Why You Should Write a Divorce Announcement

Reasons Why You Should Announce Your Divorce

Your divorce is one of the most challenging and painful parts of your life, but it is also a defining moment and a turning point in your life. There are many reasons why you should announce your divorce.

Control the Narrative

Announcing your divorce allows you to take charge of this important news and present it exactly as you want. It enables you to speak your truth and frame it as a happy, sad, or neutral event.

If you and your ex can agree and announce together, you can present a united front, sharing the same message to your social circles. When you both share the same or similar messages, it reduces gossip, confusion, and discussion about your private life.

If you and your ex cannot agree, announcing your divorce yourself allows you to express exactly what you feel and believe, setting the record straight and standing up for your truth.

Decide How Much Detail to Share

When you announce your divorce, you can decide how much information you want to give others. You might note that it comes after a long separation, or you might want to take this opportunity to say who left whom.

Other details, such as the timeframe of when you separated, who moved out, if you are using mediation, if your children are having a hard time, or even blame, can be part of what you want to put out into the world.

When you announce your divorce, you get to decide how much other people should know. You can share as much or as little as you want to. Some people might write a long Facebook post so all their friends know exactly what happened. Other people might just change their status to single and consider that their announcement.

Choose Your Audience

Announcing your divorce your way allows you to decide whom you want to tell and how.

You might call certain family or close friends and tell them everything. You could send a group text to a group of friends letting them know. You could send an email to select people at work. You could use social media to post a joint announcement together or to post by yourself.

And even on social media, you can refine who will see the message and whether it is made public or viewable only by your friends.

You may want to tell different people different levels of detail, so selecting who your announcement goes to allows you to alter your message based on the recipients.

Begin to Obtain Closure

When you come out and tell a lot of people you are getting a divorce, it can create a moment where it becomes more real for you. Until a lot of people know about the divorce, most assume you are still married. And until you come out and say, "We are getting a divorce," there is always the chance you might find a way to work things out.

Coming out and saying the words in a semi-public way helps you close the door on uncertainty and clearly enunciates that you are moving forward with a divorce and into the future that comes after that.

Keeping the reality hidden allows you to hold out some hope that things might change. Closure begins when you fully accept the path you are on.

Notify Everyone at Once

A divorce announcement can make your life easy by simply telling everyone you know all at once.

One of the reasons we have funerals is so that the mourners can talk to everyone who cares, all at once, in one setting. Imagine how hard it would be if your parent died and you had to tell people one by one over months. Every time you ran into someone different, you would have to recount the entire story and mourn it all again.

A divorce announcement does the same thing. It allows you to contact everyone en masse if you wish. You needn't then spend half an hour on the phone with your cousin, recount it all to your Pilates friend, or explain it all to your college roommate.

Doing this can ease your burden by checking the big box completely in one fell swoop.

Express Appreciation

There are likely many people who have been supporting you as you have gone through the emotional and practical challenges of reaching this point in your relationship.

In an announcement, you can thank them publicly for all they have done for you and let them know how much you appreciate the help and support they have provided you as you have moved through this period of your life.

This can be as simple as thanking people in general or as specific as you might want if there are specific people and isolated incidences of assistance you want to call out.

Stop Ongoing Inquiries

If your marriage has been challenging for some time, it's likely that many of your family, friends, and acquaintances are aware of the problems in your relationship. They may frequently check in on you out of concern (and sometimes just plain nosiness).

Creating a divorce announcement ends those ongoing inquiries and allows you to inform the people you select about your divorce.

That is not to say that they won't then continue to check in to see how you are doing, but at least you won't have to answer questions about how your marriage is doing.

Ask for Support

You may need various forms of support as you move forward with this change in your life. The announcement allows you to ask for what you need, such as help with your children's adjustment, help finding a new home, or more general support, such as prayers or good energy.

Request Privacy

There's a reason most celebrity divorce announcements ask for privacy. This is a challenging transitional time for you, and asking for privacy sends a message that you don't want to talk about it and aren't ready to be open about your feelings and your decisions. It sets boundaries and prevents people from seeking details.

Break Up With Your Spouse

It's unusual but not unheard of to notify your spouse that you're getting a divorce by making a broad announcement. This is not generally the best way to tell your spouse you have decided your marriage is over, but it might be a path that feels right to you.

Final Thoughts

There are a variety of reasons to choose to write a divorce announcement. There is no good or bad reasoning. What matters is that you feel comfortable notifying people about your decision.