104 Divorce Quotes

Divorce is a challenging journey, replete with emotional highs and lows, moments of clarity, and periods of doubt. While it can feel like an isolating experience, it's essential to remember that you're not alone. Many have walked this path before, finding solace, wisdom, and even humor in the words of others who've faced similar struggles. In this post, we present a carefully curated collection of the top 104 divorce quotes to provide comfort, insight, and perhaps a new perspective. Whether you're seeking encouragement, understanding, or just a moment of reflection, these quotes are here to remind you that healing and new beginnings are possible.

1. “Taking a thing apart is always faster than putting something together. This is true of everything except marriage.” - Joe Hill

2. “In college, I had a course in Latin, and one day the word "divorce" came up. I always figured it came from some root that meant "divide." In truth, it comes from "divertere," which means "to divert."I believe that. All divorce does is divert you, taking you away from everything you thought you knew and everything you thought you wanted and steering you into all kinds of other stuff, like discussions about your mother's girdle and whether she should marry someone else.” - Mitch Albom

3. “My husband and I have never considered divorce... murder sometimes, but never divorce.” - Joyce Brothers

4. “Paying alimony is like feeding hay to a dead horse.” - Groucho Marx

5. “Hollywood brides keep the bouquets and throw away the grooms.” - Groucho Marx

6. “In every marriage more than a week old, there are grounds for divorce. The trick is to find and continue to find grounds for marriage.” - Robert Anderson

7. “What cracks had he left in their hearts? Did they love less now and settle for less in return, as they held onto parts of themselves they did not want to give and lose again? Or - and he wished this - did they love more fully because they had survived pain, so no longer feared it?” - Andre Dubus

8. “Those unexpected morality lessons provided by the trip had jolted me into some kind of action. It was time to jettison the past before the present jettisoned me. This was my first veiled attempt at recovery. Although perhaps I was just running away again. I returned to Glasgow, planning to say a final goodbye to Anne and get out of her life, but ended up drinking with buddies in the Chip Bar and never seeing her. I called her instead to say I was moving to London and told her she could have the house and everything else we owned, which wasn't much. I think she was as relieved as I was that I was leaving town for good.” - Craig Ferguson

9. “Divorce lawyers stoke anger and fear in their clients, knowing that as long as the conflicts remain unresolved the revenue stream will keep flowing.” - Craig Ferguson

10. “She still cared for me, and the best way I could make amends to her was to be happy.I do have a knack for finding great women.” - Craig Ferguson

11. “Americans, who make more of marrying for love than any other people, also break up more of their marriages, but the figure reflects not so much the failure of love as the determination of people not to live without it.” - Morton Hunt

12. “It was one of those ridiculous arrangements that couples make when they are separating, but before they are divorced - when they still imagine that children and property can be shared with more magnanimity than recrimination.” - John Irving

13. “The arrangements that couples make in order to maintain civility in the midst of their journey to divorce are often most elaborate when the professed top priority is to protect a child.” - John Irving

14. “The real genesis is forbidden to me, vis-à-vis N´s inability to confess even the mildest transgressions.” - Suzanne Finnamore

15. “A heart can stop beating for a while, one can still live.” - Suzanne Finnamore

16. “Irrationally, I think, Will You Marry Me? Four words. I Want a Divorce. Four words. I would like time to count the letters as well, but there is not time.” - Suzanne Finnamore

17. “My mother is a firm believer in the long pause, useful in interrogations, proclamations of truth, and the occasional cutting dead of someone without their knowing it.” - Suzanne Finnamore

18. “Any way I slice reality it comes out poorly, and I feel an urge to not exist, something I have never felt before; and now here it comes with conviction, almost panic. I mentally bless and exonerate anyone who has kicked a chair out from beneath her or swallowed opium in large chunks. My mind has met their environment, here in the void. I understand perfectly.” - Suzanne Finnamore

19. “Delusion detests focus and romance provides the veil.” - Suzanne Finnamore

20. “I saw my reflection in their eyes, but not the men themselves, not clearly. This preserved the idea that all intelligent and even vaguely attractive men were essentially good. Delusion detest focus and romance provides the veil.” - Suzanne Finnamore

21. “It had all seemed as inevitable as sunset. Instead it was the beauty of the sun glinting upon the scythe.” - Suzanne Finnamore

