Divorce, once rare and stigmatised, has become mainstream – 42 per cent of marriages now end this way, meaning nearly half of us who get married can expect to experience it in our lifetime. Just as every marriage is different, so is every divorce. In this column, divorcees reflect on their life-changing experience. Helped by the benefit of hindsight, they share advice and reflections.
Farhana Hussain, 49, from Kent, put her family’s needs above her own for 15 years, until one morning, she simply couldn’t do it anymore. Interview by Lauren Crosby Medlicott.
After being married to my husband for 15 years, I woke up one morning and thought to myself: “This can’t be it. This can’t be what my life is.” We married in 2004, when I was 26, after dating for three years.
Although Matt* wasn’t my type and most certainly wasn’t the person my conservative Muslim Bengali family thought I’d marry (they would have preferred I marry someone with my cultural background – Matt is Caucasian and of Christian heritage), Matt’s humour had been so attractive to me early on, and we got on really well.
My family put heavy pressure on me to marry – it was often suffocating – and marrying Matt was a way to satisfy their desire for my marriage but also fulfil my own need to be rebellious.
