I've been wanting to write about this for a long time, but I couldn't find my way into the subject. But an incident which occurred over the holidays forced me to take a hard look my divorce through the eyes of my grandchildren - something I had not given much thought to before.
As someone whose long term marriage ended when my former husband and I were both in our sixties, we weren't just Mom and Dad to two children we'd raised; we were also Bubbe and Pop Pop to four grandchildren now ages 5-11.
However at the time we were laying the groundwork for our separate futures, one grandchild hadn't yet been born, two were only a year old and the oldest was just four. Their understanding of our divorce was not central in our minds.
As we were working through the details of our settlement and post marital relationship, we knew that our divorce would have an impact on our adult children and that it would raise serious concerns for them about the future of our family. Both our son and daughter shared their new concerns about their parents aging alone, but they made it clear that their primary worry was that they wouldn't have to take sides and we could all continue to gather as a family for holidays and special events. We did our best to assure them that we were still loving friends and devoted parents and would continue to function as such in the future.
Wanting to honor the 40 years of our marriage and what we had built together, as well as express our continued love and gratitude to each other for our contributions to the life we shared, we co-wrote a codicil to our divorce agreement - a personal statement which outlined our shared intentions for a loving post-marital life.
Here is an excerpt which we co wrote and signed with love:
"Though we are dissolving our marriage and financial connection, we want to reaffirm our friendship, deep love and the respect that grew throughout our many years together. Most
important is our role as parents and grandparents and our devotion to our family. We will never allow anyone or anything to come between all of us. We wish each other the best in the next
chapter of our lives, remaining loving and supportive."
We went back and forth about whether to include the line about never allowing anyone coming between us and our family. My husband didn't think it was necessary. He said it went without saying that he'd never become involved with anyone who would make that kind of trouble for him and his family. I understood and believed him, but I also had the sad and painful experience of being cut off from my father because of his new wife's selfish insecurities. So I needed the words.
It's one thing to agree to something in theory. It's quite another when it becomes a reality.
My former husband was the first one to have a significant other that he wanted to include in family gatherings. He became serious with a lovely, age appropriate woman. As his former wife, I was happy for him and looked forward to meeting her one day.
But as a grandmother, I was uncomfortable with her meeting and interacting with my grandchildren. And I became even more uncomfortable when he included her in family gatherings, vacations and parties without any initial conversation with our children about how the grandchildren were supposed to understand who Pop Pop's new friend was supposed to be to them.
The failure to have these discussions led to inevitable confusion.
After attending a family Hanukah party with Pop Pop's family and his friend, ( we'll call her Debbie) my four year old granddaughter announced at dinner with her aunt and cousin, "I LOVE Debbie!" It was as heartfelt, pure and genuine as it was surprising. Especially to her cousin my seven year old granddaughter who had her own heartfelt assertion.
"Bubbe thinks Debbie is trying to replace her."
Whoa.
My son was angry at me because he was sure those words came from me. My daughter and I recalled a conversation we' had after she and my granddaughter met Debbie for the first time. It was my granddaughter's birthday when she and my daughter were visiting Pop Pop in Florida , and he brought them both to Debbie's house where she made a little birthday celebration. I expressed my concern that maybe this was a little confusing and inappropriate and my daughter chose to alleviate my fears by saying that the grandkids were now calling Debbie Bubbe. She has a mordant sense of humor.
Ha. Ha. Ha.
After hearing his niece's words, my son sat me down for a good talking to. He wanted me to know what the grandchildren were saying about Pop Pop and Debbie and how it was important for him that his children be allowed to have their own authentic feelings about a person who was nice to them. While I agreed with him, I did express that if his father had initiated a conversation about how he saw Debbie's relationship with his family, it could have avoided bad feelings and confusion.
Later when I called my former husband, we had a nice talk. He told me it went without saying that Debbie wasn't trying to replace me or to even be a grandmother to his grandchildren. She was just being nice. I told him that sometimes things might need to be said and maybe he could talk to his children about that. When we were married, those kinds of talks were my job so maybe in this new season of our family, he might need to do a little more talking.
I also told him that both his children told me what a nice woman Debbie is and what a good match she is for their father. "It's like he found. a female version of himself," my son said. Outgoing, social, active, athletic. And I told him again how happy I am for him. I also told him I would have a talk with our seven year old granddaughter to alleviate any guilt she might feel about how being nice to Debbie would somehow hurt Bubbe.
Last night I went on line looking for research and advice for how to help grandchildren make sense of their grandparents' divorce. And even though the "silver divorce" is on the rise, there is little to no information about helping grandchildren through this passage.
The Bubbes and Pop Pops, Grandmoms and Grandpops, Nanas and Nonnos will have to make this lroad by walking. And our choices for inclusion of new friends or partners made with our grandchildren's best interests in mind, will provide a roadmap for others navigating this new terrain.
