The Cambridge Mummy blog on… divorce – Michelle Mone, Russell Brand and Katherine Jenkins
Posted: December 31st, 2011 | Author: cambridgemummy | Filed under: Home life | 4 Comments »I know, I know, three blogs in 24 hours. It’s feast or famine with me, I know… but the last 24 hours in the media haven’t been great on the relationships front, have they?
Michelle Mone – someone who I look up to because she’s shifted lots of weight and runs a growing business, has split with her husband of 20 years. Russell Brand and Katy Perry are getting divorced – and that upsets me because I want to think that two people who are hot and attractive, can make a go of it despite being in the public eye. And Katherine Jenkins and Gethin Thingy Me Bob have called off their engagement.
And it makes me sad. Because I hate thinking of relationships not working out. Of divorce. I only remember one family being divorced when I was growing up – and that’s how I thought of it, that divorce was something quite rare. But it’s not is it? And I’m sad that it’s a family that gets divorced, not just a couple, isn’t it? Whether there’s children involved or not. It affects everyone. Sometimes, I appreciate, people are cheering when relationships end – I know that my ex’s parents will be pleased to see the back of me and the feeling was very much reciprocal from my family, but there’s still a division of people, histories and plans that had been made for the future.
The way that I know that I’m a grown up now, is that I’m married. Whatever went before, doesn’t count. It’s what happened on 18 August 2006 for me. I’d lived with Lovely Bloke beforehand, since our second date in fact.. (ahem) but getting married was important to me. Not least because I was 20 weeks pregnant and wanted us all to have the same surname. And I really like that I’ve taken my husband’s surname – Weston – which is different, to his own family, for complicated reasons, (but nothing bad, I hasten to add…) So we’re not Payne’s (my family name) or Lindsell’s (his family name). We’re Westons. And I love it. I don’t mind at all, if our boys get married and start a new family name for themselves. I’d think it pretty good actually.
Because we are all our own units. Lovely Bloke Weston and I are a team. We work things out together. We fight. We hold hands. We bicker. We fart under the duvet at night. We look at each other and wonder “what’s happening” and “where is our life going” but we’re doing it together. We don’t always face the world together. Ha ha. He wants the boys to go shooting and stalking whilst I want them nowhere near guns. He wants all sorts of things different to me in life and it’s not always easy to resolve things. But somehow we do.
And that’s why I’m sad that, despite their money, which lots of people think makes life easier, people who have – or appear to have – everything they could materially desire, can’t make it work. People get divorced because they can’t cope financially together every day, but for people in the media, we assume they don’t have money worries. So why can’t they make it work? What chance for the rest of us? Surely they should be able to do it? It’s always annoyed me with David Beckham and the constant rumours about his life with Victoria, that if they can’t make each other happy, what chance do us muggles have?
So there we have it. I’m rambling. But I’m annoyed. And sad. That people are getting divorced – seperating families, getting divorced within 14 months of marriage and saddest of all, not even making it up the aisle together. That’s not good news is it? But at least they are all starting 2012 knowing where they are, what they are doing and where they are going, after a fashion at least eh?
Speaking as someone in the process of divorcing, I have to say that this made me bristle.
Walking away from a marriage doesn’t necessarily equal failure and sometimes, it’s in the best interests of everyone that it happens.
As for not making it up the aisle, surely better that than end up in these divorces so soon after that you feel disappointed by?
I’m sorry to have caused offence. You know that’s not my intention at all. Especially when I’m so proud of you for all the hard work and changes you’ve made in 2011. Does marriage not working out not make you sad though? I’m sad when a marriage or a relationship doesn’t work out. I don’t think I equate it to mean failure though, because I think I failed in one of my relationships by not getting out earlier than I did. Does that make sense? And yes, of course it’s better to call off an engagement. I know. But well, I don’t know, I just guess I’ve been shown happily ever after by the media for so long that I think we should all be able to have it? What that looks like and feels like, I don’t know. Maybe I’ll look at something quality like hello magazine et al, to show me what it is ;)
You didn’t offend me… Just prompted a feeling.
You hit the nail on the head by saying it’s a media thing and that’s what frustrates me. Worse that people would stay in an unhappy (or worse) marriage/relationship because they were worried what people would think.
I’ve had my life on hold for the last year while I have waited for everyone else around me to catch up with my decision and get their heads around it and I’m annoyed at myself for putting their needs above my own. In doing so, I was in a holding ground and therefore no better off for having made the decision to leave in the first place.
Onwards and upwards as they say and here’s to 2012 and happily ever after (whatever that may be).
I like the quote there about promises. Marriage is a vnceoant. It requires devotion, duty, and sacrifice. That commitment to someone else is what makes marriage a shelter from the storm.It comes back to understanding what real love is. It’s not infatuation, dependency, or cathexis. Love is not a feeling. Happiness is a feeling. Love is an unconditional, spiritually developing action for one’s self or others. It includes self because one must learn to do good for one’s self as well as others and because acting for one’s benefit also benefits others. It’s important for a happy marriage. It’s realistic to expect that problems will hit one’s marriage. But even in the tough times, happiness can be found because the good one sews today, through real love, will bring a harvest of happiness in times to come.