Member-only story
Our Casual Relationship With the Truth
I was recently having a conversation with my partner on divorce, specifically divorces within our wider circle.
Don’t tell me you never engaged in at least a little bit of gossip about this topic. I won’t believe you if you say you haven’t! Anyway, we weren’t going into the specifics, well not too much anyway (I swear!) — it was more a general conversation — one or both of us had noticed how the party in the divorce we didn’t know was almost always the devil, and the party we knew inevitably the injured party.
We knew in our heart of hearts this is not possible, it couldn’t be because it can only be the woman who is at fault (this is a deliberate lie!). I shouldn’t even joke about it, divorce generally isn’t a laughing matter. When you scrape away at the surface, underneath is a web of hurt, and broken promises, and people who changed through no fault of their own to the point they are no longer compatible.
When we relay stories of failed relationships to our friends and families, the people we are seeking comfort and solace with, it is incompatible to give the whole truth I imagine. A lot of the time it probably isn’t even deliberate.
That got me thinking — do we ever tell the whole truth? I have sincerely begun to doubt it…
