I’ve been divorced for a while. I don’t like to say the expression ‘ex-wife’. I usually refer to her by name as I would any acquaintance. I do mention that she is my ‘ex-wife’, but only to establish our relationship.
In this blog I will call her She Who Deserves Her Privacy – SWDHP.
An idea for this comes from the British television series Rumpole of the Bailey that was broadcast on PBS. Horace Rumpole is a barrister who refers to his wife as “She who must be obeyed!”
If I had been Rumpole, I would have abbreviated this to SWMBO when writing. It’s one thing to give his wife a long title when speaking. It’s another for me to want to write out such a long phrase often.
Similarly, the woman who I was once married to and now am divorced from deserves a name that protects her privacy. But, as I wrote above, calling her my “ex-wife” leaves a distaste in my mouth. She is, after all, still our son’s mother. Note how I wrote “our son.” In certain contexts, he is certainly my son. However, he came to be born as “ours,” and he didn’t change when we got divorced. We both raised him together, under the same roof, for about thirteen years.
Actually, there is no full divorce when you have children. The children bring you together when they get married, when grandchildren are born, and so on. This is something to consider if you entertain the idea of getting divorced.
Hot Tea with Sugar 