Uploaded March 2026 | Updated September 2026, 7 minutes ago
Gretchen Baskerville challenges a common message in Christian circles that divorced people are miserable and argues it can shame or trap people in unsafe marriages. Citing the 2024 General Social Survey (GSS), she notes that about 75% of divorced adults report being “pretty happy” (59%) or “very happy” (16%), showing the blanket claim that divorce ruins happiness is false, while acknowledging some face serious post-divorce hardships. She explains why the misery narrative persists: it’s a simple soundbite, can function as social control, can confuse suffering with holiness, and can misinterpret later happiness as proof of wrong motives. She also critiques the claim that divorced people “take their problems with them,” emphasizing many tried for years before leaving destructive patterns, and offers comfort from Psalm 34:18, urging divorced viewers not to let doom messaging define their future.
If you want to dig into the sources I referenced:
✅ Full blog post (with the chart + context):
lifesavingdivorce.com/hope-after-divorce-gss-2024
✅ GSS Data Explorer (you can verify the “happy / pretty happy / very happy” breakdown yourself):
1.
gssdataexplorer.norc.org/trends?category=Gender%20%26%20Marriage&measure=happy&Measure%20Category=Very%20happy&Breakdown%20Label=Total
2. At the “Breakdown” dropdown menu, select Marital Status.
Where would you put yourself today—very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy? If you’re in the hard 25% right now, you’re not alone. 💛
00:00 Divorce Misery Myth
00:41 What The Data Says
01:25 Hard Stories And Healing
02:14 Why The Myth Persists
03:19 They Take Problems With Them
04:00 Comfort And Next Steps
Gretchen Baskerville is a Christian divorce recovery leader and author. She began leading support groups for single mothers in conservative churches in the Los Angeles area in 1998 and now focuses primarily on reaching people online.
For more than 25 years, Gretchen has helped women and men of faith find strength, courage, and healing through the challenges of life-saving divorce. She listens with empathy to those recovering from domestic violence, betrayal, infidelity, addiction, and emotional abuse.
A survivor of a toxic marriage herself, Gretchen understands the journey of rebuilding after loss. Following her own life-saving divorce and years as a single mother, she is now happily remarried.
She is a graduate of Wheaton College with a degree in Bible and Christian Education.
Short bio:
Gretchen Baskerville is a Christian author, speaker, and founder of LifeSavingDivorce.com. After navigating a life-saving divorce, she raised two children as a single mother and began leading divorce recovery groups in evangelical churches in 1998. She later remarried and continues her work with more than 25 years of biblical and research-based insight. A Wheaton College graduate, she is the author of The Life-Saving Divorce.
Defintion:
What’s a Life-Saving Divorce?A Life-Saving Divorce is the opposite of a “grass is greener” divorce, an “I’m bored” divorce, or an “I miss the party life” divorce. It is a divorce for serious reasons: to find relief from a pattern of sexual immorality, physical violence, chronic emotional abuse, felony behavior, family-crushing addictions, or abandonment through neglect and indifference.
Links to my resources
* The Life-Saving Divorce: Hope for People Leaving Destructive RelationshipsBook (paperback/eBook/audiobook page): amzn.to/3J3vXa7
* Audiobook (direct link): amzn.to/4f52Mh4
* Website & Blog: lifesavingdivorce.com
* Pastor Education page: lifesavingdivorce.com/pastor-education-domestic-violence-biblical-response
* Gumroad (EPUB + PDF download): gumroad.com/lsp
* For those who share an Amazon account with their abuser.
Social media
* Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/lifesavingdivorce.bsky.social
* Facebook: facebook.com/lifesavingdivorce
* Instagram: instagram.com/gretchenbaskerville
* YouTube: youtube.com/@lifesavingdivorce
* Twitter/X: twitter.com/GGBaskerville
* LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gretchen-baskerville-2873591b5
Gretchen Baskerville challenges a common message in Christian circles that divorced people are miserable and argues it can shame or trap people in unsafe marriages. Citing the 2024 General Social Survey (GSS), she notes that about 75% of divorced adults report being “pretty happy” (59%) or “very happy” (16%), showing the blanket claim that divorce ruins happiness is false, while acknowledging some face serious post-divorce hardships. She explains why the misery narrative persists: it’s a simple soundbite, can function as social control, can confuse suffering with holiness, and can misinterpret later happiness as proof of wrong motives. She also critiques the claim that divorced people “take their problems with them,” emphasizing many tried for years before leaving destructive patterns, and offers comfort from Psalm 34:18, urging divorced viewers not to let doom messaging define their future.
If you want to dig into the sources I referenced:
✅ Full blog post (with the chart + context):
lifesavingdivorce.com/hope-after-divorce-gss-2024
✅ GSS Data Explorer (you can verify the “happy / pretty happy / very happy” breakdown yourself):
1.
gssdataexplorer.norc.org/trends?category=Gender%20%26%20Marriage&measure=happy&Measure%20Category=Very%20happy&Breakdown%20Label=Total
2. At the “Breakdown” dropdown menu, select Marital Status.
Where would you put yourself today—very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy? If you’re in the hard 25% right now, you’re not alone. 💛
00:00 Divorce Misery Myth
00:41 What The Data Says
01:25 Hard Stories And Healing
02:14 Why The Myth Persists
03:19 They Take Problems With Them
04:00 Comfort And Next Steps
Gretchen Baskerville is a Christian divorce recovery leader and author. She began leading support groups for single mothers in conservative churches in the Los Angeles area in 1998 and now focuses primarily on reaching people online.
