divorcing in med school

[@70mphC2005--->]

i hate to say this but it's happening. lots of problems go on in divorcing in med school - namely feeling like other think i have failed in some way [even though i did everything i could to save this marriage], being viewed poorly by faculty and deans, name changes, interruption of studies, etc.

has anyone heard of a couple divorcing in med school. how did it turn out? did you sense that others viewed the divorcing person in a poor light, and how did they managed that ?

any responses are appreciated.

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[carcrazyguy]

I can not tell you from experience, and hope it never happens to my wife and I. However, KEEP YOUR CHIN UP!!! Everything will work out for the best. It may be a long road but if that is what you have to do or want to do, JUST HANG IN THERE. Don't think that people look down on you for this. In fact, I bet a lot of the people that you think are looking down on you, have been through the same thing at one time or another. Just keep studying and keep your spirits up.


Good luck.

 

[DrMom]

So sorry to hear about that.

The class ahead of me has had a few divorces (including 2 couples with both wife & husband in the same med school class). Overall, I don't think it is any different from other divorces (friends may take sides, etc), but that doesn't make it any easier for you. I'm sure it is a huge additional strain on top of all of the normal med school stuff. I seriously doubt that classmates are going to be looking down on you, and if a couple of them do, blow them off 'cause they're not worth your time & emotional outlay.

 

[Xmulder]

Originally posted by @70mphC2005--->
i hate to say this but it's happening. lots of problems go on in divorcing in med school - namely feeling like other think i have failed in some way [even though i did everything i could to save this marriage], being viewed poorly by faculty and deans, name changes, interruption of studies, etc.

has anyone heard of a couple divorcing in med school. how did it turn out? did you sense that others viewed the divorcing person in a poor light, and how did they managed that ?

any responses are appreciated.

I actually chanced upon a multi-series PBS documentary that focused on medical students and their spouses a while back. It tracked many single students and couples, many of whom ended in divorce or legal separation, sadly. It tracked these ppl over the course of many years, throughout med school, then residency.

What I remember was that the things that were cited as the main reasons for failure in their marriages were *very* consistent across many couples. These were: the pressure (of course), lack of time, but also that they realized they were ultimately different people, with poorly matching personalities and different interests, short and long term. Especially since many couples who enter med school married at a fairly early age, and so entered into their vows less so out of finding the right person, and more so out of fear of loneliness, lust/glamour of the ceremony, etc. I was very surprised to see so many failed marriages, esp since it showed their progress from being sig others, to the weddings, and then breakup. I suppose it is not surprising given the 50% divorce rate in this country.

Curious why you are inquiring about this issue?

 

[Goober]

I know of two people.

One guy got divorced in his 4th year of med school. I met him as a first year resident. He was paying alimony on his meager resident salary. He was very bitter about the whole thing but it didn't affect his performance in residency.

Another guy was a 2nd year resident. His wife of 10 years left him. He didn't want a divorce and was completely shocked. He went into a downhill spiral and ended getting kicked out of the program because a variety of factors but basically he wasn't studying and had too many absences.

 

[radspouse]

I only knew of one couple that divorced in my husband's class at med school. They were both medical students and apparently the female half of the marriage had a rather open affair with a non-medical person. There were some other people in different classes that had problems but they were few and far between and I wasn't privy to the details of those cases.

What really amazed me were the spouses that stayed with their medical spouses who were openly cheating on them and/or going out and getting drunk and manhandling strippers after every exam. That seemed more common at that medical school than divorce....

 

[Mashiara]

Originally posted by Xmulder
I actually chanced upon a multi-series PBS documentary that focused on medical students and their spouses a while back.

Do you remeber what it year showed or parts of the title? I'd love to watch this.

Thanks a bunch!

 

[Xmulder]

I do not remember the title of the series, but you can go to the pbs.org website and run a search. Good luck!

Very inspiring and fascinating in all respects, though the relationships/marriages failing parts are very sad.

 

[k's mom]

My husband and I watched it when he was just starting his premed classes, so that must have been 1999 or so, so it is at least that old...they did a really good job, but I came away from it with a totally unrealistic picture of the fate of medical relationships. Of the 500+ medical students here, I have only heard of two divorces over the past two years...not to say that there aren't more, but if I remember correctly, every relationship on that PBS show ended in divorce relatively quickly. Sad, but I don't feel it is typical.

 

[dstn2bmd]

Any divorcee medical students you know been female with children. Have they fared well considering?

