Doomed Marriages: A Psychologist's Insight into Family Tragedy Causes

Doomed Marriages: A Psychologist’s Insight into Family Tragedy Causes

As a classic once said, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Today, we delve into the reasons behind marital problems with the help of a psychologist from the Minsk City Clinical Center for Psychiatry and Psychotherapy.

The Greenhouse Child Trap

Often, the roots of divorce lie deep within a person’s history, stemming from their upbringing.

Root Cause One: The Greenhouse Child Trap

Nature has generously endowed women with an immense reserve of love, affection, and warmth. Today, this avalanche of emotions often falls upon a single child. In many families, this child becomes the center of the universe from day one, with everyone’s lives revolving around their whims and fancies.

Being the sole child, they grow accustomed to considering only themselves. They spend hours alone watching TV or using the computer, rudely shutting doors when they please. It’s no surprise that later, the mere physical presence of someone else becomes exhausting, and caring for others feels like an insurmountable task. Family problems become inevitable in such cases.

What to Do

If you were an only child, learn to care for your loved ones. If you have a single child, don’t let them rule the roost from day one.

Root Cause Two: The Ideal Parental Family

Surprisingly, people who grew up in wonderful families often struggle to create their own strong families. They are used to their parents loving each other and loving them unconditionally.

These children find it hard to form their own families because their parents are their ideals. They feel comfortable under their parents’ wings and are in no hurry to tie the knot, even with the most wonderful partners. Finding a worthy candidate is tough! Remember the joke where a daughter tells her mother, “It was easy for you to marry Dad, but I have to marry a stranger.” And the young man wants his wife to be just like his mother.

When they finally marry, they expect the same love from their spouses as they received at home. But here’s the catch: their spouse cannot provide that kind of love. Why? Because no one in the world can love as selflessly as a mother. The conclusion comes naturally: I am not loved.

Children from ideal families, having created their own families, live in constant grievances against each other. Often, the parents of one of the spouses are involved in all intimate matters and are the first to fuel the flames of domestic war. Naturally, such a union cracks, and family problems worsen.

Interestingly, the main reason for divorce in such families is often cited as the husband’s drinking, TV addiction, or computer obsession. But the real reason for the breakdown of the relationship lies elsewhere. When a person cannot cope with the situation, they have one choice: to shield themselves from troubles with some kind of screen, like a bottle of vodka or a computer screen.

What to Do

Any healthy family should be autonomous and, in the early stages, self-contained. This means spiritual independence. If you decide to get married, do not involve your ideal parents in your family problems, but learn to solve them yourself. Remember, your husband or wife is not your mother or father. They did not grow up in your family and do not know its laws and rules. Create your own rules.

If you want to protect your child from such problems in the future, you need to learn to love your husband or wife more than your child and prioritize your relationship. Then the child will not be so attached to the family that they cannot break away from the parental umbilical cord.

Root Cause Three: Too Different People

This is the most common type of families doomed to divorce. Often, such families are formed under pressure from others. “What, she’s already 25 and still not married? Well, that’s it, she’s an old maid.” Yielding to such phrases and persuasion, women and men stop choosing and looking for their soulmates, settling for whoever is available at the right time and place.

For many women, family, husband, and children are a matter of special pride and prestige, a means to enhance their social status. For some, prestige comes from higher education, for others from wealth, and for others from marriage.

But here’s the problem: almost immediately after the honeymoon, family problems begin, and spouses realize they are not suited for each other. They understand they are simply strangers. The family falls apart, and people start blaming society. But now society says something else: “You should have thought about it,” “You chose yourself,” “No one needs you now with children.” Should you listen to this social dictate?

What to Do

Listen to yourself. Remember that you are creating a family for yourself, not for your girlfriends, acquaintances, or parents. You will live with this person, solve problems together, and raise children.

Root Cause Four: Common Interests Without Unity and Love

The fourth type of families prone to divorce are those where spouses have lived together for many years and raised children. There was no love, but there were common interests: children, a summer house, a car, etc. Sometimes, feelings fade over time. Family problems arise more frequently, grievances accumulate, and the family falls apart.

What to Do

It’s best not to let routine consume your family life. Even if you have a thousand things to do, find time for a date on Saturday evening. Go for a walk, to the cinema, a restaurant, or play board games at home. Find a common hobby: go hiking, do sports together, or take trips out of town. Maybe you’ve already forgotten how wonderful your husband is as a conversationalist, or how beautiful and smart your wife is? Or perhaps you never knew?