5 Indians Tell Us How Their Parents' Separation Shaped Their Own Perceptions Of Love

My parents got divorced when I was very young, so for as long as I can remember, I always had two of everything — two homes, two birthday parties, two Christmas vacations, and essentially, two families. My mom and I, and my dad and I. Two very, very different people who make two excellent parents, but poles apart. Growing up, this did create a sense of dissonance about who I was and where I fit in. My understanding of family was very different from that of my peers, who, from a distance, seemed to have the cookie-cutter nuclear family — a mom, a dad, and two children — something I could never quite relate to, but often aspired to.

As I grew older, my opinions on love and relationships began to shift, shaped by what I saw around me and what I didn’t see at home. Interestingly, though, I never lost faith in companionship — not necessarily marriage, but the idea of enjoying someone’s company enough to build a life together.

In India, marriage does not automatically equate to that. Beyond being an industry, an economic agreement, or a social farce, marriage can be beautiful — as long as the people involved actually get along with each other. A lot, if not most, of my early opinions on family and marriage were based on my parents’ divorce.

So, to really understand the consequences of growing up in a so-called “broken” family (a phrase I absolutely hate), I spoke to four other young people whose parents are also divorced or separated, to learn what they think about love, family, and marriage in light of what they saw at home.

Redefining What Family Means

While talking about what family meant to him growing up, Drishya Maity explains that over the years, its meaning has changed a lot for him. “It (family) used to mean my parents and my brother — people I thought I could count on for unconditional support. It used to mean time together, working together, and the shared pursuits of happiness. Now I don’t put much stock in blood relations.”  

I’ve realised over the years that family is also a societal construct and can mean whatever you want it to mean. To me, during my three years of college, my roommate was my family; she was my rock through those turbulent years.

One of the respondents, who chose to remain anonymous, while talking about the feeling of being out of place, said, “For a long time I didn't tell my friends that my parents weren't living together anymore, just because it was so embarrassing and made me feel so abnormal. And my mom did the same too.” This feeling of shame is often attached to divorce because marriage is seen as sacred and unbreakable. When it does break, its ramifications are felt not just by the two people in the marriage but by the entire extended family. More often than not, it’s felt more severely by women, because as a society we’re quick to criticise them as wives and mothers — and somehow, all the responsibility for a failed marriage is placed on their shoulders. 

What Does Love & Commitment Really Mean?

When it came to the idea of marriage, the people I spoke to couldn’t have been more different. Each of them carried their own version of what love and commitment should look like and were shaped by what they saw growing up, and what they hoped to avoid or rebuild.

On one hand, Drishya believes marriage to be a classist, casteist, and patriarchal tradition. “I think love can not only survive but thrive without the structure — or limitations — of the marriage institution. I think of marriages as sunk cost fallacies.” It’s hard not to see where he’s coming from, so much of what we’ve been taught to equate with “commitment” feels more like social pressure dressed up as romance.

Mikhail Khan, however, says his view on marriage has evolved with age. He understands that it’s neither an end-all solution nor a fairytale. “There’s something about committing to someone formally, but there are different ways to go about it. I’m more comfortable with the idea of marriage now, though I’m also aware that it’s really hard to make a marriage work.” Not everyone felt disillusioned. One of the people I spoke to said that, unlike other children of divorce, she fiercely believes in marriage. “I’ve seen how tough it is for my mom to have lost someone she loved so deeply. The idea of raising children on my own is also really terrifying. I strongly believe in marriage — not just symbolically, but because there’s a certain weight attached to the institution; something deeply profound and intimate.”I think it’s interesting that people who’ve seen the worst of what marriage can bring out — jealousy, dishonesty, anger — still root for it, perhaps because they’re so focused on not getting it wrong after seeing how bad it can be.

Between Caution & Idealism

India has historically had some of the lowest divorce rates, as low as 1%. Even though there’s been a significant rise in urban cities, the notion that marriage is about endurance,  ‘sticking it out no matter what’, remains deeply ingrained. Rohaan Nambiar while acknowledging that even though most of the social circles, which is mostly upper-middle class, he’s in are fairly progressive, that boils down to a very small population of our country. “It’s not staying together no matter what, but the woman has to stay with the man no matter what. No man 'has' to stay in a marriage, he can stay in a marriage and do whatever he wants and face no consequences.” I saw this myself, with how easily my dad navigated his world after the divorce but my mom was forced to feel like she had failed at what was supposed to be the most 'important' thing in her life.

My parents’ divorce didn’t make me lose faith in love, but it gave me a kind of safety blanket — the belief that I could always walk away if things got too hard. That instinct, I’ve realised, has its own pitfalls. Mikhail said his parents’ turmoil taught him to set boundaries and avoid codependency. Rohaan, on the other hand, says he’s neither cautious nor idealistic. “I’m happy with what I have, and the emotions I experience. I don’t really like the romanticised version of love portrayed on television.” This does point toward how we are exposed to ideals in our media on what family and marriage should look like and why an over-dramatised representation of love can be so harmful and the way it gets perceived.

What these conversations revealed is that love, family, and marriage are never one-size-fits-all, especially for those of us who come from (here it comes again) “broken” homes. I thought that because of everything I had experienced growing up, I would be bullet-proof and had somehow found the cheat-code at family and love, and man was I wrong. After being in relationships myself and talking to all the respondents for this piece I realised that experiences with separation do distort your own perception of marriage. And there is no easy way out of it.

Growing up between two families taught me that bonds are defined not just by blood, but by presence, trust, and choice. I was very lucky to be raised by two people who deeply cared about being good parents. But it is human nature to crave companionship and want love, in any and all forms. There is a quote from Sally Rooney’s ‘Beautiful World, Where Are You’ that sums it all up, for me at least: "

Because when we should have been reorganising the distribution of the world’s resources and transitioning collectively to a sustainable economic model, we were worrying about sex and friendship instead … And I love that about humanity, and in fact it's the very reason I root for us to survive - because we are so stupid about each other.'

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