Divorce is rarely a pleasant experience and despite the soaring rates in divorce, it is still considered taboo.

In recent years there has been a tremendous rise in divorce rates. Divorce itself is today still considered to be taboo in our society. In fact women (men in certain cases too) facing some very serious marital problems, still think twice before mentioning the word ‘divorce’. Many, who make it to a divorce court, are generally accused of taking marriage either ‘very lightly’ or ‘of not having tried hard enough to adjust’. In some cases, insensitive and unwarranted remarks are made by the so called ‘know-it-alls’; close and not so close friends and relatives of the family and couple, who claim to know everything about a broken marriage.

But, is there any justification for remarks such as these? Were these people even there? Is it then fair to make such statements? After all what goes on between a couple is really just that ‘between’ the couple. While some of the stories spread about a couple’s dissensions could be true, who’s to be the judge? On whose door should the blame of a failed relationship lie? Is it the mismatched couple/marriage, adjustment, interfering in-laws and so forth?

Divorce is never pretty. One party, if not both, will get hurt and probably badly, especially if emotions, children and family are involved. Rumours will fly and mudslinging will happen which unfortunately is a reality. Divorce makes serious issues between a couple’s marriage, very, very public and that is what many dread. However, should a couple who are unhappy with each other suffer silently in a hypocritical marriage, and sometimes a very publicly humiliating one? Or should they be allowed to make their choices; to grab that chance of a little happiness by going separate ways?

Even children from unhappy marriages testify that it’s hell to be a part of the tensions between a warring couple. Children often become convenient scapegoats and are used by their ‘near and dear’ ones for revenge purposes. This, in itself, creates complexed individuals who eventually end up having dysfunctional relationships in adulthood. There are many that can in actuality never commit to an adult relationship/ marriage due to commitment fears built up during childhood.

Reasons for divorce could be practically anything — an inability to adjust, infidelity, financial difficulties, family pressure, impotence, infertility, physical disability, interference of the in-laws, inability of being able to consider ones husband or wife in that particular role, sexual preferences, rape, physical-verbal-mental abuse and the list goes on and on. During the divorce many friendly relations and relatives become unfriendly, whereby people actually get at each other’s throats; friends too find themselves having to make choices by taking sides. Divorce is rarely if ever friendly.

The emotional, and on occasion physical, battering one takes during the marriage and consequent divorce sometimes leads one to think that ‘life’s the pits’ or ‘will I ever lead a normal life again’? This is apart from the social and personal stigma of being labelled a ‘divorcee’. One also has to deal with financial and family pressures.

Having heard and personally seen so many cases the purpose of this story is to give the viewpoints of a few individuals who survived the ups and downs of bad marriages. This article is not meant to undermine or hurt anyone’s sentiments but instead to broaden those horizons, and perhaps views that are not seen from the eyes of those that claim they ‘know-it-all’. For some it may also be a learning experience, while for others sharing a similar experience that is theirs or of someone they know. Divorce isn’t the end of the motion picture of life for there could also be a ‘happily ever after’ — whether one chooses to remarry, stay single, become the committed career-a-holic or whatever. The following are case studies of certain individuals as told to TR.

Faiza

Faiza (36) had been married for 10 years and cared very much for her husband. Hers was an arranged marriage. She says, “My father was a successful professional so I had the pick of the best of men. I’d been engaged twice before but found that what my ex-fiancees wanted was very different from what I wanted. I needed the magic of love, friendship and kids, while they were more interested in how their careers could be furthered being married to me. When Amjad’s proposal came, I agreed because he seemed to be the kind of person who was just right.

“The first couple of years everything about our marriage was perfect but then our relationship started deteriorating on a physical level. Amjad didn’t want to consummate our marriage any longer, and the times I insisted seemed a duty. He would keep finding excuses to avoid any sexual contact. These excuses initially hurt me and then when it went on for a time I started thinking maybe there’s something about me. The strangest of thoughts would enter my mind.

“When I asked him to consult a doctor, he refused to discuss it. The physical tension got too much for me. We’d been married 10 years and had no children. Questions started coming and subtle hints by his and my family precluded visiting a fertility clinic. It gave me many sleepless nights. Finally, when I couldn’t take the stress any longer, it all came out.

