The Stigma of Divorce at 26

"My first marriage lasted only eight months. My husband turned out to be a man with uncontrollable outbursts of aggression, and after he raised his hand against me for the first time, I took my papers and left. The community helped me obtain a divorce (Get), but when I tried to return to the shidduch world, I ran into a solid wall of disdain.

A well-known shadchanit in Cleveland said to my mother bluntly: "Esther is young and beautiful, but the status of being divorced is a stain on her profile. Good guys from decent families won't even look at her candidacy — they're afraid of 'problematic' women. Now we can only offer her to men much older, to widowers with children, or to those who have obvious flaws of their own." I'm 28 years old, I have no children, I gained enormous experience from my mistake and I know exactly how to build a healthy relationship. But the system writes you off simply because you found the courage to save your own life and leave an abuser."