You put a lot of time and effort into your career. That means long hours. It means dedication to your work that goes beyond everything else. While you pride yourself on that dedication, you also wonder if it is going to take a toll on your relationships.
It may. Studies have found that overwork can lead to divorce. To see why, take a look at these statistics:
- Workers average 90,000 hours on the job in their lives.
- Annually, workers spend roughly 100 hours in the car, driving to or from work.
- 25% of Americans claim that nothing brings on more stress than their jobs.
- People also tend to gain weight at work, with 26% adding over 10 pounds.
All of these things — stress, time apart, weight gain — can bring about a divorce. It may not happen overnight. But it can chip away at the relationship.
This is especially pronounced when one person becomes a workaholic and does nothing else in life. This can make their spouses “feel more estranged from their partners.”
Drifting apart
People who get divorced often talk about drifting apart or growing apart over time. They cite this as the reason that the relationship had to end. They may not have any major events to talk about, such as infidelity. They just feel like they do not have that close, romantic relationship that they once shared. When those feelings end, they decide it is time to move on.
As you can see from the above, the reason that they drift apart could be work. It makes them feel estranged. All of those hours on the road or in the workplace are hours that they do not spend together. Is it any surprise that they feel less close emotionally when they are, in actuality, far less close physically? The two go hand-in-hand.
What should you do?
Naturally, you can have a productive career and a happy marriage. And, even should you choose your career over your relationship, this isn’t to disparage your dedication to that career.
Instead, this should help to show you what the impact of that career may look like on the rest of your life. You need to know how studies have tied these events — overwork and divorce — together in the past. Keep that in mind when deciding exactly how you want to proceed and what decisions you’ll make.
If you do end up getting divorced, whether the split is connected to you or your spouse’s work habits or not, make sure that you know about all of the legal rights that you have in Minnesota. Divorce can get complicated, especially for busy individuals, and you must know where you stand.