15 Impossible Tips To Avoid Divorce

Want a long, stable marriage?

The trick is to marry an optometrist, agree to have two male children and SMILE!

Take pains to avoid any kind of personal problem or health issue.

And ladies, avoid the military at all costs.

Anneli Rufus has compiled a list of scientific studies that predict divorce. It’s a fascinating read, especially since most of the predictors are beyond our control (but I wouldn’t be surprised to see it lead to a The Rules: Divorce Edition in a year’s time).

Let’s look at them together, shall we?

1. If you’re a woman who got married before the age of eighteen, your marriage faces a 48 percent likelihood of divorce within ten years.

Considering that your husband faced a 100% chance of death by shotgun before he proposed, those odds aren’t too bad.

2. If you’re a woman who wants a child—either a first child or an additional child—much more strongly than your spouse does, your marriage is more than twice as likely to end in divorce as the marriages of couples who agree on how much they do or don’t want a child.

But I promise I’ll feed it and clean up after it and wash it and play with it every day! Honest! Pretty please?

3. If you have two sons, you face a 36.9 percent likelihood of divorce, but if you have two daughters, the likelihood rises to 43.1 percent.

This one confused me until I remembered teenage girls. You know, the screeching harpies that throw plates at your head before bursting into tears? At least after your son says “fuck you” and slams his bedroom door you have the rest of the night free.

4. If you’re a man with high basal testosterone, you’re 43 percent more likely to get divorced than men with low testosterone levels.

So nice guys do win in the end.

5. If your child has been diagnosed with ADHD, you are 22.7 percent more likely to divorce before that child turns eight years old than parents of a child without ADHD.

Really? Really truly? Why? Tell me why! Really? Are you sure? Are you and dad gonna get divorced? Will I have another mom? What if she’s prettier than you? Can I get two Christmases? (Actually that’s all kids under 8).

6. If you are currently married but have cohabited with a lover other than your current spouse, you are slightly more than twice as likely to divorce than someone who has never cohabited.

Sinners aren’t winners.

7. If you didn’t smile for photographs early in life, your marriage is five times more likely to end in divorce than if you smiled intensely in early photographs.

I smiled like an insane air hostess as a child — big and fake. Does that mean my marriage will seem happy on the outside while my husband and I watch our souls slowly die?

And what about the jerks that did bunny ears behind their sibling’s head?

8. If your child has died after the twentieth week of pregnancy, during labor, or soon after labor, you are 40 percent more likely to divorce than if you had not lost a child.

There may be evolutionary reasons for this but it is just too sad to think about.

9. If you’re a woman who has recently been diagnosed with cancer or multiple sclerosis, your marriage is six times more likely to end in divorce than if your husband had been diagnosed with those diseases instead.

Is this because women are bigger whiners or men are bigger jerks? Perhaps John Edwards can clue us in.

10. If you’re a Caucasian woman and you’re separated from your spouse, there’s a 98 percent chance that you’ll be divorced within six years of that separation; if you’re a Hispanic woman, the likelihood is 80 percent; if you’re an African-American woman, the likelihood is 72 percent.

This boils down to the Protestant work ethic. Separations take work. You have to roll up your sleeves and develop a deep-seated hatred where there was once love. WASPs have been trained in this since birth.

11. If you’re a dancer or choreographer, you face a 43.05 percent likelihood of divorce, compared with mathematicians, who face a 19.15 percent likelihood, and animal trainers, who face a 22.5 percent likelihood.

What? The spouses leaping about in skin-tight clothes and thrusting their hips are less safe than the ones who spend their time thinking about number theory?

And it is unlikely an animal trainer will be cheating on you while working late (and if they are, do you really want to be competing with Flipper for your spouses attention?).

12. If you’re a farmer or rancher, you face only a 7.63 percent likelihood of divorce, joined by other low-risk occupations such as nuclear engineers, who face a 7.29 percent likelihood, and optometrists, who face a mere 4.01 percent likelihood.

I like how these run the gamut of education levels and personality types. It makes me want to uncover the secret connection between the three that could safeguard my marriage.

13. If either you or your spouse have suffered a brain injury, your marriage faces a 17 percent chance of ending in divorce.

If one partner is mentally impaired the marriage is safer than if a spouse is a dancer, doesn’t smile in photos, lived in sin before marriage, or had two kids with you.

14. If you’re an African-American woman, your first marriage has a 47 percent likelihood of ending in divorce within ten years; for Hispanic women, the likelihood is 34 percent; for Caucasian women, it’s 32 percent; for Asian women, it’s 20 percent.

And yet African-American women and Hispanic women are more likely to go back to their spouses after a separation than Caucasians? Bizarrely enough, this apparent inconsistency is from the same study.

15. If you’re a woman serving actively in the military, your marriage is 250 percent more likely to end in divorce than that of a man serving actively in the military.

Finally the Moore-Willis divorce is explained!

Looking at these indicators it is easy to think that marriage is as fragile as a hot house flower and that one small change in the environment can kill it.

But if you can get past them, these hurdles temper the marriage — making it stronger, more flexible and resilient.

So don’t fret if you are the wrong race, the wrong age or have the wrong career. If your marriage is right for you that’s all that matters.