Marriage of Ex Doesn’t Always Spell Relief

When a mutual friend told Susan that her ex-husband was remarrying, she felt relieved. “It’s a chapter closing,” thought the successful businesswoman, who had asked for the divorce and since remarried.

It wasn’t the last chapter.

On the heels of her feelings of relief, Susan felt a more insidious emotion surface: jealousy. Her ex’s second marriage was much more elaborate than their own simple ceremony. “He never did this for me,” she remembers saying to herself.

Careful not to discuss her feelings with her new husband, Susan worries that she shouldn’t have gotten so upset about her ex’s remarriage. But mental health experts say reacting to the marriage of an ex-spouse is natural, even psychologically healthy, if you don’t take it to extremes.

“Most people will feel something on the day of the (ex-spouse’s) remarriage or the day they find out about it,” says Constance Ahrons, USC professor of sociology and author of “Divorced Families” (W.W. Norton, 1989). “Even something as simple as thinking, ‘He really did move on.’ (Or) ‘She really does love someone else.’ ”

Strolls down the aisle by ex-spouses are becoming more common. Last year, nearly 1.5 million divorced people--738,000 women and 748,000 men--remarried, says demographer Barbara Foley Wilson of the National Center for Health Statistics. That’s a 6% increase in remarriages since 1980.

While therapists can’t pin down an exact pattern or sequence of reactions, they find relief is common, especially among ex-spouses who sought the divorce. One husband, on hearing about his ex’s imminent remarriage, recalls thinking, “Maybe now she’ll stop putting out third-party feelers about our getting back together.”

Other ex-spouses cite a feeling of sadness--and surprise at that emotion. “I felt a sense of loss,” says Linda, who split up with her husband after a decade of marriage and then found out, four years later, that he was remarrying. A legitimate reaction, says Tom Kennon, a UCLA psychotherapist: “Remarriage is the final nail in the coffin, signaling the end of the relationship.”

“To experience a sadness is not necessarily unhealthy,” says Dr. Thomas K. Ciesla, a psychiatrist at St. John’s Hospital and Health Center, Santa Monica. “In fact, the healthy thing is to reminisce and grieve, at least for a while.”

Mental replays of the ex-spouses’ wedding--down to reception menus and bridal bouquets--are also common, therapists say. “There is a tendency to re-experience the feelings surrounding the breakup of the relationship,” says Ciesla. Perhaps, experts say, it’s a last-ditch effort to make sense of the failure.

Self-doubt also can occur when an ex-spouse moves on to another relationship. A typical question: “Why can this person get along with my ex and I can’t?” Ex-spouses who haven’t remarried may feel left behind. “The message is, ‘Someone else has replaced you,’ ” says Ahrons. Ex-spouses may face issues of aging when their ex remarries, especially if the remarrying ex chooses a much younger partner.

Curiosity about how the ex-spouse acts with his new partner is normal too. Says Kennon: “If you made a major emotional investment in the marriage, it’s common to wonder, ‘Does he say the same things to her as he did to me?’ ”

Inconsequential Details

Seemingly inconsequential details can become sources of aggravation. “If an ex-wife didn’t take back her maiden name, she often thinks, ‘Someone else has that name now too,’ ” notes Ahrons.

In general, the remarriage of an ex-spouse is more difficult to accept, experts say, if it occurs rapidly after the divorce; if an ex-spouse has reconciliation fantasies; if the original marriage was lengthy; and if the remarrying spouse sought the divorce against the partner’s wishes. In that last case, says Kennon, the partner who didn’t seek the divorce may be idealizing the former relationship, making the remarriage even tougher to accept.

If the ex-spouses have children together, facing the new marriage is often more difficult for both, since it might necessitate such additional changes as rearranged visitation schedules or the introduction of step-siblings.

But sometimes the opposite is true. Since Linda’s ex-husband remarried, she finds him more likely to follow the joint-custody schedule involving their daughter. “And his new wife has a sensitivity to our daughter’s needs that’s similar to my own,” she adds.