I've been spending a lot of time with my son's children this winter. The other night, at dinner, with no context nor prompting, my four year old granddaughter exclaimed, " I love Bubbe AND Debbie!" Her parents held their breath and looked at me nervously.
"And we love you!" I said and gave her a big hug while she giggled in delight.
I would love to hear your thoughts, stories, experiences, wisdom, questions about this. With silver divorce on the rise, it's not going away any time soon.
Marsha Rosenzweig Pincus is the author of Seventy Thoughts on Turning Seventy (Substack)
Below - Bubbe and Pop Pop with grandson 2018
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This really speaks to me. Although my divorce was before my daughters had children, some of these tensions erupted because he left me (us) for a woman he married immediately and brings her to any and all family events. (He actually began doing that WHILE we were still divorcing,) I'd like to hear more stories on this topic and how people resolved the issues.
So many silver divorce stories... here's mine.
I got married in 1981 and my kids were born in 1986 and 1991. I stayed married far too long to the father of my children, after I'd forgiven his infidelities when they were in elementary school and created an independent social life of my own when they were a little older. By the time my youngest went off to college, I'd moved into her room, and he and I lived quite separate lives.
When my mom asked me to move in with her in 2014, I jumped at the chance and left him living in the co-op we owned together. He kept me on his health insurance. He had a girlfriend, and I had/have a boyfriend. It was an unspoken arrangement, and it worked for a good long while, almost 8 years. When my mom died in 2018, he came and sat shiva with us. After that, we had a couple of Thanksgivings together, one big happy(ish) family. I actually liked his girlfriend, she'd never been married and had no kids and she liked my kids a lot - and they were adults by this point (and neither of them has children, so no Bubbe or Zayde in this tale).
And so it went for a few years... until he reconnected with his high school girlfriend on Facebook (yes! How trite! but true) and had an epiphany - suddenly he dumped his girlfriend of 7 years, and told me we needed to get divorced, we needed to sell the co-op, and he was packing up his life and moving across country to be with her. It was a bit of a shock, especially when he confessed to me that for 40 years, whenever we would fight or whenever he was feeling down, he would "go to a little place in my heart where I held the memories of her" and that he never loved anyone the way he loved her. It was a gut punch that took me by surprise, I thought I was numb to any more hurt from him, but hearing that felt like he was negating our entire marriage (and our kids). It sounds silly - we were getting divorced, after all - but it really hurt to imagine that for all those years I struggled to keep this marriage together, he was escaping to an interior fantasy, one so powerful that he tracked her down and made it a reality.
So we got divorced, and it was both sad and liberating at the same time. It took several months; we used a mediator, because there were few possessions other than the co-op, and we sold that and split the proceeds. The hardest part was getting him to understand that I was entitled to half his pension; I'd been a full time mom for 15 years (with financial assistance from my generous mom). Anyway... I ended up settling for less than half, and neither of us was happy - I guess that's a successful divorce.
Another thing that was painful about my divorce is that for over 30 years, I lived with him and raised a family in a little 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom garden apartment in Queens, although my mom offered to help us buy a house many times - but he "never wanted the responsibility" - at least that was his excuse. I grew up in a house, and I wanted my kids to experience that as well... but they had to make do with visiting Grandma's house. My son actually lived with my mother while he went to law school, an arrangement that worked out well for everyone, since she was in her 80s and didn't want to live alone and he was in his 20s and didn't want to live in the crowded garden apartment. So, now that my ex has upended his life and moved to California to be with the high school girlfriend, they are buying a house in North Carolina and will live on the edge of a nature preserve with lots of land. It stings to see him finally taking on the responsibility of homeownership when he's 72 and retired, when he didn't care to provide a home for his family when he was young.
The divorce became final on August 8, 2023. I haven't met the new girlfriend yet, but I think my kids have, when she visited New York last year. I'm sure he'll marry her eventually, probably sooner rather than later. I still chat with him occasionally online, maybe once every few weeks, and mostly about the kids, or music, or cats. The new girlfriend never had kids, which I suppose makes life simpler for me. If either of our kids has a wedding and we're all there, I will be cordial to her, but that's about it.
As for me, I'm living with my boyfriend since 2015, my mom left the co-op to me when she passed, and I don't really want or feel the need to get married again. We've been through a lot together. I have had multiple orthopedic surgeries and have mobility issues; he developed sepsis in 2019 and was on dialysis for 3 years before receiving a kidney transplant in 2022 from an altruistic living donor, a young man who was 36 at the time. So weddings are not top of my list of priorities, I guess. On Saturday, June 15, we will be attending the wedding of his donor in New Jersey, and I'll enjoy the miracle of that celebration with this new member of our extended family.
Sorry to ramble on... "There are eight million stories in the naked city. This has been one of them."