For more than 25 years, Gretchen has helped women and men of faith find strength, courage, and healing through the challenges of life-saving divorce. She listens with empathy to those recovering from domestic violence, betrayal, infidelity, addiction, and emotional abuse.
A survivor of a toxic marriage herself, Gretchen understands the journey of rebuilding after loss. Following her own life-saving divorce and years as a single mother, she is now happily remarried.
She is a graduate of Wheaton College with a degree in Bible and Christian Education.
Short bio:
Gretchen Baskerville is a Christian author, speaker, and founder of LifeSavingDivorce.com. After navigating a life-saving divorce, she raised two children as a single mother and began leading divorce recovery groups in evangelical churches in 1998. She later remarried and continues her work with more than 25 years of biblical and research-based insight. A Wheaton College graduate, she is the author of The Life-Saving Divorce.
Defintion:
What’s a Life-Saving Divorce?A Life-Saving Divorce is the opposite of a “grass is greener” divorce, an “I’m bored” divorce, or an “I miss the party life” divorce. It is a divorce for serious reasons: to find relief from a pattern of sexual immorality, physical violence, chronic emotional abuse, felony behavior, family-crushing addictions, or abandonment through neglect and indifference.
Links to my resources
* The Life-Saving Divorce: Hope for People Leaving Destructive RelationshipsBook (paperback/eBook/audiobook page): amzn.to/3J3vXa7
* Audiobook (direct link): amzn.to/4f52Mh4
* Website & Blog: lifesavingdivorce.com
* Pastor Education page: lifesavingdivorce.com/pastor-education-domestic-violence-biblical-response
* Gumroad (EPUB + PDF download): gumroad.com/lsp
* For those who share an Amazon account with their abuser.
Social media
* Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/lifesavingdivorce.bsky.social
* Facebook: facebook.com/lifesavingdivorce
* Instagram: instagram.com/gretchenbaskerville
* YouTube: youtube.com/@lifesavingdivorce
* Twitter/X: twitter.com/GGBaskerville
* LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gretchen-baskerville-2873591b5
![Does God Hate Divorce? No! Debunking Malachi 2:16 [Multi-language]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/z5eTqGNSfBE/mqdefault.jpg "Does God Hate Divorce? No! Debunking Malachi 2:16 [Multi-language]
The book of Malachi was written about 2,500 years ago. Since then, Malachi 2:16 had been interpreted two ways: As an anti-treachery verse (for about 2,100 years) and as an anti-divorce verse (for 385 years). Thanks to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls (the oldest and best copies of the book of Malachi) now we know it meant to be an anti-treachery verse. Heres a 11-minute video explaining why.
For starters, it was interpreted as an anti-treachery verse for 2,100 years of those 2,500. The idea that its an anti-divorce verse is only a 385-year blip in Bible interpretation history. And every new major Bible translation published in the 21st Century interprets it as an anti-abuse verse: Take a look at the NIV (2011 update), ESV, and CSB.
This is an 11-minute excerpt from a 1-hour video showing DIVORCE AS GODS PROTECTION OF WOMEN IN THE BIBLE: from Abraham and Moses to Jesus and Paul. https://youtu.be/5EIEgh04Frg?si=4u_MMoq91O1397Jd
ABOUT
Gretchen Baskerville is a Christian divorce recovery leader and researcher. For more than 20 years, she has worked with Christian women and men going through difficult, life-saving divorces, listening with compassion to those who have suffered from domestic violence, betrayal, infidelity, and emotional abuse. She helps heartbroken people find strength and courage and healing.
Her book, The Life-Saving Divorce is about the one-half of U.S. divorces that are for very serious reasons. She will give you optimism about your childrens future (nearly 8 in 10 children turn out fine after divorce, according to top researchers); and will help you understand emotional abuse, gaslighting, the abuse cycle, and tips for surviving high-conflict divorces.
FOR A DISCUSSION OF BIBLE VERSES THAT CONDONE DIVORCE and REMARRIAGE, read CHAPTER 6 in The Life-Saving Divorce book. Or for a short summary: http://www.lifesavingdivorce.com/abus...
Whats a Life-Saving Divorce? A Life-Saving Divorce is a divorce for the serious reasons: a pattern of chronic emotional abuse, infidelity, domestic violence, sexual immorality, felony behavior, neglect, substance abuse, etc.
Book, The Life-Saving Divorce: Hope for People Leaving Destructive Relationships
Paperback or eBook: https://amzn.to/3CCBsnr AUDIOBOOK: https://amzn.to/4f52Mh4
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Follow Gretchen Baskerville:
Links to my resources
* The Life-Saving Divorce: Hope for People Leaving Destructive RelationshipsBook (paperback/eBook/audiobook page): https://amzn.to/3J3vXa7
* Audiobook (direct link): https://amzn.to/4f52Mh4
* Website & Blog: https://lifesavingdivorce.com/
* Pastor Education page: https://lifesavingdivorce.com/pastor-education-domestic-violence-biblical-response/
* Gumroad (PDF download): https://gumroad.com/lsp
* For those who share an Amazon account with their abuser.
Social media
* Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/lifesavingdivorce.bsky.social
* Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lifesavingdivorce
* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gretchenbaskerville/
* YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@lifesavingdivorce
* Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/GGBaskerville
* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gretchen-baskerville-2873591b5/")