Even so, Linda couldn’t bring herself to accept her ex’s invitation to the wedding. “I decided I wouldn’t be comfortable,” she says.

Part of that discomfort, she says, stemmed from her own absence of a dating partner at that time. “If I had been in a relationship, I probably would have gone.”

Ex-spouses who have developed a civil, even friendly post-divorce relationship may have a harder time accepting a former partner’s remarriage than those on door-slamming terms, says Ahrons.

In her experience, ex-couples who get along--those she categorizes as “perfect pals” and “cooperative colleagues”--have a more difficult time facing the remarriage of an ex-spouse than those who have “angry associate” or “fiery foe” relationships. That’s because remarriage may alter the friendly relationship, she says. Fear of upsetting the new relationship, for instance, may rule out such activities as ex-spouses dining together.

Flip-flopping Emotions

Whatever the ex-spouses’ relationship with each other, flip-flopping emotions around the time of the wedding are natural, Ahrons finds. She remembers one woman changing her mind several times about whether she wanted her children to be involved in her ex-husband’s wedding. Finally, she gave the go-ahead. On the day of the wedding, she felt left out and abandoned. “But it’s not that she wanted to be there,” Ahrons adds.

Handling an ex-spouse’s remarriage is easier, say those who have been there, if ex-partners remain sensitive to each other’s feelings. “My ex told me about his remarriage (soon after he decided) so I wouldn’t hear about it first from mutual friends,” says Linda.

Also of help are understanding family members (those who resist the urge to say they always knew the original marriage wouldn’t pan out). Good friends can ease the adjustment for ex-spouses too. “They can help by reassuring the ex-spouse of their desirability, especially if he or she is still single,” Kennon says.

Although Ahrons knows of one woman who went to her ex’s wedding bearing good wishes, she acknowledges few people can do this. Ahrons advises ex-spouses: “Give in a little to the sad feelings. Sit and talk about them to a close friend.” That’s healthier, she believes, than escaping on a cruise or enjoying a shopping spree. Getting involved in a support group may help ex-spouses who have a difficult time coping too, Kennon says.

There’s no single “normal” way to react when an ex remarries, experts agree. A wide range of reactions is normal. But reactions that persist aren’t, mental health experts warn. How long is too long? It depends on such factors as the duration of the original marriage and the time lapsed since the breakup. But Ahrons tells clients a week is long enough to wallow in hurt, humiliation or sadness. If the news of an ex’s remarriage still stings enough to interfere significantly with work or social life after a week, professional help is in order, Ahrons says. But others say a week is arbitrary, that even if feelings persist after that, it’s no cause for concern.

Ill Will or Revenge

Another red flag: when fleeting feelings of ill will escalate to nasty revenge. Thinking such sarcastic thoughts as “I hope she enjoys round-the-clock television sports” are probably pretty normal, therapists say. But more serious thoughts of revenge--’I hope the hotel they’re honeymooning in gets bombed”--are not.

The fact that ex-spouses react in any way to a former partner’s remarriage, Ahrons speculates, may reflect a bittersweet truth: “Even though we’ve become a divorcing culture, we still consider marriage very final.”

When Your Ex Remarries What’s Normal: * Reliving your own wedding. * Feeling: * angry. * sad. * surprised about feeling sad. * abandoned. * relieved, especially if you have already remarried or if you’ve filed for the divorce. * left out, especially if your children are involved in the ex-spouse’s wedding. What’s Not Normal: * Having long-term, elaborate wishes for revenge. * Feeling so sad or obsessed that it interferes with work or social life for more than one week. Expect Greater Impact If: * You and your ex-spouse have developed a post-divorce “perfect pal” or “cooperative colleague” relationship. * You and ex-spouse had children together. * You find out about the wedding after it occurs. SOURCE: Constance Ahrons, USC sociology professor and author of “Divorced Families” (W. W. Norton, 1989)