What percentage of marriages do you think are really happy?

[B_Hung Jon]

The purpose of life isn't necessarily to be "happy". So I feel the same way about relationships, including this thing called "marriage". There's no guarantee that being married will bring you anything, except maybe kids if you fuck without protection.

 

[D_Chesty_Pecjiggle]

I think very few marriages could be classified as having more good days than bad days.

I'm surprised to see you write this, Red!

One question is how many people have more good days than bad days?

And when you have a bad day, do you infect your spouse with your bad day? Or do you let him or her cheer you up?

 

[Tattooed Goddess]

I'd say my husband has a highly stressful job and doesn't cheer up for any reason if he isnt ready to. There is no way to know how many people are out there that are happy. You can take people you know from your family and friends and get an idea of how many people aren't happy.

I'd say life in general is just hard, paying bills and staying alive that most days are just normal days in life and not really bad or good. They are what they are. Sometimes you fight really bad and sometimes you have a superbly awesome day inbetween the mundane pace of life.

 

[B_Hung Jon]

I'd say my husband has a highly stressful job and doesn't cheer up for any reason if he isnt ready to. There is no way to know how many people are out there that are happy. You can take people you know from your family and friends and get an idea of how many people aren't happy.

I'd say life in general is just hard, paying bills and staying alive that most days are just normal days in life and not really bad or good. They are what they are. Sometimes you fight really bad and sometimes you have a superbly awesome day inbetween the mundane pace of life.

MR, cool response. I just wonder if a lot of younger people enter into marriage thinking that the other person will make them happy; or maybe that they'll somehow be more fulfilled being together rather than being on their own? On the other hand, I know some women who were really miserable before they got married, and then after they had children, sort of blossomed. I think that for some people having kids together is a really wonderful thing that is satisfying and rewarding.

 

[D_Philochristus Hosenstein]

I picked > 25%. We've always heard about the increasing rate of divorce rate in this country, but there are always couples out there that are happily married. I've been married for several years and it's a roller coaster; we laugh, we cry, you work hard to make marriage work, you make sacrifices. But when I wake up every morning I am still thankful to God that I have a beautiful wife who is faithful and who takes care of our kids. She also takes care of my sexual needs when I want to and she gives the best puss muscle control that you can imagine and the most gratifying blow job you'd ever want.

Joe

 

[D_MisterBater]

went with more than 25%. just a guess. what is the divorce rate in the US? around 50%?

 

[Tattooed Goddess]

MR, cool response. I just wonder if a lot of younger people enter into marriage thinking that the other person will make them happy; or maybe that they'll somehow be more fulfilled being together rather than being on their own? On the other hand, I know some women who were really miserable before they got married, and then after they had children, sort of blossomed. I think that for some people having kids together is a really wonderful thing that is satisfying and rewarding.

I can relate to all of it. I got married at 18 and my husband was barely 20. Now we are 30 and 32. When we got married, i was the immature one, not because of my age necessarily, because of the upbringing. I had all sorts of ideas in my head of what he should do to make me happy.

I think we have a generation of selfish people who shouldnt be getting married and making the other person miserable and obligated to make them happy. I matured greatly when i got pregnant and continued down that path as my daughter has gotten older.

Marriage has been a good decision for me, but its a lot of work too. Just like anything else you want to work. But some people are horrid at picking a good partner. There are many reasons i think marriage doesnt work out a lot of times:

1) we dont have the societal pressure to hold things together

2) most people come from broken homes

3) a lot of people don't understand what is required to make a marriage work

4) there isnt really a mindset that people even have to get married these days to have a family or cohabitate

5) people have all sorts of personality disorders that can portray manipulation or abuse that the other person can't tolerate and shouldn't be tolerating or having the kids endure also

6) it's a lot easier to have a more anonymous life on the side with the advent of the internet and find someone else that seems to work better

7) people are more independent and not having children, women used to marry to be supported financially because they weren't able to go out in the work force and make it. They used to get married to have children legitimately also

8) people are selfish individuals and don't want to share their life with another person or give to another person properly in marriage without making it absolutely one-sided, this is especially worse if two selfish people marry

9) society promotes a life of partying, sexual freedom, no children, etc. All of these things don't really coincide with marriage ideas (traditionally speaking)

10) people are seeing everyone around them fail in relationships left and right. I've seen more divorce or seperations in my family then ever before in the last couple of years, for all of the reasons above and more

11) and probably one of the biggest reasons i've seen personally....people ignore HUGE red flags and get married anyway

 

[D_Philochristus Hosenstein]

Well said Mademoiselle Rouge. I can totally agree with what you've stated. Thanks for sharing your perspective.:smile:

 

[B_jeepguy2]

Not sure, but most of my high school and college friends who got married have been divorced, and several have gotten re-married and divoced again...and all of them are under 40. Several of my friends who are married have confided to me that they really wish they had never married because they are not sexually attracted to their wife anymore but only stay in the marriage because getting a divorce would cost them too much $$$. Doesn't sound like a happy situation to me.

