Not Your Halal Girlfriend

My theory on the current divorce trend.

There’s a popular phrase heard in Christian wedding ceremonies: 

For better or for worse, until death do us part.

Many American brides and grooms, whether they’re Christian or not, stand before family and friends to make a promise on their wedding day to stand by their partner in good times and bad times, until death ends the relationship. 

In Islamic marriages, we don’t have those types of vows. At least not publicly. Instead we have a process of writing out a contract, and putting all our financial promises and expectations on paper. In some ways it's more practical than the Christian way of officiating marriages, and in some ways it’s less romantic. 

X and I chose to do our own private vows on Ocean Beach weeks after our nikkah. It was just the two of us under an umbrella on an unusually hot day in August. We promised each other to be the best versions of ourselves and to love one another in this life and in the next. Not even death could do us part.

But only fifteen months into the mar…