Heb

 

[prwunecom]

that would be me.....I divorced after 15 years of marriage during my first year of med school. Unfortunately I married my husband when I was very young -- only 17 -- and therefore I grew into a person that he didn't really want for a wife. We parted amicably, but that didn't make it any easier. Divorce sucks, even when you know it is the right thing to do. In my case, I have three small children, and since my schedule as a medical student wasn't a very stable environment, my kids stayed with my husband. That was a very hard transition, and ultimately I was able to extend my med school education to 5 years to help in making the transition.

I am now about to graduate from med school and begin my residency in psychiatry this summer. Both my ex and I have since remarried, and my kids remain with them as they are well grounded and settled in their home environment. They are very well adjusted, though, because through it all we have all managed to show them how loved they are by all of the adults in their lives.

It was tough for me as a woman to go through this, but I feel it has made me a stronger person and hopefully a more empathetic individual. My classmates as well as the faculty at my school were SUPER supportive. In fact, without them, I don't think I would have had the courage or stamina to stick with med school and get to the point where I am today.

 

[@70mphC2005--->]

that's quite an experience you've had. i hope that one day i can look back and say something positive about this. people here are not very supportive here. either they ignore me or i shut them out after they know about this. the residents act like they don't even acknowledge my existence. i'm trying to get the chance to sit down with one and tell them look this is very stressful and i will do all i can to get through and continue working hard, but to understand that i am doing my best right now. i've mucked up a few times lately on the wards and this is very unlike me. i gotta take more time out and rest more than usual,. i guess this is just what people go through when there undergoing divorce or other stressful life events

 

[BigBopper]

that's quite an experience you've had. i hope that one day i can look back and say something positive about this. people here are not very supportive here. either they ignore me or i shut them out after they know about this. the residents act like they don't even acknowledge my existence. i'm trying to get the chance to sit down with one and tell them look this is very stressful and i will do all i can to get through and continue working hard, but to understand that i am doing my best right now. i've mucked up a few times lately on the wards and this is very unlike me. i gotta take more time out and rest more than usual,. i guess this is just what people go through when there undergoing divorce or other stressful life events

In my experience, in medicine people don't care or want to hear about your personal problems. If you can't do or handle the work people are not forgiving *in general*. The more comeptitive the specialty the less they want to hear it.

 

[@70mphC2005--->]

thanks for all your replies.

unfortunately most are actually finding out without me directly telling them. after all, they ask if i have changed my last name because i have become married - i say 'no, it's the other way around'. they always look at me funny wondering 'huh...' . i say -'yes that is exactly what i am talking about'.

truthfully my work has become sloppy since this is going on - showing up late a couple times. my hope is to just plow through this and come out solid. i hope they understand that i don't want this to affect my education and will try my best so that it does not, even though it has in some ways.

but i do often wonder how others have experienced divorce in med school and how it was handled.

 

[Olanzapine]

70% of couples who marry during their medical training (med school/residency) get divorced within 15 yrs according to Iserson's getting into residency.

 

[Lion-O]

70% of couples who marry during their medical training (med school/residency) get divorced within 15 yrs according to Iserson's getting into residency.

Does this book give statistics on couples who get married before medical training?

 

[Olanzapine]

Does this book give statistics on couples who get married before medical training?

I think that the overall divorce rate is slightly higher then the general public (50-60%).

 

[DQuest]

Well, divorce sucks. My wife is in med school, her first year and she and I are now getting a divorce. I never thought it would happen to us but it is. I tried to do everything I could, just didnt work. She totaly changed after about the first month. Be it the stress from school, or just too much physical contact with the OMM tutor she fell in love with I dont know exactly. But when I found out, it was realy hard to handle. Would have probably been difforent if she had just been up front and told me, but me finding out on my own put it in another light. The whole thing is realy sad to because before med school we had a good marriage. I guess people just change once they go to med school.

 

[prwunecom]

Sorry to hear about your situation DQuest. That sucks! Hang in there......my thoughts are with you.

All I can say is that I have seen time and time again that medical school is incredibly difficult on relationships.....those that manage to stay together should really pat themselves (and each other) on the backs!