22. “People told me not to get married; I didn´t listen. No one ever listens, it seems to me now. Perhaps people should stop trying to communicate. N was not a communicator; early on, I´d insisted on communication. Now I see his point acutely. I would love to have him back to not communicate with me. I would never ask for communication again, I would simply go elsewhere for the deep fish. Also, I´m not at all sure I want to hear what he has to say in this new vista. This works out well.” - Suzanne Finnamore

23. “The abandonment came, and now this shabby bacchanal.” - Suzanne Finnamore

24. “I know one thing about men," Bunny says with finality, leaving the room to check on A. "They never die when you want them to.” - Suzanne Finnamore

25. “They ought to do away with divorce settlements. Instead, both parties should flip a coin. The winner gets to stay where he or she is and keep everything. The loser goes to Paraguay. That´s it.” - Suzanne Finnamore

26. “It´s a little song about abandonment, and it goes something like this....” - Suzanne Finnamore

27. “Soon he was online every night until one or two a.m. Often he would wake up at three of four a.m. and go back online. He would shut down the computer screen when I walked in. In the past, he used to take the laptop to bed with him and we would both be on our laptops, hips touching. He stopped doing that, slipping off to his office instead and closing the door even when A was asleep. He started closing doors behind him. I was steeped in denial, but my body knew.” - Suzanne Finnamore

28. “I was steeped in denial, but my body knew.” - Suzanne Finnamore

29. “Daily I walk around my small, picturesque town with a thought bubble over my head: Person Going Through A Divorce. When I look at other people, I automatically form thought bubbles over their heads. Happy Couple With Stroller. Innocent Teenage Girl With Her Whole Life Ahead Of Her. Content Grandmother And Grandfather Visiting Town Where Their Grandchildren Live With Intact Parents. Secure Housewife With Big Diamond. Undamaged Group Of Young Men On Skateboards. Good Man With Baby In BabyBjörn Who Loves His Wife. Dogs Who Never Have To Worry. Young Kids Kissing Publicly. Then every so often I see one like me, one of the shambling gaunt women without makeup, looking older than she is: Divorcing Woman Wondering How The Fuck This Happened.” - Suzanne Finnamore

30. “Très, très, triste...” - Suzanne Finnamore

31. “Naturally, I do blame Françoise. I blame her for having N in the first place. She was young, she was beautiful, she was married to a doctor, and she was intelligent. She could have abstained from producing her first son. It was wrong on a variety of levels.” - Suzanne Finnamore

32. “Although I notice there is never a truly good time to have a nice long chat with one´s mother-in-law, unless you are having an extraordinary life and marriage and your mother-in-law is, say, Maureen Dowd, or Indira Gandhi. Someone of that ilk.” - Suzanne Finnamore

33. “I used to loathe ambivalence; now I adore it. Ambivalence is my new best friend.” - Suzanne Finnamore

34. “There is that, and there is also the Irreconcilable Differences line. It seems so catchall, so vague. You could say that about anyone, any man and woman at all. Jesus and Mary Magdalene: "Irreconcilable Differences." JFK and Jackie, anyone at all. It´s built into the man-woman thing. What kind of paltry reason is that? "Insanity" is another box to be checked on the divorce petition, the only alternative to "Irreconcilable Differences." I would like to check it.” - Suzanne Finnamore

35. “He announces that lately he keeps losing things. "Like your wife and child," I want to say, but don´t. At fourty, I´ve learned not to say everything clever, not to score every point.” - Suzanne Finnamore

36. “I remember one desolate Sunday night, wondering: Is this how I´m going to spend the rest of my life? Marrid to someone who is perpetually distracted and somewhat wistful, as though a marvelous party is going on in the next room, which but for me he could be attending?” - Suzanne Finnamore

37. “Take me now, God!" I shout to the inky sky. "I´m ready.""You´re not ready. You´re not even divorced yet," Bunny says. "You cannot die married to that man.” - Suzanne Finnamore

38. “The snag about marriage is, it isn´t worth the divorce.” - Suzanne Finnamore

39. “Surprises, I feel now, are primarily a form of violence.” - Suzanne Finnamore

40. “You get what you give," we will tell his sorry, selfish ass." The Betty Lady has spoken. I detect a Bronx accent."But," I demur, "it will make the other woman say, ´See? She IS a jealous and paranoid and pushy wife.´"The Betty Lady rips open a cell phone statement with a nail file and, without looking up at me, says, "Let me tell you something, honey. In my experience? The only thing they care about is what they see in the mirror each morning and WINNING...or their perception of winning.” - Suzanne Finnamore