“My family talking to Amjad gained no response which is when I decided to end our marriage. It was a very painful decision. He was my dear friend, my family more than a husband and after you’ve lived with someone for 10 years... I wanted him, I wanted to have a family and I wasn’t getting any younger. I felt extremely alone in our relationship.

“Amjad was very upset with me, our separation and consequent divorce, as was I. I missed him but knew this was the only way I would survive or go crazy.”

Amjad, when contacted preferred not to delve into the past. Faiza, who had been working for a multinational during her marriage to Amjad, resigned and went back to studying design after the divorce. It was something she’d wanted to pursue at one time but had put off. She worked her way up gaining recognition in the field and is happy with her second husband. Amjad remarried as well.

Maya

Maya was in her late 20s and felt the need to get married. None of her siblings were married and she felt she didn’t want to be left on the shelf, so when she met Misbah, she promptly fell in love and when he proposed she accepted with ‘relief’. Maya says she was so willing to go blindly into the relationship that she couldn’t even see the telltale signs of future destruction. “Misbah asked for a certain dowry to be given —— like a Rolex and other very expensive things. My parents were planning to give me the usual stuff but his list was over the top. I insisted they give in to most of his demands. My parents came under pressure to please.

“The abuse started about six months after our marriage. Initially, I thought I must have done something to displease him as he would make up to me afterwards. But as time went on, it just started getting worse. He would call me names, insult me and my family and then hit me. Whenever my parents saw a bruise on me I would say things like, ‘I fell down the stairs, banged into a door.’ I could have told them, but just did not. I felt I’d made the choice and had to live with it. I guess pride would not allow me to admit my marriage was a mistake.

“However, my sister started to suspect something was wrong and confronted me so I told her. I kept hoping Misbah would change, as by then we had a son.”

But the next time Maya’s husband hit her and quite badly, her sister broke the promise and told their parents. They were shocked and tried suggesting counseling to Misbah —but he got even more abusive to Maya. She left when she realized Misbah would never change. It was she, who would have to make the changes.

Having finally decided to give up her husband of five years, she asked for, and got, custody of their son, to whom he has visitation rights. He still insults and badmouths the mother of his son to gain sympathy of strangers. Maya, meanwhile, six years down the road has gone on to become a successful writer. She also fell in love and married someone else with whom she is not only blissfully happy, but has three beautiful children. In retrospect, Maya feels that had she not felt the pain of her first marriage, she would not now have known what a blessing she had in her second.

Javed and Sana

Javed comes from a background of wealthy, politically active landlords. Sana, his ex-wife, is a model, hailing from a socially prominent family. Both were cousins and married after falling in love. This too despite family opposition and trepidation. Having moved out of the joint family environment within a few months after marriage (Sana didn’t want to live there), they installed themselves in a new home. Happiness abounded until Sana realized she had her husband to herself all day, every day! Sana’s says it confused her that he was literally at her beck and call and that’s not the kind of image she had of men, more so husbands and marriage.

Javed’s character was not that of a stereotypical landlord. He was the youngest in his family, broad-minded, gentle, soft-spoken and a quiet kind of person. He had never had to work as all his needs were catered to by his family. The problem according to Sana was: “He was home and around all day; I had no breathing space. He didn’t even go to work. It got to me.” He says, “She wanted to go out all the time and mostly without me.”

Some people complain of never having enough time to be with their loved ones and financial problems, whereas here it was the opposite. The marriage didn’t last even a year. Sana asked for a divorce, although Javed wanted to try for a reconciliation; he went out of his way to set up a business he could run apart from the family to make her happy. She, however, had decided that Javed’s gentle ways were not her way; she wanted someone far more macho, preferably her current infatuation (whom she did not eventually marry).

Javed remarried four years after his divorce, to a girl who is again a cousin but much younger than him. He says he’s much happier now because his present wife understands him better and is willing to lead a quieter, family-oriented life. Of the past Javed feels, “Sana hurt me then, but I now understand her psyche. She wasn’t ready to settle down. Although she was a single, working woman when I knew her, she wasn’t totally independent of her family. She also wanted to get out of her home and live her own life. Marriage to me gave her the independence and time to find her feet, but it was also in fact too much for her to handle.”

