on anything having to do with my marriage or my life I always thought to myself “if they only knew”.  Church is still hard because there aren’t many single men or women and it can be uncomfortable being one of the only ones. I don’t really fit in.

President Faust of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints gives a three-part test to determine if ending a marriage is justified.
Prolonged difficulties-spouses should spend a lengthy amount of time attempting to repair or reduce serious problems. Couples should not contemplate divorce before doing this.
Apparently irredeemable relationship-the relationship has little hope for being repaired
Destruction of human dignity-the relationship threatens to destroy the dignity of one or both spouses.

“Some divorces are necessary and just, and may actually serve to clarity the moral boundaries of marriage by identifying behavior that seriously violates marriage covenants.”

As a divorced women, I learned that sometimes it can be really hard to know if a divorce is necessary or not. For some relationships it’s easy to tell, it doesn’t mean it's easy to leave the marriage but we know that if we are being abused in anyway it is necessary to leave the marriage. In situations like mine, I didn’t realize until I was out of the marriage that it was necessary. I didn’t realize until after I was divorced that there was some emotional/verbal abuse happening. I didn’t realize that I was so dependent on my ex-husband that I had lost all opinions, thinking for myself, control of my actions. It wasn’t until after my divorce that I realized that I wasn’t being treated the way I should have been treated by my husband. That doesn’t mean that it was all his fault and that I treated him perfectly but I believe that my actions were based on his treatment of me.

I did a lot of praying after my divorce. Asking God to help me through, to help me as I tried to parent by myself, to help me get through financially, to help me know what to do for my future. We learn as members of the church that prayer and speaking to God will help us to build faith. It will help us to get through hard times and soften our hearts.
The biggest thing I learned form this chapter said “it is important for those at the crossroads of divorce to surround themselves with a network of friends and family who will support their efforts to repair and strengthen their marriage rather then urge them to abandon the marriage.” although I was not at a crossroads, my husband was getting a divorce no matter what, I did not surround myself with a network at all. I backed away from anyone and didn’t want to spend any time with anyone that was going to want to talk about or ask me about why my marriage ended. I hardly left my house and just focused on my kids as I had a one year old at the time. It was probably the worse thing I could have done for myself and I really feel like I wasted away the first 6 years after my divorce being miserable and staying to myself and not letting anyone in. We need our support group more than ever when we are going through these times.

I believe that there are marriages that can be fixed and if you are in one of those do whatever you can to make it better. Learn to love your husband again. Divorce is hard and it’s something I would not wish on anyone. If you can work it out do it. It will be better for everyone involved.






Hawkins, A., Dollahite, D., & Draper, T. (2012). Successful marriages and families. Provo, Utah: BYU Studies and School of Family Life, Brigham Young University.