41. “I am replete with stamina in finding out every single fact I can about this whole affair.Yet, I think, do I want to pull that thread? Do I want to unleash the truth, unravel deceit, and kill reality as I´ve known it? It is irreparable, if I do, from the moment we met until now. It is long. If I discover too much that is false about what I thought my past was, Time will be skewed even further. I already have a poor connection with the present. Example: I have no sense of what day it is. It´s better.” - Suzanne Finnamore

42. “For me, it´s sloth," I say. "Hedonistic sloth and escapism.” - Suzanne Finnamore

43. “To keep myself from harming or calling N and to stave off the rage and despair, I focus on my extraordinary son, drink midrange Chardonnay every night after he is asleep, and make a barrage of late-night mail-order retail purchases placed from the couch. The couch has officially become my second battle station. I am angry and I have credit And I´m all blackened inside; I should wear a pointy witch hat around Larkspur as I go to the bank and drop A off at day care. It would be more honest.” - Suzanne Finnamore

44. “God is great and God is good," Lisa says. "But where are the Apache attack helicopters when you need them?” - Suzanne Finnamore

45. “The problem of unmet expectations in marriage is primarily a problem of stereotyping. Each and every human being on this planet is a unique person. Since marriage is inevitably a relationship between two unique people, no one marriage is going to be exactly like any other. Yet we tend to wed with explicit visions of what a “good” marriage ought to be like. Then we suffer enormously from trying to force the relationship to fit the stereotype and from the neurotic guilt and anger we experience when we fail to pull it off.” - M. Scott Peck

46. “What we wait around a lifetime for with one person, we can find in a moment with someone else.” - Stephanie Klein

47. “Our ex-wifes always harbour secrets about us that make them irresistable. Until, of course, we remember who we are and what we did and why we are not married anymore.” - Richard Ford

48. “They may already know too much about their mother and father--nothing being more factual than divorce, where so much has to be explained and worked through intelligently (though they have tried to stay equable). I've noticed this is often the time when children begin calling their parents by their first names, becoming little ironists after their parents' faults. What could be lonelier for a parent than to be criticized by his child on a first-name basis?” - Richard Ford

49. “Like the muscles knew from the beginning that it would end with this, this inevitable falling apart... It's sad, but a relief as well to know that two things so closely bound together can separate with so little violence, leaving smooth surfaces instead of bloody shreds.” - Julie Powell

50. “Darling Daddy,This is Rose.The shed needs new wires now it has blown up.Caddy is bringing home rock-bottom boyfriends to see if they will do for Mummy. Instead of you.Love, Rose.” - Hilary McKay

51. “My sudden, unforeseen capitulation had knocked me backward, and I had nothing to hold on to. My internal weather was eerily calm, as if in a tornado's aftermath, birdsong, sunshine, supersaturated colors, wreckage all around, and myself, dazed and limping.” - Kate Christensen

52. “From the photo albums, every single print of her had been peeled away. Shots of the both of us together had been cut, the parts with her neatly trimmed away, leaving my image behind. Photos of me alone or of mountains and rivers and deer and cats were left intact. Three albums rendered into a revised past. It was as if I'd been alone at birth, alone all my days, and would continue alone.” - Haruki Murakami

53. “And whosoever fears Allah and keeps his duty to Him, He will make a way for him to get out (from every difficulty).And He will provide him from (sources) he never could imagine.” - Anonymous

54. “Losing a mate to death is devastating but it's not a personal attack like divorce. When somebody you love stops loving you and walks away, it's an insult beyond comparison.” - Sue Merrell

55. “The divorce papers remained unopened in the crisp yellow envelope. He had thrown it on his desk without a backward glance. Between his lashes, his dark chocolate eyes burned with fury but there was something else in the depths that she hadn’t seen in a long time, passion.” - Suzan Battah

56. “Divorced?''Separated.' He tested his thumb against the pricks of the rose. 'Women. They say you got all the freedom. Then you give them their freedom, and they don't want it.' ("Novelty")” - John Crowley

57. “If you're as detached as that, why does the obsolete institution of marriage survive with you?"Oh, it still has its uses. One couldn't be divorced without it.” - Edith Wharton

58. “Staying married may have long-term benefits. You can elicit much more sympathy from friends over a bad marriage than you ever can from a good divorce.” - P.J. O'Rourke

59. “Revenge is what I want. Nothing but pure unadulterated revenge. But my mother brought me up to be a lady.” - J.P. Donleavy

