A recent article in Fatherly summed up the risk of divorce by married years. Years 1 to 2 are “high risk.” Years 9 to 15 go down to “low.” By years 15 to 20, the risk rises again to “average.”
“Newlyweds and old married couples,” concluded the article, “can never get too comfortable.”
The numbers don’t lie, but the danger of studies like this is portraying divorce as something that just happens because of “falling out of love” or something like that. The truth about marriage is, thankfully, more complicated.
Couples committed enough to fight for their marriage stand a good chance of making it. Eighty percent of couples who participated in Focus on the Family’s Hope Restored Marriage Intensive are still together two years later.
It also matters what we believe about marriage. As of 2019, divorce in America had reached a 50-year low, but that’s because fewer Americans are getting married at all. So, the ones who marry tend to believe there’s something to it.
And there is, which is why when it comes to marriage and the health of our society, none of us should be comfortable.