Divorce rates in the UK steadily rose since the 1960s but then began to drop in the 2000s, often tracking the economy. Photo / Getty Images
It’s a typical Saturday morning for Becky and David – they’re a sporty family so they’ll go to their local Parkrun, have a hearty brunch of homemade waffles and then cheer on their three sons playing football.
Perhaps they’ll talk about their plans for Christmas or their next trip abroad. Then she’ll go back to the family home and he’ll retreat to the flat he rents nearby and where he’s been living since they split up three years ago.
For Becky and David are separated but not divorced. Neither of them have sought legal advice and in ways their lives are more conjoined than many more conventional couples – they share a joint account, a surname and most of their holidays.
It has been revealed that Hollywood stars Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith have been separated since 2016, six years before he punched host Chris Rock at the Oscars with the war cry “keep my wife’s name out of your [expletive] mouth”.
This uxorious gesture looks even odder with the news that they weren’t even living together at the time, but he wasn’t lying: she was and still is his wife and the couple has no plans to divorce.
“I made a promise that there will never be a reason for us to get a divorce,” she said in an interview. “We will work through whatever. And I just haven’t been able to break that promise.”
They might be rich celebrities, but the no-divorce separation is something that experts are seeing in the real world.
Natasha Silverman, a relationship counsellor and sex therapist, says she has seen a marked increase in what she calls “soft separations”.
Kate Daly, who founded amicable.io, the online alternative to solicitors that helps couples manage their divorces less acrimoniously and more cost-effectively, agrees.
“It’s definitely a phenomenon and one that for normal people is primarily driven by the cost of living crisis,” she says. “For celebrities like the Smiths, it’s not about money, it’s more about reputational damage.”
Even for wealthier couples, there can be financial reasons to remain wed. Alex Carruthers, founder and partner at family law practice Hughes Fowler Carruthers, had a case where the husband argued that they would save millions by staying together.
“It is true that there are some tax advantages in being married, but there are dangers if the assets are all in one person’s name,” he says.
Divorce rates in the UK steadily rose since the 1960s but then began to drop in the 2000s, often tracking the economy. “In the last financial crisis of 2008, divorce rates fell and it took a good two years for them to peak again,” says Daly. “And we’re seeing the same since the pandemic.”
Although the number of divorces is rising again, having been put on hold in 2020, rates haven’t rocketed up in a way that we might have expected due to the financial pressures that prevent couples from splitting.
While an uncontested divorce can cost as little as £593 (about NZ$1222) in the UK, the reality is that most will spend a far higher sum on solicitors and other associated costs such as renting an additional property.
An Aviva survey in 2018 calculated that divorcing couples jointly spent around £15,000 on legal and lifestyle costs, a figure that will have only increased in our inflationary times. It’s no wonder that many couples will avoid the expense at what is already a stressful time.
One of Daly’s clients asked her for help not in agreeing a divorce but to draw up some rules for living in a house together as they did not have enough money for one of them to move out.
Becky’s reasons for avoiding a more formal solution are myriad. She admits that it is partly pragmatic. “It keeps the admin simple to stay married”, but their primary aim was to make the transition easier for their three teenage sons. “We’re still working as a family, we’re just not a romantic couple,” she says.
Becky also wanted to let the emotional fall-out of their relationship breakdown subside before making any permanent decisions. “It was all so difficult at first that we didn’t want to carry that into all the negatives of the divorce process – the lawyers and the acrimony,” she says.
“I wanted to focus my energy on doing things to keep me uplifted and positive rather than the details of the division of assets, which always seems to turn sour. It’s allowed us to process the grief of losing the marriage better.”
Laura, now in her 50s, lived in the same house as her estranged husband for six years before they eventually began the divorce process.
As a child of divorced parents herself, she wanted their children to get to secondary school-age before they’d need to shuttle between houses. “I knew that I wanted them to be old enough to travel independently between us,” she says.
“It was hard, but I’m glad we did it that way. By the time we got divorced, he was just this slightly irritating flatmate rather than the man I’d fallen in and out of love with.”
While they both feel that their emotional state benefited from postponing divorce, experts warn that a delay can leave the couple feeling worse.
Liz Hamlin is the joint head of clinical services at Tavistock Relationships and a psychotherapist with a specific interest in divorce and separation.
She concedes that “what we might call a ‘nominal divorce’ has the potential to lead to less tension and conflict, but it doesn’t allow the relationship to develop”.
There is always the spectre of an “until”, she says. “Until one meets a new partner, someone wants to move or get a new job, some change that involves the children.”
Silverman agrees. “It can be convenient at first, but when one partner meets someone else, it can cause more grief in the long term.”
There is also the danger that the couple is staying together not for sensible reasons but because they cannot leave a partner, even when they are causing distress. “The one-foot-in, one-foot-out relationship can be addictive as the uncertainty gives us a dopamine hit,” Silverman says.
Emotions are further muddied by the increased likelihood of a continuing sexual relationship. “And that sex is likely to be more intense and exciting than sex in a stable, secure relationship,” she adds. “A couple living with the question of whether or not they’ll divorce can find that sexual energy and tension skyrockets.”
There is also the danger that the financial settlement might become more complicated if one spouse dies, Hamlin points out.
“The surviving spouse may receive financial benefits such as a share of the property or a pension. If one person’s parents die and there’s an inheritance, then that will be shared. You have to think, is that what I want?”
Even a new will might not be enough. “If you’re not leaving your ‘spouse’ any money, then you have to be clear in explaining in detail why not,” Carruthers says. “Otherwise they’ll have a case against you.”
While companies like Amicable offer separation agreements, they are not legally binding in the same way as a divorce and can end up costing the couple more, Daly says, “as you end up paying twice”.
Even the desire to protect the children might be misplaced. Hamlin says that continuing to live together and do things as a family can keep alive the hope of reconciliation for children. “It’s also a denial of loss and the message you’re giving children is that loss cannot be survived and that life cannot be good again if this thing happens,” she says.
Silverman points to the research that shows children who grow up in houses with a high level of conflict have poorer outcomes emotionally, educationally and physically.
“Parents have to be aware that they’re forming their children’s relationship template,” she says. “You can argue, but you need to argue well – they need to see the bit when you apologise afterwards for raising your voice.”
I ask Becky whether she is anxious that she is shunting a difficult process further down the line, like tidying out a particularly heinous cupboard.
“I did worry that we’re just procrastinating,” she says. “But I just want to focus on the kids and wait until they move out. They are very certain that they don’t want us to get back together and are quite happy with the status quo. And so are we.”
Let’s take a look at the science.