Recently, Rebecca Stokes of CafeMom’s blog, The Stir, looked at the “7 Good Reasons To Date A Divorced Man.” In the post, Stokes makes a lot of good points, such as:
However, many of these can be deceptive when you’re first starting out, and if you’re dating him right after he or his ex has decided to file for divorce, you may not be getting the full version of whom he will be in his post-divorce life. Still, there is one telltale sign that you can look to to see if the divorced man (or woman, for that matter) is good dating material, and it’s one that Stokes specifically states in her post:
He knows communication is key.
While you often can’t tell until you get to know someone whether they put other people first, or they’re a good parent, or they’re good at committing, or they’re realistic, or their experience means anything, you can usually gauge their communication abilities from the beginning.
Ultimately, lack of communication is what leads to divorce papers. One party or the other (or both) have not done a very good job communicating what they need out of the relationship as time moves on, and pretty soon, they’re finding fulfillment in other things or other people.
If you can see that he isn’t a very good communicator from the beginning — if he walks away from confrontation or doesn’t have a lot to say in your private moments together — then you can’t assume that simply finalizing his divorce forms has made him good relationship material.
Always be hyper sensitive to this aspect of the divorced person, whether man or woman. If you feel like you’re playing the guessing game, then any progress that you might otherwise automatically attribute to the experience of divorce should be called in to question.
Communication is key, that’s for sure. Just make sure he (or she) has learned that lesson from their previous marriage before you assume it’s built in to the growth process of divorce.