Relationships seem to hit a romantic cul-de-sac and end up in divorce as people reach their 40s. Photo / 123RF
Plenty of relationships hit obstacles once couples reach midlife – here are some expert tips to help you navigate them.
I was 44 when my ex-husband and I called it quits on our marriage and we divorced a year later. While we'd been having problems for a while, the death of my mother at this midway point in my life triggered an existential crisis that brought everything to a head.
We'd been married for 10 years and had two children under 11, but I could see enough road ahead to want a life more peaceable and joyful – for both of us. And our kids deserved better than two warring parents.
Tosh Brittan was 43, a year younger than me, when the restlessness and dissatisfaction with the state of her marriage kicked in.
"We'd been married for 17 years and got to the stage when the children were aged seven and nine, and we weren't rushing around after them any more so life felt more freed up," says Brittan, now 53, from Petersfield in Hampshire. "I started to think about life beyond children and looked at my marriage and thought, 'Is this it?' My husband worked away a lot so I was looking after the kids much of the time on my own anyway and, when he did come home, he felt guilty about being away so much so we just concentrated on the children and the spark between us was gone."
Both Brittan and her husband came from divorced parents and were determined not to repeat history. "We didn't want to put our children through what we'd been through, so we went to counselling and tried to work on rekindling that spark. But it didn't happen," she says.
After four years of trying, the couple agreed to split on day three of a month-long summer road trip around France and it felt sad, but matter-of-fact. "We were sitting in a static caravan talking about our marriage and I said, 'OK, I think we should get a divorce' and that was that. I didn't leave thinking there was going to be someone else, but I was just looking to do something in my life other than being a wife and parent, and it felt like we'd been operating separately for years anyway."
Brittan and I are one of the many couples whose marriage didn't make it beyond their 40s; a decade where relationships seem to hit a romantic cul-de-sac and end up in divorce.
In the UK in 2019, 45 to 49 was the most popular age to divorce, with the average age being 46.4 for men and 43.9 for women, so clearly there's a sea change of some sort happening in this fifth decade.
Recently, former S Club 7 singer Rachel Stevens, 44, announced she was splitting from her husband of 12 years, Alex Bourne, following in the celebrity footsteps of Gwyneth Paltrow, who divorced at 41 after 13 years of marriage, and Davina McCall, who ended her 17-year marriage at 49.
Each of these couples had successfully surmounted the hard baby years of sleepless nights and endless nappy changes, but ran aground when their children were in their tweens or early teens – an age when life should become easier, but when many marital differences surface.
"When you're in the baby years as a couple, you're often in fight or flight mode, building your career and raising your kids, and you're just firefighting and trying to get through it as best you can with the relationship often falling to the bottom of the to-do list," says couples psychotherapist Louise Tyler (personalresilience.co.uk). "It's only when you emerge and the children are a bit older that you might look at your partner and feel completely disconnected or that you've sunk into familiarity and boredom. In the past, marriage was often a financial and legal arrangement and women had little choice but to stick with it, but nowadays women are financially independent and there's a feeling we should be living our best life and shouldn't stay in an unhappy relationship if we don't want to."
Relate counsellor Simone Bose comes across many couples experiencing this "midlife malaise" at her practice. "After 10-plus years of marriage, couples gradually make less effort and become complacent towards each other, and often the things they found attractive at the beginning can become what now annoys them. For example, relaxed becomes lazy, or assertive becomes bullying or controlling," explains Bose. "It's a crisis point because you see that life is passing you by and you wonder if you should settle or if you're still young enough to have new adventures and even meet someone else."
Michael Ross reached this crisis point when he was 42, divorcing his wife after 17 years of marriage. "I got married at 25 and I think you just don't know yourself in your 20s; over time my wife and I became two different people and changed from who we were when we first met," he explains.
The couple had three children under 12 when they split and it was the conflict in the home that propelled his decision. "There was a lot of arguing. It was draining all my emotional and physical energy. It was bad for the kids and terrible for me," says Ross, 44, a financial adviser from Borehamwood in Hertfordshire. "I kept thinking of my life and the fact that I was half-way through and that time was finite. Did I really want to spend the rest of my life living in this situation? It felt unworkable and when I pushed the button I never looked back."
It's no coincidence that children reaching an impressionable age can trigger a decision to divorce. "Your children are getting older, seeing the arguments and asking questions, and it can feel quite shameful and toxic," says Bose.
"It's at this point when many couples think, 'What kind of relationship do I want to give as a role model to my kids?' and decide to leave the marriage."
While many do jump ship at this pivotal point (42 per cent of marriages currently end in divorce), Tyler points out that relationship satisfaction is U-shaped, starting high after you get married before the responsibilities of children and career kick in, then sinking to a nadir, "most likely in your 30s and 40s with all the external stresses", before rising again in your 50s – but only "if you work on it".
Tyler adds: "If you don't work through your differences in this stage of disharmony then it's unlikely you'll get through to the next stage, which is all about having synergy and working better together."
But making it through this decade takes more effort than the odd clichéd candlelit dinner or child-free break. "You need a pretty strong foundation to survive these hardworking, responsible years when there's little fun or sex," says Marian O'Connor, psychoanalytic couples' therapist at Tavistock Relationships (tavistockrelationships.org). "You have to be able to stand outside yourselves and look at what you're doing to each other, and think about how you can make your life fun and nurturing and not just a life of tasks."
Going to counselling is a helpful first step. "Through therapy, couples can look at why they disconnected and ways they can be different. It gives them a space to really listen to each other and say, 'this bothers me because …' or 'this is how I feel'," says O'Connor. "Individual therapy can be good too, to find out what your triggers are, how much your background plays into what's going on and to see if you're curious enough to change and work on problems – after all, even in a couple, the only person you can change is yourself."
Brittan is now a divorce coach, believing that couples who wish to divorce-proof their marriage should pay attention earlier to the little niggles that something's not quite right. "Don't let things slide at the time until they build up beyond help," she says. "At the time you feel them, talk about it to your partner."
Brittan also believes in growing independently within your marriage to prevent you from thinking you have to escape it in order to feel free. "Think about what you can do to build your own confidence up, whether it's retraining in your career or taking up cold-water swimming," she says. "Often we're looking for some excitement in the marriage that we can easily find on our own."
For Tyler, nurturing the emotional intimacy of a marriage should come before anything. "We have to remember that our partner is on loan, with an option to renew and their love is not unconditional," she says. "Emotional and sexual intimacy go hand in hand and if you want to build up your sexual relationship, it all starts with strengthening your connection on a cerebral level, learning to talk and to communicate your needs and desires with honesty and kindness. Once that emotional connection starts to come back you might find you'll start holding hands or cuddling. That's how it reignites."
Of course, divorce is often the only – and right – way forward for many couples, especially if there are issues such as domestic abuse or coercive control. "If there's contempt or too much trust broken or too much of an injury in a relationship to make it work then you're often better on your own," says Bose. "But if you still have a fondness and liking for each other and are willing to learn to communicate better and speak about the things you want to, you can reinvent your relationship into your 50s and 60s and have a happy future together."
As for me, I'm now 51, seven years post-divorce and about to celebrate my first wedding anniversary with my new husband. The goal was to have a life more peaceful and joyous and that's how it is – my ex, the children and I are all much happier now we've divorced. Having gone through such a tumultuous time and come out the other side makes me appreciate my husband and this marriage even more. My divorce may have been necessary and liberating, but I have no plans to go there again.
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