Avoiding Divorce After Retirement
Surprisingly, avoiding divorce after retirement requires a new awareness of the hazards many couples face during this new life phase.
As an experienced marriage counselor, I’ve worked with a number of couples who carefully planned their retirement finances yet did not foresee the dramatic shifts that would occur in their relationship.
The term “gray divorce” has gained a foothold in the past decade as more older couples seek to end their marriages or long-term relationships.
In this post, I’ll help you understand how major life changes such as retirement can greatly impact your marriage. The focus will include opportunities retirement offers to renew your bond and connection.
Life Changes Can Test Any Marriage
You’re not alone if you’ve struggled to make transitions to new life phases. For example, the divorce rate can spike with the birth of the first child. This profound change in a couple’s life can bring stress, including lack of sleep, different parenting beliefs and needed discussions of who will take on various home responsibilities.
Caring for aging parents also brings stressors of added responsibilities when parents need greater assistance. The empty nest when kids leave permanently creates a void.
Job and career changes also can impact the marriage or relationship. A promotion at work is usually a good opportunity, but can be accompanied with additional stress, perhaps longer hours and amore travel. It’s challenging to balance the new responsibilities with family needs.
Then, there’s retirement. While most couples look forward to the freedom of retirement, they’re astonished when rough times take over their relationship.
Avoiding Divorce After Retirement Requires a Different Type of Planning
As you’ll see, the challenges require conversations and discussions about choices, how time is spent together, financial concerns and, sometimes, setting boundaries with adult children.
Here’s some concerning data: The divorce rate for couples over 50 has doubled in the past 20 years. Sixteen percent of 30+-year marriages are ending in divorce. One in four couples divorce after age 50.
Retirement is often accompanied by other life changes. Children have left the home, and this can be dramatic for some couples, particularly if much of their focus had been on child-rearing. Suddenly there is the absence of many obligations of attending kids’ sporting events, vacations as a family and the daily interactions that kept the focus away from just the couple.
Retirement can also mean a sudden loss of feelings of importance, accomplishment and purpose that were part of working life. Yes, the stress of work obligations is gone; however, gone as well is the structure and, for some, the adrenalin rush of meeting deadlines and goals.
Differences May Become More Evident
Now there’s just the two of you. New discoveries can surface:
One of you wants to travel more; the other prefers quiet time at home
One of you has more friends and hobbies and outside interests than the other
One of you wants to spend money more freely now that obligations to kids are less
One of you places more value in helping out with grandchildren
These differences might always have been there; however, now that there is more time spent together, you may notice that these preferences now lead to arguments or to avoiding important topics of discussion for fear one or both of you will become upset.
These arguments then can lead to greater distance between you, the feelings of “walking on eggshells” more frequently and frustration that the issues are not able to be resolved.
Adult Children May Present Different Challenges
You and your partner may disagree about how and how much to aid adult children. One may feel more strongly about offering babysitting or other childcare. Similarly, you may have different preferences about using vacation time to travel to be with children and grandchildren.
Then, there can be disagreement about providing financial support to your adult children. Today’s economy is much more difficult for young adults than for previous generations. Housing costs are greater; student loan repayments can be quite overwhelming. The costs to purchase a car (new or preowned!) are greater. “Launching” into adulthood now comes with higher price tags.
These factors may complicate how you might previously have thought about financially helping your adult children. There may feel like added pressure to help them and at greater amounts. If your views are different, discussions between the two of you may become more contentious and be harder to reach an agreement.
Sexual Expectations and Desires May Change in Retirement
Many couples find discussing problems related to intimacy to be the most difficult. Additionally, retirement can change your “intimate landscape” in several ways.
First, there’s more time and privacy now that work obligations are gone and the kids are out of the house. That doesn’t mean, however, that both partners are in sync about sex.
Physical challenges may have emerged. Either one of you may have difficulty with certain positions due to changes in your body, such as hip or joint pain. While I don’t like the term “performance,” the fact is that one or both of you may have less ability to achieve orgasm or for the man to maintain an erection.
Openness about in sharing your feelings is crucial as well as the ability to discuss alternative approaches to achieving sexual satisfaction.
Keep in mind that intimacy is a way we secure and acknowledge the emotional bond between partners. Our brain chemistry thrives with intimate connection – both emotional and physical! When there are concerns about sex, couples may notice that they touch less and infrequently hug, kiss, hold hands. The partner who is concerned about intimacy may avoid any contact for fear the engagement will then go further – and they then worry they won’t be able to satisfy their partner.
Distancing or avoiding intimacy can easily be interpreted as rejection, which is deeply hurtful. Heartfelt conversations go a long way to avoiding conflict and one or both of you feeling confused, saddened and distant.
The Imbalance When One Retires Earlier
Couples may struggle to adjust when one partner has retired and the other continues to work. Suddenly one partner has more free time. There can be resentment by the working partner and, also, the retired partner may feel more isolated.
The working partner may want the retired one to take on more household chores. He or she may not have the time and energy to match those of the retired partner for outside activities and intimacy.
As you’ll see below, these are important topics for slow and open conversations.
Now, What Are Keys to Avoiding Divorce in Retirement?
If you have not yet retired, each of the above areas should be addressed. Having quiet and thoughtful conversations about each of your goals for retirement are essential. It can be far easier to have these discussions when in “planning mode” than after concerns have evolved about your differences in how you want to spend your time in retirement.
If, however, you are now retired and struggling with your differences, having calm discussions in which you can slow down and hear each other’s concerns are essential.
In Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy, couples learn to have what are called “hold me tight” conversations. In brief, here’s a bit of how the process goes:
Set aside time when you both can focus on the concern. This is best if you address just one issue at a time.
Begin with one of you sharing your own feelings and concerns related to the topic. Avoid interrupting your partner (Usually when we interrupt we are defending our own position!)
Share the emotions that underlie those feelings. The “listening partner” can acknowledge that they understand their partner’s feelings – even if you don’t agree. It is essential that each person feel heard and understood and that their partner sees that their feelings are true and valid.
With the same care and attention, the listening partner then becomes the one who is speaking of their deeper feelings and concerns.
The conversation continues going back and forth and, hopefully, new insights into each of your concerns comes to light. With this new information, it may be more possible to reach resolution.
How Marriage Counseling Helps Retired Couples Find New Love, Connection and Joy
Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy, or EFT, is a brief counseling method that is the most effective, according to research, of the approaches to helping couples in distress.
You’ll reach a new depth of understanding of the emotions that lie beneath your actions in your relationship. This approach is balanced so that both partners are heard and helps each of you gain a new understanding of your reactions when you are not getting along.
You can read more about Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy, or EFT, here.
Feel free to reach out to me to set up a no-cost consultation to discuss your questions about counseling and to see whether we’re a fit. You can call me at 602-882-0533.