 

[Gecko4lif]

11 - 15%

You either grow bitter or you die happy.

 

[D_Alec_Baldtwins]

I remember seeing an actual survey on this, and don't remember all the details, but the ones that stuck with me:

1) About 50% of marriages in the U.S. end in divorce (no surprises here).

2) Of the remaining 50%, half said that if they had to do it over again, they wouldn't re-marry their same partner. (We know they're not really happy...)

3) Given that the remaining 25% or so are going to be somewhere between very happy and just reasonably satisfied, I think we can extrapolate that the number of people who are "really happy" in their marriages isn't going to be that great.

 

[D_Harry_Crax]

I remember seeing a study on this, too. I know that the happiest people in the US were couples who did NOT have children. If I remember correctly, single people without children were second happiest. I don't remember which one was third and which was fourth: single people with children, or married people with children, but in any case, the study shot to hell the "ideal" of so-called nuclear families: married couples with children being some sort of state of perfection. (Therefore I know why my parents were happy that they waited four years after marriage to have their first child, and many of my other friends with long, happy marriages also waited several years to have children; in one case, one happy couple I know from university waited about 15 years to have a child!)

 

[kit_kat]

I think more people are happily married because it's fairly easy to get a divorce and there is less pressure to stay married if you are not happy. All the married people I know are happy, except one couple who are "average" but I think that's because they each tend to want to be right all the time. I know more unmarried people who jump from one relationship to another with each relationship starting out well and then going bad than unhappily married people.

 

[sexplease]

perhaps another question would be: what percentage of people are living in denial or are delusional about their perceived happiness in a marriage.

 

[FuzzyKen]

Last time I heard the actual statistic I think that it was something like 2 out of 3 marriages failed within ten years.

Happiness is however a loaded question because the way the question here is phrased it is not clear if the question refers to the marriage only, OR if the question means with complete satisfaction in life with the marriage as only a single component.

I have been with my life-partner and we celebrated out tenth (10th) Anniversary some time ago.

Survival of a marriage or any relationship depends on the commitment of the individuals involved in it.

Many years ago, at an Anniversary party for a husband and wife both in their late 80's age wise, I asked the husband to what he attributed his long and successful marriage.

Here were his answers:

Love, communication, selective deafness, selective blindness, knowing which buttons not to push, and complete and total ignorance of facts when it was needed.

I asked him if in the vast number of decades that he had been married to his wife if he had ever contemplated divorce.

His answer was: "Divorce. . . .Never! Homicide, numerous times!"

I then asked the wife the same questions: Her answer was similar to his.

She then said: I agree with his answers completely! Right now for instance!

My other-half and I have had in reality in the decade plus we have been together only a couple of disagreements that resulted in a heated exchange of any consequence. One of these battles which was probably the worst one came over the difficulty in quitting smoking that he had. He was seriously addicted and on more than one occasion he tried to cover the fact that he had gone back to smoking after trying to quit.

In view of the fact that my other-half is basically tall and slender and in spite of this has severe sleep apnea requiring a CPAP, this is the last person that should have "cancerettes" as part of his life.

At this point it appears that the last effort he made has been successful. Either he has gotten a great deal better at covering it OR he has successfully quit.

He has two Brothers. Both of his Brothers also gifted with severe sleep apnea have not been successful. The oldest Brother, now in his early 50's insists that not using a CPAP and smoking is not important. The middle Brother has tried again and again to quit and he is still struggling with his addiction. I know how hard this has been for my other-half and the only thing that made me lose my temper at the time with him was an attempt at deception rather than seeking my help.

There are going to be times of disagreement.

We have several rules. The first is that we never go to bed angry at each other. We have also learned to "agree to disagree" on things and then we as far as family decisions reach a consensus opinion on things period.

