I didn’t sit down to research divorce. I wasn’t looking for statistics. But somehow, the topic keeps finding me. A reel talking about marriage not lasting. An article shared in a group chat. Someone quoting numbers like it’s common knowledge now. After a while, you stop ignoring it.

What’s confusing is that it feels like divorce is increasing everywhere, but when you actually look it up, the story isn’t that simple. I went down that rabbit hole one night and found out that the overall divorce rate in the US has actually gone down compared to the 1980s. The numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show the divorce rate sitting around 2 to 3 divorces per 1,000 people in recent years. That’s lower than what it used to be.

Still, the conversation feels louder than ever.

Maybe it’s because even if the numbers are lower, divorce feels closer now. We see it in people around us. Friends. Coworkers. People online talking openly about leaving marriages that didn’t work. Stories spread faster than data ever will.

Another thing I read stuck with me. According to breakdowns shared by Pew Research Center, first marriages still fail at a noticeable rate, and remarriages fail even more often. That kind of information stays in your head. It creates doubt. Even if things are okay in your own relationship, a small voice starts asking questions you didn’t ask before.

What bothers me isn’t divorce itself. Sometimes leaving really is the healthiest choice. What bothers me is how little we talk about the quiet phase before it. The months or years where people stop listening. Where they’re tired, stretched thin, and don’t know how to say what’s wrong without starting a fight.

I think that’s why people keep reading about divorce. Not because they want relationships to fail, but because they’re trying to understand what goes wrong. They’re scared of ending up there. Or already feel like they might be.

I don’t have a conclusion. I’m not taking sides. I just know that this topic keeps coming up for a reason. Not because marriages are suddenly weaker, but because people are overwhelmed, expectations are high, and patience feels harder to hold onto than it used to.

If you’re curious like I was, you can check the numbers yourself. I looked at the CDC’s marriage and divorce data page, and a few Pew Research articles that break down long-term trends and patterns. Nothing dramatic. Just facts. And somehow, that made the whole conversation feel heavier, not lighter.

Maybe I’m not the only one noticing it. Maybe a lot of us are reading the same things quietly, trying to understand what commitment looks like now.