The Rise in ‘Gray
Divorce’: It’s Always
Hubby’s Fault
By Jeffery M. Leving and
Glenn Sacks
© 2005
In both the United
States and Japan, divorce among older couples is on the rise. The
American Association of Retired Persons detailed the phenomenon
among American seniors in a study last year, and Japan’s wave of
gray divorce is expected to swell into a deluge, since Japanese
women will soon be legally able to claim half of their husbands'
retirement pensions.
There are various explanations for the trend but
media commentators agree on one thing--when the husband divorces his
wife, it’s hubby’s fault. When the wife divorces her husband, well,
it’s hubby’s fault too.
In a recent New York Times article Terry
Martin Hekker, whose husband of 40 years divorced her, criticizes
what she and others in the media are calling a trend: selfish older
men dumping their wives for younger women. In Japan, a popular book
is Why Are Retired Husbands Such a Nuisance?, and one of
Japan’s most-watched television dramas is Jukunen Rikon
(“Mature Divorce”).
One Japanese newspaper says “some Japanese women see
their husbands as an obstacle to enjoying their sunset years. With
few hobbies or friends to turn to, many Japanese retirees, often
nicknamed ‘wet leaves’ for their tendency to cling to their wives,
spend their time at home.” These “wet leaves” are increasingly
being swept aside by their newly independent wives.
In both countries this “Pin the Blame on the Husband”
is unfair. For one, the stereotype of the husband trading in his
wife for a younger model is by and large a myth. The women in the
AARP study were 60% more likely to claim that they ended their
marriages than the men were, and men were almost twice as likely as
women to say that they never saw their divorces coming. In contrast
to the Porsche and trophy wife stereotype, the AARP study found that
these divorced men had many serious concerns, high among them their
fear of losing touch with their children after their divorces.
Many of these men would see their fears in Hekker’s
description of her divorce. Hekker likens her anger to that of the
jilted bride Miss Haversham in Dickens's Great Expectations
who “spent decades…consumed with plotting revenge.” She says that at
a family baby shower recently, her niece said “I don't want to end
up like Aunt Terry."
In other words, Hekker plays the victim and the
family has been instructed to feel pity for her and outrage at her
ex-husband, who now is apparently persona non grata among
his relatives. What a nice reward for the 40 years he worked to
provide his wife and children with a comfortable standard of living.
Japanese women--who enjoy one of the longest life
expectancies in the world—are apparently similarly ungrateful. Is it
so surprising and contemptible that after four decades of work,
work, work, retired Japanese men don’t know what to do with
themselves? They’ve never known the freedoms and unsupervised days
that their homemaker wives have enjoyed.
This is not to say that there’s no validity to
women’s complaints. Radio host Howard Stern recently interviewed
television commentator Geraldo Rivera, who in 2003 married a woman
less than half his age. Stern was only half-joking when he asked
“aren’t you worried about your future? Think of it--when you’re 75,
you’re going to be stuck married to a 45 year-old woman.”
In this area biology dictates much--if men found
60-year-old women as attractive as they found 30 year-olds, the
human race would have died out a long time ago. Yet marriages break
up for a variety of reasons, most of them having little to do with
male perfidy. There’s a big distinction between dumping your wife
for a younger woman, and pursuing a relationship with a younger
woman after your marriage has ended.
Though nobody says it, “dumped for a younger woman”
is sometimes just a woman’s cop-out for not taking responsibility
for her own contribution to the marital breakdown. Hekker says her
ex-husband spent 16 pages of his divorce papers “meticulously
detailing my faults and flaws.” Yet the New York Times’
editors didn’t ask her to devote a single one of her 1,600+ words
towards giving the reader a clue as to what her ex-husband’s
feelings and complaints might be.
Given the way the media is portraying gray divorce on
both sides of the Pacific, this is no surprise.
This article first
appeared in the
Cincinnati Post
& the Kentucky Post (1/30/06).
Jeffery M. Leving is one of
America's most prominent family law attorneys. He is the author of
the book Fathers' Rights: Hard-hitting and Fair Advice for Every
Father Involved in a Custody Dispute. His website is
www.dadsrights.com.
Glenn Sacks' columns on men's and fathers' issues have appeared in
dozens of America's largest newspapers. Glenn can be reached via his
website at
www.GlennSacks.com or via email at
Glenn@GlennSacks.com.
Copyright 2006 Glenn
Sacks, all rights reserved