 

[@70mphC2005--->]

dquest,
sorry to here about this, it is quite true that many do change once they get into med school. particularly, it seems that those entering med school soon become less interested in the needs of their partner and cannot be there for them like before medical school. this happened to me, i became like that and tried very hard to pay as much attention as i could to the relationship, but it was impossible to be the same person like before the first year.

some people will never go back to the way they were, as i've seen. others can change and go back to something similar to their younger self, but this takes a while [certainly not in the next 3-6 months] to learn, possibly talking about years. this is because med school is very consuming, and relationships that were consuming in the past have been replaced by this big burden of med school. then trying to go to relationship counseling might be even more of a burden because it takes away from study time that is seriously needed for courses like anatomy or biochemistry.

often couples can work it out despite the stress of med school. where i personally drew the line and sounds like what you are concerned about, is when the partner commits an act that seriously violates the laws of marriage. i don't know if you should divorce based on just thinking your wife might be in love with another person, you may want to know for sure - because oftetimes the less attention a partner receives while one is in med school can be misconstrued as having an affair with another person when it might really be the result of the student focusing on their studies. but i suppose either way can be harmful to the partner.

 

[DQuest]

I would like to think that I was just overly concerned, but sadly that?s not the case in this situation.

 

[Wifty]

Divorce is one of the reasons I think it is sooo important for spouses/partners to learn what med school is like BEFORE they start the process!! This is where connecting with other spouses helps. As I go thru the process, I can give insight to those coming behind and I learn from those that have already gone where I am going.

Being in med school is a unique experience because it IS intensive and intensive for a long period of time. A spouse needs to understand this and figure out whats most important to them and make sure they get at least that, even if they have to compromise on other things.

Honestly, being at the end of the MSII year, I have found being married to a med student SOO much easier then I thought it would be!! I really think its because we both looked at how hard it would be before we started and talked about how we would handle things.

We have had a couple of divorces in the first year - mostly in relationships where the med student committed too much time to school and really never spent time at home or with their spouse. The time changes....but it has to be a priority to spend time together.

Its hard.....and I feel for those that divorce. Sometimes even when everything is done 'right', things still don't work out.

With smiles,
Wifty

 

[DQuest]

Yes I should have learned more about it and I sure as hell wouldn?t have pushed her to attend an Osteopathic school. Intensive?guess it was intensive for her, that?s pretty much how she was describing it to her friend on the phone when I overheard the conversation, O and recorded it. Yah pretty intensive. Didn?t make me feel that intensive when I found out my wife of almost 7 years was messing around. She found out just how unique OMM is first hand from her tutor. As far as understanding, I don?t know how anyone with good morals could even consider being understanding about their spouse having an affair. Figure out what?s most important to them and make sure they get at least that,,,? And compromise??? No way, when I found out, I confronted him, told him that if I ever saw them talking I would find and give his spouse a copy of this tape. And she has the audacity to try to get me to call him and tell him its ok if they talk and thinks I should feel bad for her because he won?t even speak to her now.?Sucks I just bought and paid off a new car for her in January. I didn?t see any of this coming, I knew she was having trouble, and was acting really strange. I just thought everyone that went to med school acted that way. I was very understanding. She wonted me to wait on selling the house, quitting my job to move with her for one semester to make sure she could make it, so we wouldn?t loose the house if she changed her mind or couldn?t make it or whatever. One semester goes by, she says lets do it, I sell the house, quit my job, and move down here. Having no idea. Understanding, I was very understanding, but not now.

 

[Wifty]

I am really sorry for all that you have gone through and are going through.
The things I said about understanding and talking, were for in general and are what works for me and my relationship with us being honest with each other.

Everyones relationship is different and there is no hard and fast rule that works for all of them because people are different. Your SO doesn't sound like she was being honest with you - and that is terrible and inexcusable because it has led to things being this way for you.

Again, I am sorry. I wasn't in any way saying that you should do differently now or that you did anything wrong. You invested alot of yourself it sounds like, and it should have been returned.

Good luck.
Wifty

 

[no-see-um]

Divorce is one of the reasons why female doctors should always go by their Maiden name. I hate to say that because it is my culture where the female takes the male's last name, but it's true...

 

[DQuest]

No problem, perhaps I took your quote the wrong way, our relationship very likely would have been different had she just been honest with me, but her trying to hide it just about drove her and me both crazy, and then when she would see me in the evenings once I moved down here, I guess she would start feeling guilty, and it would bother her, that?s all I can figure, I don?t know. Sucks though, the worst part of all of it is loosing your best friend, before med school you couldn?t have parted us for anything. I did everything she ever ask me to do for her. Tried everything I could to save the marriage, I still care for her, but this is what she wants, I guess I will never understand it. I do know one thing; I have to try to get away from everything that reminds me of her. Hopefully that will make it easier. I don?t know anyone here in Tulsa anyway.

 

[thewebthsp]

I'm sorry man. This information is making me think I should never get married. I guess I can have kids outside of marriage...

Maybe just accept serial short term (~3 mos) relationships...