60. “She divorced her husband, y' know. I never knew him, it was before I met Jane. Apparently she came back from work one mornin' an' found her husband in bed with the milkman. With the milkman, honest to God. Well, apparently, from that day forward Jane was a feminist. An' I've noticed, she never takes milk in her tea.” - Willy Russell

61. “When you have to face up to the fact that marriage to the man you love is really over, that's very tough, sheer agony. In that kind of harrowing situation, I always go away and cut myself off from the world. Also, I sober up immediately when there is genuine bad news in my life; I never face it with alcohol in my brain. I just rented a house in Palm Springs and sat there and just suffered for a couple of weeks. I suffered there until I was strong enough to face it.” - Ava Gardner

62. “God Hates divorce.""He hates cruelty even more."Caring For Eleanor” - Sonia Rumzi

63. “A Plan B life can be just as good or better than a Plan A life. You just have to let go of that first dream and realize that God has already written the first chapter of the new life that awaits you. All you have to do is start reading!” - Shannon Alder

64. “The obvious effect of frivolous divorce will be frivolous marriage. If people can be separated for no reason they will feel it all the easier to be united for no reason.” - G.K. Chesterton

65. “There was a time when I thought I loved my first wife more than life itself. But now I hate her guts. I do. How do you explain that? What happened to that love? What happened to it, is what I'd like to know. I wish someone could tell me.” - Raymond Carver

66. “Divorce is a fire exit. When a house is burning, it doesn’t matter who set the fire. If there is no fire exit, everyone in the house will be burned!” - Mehmet Murat ildan

67. “Bad divorce?" Hardy asked, his gaze falling to my hands. I realized I was clutching my purse in a death grip.“No, the divorce was great,” I said. “It was the marriage that sucked.” - Lisa Kleypas

68. “Why did we divorce? I guess you could say we had trouble synchronizing. You know that carnival ride where two cages swing in opposite directions, going higher and higher until they go over the top? That was us. We passed each other all the time, but we never actually stopped in the same place until it was time to get off the ride.” - Diane Hammond

69. “There is no such thing as a "broken family." Family is family, and is not determined by marriage certificates, divorce papers, and adoption documents. Families are made in the heart. The only time family becomes null is when those ties in the heart are cut. If you cut those ties, those people are not your family. If you make those ties, those people are your family. And if you hate those ties, those people will still be your family because whatever you hate will always be with you.” - C. JoyBell C.

70. “When mom and dad went to war the only prisoners they took were the children” - PAT CONROY(AUTHOR)

71. “Even the jerks earn some of our affection. We can be glad they're gone and yet still mourn the good parts.” - Shannon Hale

72. “Courage is fueled by the motivation to take the first step into the unknown.” - Cheryl Nielsen

73. “you're not dead-you're dormant.” - Cheryl Nielsen

74. “When you're corked...you're corked!” - Cheryl Nielsen

75. “Grief is the emotional contract of divorce” - Cheryl Nielsen

76. “Choosing to break up your family is one of the most difficult decisions you will make in a lifetime. But once you have come to it; it will be with certainty. Certainty that you are ready to embrace the changes, the challenges and the joys of starting a new life.” - Lisa Thomson

77. “It is a pity he did not write in pencil. As you have no doubt frequently observed, the impression usually goes through -- a fact which has dissolved many a happy marriage.” - Arthur Conan Doyle

78. “We ruined each other by being together. We destroyed each other’s dreams.” - Kate Chisman

79. “A united front announcing a split.” - Sarah Dessen

80. “Consider this a one-thousand horsepower divorce, sweetheart” - Daven Anderson

81. “Do I think a marriage with him would last? I have my doubts. There, I said it. But marraige is always a risk. And so what if it doesn't work? Would that make you absolutely unhappy for the rest of your life? I would hope not.” - Amy Stolls

82. “The leaving happened slowly, gradually, as these things do, and before we knew it, we were lost to each other, as if a magician had whisked a cloth off the table, leaving the dishes there, jolted. And when we looked back it was all a blur, time on fast forward, hurtling to an inevitable conclusion.” - Kathryn Stern

83. “Whenever there is a break up, it's usually not the fault of just one party. Both are usually at fault” - Louis N. Jones

84. “I was very happy in both my marriages. I was unfaithful and so were they, just like any other normal couple.” - Paulo Coelho

