why can't generationX seemingly hold marriages together?

to be in one's twenties is the time to further define one's self, explore the world, experience new things, try new jobs. they can be pretty unstable years. many of us try to establish stability and get married during these years. too many of us are also getting divorced in these years. what's contributing to vast martial instability among our generation in particular? i somewhat sense that our generation is bailing right after the honeymoon stage has begun to transition into the reality stage. right at the point when natural disillusionment occurs. have our expectations for the honeymoon stage - which possibly have been malformed by unrealistic portrayal throughout our "tv-baby" upbringings and/or not solidly modeled for us by parents and step-parents (of whom never successfully dealt with their own divorce) - been unrealistically misaligned? is our disillusionment that much more off-base than those generations before us? if so, has it served to ill-prepare us for the real business of life together - for the compromises?

why can't we deal?

oftentimes i get the distinct impression that most of generationX simply isn't prepared for the rigors of marriage. are too many of us operating under a false fantasy of marriage, and severely lacking a grounded knowledge of partnership?

or why won't we deal?

does it still come down to basic, yet timeless, male / female misunderstanding and miscommunication? are we not fully understanding our spouses? do we still not have a grasp on male / female needs, wants and desires? if not, why not?

are we not communicating properly? are we lacking respect of the opposite sex? have we not been taught how to behave and what to expect in marriage? even if we were, have these expectations been so radically altered compared to our parents, that they're largely irrelevant for us? do we need to take another good look at our parent's feminism and assess how it's affecting women and men's ability to relate to one another today?

has there been so much social, economic, political and interpersonal change that we aren't certain where we stand with one another? in the process of trying to enlighten and "shape-up" the opposite sex, have we actually alienated the opposite sex? has this led to such drastic changes in the marriage roles, it's left us unable to make marriage work?

are generation X'ers experiencing the inevitable repercussions of so many of our own parents' divorces? has lack of prime, positive role models left us to figure out the intricacies of intimate relationships ourselves (often remaking the same disastrous mistakes in our own lives).

are a large percentages of young marriages being thrown away for the wrong reasons? are people just getting married for the wrong reasons: because they think they should, fear of loneliness, convenience, tired of dating? are our generation's divorces the inevitable fallout from wrong reasoning? were mismatched marriages always common but in the past people just settled, tolerated, suffered through in quiet desperation, or just "made the best of it"? do we not know how to "make the best of it"? are we a less tolerant generation? one that doesn't just "make the best of it"? are marriages prematurely severed which might otherwise thrive with a little more support, encouragement and understanding?

do we expect more of our relationships and spouses now? more than is realistic? are we a spoiled group that calls it quits at the first seemingly insurmountable glitch? is there no devotion left? what's the acceptable threshold of disappointment in marriage now? how much conditional love has to be rejected before you're not "loving" your spouse anymore? are we tolerating less and bailing sooner?

have we set our expectations up to be dashed? have others set those expectations for us? friends? parents? school? society? real society or "tv-baby" society? the "disposable" society?

has the consumer conditioning of disposability finally seeped into the sphere of relationships? are we treating each other and our marriages like disposable items? "oh, i'm done with this one. it satisfied what i wanted for that brief period of time, and it no longer seems to be working, so i'll throw it out and just go to the 'singles store' and get a new marriage..." (we've created a paradox, though. relationships are hardly built to last any more because of that "disposable" attitude, and directly because of that attitude they aren't lasting.) there is no one-stop-shop "singles store", either. (if you think dating was difficult before marriage, it's even tougher after a divorce...)

have we not only bottomed out on hope, respect and trust for our futures financially, but emotionally as well? is there a self-fulfilling danger in leaving this thinking go unchecked?

considering that expression is inspired by our interpretations of the world at various points in our lives, generationX may be ever-so-slightly subconsciously, creating our own self-defeating self-fulfilling prophecies which we feel compelled to express about. marriage requires a lot of problem solving. while, yes, we may have different pressures, attitudes, expectations from marriage today; it's not so much which difficulties to solve, more than how we're solving them. in some ways it seems - to ourselves and others - that we are creating our own chaos, upheaval and change to validate our own rhetoric. we would probably all agree it's best to provide a solution to a problem and not stand on the sidelines and complain about it. for certain, we are a smart group of young people. though, very possibly we may be stemming-off our own potential for happiness and ultimately deluding ourselves. our tendencies toward cynicism, frustration, mistrust, lost faith in personal relationships, families, politics, corporations, medical care, the environment and so forth; can program us to believe that we're in chaos, in upheaval, in change. in real terms, we are and have been. so, we bitch. in other senses, we not. but we still bitch. of course, the undercurrent of genX is our perceived frustrations to achieve what we want in our lives. it may be best to take pause for a bit, realize we can affect control over what we want, but it'll just take a little longer, that's all.

naturally, we want happiness in our marriages. and when the inherent obstacles of being so young, being generationX and being generationX with all the gender power confusion collide; very often our frustrations resume, our hopes shatter and be we bail the marriages for that rolling field of "greener grass".

in my experience, i've found there generally is no such thing. it's probably safe to bet that the multitude of reasons you married were based on a solid and true connection. a true love. it's what most everyone ever hopes for. why else do we fantasize over true love in the cinema, in books, in music and most all other art. sadly, i'm not so certain how many more of those true loves - if any - await the divorcee running over the hill to live upon that "greener" grass.

the bedrock of marriage is commitment. as the "life spans" of technology, careers and locales gen X'ers live in for these technologically driven careers shorten and turn over at quickening intervals, individuals educated to staff these technologically driven jobs are less inclined to make commitments to any one long term situation. a good marriage should be a long term situation. but just as gen X'ers are resigned to high turnover in these aspects of their professional lives, we're now becoming accustomed to the same high turnover in our romantic lives too. if we look at a "chain of commitment" as related to work and then to a marriage, it's my opinion that genX'ers don't have much to put their reliance upon. many companies are reluctant to make commitments in terms of hiring new full time employees. instead, we're hired as temporary contractors without health, dental, or investment benefits -- (which we can kindly buy a la carté, thank you). a young person in this situation has difficulty making large, marriage-style financial commitments in terms of a purchasing a car, or a home for themselves; let alone entering into a marriage and family where both the man and woman aren't in positions to make a commitment since their expensively educated jobs may disappear at a moments notice, forcing either taking a job in a separate city or asking that person to compromise beyond what their education is worth for the sake of the marriage. (no resentment there... and resentment is, oh, so good for a marriage...) if the man, and now the woman, aren't inclined to compromise for the sake of their romantic commitments since their professional futures are too instable, then i believe we'll continue to witness marriages fall to divorce among gen X'ers in this current climate of societal and professional structures as stable as quicksand.

what readers have said.