Relationship status

I just read a great blog by former literary agent, current author, Nathan Bransford about his divorce and the ramifications of doing so in the current ultra-connected world of 2012. (read his blog here.)

It made me think and, for a moment, I changed my facebook relationship status to divorced. Really, that is what I am considered if I have to fill something out. Divorced.

For a woman who thought I would never get a divorce (I don't believe in them, to be honest), this relationship status annoys the shit out of me.

I always (and still do) believe that marriage is supposed to be forever. Until death do we part is one of the vows and when I vow something, dammit, I fully intend to do it.

But there are times (like in my divorce) when it takes two to make it work and two to make it fall apart and ours was broken in a way that NOTHING would ever fix. (Well, except for a time machine that lets you go back in time and say, "Actually, I don't.")

Aside from my general hatred of divorce (my parents were divorced...so I guess the statistics would suggest that this was probably expected...) and the feelings of failure that a failed marriage causes...

I got divorced almost 13 years ago.

Why is my relationship status still divorced? I have been single for more than twice as long as I was married. So, although I changed my relationship status to divorced for about half a second, I swapped it right back. I am single. It feels like calling myself divorced is living in the past. I have changed and grown and moved on and using the title 'divorced' is like living in that world again...

And it wasn't the greatest world. Divorce is hard. It hurts, even if it is the right choice, and has a lot of repercussions on levels that go beyond the relationship you are ending.

So, I am back to being single on facebook because that is what I feel and have felt for much longer than I felt divorced. (Actually, I have been single for longer than I was married and longer than I felt divorced combined...) Even when I have dated, I never changed my status to 'In a Relationship' or 'It's complicated' because...well, I have still felt single.

Probably my relationship status will stay single unless someone convinces me to stick on two rings again.

How many of you guys are 'divorced'? Do you feel divorced or do you feel single?