Divorce will kill you

Be careful. Your health could plummet as if you had taken up smoking, become overweight or started drinking excessively.

A new review by the University of Arizona of more than 30 published studies found divorced adults have a significantly higher risk of early death compared with married adults.

The risk of dying early was 23 percent greater among divorced adults than married couples tracked by researchers for an average of 11 years. Researchers found the risks associated with divorce are similar to other well-established public-health risks, such as smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day, getting limited exercise, being overweight and drinking heavily, said the study’s lead author, UA psychology professor David Sbarra. http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/news/ua-study-divorce-can-raise-risk-of-early-death.html

Research on divorce

Research done on the causes of divorce reveals that -

• Lack of communication is one of the leading causes of divorce. A marriage is on the rocks when the lines of communication fail. You can’t have an effective relationship if either one of you won’t discuss your feelings, can’t talk about your mutual or personal issues, will keep your resentments simmering under wraps, and expect your partner to guess what the whole problem is about.
• Divorces often happen because people rarely discuss their expectations in detail prior to marriage, are less willing to work on their marriages afterwards, and would like quick solutions rather than having to resolve issues. People have gotten divorced for trivial reasons like snoring.
• People who come from divorced homes are more likely to get divorced than people who come from happily married households. Divorce seems less like a big deal if you have seen your parents go through with it.
• People who get married between the ages of 23-27 are more likely to stay together than people who get married in their teens.
• People who cohabit before marriage have higher rates of divorce than people who didn’t cohabit before marriage.
• Recent research into causes of divorce at Ohio State University has revealed that the probability of divorce increases when the husband is unemployed. A wife’s unemployment doesn’t seem to have any effect. This may have something to do with the male ego, whose major source of nourishment lies in his ability to ‘Put food on the table‘. Unemployed males tend to be depressed, irritable, infected with low self-esteem and difficult to get along with.

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/common-causes-and-reasons-for-divorce.html

Forever love

Roger Zerbe, who suffered from early onset Alzheimer’s disease, journaled this to his wife after a particularly troubling bout of forgetfulness.

Honey,

Today fear is taking over. The day is coming when all my memories of this life we share will be gone. You and the boys will be gone from me. I will lose you even as I am surrounded by you and your love. I don’t want to leave you. I want to grow old in the warmth of memories. Forgive me for leaving so slowly and painfully.

Blinking back tears, Becky wrote:

My sweet husband,

I will continue to go on loving you and caring for you—not because you know me or remember our life, but because I remember you. I will remember the man who proposed to me and told me he loved me, the look on his face when his children were born, the father he was, the way he loved our extended family. I’ll recall his love for riding, hiking, and reading; his tears at sentimental movies; the unexpected witty remarks; and how he held my hand while he prayed. I cherish the pleasure, obligation, commitment, and opportunity to care for you because I remember you!

—Becky Zerbe, “Penning a Marriage,” Marriage Partnership (Spring 2006)

Larson, C. B., & Ten Elshof, P. (2008). 1001 illustrations that connect (14–15). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House.

Respectfully, Gary Thomas, I disagree

Sometimes, good preaching makes bad theology. We say it because it sounds so good and we can get a house full of people to say AMEN, but, when we really take it apart, it doesn’t make good theology. Here is an example:

God is more interested in your holiness
than your happiness.

I have heard that in a number of sermons and books and bible study groups and everyone always nods and says amen. My question: is it really true? Is God more interested in our holiness than our happiness? Is God interested in our happiness at all? Does our happiness matter at all to God? Or is he only interested in our holiness? How does God feel about our happiness? Does he care whether we are happy?

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Divorce from a kid’s perspective: Adult Tolerance

In dealing with the situation, I found the cycle has a pervasive ability to perpetuate.  By God’s grace, my wife and I have never divorced, but the divorce haunts us.

Diary Entries

“O.K., here’s the scoop.  We now have two children that everyone loves.  Guess what…we’re rationing time at Christmas and Thanksgiving between her family and my two families.  My children are now victims of a divorce that happened before their lifetimes!  It doesn’t end.  It continues.

Two generations are easily affected by the decision of two people in the past.  There are ramifications for every decision.”

Kevin Garrett
onyourmark@bellsouth.net
http://www.facebook.com/kevinleegarrett