Sana, five years down the road is still living with her family. Working for a multinational eventually gave her the independence she craved for and after a little more experience with life and unsuccessful relationships, she says, “I was immature then and didn’t appreciate what I had. Not that I would have had it any other way. A lot of my friends and cousins are now married, I see what its like for them. I feel I am now ready to commit, to get married.” Sana did find her kind of guy and has recently taken the matrimonial plunge.

Nadia and Qadir

Nadia and Qadir married for love and were socially and family-wise thought of as an ideal couple. She was the perfect bahu, he was the wonderful son-in-law. To complete their pre-conceived ideas about wedded bliss they had two kids within eight years of their marriage. Life couldn’t have been better, that is until Qadir met someone else.

He says, “I loved Nadia. We’d been married a while but I feel the passion just went out of our relationship. Then I met Tanya and things went crazy. I just couldn’t stop myself; I wanted to marry her. I told my parents and Nadia, and well they were dead against it. I couldn’t live without Tanya so I walked out of our home and married her. My parents as a result disinherited me. Everything I took for granted was gone with my one decision. But Tanya was by my side and we just started over.

“I know Nadia was hurt by my actions but I couldn’t live in the situation of a husband and wife with Nadia any longer. I just couldn’t pretend...I do, however, appreciate Nadia’s attitude towards what could have continued to be a very difficult scene. She helped our children and families to reconcile to the new situation. I will always be grateful to her for her handling of the situation. My kids could have been turned against me, but she helped them understand. Just because we aren’t married any longer, does not mean I love my kids any less or don’t care and respect Nadia. I feel both these women in my life have turned a very complicated situation into a positive one. I know I have been the selfish one to want it all.”

Three years down, Nadia is still single and their kids live with her, although Qadir and she both have joint custody. Meanwhile, not short of financial backing, Nadia has gone back to work about which she says, “I wanted the independence and mental stimulation that a job would give me, that’s why I started working. Being a housewife for so long I had forgotten what it felt like to be myself, even though I used to help Qadir in the family business, but I was just his wife. Everything was focussed on him and the kids. I still focus on the kids, they come first, but now I am as important — which is what I had forgotten. Where remarriage or love is concerned, I don’t know; it is difficult to trust. It has to be earned. Right now I’m taking one step at a time. But hopefully, if there is someone out there...I’m not closing my mind to it. Marriage can be wonderful.”

Mina

Mina’s husband was found to be impotent. Unfortunately, they were cousins and therefore a lot of bad blood ensued. After nearly three years of living in a silent ‘wait and see’ situation which was termed as a marriage, she took the decision of telling her family. Needless to say, they were shocked. She found out later that he knew he was impotent, but had married her due to pressures put on him by his family — who again had no idea he was physically incapable of consummating the union.

The in-laws, however, refused to accept this verdict on their son’s impotence and asked for many qualified opinions, which were then duly confirmed. The divorce came through. Mina, however, still had a lot of strife to go through before she attained any kind of organized semblance in her life. In the same year, the company she was working at was merging and offered her the golden handshake, which she accepted.

With all this upheaval happening, the twentysomething, decided to take the money she’d gotten from the golden handshake and invest it in her future. She moved to the States and joined a college there. After completing her degree she decided to take a much needed break by returning to see her family in Pakistan. Little did she know that fate had something more in store for her.

Attending a cousin’s wedding she was introduced to an eligible man who promptly proposed. Mina, now well-settled in the States, did not want to move back to Pakistan. That was her one condition to any marriage. The boy accepted the condition and asked his company to assign him on a posting to the place where Mina was stationed. They were married last year and are now quite happily settled there. Kismet has a way of taking charge.

Hadia

The beautiful Hadia, a very popular girl from a socially prominent family, was in her early 20s when she married Adil, a good looking man from the social circle. Theirs was a love marriage that turned sour. “Adil had a drug addiction problem which I didn’t think would turn into such a major problem. It lead to a lot of irresponsibility and financial difficulties,” said Hadia. “There was just no stability. I already had an income from an inheritance but I wanted Adil to be working and supporting us. He couldn’t stick to a job and would disappear for days on end. I had a baby within the year but eventually after giving him several chances to rehabilitate, we separated and I moved back into my parents home.