Both of us were thrust into the role of "parents" when we saw our then teenaged Nephew being abused in multiple ways. An event at the beginning of 2005 brought him to live with us. It was then that we discovered the extent and nature at the abuse he had suffered. The cause of the abuse is or was an alcoholic Father and a mentally ill baby Sister. It was also a Mother that "gave-in" always to the mentally ill baby Sister 100% of the time just to have a completely phony and idiotic peace even if it was at the total expense of her own Son's long term mental health and sanity.

Many things have strained my relationship with my other half and most relate to family which do not live under our roof.

I love my other-half, I love my Nephew as if he were my own Son, the In-Laws are OK, but the "hands-off" attitude they have maintained for decades is a partial cause for all of the other family strife.

The other two Son's have had multiple marriages and divorces. The current marriages of both other Sons are dysfunctional, and the ONLY marriage that is in truth working "good or bad" is the gay marriage of the youngest one. All have their problems, but communication is the key to success. If the communication is lost so is the relationship.

In my own life I have seen many Marriages dissolve. I have seen the reasons for failure in others and learned from them. It's the only way to make your own work!

If I were to give advice to anyone the only thing I would say was this.

Any time you part company with your significant other even if it is to go into another room always tell them that you love them. Always leave the door open for communication and never have your significant other fear conversation with you. The final thing is a successful relationship takes work and effort every hour of the day even when you are not together. If you're doing it right, you'll know.

 

[deleted405852]

I'm friends with 3 married couples and only 1 of them seems genuinely happy because they respect each other, trust each other and they want to be with each other and no one else.

I have a friend that got married 7 months ago and now both her and her husband want out, they can't stand each other now. She called me late last night and told me they were done! Here's the thing though, as bad as this may sound, I didn't think they'd last long because of her reasons for marrying him.

Here's my take on things, if you are marrying someone because you can't imagine living without them and they make you feel great about being with them and yourself, then the marriage has a better chance of lasting. But if the marriage is supposed to be some sort of escape or distraction from other things in life, the magic will wear off and you'll feel like you're living with a stranger. If you're marrying someone while you feel as though you had other/better options, than save yourself, your ego and everyone else some time, energy and money by not going through with it.

The reason I'm projecting these feelings is because I feel that my friend's marriage was built on the wrong foundation and as much as I hoped it'd work out for them somehow, last night strongly suggested otherwise. *sigh*

 

[Captain Elephant]

Even my first failed marriage could be considered happy. We were very happy. It just ended badly, and if it hadn't ended it would have been an unhappy marriage. Neither of us wanted that. My wife's first marriage was shorter than mine, but I think she was happy until she found out he was cheating.

So yeah I guess it does depend on your definition of happy. Anyway, you need to go higher than 25%. Too skewed toward the low end.

By the way, our marriage is 100% happy right now. Gimme a button to push, dude.

 

[Daisy]

It is sad when people divorce but sometimes it's better to cut your losses and move on. I don't think many married couples are happy because I think most married for entirely wrong reasons, the top 2 being:

1. You're at "that age" where people start expecting you to be married
2. You're materialistic and you want a "fairy tale" wedding, so that you're more focused on the wedding then the actual long term marriage.

I got married for #1 like so many of my friends. It's too bad we put to much emphasis on marriage in this country (every country?)

 

[798686]

Hmm..I'd say prolly about 40% are generally happy?
I think it varies, though. Most marriages (I'd imagine) have ups and downs.

 

[deleted3782]

I estimate 6 - 10% of married couples are very happy.

My nephew faced these pressures when he was 24. All his friends were engaged or soon to be married, including his best friend. They were all asking him when he was going to settle down. On top of that, he had a psycho girlfriend going around town introducing herself as the future Mrs. Nephew. She was already picking out china patterns and kids names.

I told my nephew that he didn't have to do anything he didn't want to, and that it is better to remain single than to be married to a person for the wrong reasons. He really didn't love her, but she was convenient. He still wanted to go to grad school, so from his side the timing wasn't right, but the pressure was pretty high. He was really confused.

After our talk, he did break up with her. He has had a few relationships since, including one girl who could not follow him to grad school...so they broke up. I feel good about making him aware that he had options...but I worry that he will become disenchanted with relationships like I am. I worry that guys who don't get married while young become aloof playboys without the ability to commit. That said, I'm not sure how big a fan of marriage I am personally. Good thing I'm [obviously] not married!