By Hanna Leppänen
Fiona Miles, 43, has been living in a cramped north London home with her husband Mike, 45, for over 15 years. As a senior developer in a small firm Mike usually works long days at the office, but since the lockdown he has been working from home. Fiona is also at home, waiting for her bakery to reopen in June.
After spending just over a month in lockdown together, the couple have found that their relationship has reached the point of no return – and have decided to go their separate ways as soon as possible.
“It’s the small things,” Fiona says. “We are now at the point where I can’t even be in the same room with him without wanting to scream. I hope this lockdown ends fast.
“We didn’t fight before all this – in fact, we barely talked. That has been so easy because both of us just left the house for a day and came back late in the evening.
“Now we are forced to face our problems because we can’t go anywhere and pretend that they don’t exist.”
Lockdown has been a turning point in many relationships, and there has been a marked rise in global divorce rates after it was lifted.
Now, as restrictions in the UK are starting to ease up, a survey made by Omnisis and Old Salt shows that 76% of women and 64% of men think that the same will happen here.
Fiona and Mike are not the only couple who has had a change of heart about their marriage during the lockdown. Marketing manager Sarah Levy, 34, has lived in southwest London for two years with her civil partner Linda Oskarsson, 29, who works as a translator, and their Golden Retriever Rolf.
Both humans still work full hours from home, but the lockdown has given them more time together and made them both realise that they want different things from life.
“We have created such a beautiful life together, but it has been a total rollercoaster, and we both think it’s time to stop it now,” Oskarsson says.
“This has been a time when we have realised how different we are,” adds Levy. “Now that we have had a lot of time to discuss what we want from our futures, we can both see that this is not going to work out. We did talk about these things before we got married, but people change.”
Divorce numbers rising worldwide
Deciding to file for divorce and self-isolate together might not be the easiest thing to do, but many couples have already approached Michael Barrett, 52, a London-based lawyer specialising in family law who is writing his first book about it.
“Every couple is different,” Barrett says. “I think it’s too early to say what is going to happen here, but there is a possibility that the figures go up. I know many firms are now making arrangements to provide as much help as they can to couples after the lockdown is lifted.”
Barrett says that lockdown is a “very stressful situation” to many. “Couples are together at all times without being able to get out of the house and seeing other people,” he says.
“Many couples are also both working from home in their small houses, which can increase the tension.”
China ended its lockdown in early March. After that, the city of Xian in Northwest China recorded the highest divorce numbers in its history, and the town of Milou in Hunan province, China, had so many couples filing for divorce that the officials “didn’t have time to have a sip of water”, according to a report from the city website.
“I don’t think that the lockdown itself causes divorces but might lead up to it if the couple has had some problems before,” Martin says.
A study made by academic Catherine Cohan about the effect of 1989’s Hurricane Hugo on relationships showed that after the disaster, people tended to make big decisions in general, which would explain the high divorce numbers. According to her “a natural disaster mobilised people to take action” and therefore make big changes in their lives.
Domestic violence numbers rising
As divorces have increased following quarantine, many countries have also reported that domestic violence numbers have been rising during the lockdown.
Visits to the UK’s National Domestic Violence helpline website increased by 150% at the beginning of March and in London, the charges for domestic violence has risen by 24% according to The Guardian.
“We did have fights before the lockdown, but not anything like this,” says Tina Anderson, 25, a barista from London, whose name was changed to protect her privacy. “I usually leave when we fight, but now there was nowhere to go, and it just started getting worse and worse.
“I knew that I needed help, but he was constantly watching me, so I had to contact a charity through a friend,” Anderson continues.
“Now people were aware that I had a problem, but because of the virus, they couldn’t provide me with a place to go. Luckily my friend took me in, and I’ve been living with her since then.”
The UK is not an exception: incidents of domestic violence have been rising all over the world since the lockdown. In Shanghai, there were four times more domestic violence reports in February 2020 than February 2019, and Spain reported 18% more domestic violence emergency calls after the lockdown started.
“The calls to our helpline have risen 25% which shows that the situation is dire,” says Lucy Reed, who works for SafeLives UK. “We have calls from people in many different situations and also from couples who haven’t had this kind of problems before lockdown.
“I don’t think things were thought through when it comes to this side of isolation which is leaving many people in trouble. This leaves the responsibility to people to take care of each other,” Reed continues.
Physical violence is only one form of domestic violence – there are many others. It can include separation from family and friends, constant surveillance on what the other is doing, strict rules on how to behave at home and in public, and restrictions to access fresh food or clean clothes.
For Fiona Miles, safety is not an issue – but she looks forward to living a better life once she can move out on her own.
“Filing for a divorce is not the easiest thing to do in this situation, but at least I can still live at home because we are making it work between us,” she says. “In a situation like this – we should all be able to feel safe and taken care of.”
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