“I thought this may force his hand and make him realize. My son loved his absentee father and that’s one of the reasons why I couldn’t take a step towards the final cut plus I was scared of the social stigma attached to the word ‘divorcee’. I eventually realized I did want to be in a full-time marriage again but it was important that I marry someone who was not only financially sound, but a person who would give my son a stable, healthy environment to grow in.”

Hadia started working as beautician soon after her separation although she did not need the money. But as she always espouses, “I may have money today, but what’s the guarantee it will be there tomorrow? I invested the money I was getting each month from an inheritance for our future. I was also lucky since I was living in my parents house, I had no expenses like food and rent. I also preferred to get all the necessities that my son and I wanted from my earnings although my parents would gladly have provided for us.

Hadia finally divorced Adil, six years after their separation when she fell in love for the second time. She got married to Saad, a divorcee who is several years younger than her. Saad has provided a loving and secure home environment for her son and her. Now 10 years down the road Hadia’s son is a mature 18-year-old, who will soon be going to college abroad on the money she’d saved up not so very long ago.

Meanwhile, Hadia is also busy bringing up her two children through Saad. Adil disappeared to the Netherlands and is to date still an absentee ‘loving’ father.

Riffat

Riffat and Ziad were working for the same financial institution. He liked her and decided to propose. Since Riffat knew him as a colleague and liked him, she accepted. They started their marital lives living with the in-laws, who weren’t too happy about their son’s choice and made it obvious. After about a year, Riffat and Ziad decided they wanted their own place and so decided to move into an apartment.

Riffat had already noticed several changes in Ziad’s personality, issues that needed resolving. He didn’t like the fact that she earned more than him and was in a senior position to him. Riffat, whose career had been going really well, till then found Ziad had a complex about her seniority at work. So she let her heart rule her head and decided to quit her job to please her partner. But as she was still determined to work she took up a lesser paying junior position in another firm.

She now thinks back in retrospect, “Ziad did not want me to have a career. I admit I wasn’t the typical housewife but I tried my best and Ziad knew everything about me before he married me. I thought I knew him but he was a different man after our marriage. He seemed to have so many complexes.”

Ziad had by then also started to criticize her cooking and housekeeping skills. He would not allow her to keep any help even though they were both earning well and could afford it. She feels it was just another way to upset her. When Riffat got a great promotion in her second job, Ziad couldn’t stop nagging. To save her marriage she decided to leave this job as well and so took on a third job, teaching.

Working part time, she felt would at least give her some independence. She was by now, however, beginning to suffer serious depression and had started overeating — this gave Ziad something else to add to his growing list of ‘Riffat faults’. Her appearance had also started to go down where her weight started to go up. Ziad had also started using a variety of choice derogatory names for her.

Riffat then decided to leave her third job and stay at home to work on her marriage. Ziad, however, found even that unsatisfactory. “No matter what I did to please him, I just couldn’t,” says Riffat.

One night Ziad just asked Riffat to leave their house. He told her he wanted a divorce. “I could not believe that he would do that. I had tried my level best. I quit working, took up cooking and slimming classes but he just asked me to get out. He said he couldn’t stand me. I went back to my parents in shock and tears. They did not even know I’d had any problems in my marriage. My father’s ill health kept me from adding to their burdens.”

Riffat’s marriage ended after four years of constantly trying to please a dissatisfied and highly complexed man happy. An intelligent woman, she had been emotionally abused and scarred by a person who called himself , her protector, her husband.

The beautiful Riffat is now, after six years of soul-searching, once again a happy and successful career woman. It took her a while to get over some of the ego bashing her husband so thoughtlessly put her through, for which she still consults a psychiatrist. “I’ve gotten over the self-recriminations bit. I realized it wasn’t me but him who actually had the problems. I was just a convenient scapegoat for his frustrations. The love of my friends and family pulled me out of the hell-hole I was in.”