Staggering Divorce Rate For Those With A Chronic Illness

I made the mistake today, of researching the divorce rate among couples who deal with a chronic illness or chronic pain.  What I found, was staggering.  There is a 75% divorce rate among those who are dealing with a chronic illness.  75%.  That number, is almost unreal to me.

I'm not gonna lie, that number scared me.  It also made me really sad.  When a couple marries, they think that their spouse is their best friend.  They think that they will always be able to count on their spouse, to turn to if something's wrong.  To see how high the divorce rate is in this group, almost cripples me.  My heart is breaking to think of the pain, betrayal,anguish and tears that the chronically ill person must feel when their spouse tells them that they want out, because they became sick.

Since I've become sick, my marriage has hit speed bumps.  Even though my husband thinks that he "gets it", he doesn't really "get it".  Little things that have been said in the heat of the moment shows me that he doesn't really "get it".  On the other hand, I can't really understand fully how it must be for him, either.  To go from having a life-long companion, to having to help take care of someone who's sick every single day.  I know this can't be easy for him either.

So, how do I make sure that my marriage falls into that 25% catagory?  What do I need to do, to make sure I'm doing my part in keeping this marriage alive?  I don't really have an answer to that, and that scares me.  I'm the type of person that always sits and analyzes everything.  I need a plan A, a plan B, and usually I don't feel content until I have a plan C also in place.  The thing is though, with a marriage, let alone a chronic illness, there isn't any way to make a plan A, let alone a plan B and a plan C. 

Marriage is hard to keep alive and well, even when a chronic illness isn't involved.  The added stress of a chronic illness just makes everything that much harder.  To keep a marriage alive, when chronic illness is present, takes a strong committment from both partners.  If one or the other in the marriage isn't 100% fully committed to making things work, then there will be problems. I know that I'll do everything I can, to try and ensure that my marriage doesn't fall into that 75% divorce rate.  I also pray that none of you, will fall into that catagory as well.  I found this divorce rate listed in several websites across the web.  I will leave you with the link to one of those websites though.   You can click HERE to read the page I found this statistic on.