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My wife Kelly and I are about to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary. We've actually been together way longer than that. If asked if I'd do it all over again I would say, in a heartbeat, YES! When you know, you know. Or as one half of one of the old couples featured in the movie "When Harry Met Sally" said "I knew, like the way you know about a good melon"! Truth be told if I had to do it all over again I would change very little. I'd perhaps get married sooner and learn how to be a better husband sooner.
Getting divorced when we are just learning how to take advantage of our AARP cards and order from the senior menu sounds like a horrible idea. I can't, for the life of me, even consider not being married to this woman. I can promise you this, I would never get married again. But I'm sure there are older couples out there whose tolerance of each other has run out and they resort to divorce in order to end a pattern of verbal and/or physical abuse, loneliness within the household, infidelity or simply to squeeze a little joy out of what's left of their golden years. These late-in-life splits have a name.
Gray divorces … You would think that couples who have been together for a long time will stay together into their golden years. But according to the American Bar Association, there is a rise in “gray divorces” – couples getting divorced in their 50s and 60s. Currently, 25% of all divorces occur in the over-50 crowd. Empty nests, growing apart and losing the spark are all contributing factors, as is the fact that with people living longer, some couples in their 50s and 60s are looking at the next 20, 30, or 40 years of their life and want to make the most of them and do things their way.