85. “Because the truth was, and we both knew it, he'd gone long, long ago. I'd just made him stick around when he really wanted to be somewhere else. In his own weird way, he was another victim of the shooting, One of the ones who couldn't get away. "Are you mad?" he asked, which I thought was a really strange question. "Yes," I said. And I was. It's just that I wasn't so sure I was mad at him. But I don't think he needed to hear that part. I don't think he wanted to hear that part. I think it was important to him to hear that I cared enough to be angry."Will you ever forgive me?" he asked."Will you ever forgive me?" I shot back, leveling my gaze directly into his eyes.He stared into them for a few moments then got up silently and headed for the door. He didn't turn around when he reached it. Just grabbed the doorknob and held it. "No," he said without facing me. "Maybe that makes me a bad parent, but I don't know if I can. No matter what the police found, you were involved in that shooting, Valerie. You wrote those names on that list. You wrote my name on that list. You had a good life here. You might not have pulled the trigger, but you helped cause the tragedy."He opened the door."I'm sorry. I really am." He stepped out into the hallway. "I'll leave my new address and phone number with your mother," he said before walking slowly out of my sight.” - Jennifer Brown

86. “Pastor McFucking Bride this . . . Pastor McFucking Bride that. Fuck him!” - S.B. Redd

87. “And the game of dominoes is much like life: You gotta play the bones you’ve pulled. It don’t matter if you got seven doubles in your damn hand.” - S.B. Redd

88. “I'm going to marry him. And if he thinks he can get divorced and married every two or three years in the approved Hollywood fashion, well, he never made a bigger mistake in his life. He's going to marry and stick to me.” - Agatha Christie

89. “What's the truth? The truth is what happened to you and him or her, over the years, and what didn't happen. The truth is what you said and didn't say, how much you tried, how you changed, and whether you were lucky. I believe in luck. I think luck plays a huge part in success. Or failure. In the end, who cares about the truth? You still end up divorced. Finally, the biggest asshole wins. Sort of. At least the biggest asshole takes home the must stuff. If you consider this winning then have at it. You're an asshole.” - Margaret Overton

90. “Everything can change in a heartbeat; it can slip away in an instant. Everything you trust, and treasure, whatever brings you comfort, comes at a terrible cost. Health is temporary; money disappears. Safety is nothing big an illusion. So when the moment comes, and everything you depend upon changes, or perhaps someone you love disappears, or no longer loves you, must disaster follow? Or will you-somehow-adapt?” - Margaret Overton

91. “Once that ship has sailed don't hold on to the anchor” - Stanley Victor Paskavich

92. “It is hundreds of tiny threads of memories, which sew people together through the years. Despite, their mental separation they stay woven into that tapestry out of habit, emotion, obsession or fear.” - Shannon L. Alder

93. “A man who respects his wife, does not sleep with other women. And a woman who respects herself does not allow her husband to get away with it” - Courtney Giardina

94. “A divorce party--that's really better than a wedding party!” - Nujood Ali

95. “Vomit began to spill out of me like pea soup, splattering the road with champagne and caviar, long island iced teas, of bacon appetizers and croissants, and a perfectly grilled filet mignonette. It had gone down easy, among the kiss ups of the lawyer world, but spewed out nastily and hard, in the company of a cheater.” - Keira D. Skye

96. “She had golden blazing sun kissed hair, which hung down in loose, lazy spirals, a heart shaped pouted mouth, which was pink tinged with violet blushing, wide, spangled blue eyes that glimmered sparks to flicker and ember in the vivid intelligence of the moon’s love, and a yielding body, that seem to tangle in loose rhythm as I walked near to her.” - Keira D. Skye

97. “For women, marriages foreclosed often resulted in anaccumulation of booty; for men, these failed projects of implausible optimism were more likely to manifest themselves in material lack. It was hard to resist the metaphorical impression that women got to keep the past itself, whereas men were simply robbed of it.” - Lionel Shriver

98. “Every relationship that has hit a crossroads has asked, “What is it that you want from me?” - Shannon L. Alder

99. “how many times had I begged Mom to divorce him already?” - Justina Chen

100. “You never have to suffer because of, or be denatured by, another person, even someone you love.” - Rossana Condoleo

101. “Divorce = Rebirth: forget the past, replan your life, improve your appearance & REJUVENATE!” - Rossana Condoleo

102. “Divorce is the start point for a brand new life. Don't lose the chance to redesign it upon your dreams!” - Rossana Condoleo

103. “When we do something we like, we are not only happy. We are also very strong!” - Rossana Condoleo

104. “If you spend your time hoping someone will suffer the consequences for what they did to your heart, then you're allowing them to hurt you a second time in your mind.” - Shannon L. Alder