Etiquette question

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-03-2003
Etiquette question
12
Mon, 01-03-2005 - 12:12am

When do you stop wearing the wedding ring and what do you do with it? I have filed but it is not final yet. We have a 60 day waiting period. I actually bought my ring. H did not. He said he wouldn't and I didn't want to be without one so I did thinking it would look bad otherwise. I have a 4yo daughter. Is it something I should save for her someday? Would it be bad to exchange it for another piece of jewelry? I've always wanted a mother's ring. It's kind of trivial stuff compared to other things we deal with but I would like some input.

Thanks!

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Avatar for momtojoeybear
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 01-03-2005 - 12:50am

Like so many questions we wind up facing during our time in limbo, there are no correct answers for this question. In my case, my xh took off his ring (or TOLD me he took off his ring) one week before he told me he wanted to divorce... since he was in and out of the house so infrequently during those weeks, I truly have no idea about him...

As for me, I continued to wear my rings, as they were the one piece (although merely symbolic) of my marriage that I had... after all, I didn't want this divorce. I went through counseling, and at one point, my pastor said something (that I don't remember) that hit home... anyway, that evening, I took my rings off to clean them and never put them back on... I substituted another ring on that finger until I got used to not wearing a ring on that finger period... I have a friend who wore his ring, despite the fact that he wanted the divorce, until the judge declared the marriage dissolved...

What I am saying here is there is no right or wrong answer, except for what feels right to you... along the lines of your post, if you want a mother's ring, I think that you should defintely look into that possibility as it would definitely be meaningful and something for you to be proud of...

Good Luck!

Julie

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 01-03-2005 - 1:15am

I often think of that. I LOVE my ring & dont WANT to stop wearing it~! lol one of the reasons is it is made from my Grammas diamond. So sentimentally, i love it. Plus, we designed it to be hand made, w/ surrounding diamonds, in platinum. Whats so funny is that he always BRAGS to people that he "had to sell his car to buy my ring". Ummm, REALLY what happened was - i inherited this large 1+ carat top grade 10K solitaire diamond. We then took THAT & for another 2K, had 2 diamonds put on each side & set in platinum. Now, he DID happen to sell his Saab for like 2500 K at the same time - but we were living together w/ combined finances AND he got a new car that we both paid for. So how HE bought MY ring, i will never know. & btw, i ALWAYS made 4 times what he did moneywise ... so i REALLY DID buy it!!! But i bet a million bucks he will ask for it back since it is worth a lot of money. he can kiss my *ss. & truthfully, now that i think of it ... i could sell it & pay for my whole divorce! But since its my Grammas diamond, i want to save it for my dd. If he wants the 4 side diamonds, fine. Although *I* persoanlly think that the whole thing being saved for Averey is the way to go. & if he doesnt say anything about it, i will take it all apart & make myslef one beautiful ring for my right hand! & then let Averey have it when she is older.

One sad thing is that Averey always talks (she is almost 5) about how beautiful my wedding rings are. & she always asks things like "Mommy, this one is your engagement ring to Daddy, right? & this one is your wedding ring when you were a beautiful bride, right? When you became Daddys wife." She loves them. I think that will be the worst part of taking them off for me b/c she so identifies me in her little Princess 5 yr old mind as the beautiful bride w/ the beautiful rings :( Ugh.

R~

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-28-2003
Mon, 01-03-2005 - 11:21am

well, i don't know what ms. manners would say.... my first marriage - i took them off after we filed. it was just a little 'gesture' on my part, just to FEEL like things were moving along. i saved them for our son - who says he doesn't want them (it was a cheapo thin ring with a teeny tiny stone). truth is, my ex had bought it, and at the time i was very touched because he didn't have any money.


second marriage: my now-ex is very rich but veeeeerrrrryyyyyyyyyy cheap. so - he went to the jeweler and picked out a few rings in the price range that he had decided, and then i went to narrow it down. i actually did see the reciept and i was shocked at how LITTLE he paid. i knew how his little brain works, tho - it was like this: "i am not sure if this marriage is going to work out, so i want to invest as little as possible". the wedding band is a horrible plain band, ostensibly because this is how his rabbi said it should be, but whatever. since he and i had no children together - i have nobody to save it for - and i am planning to trade them in for something else.


iVillage Member
Registered: 01-23-2004
Mon, 01-03-2005 - 11:40am

On the general subject of rings, I think that there is no rule of etiquette about it. Probably it would be tacky to show up at your ex-husband's next wedding wearing the rings ;), but other than that I don't know of any rule.

For my part, as I described elsewhere, removing the ring when I realized that the marriage was going nowhere was a _first_ step in letting go. And now I have this simple silver and marcasite band to wear on my finger as a "divorce ring" which in a funny way makes me very happy.

Rebecca, You might just switch the rings to the other hand and keep on wearing them since you like them so much. And you might start telling your little girl the story of the wedding ring--how you got this ring from your grandmother and how you added to it when you got married and how the ring will be hers when she's grown up.

The reason I suggest this is that the stories that we tell our children help shape how they view reality. If your child has grown up on the story of you as beautiful bride with ring, you may want to help her make the transition to another, equally appealing story, so that she will not view the rings with pain. And it sounds to me as if you need to redefine those rings in your mind (which you are now doing) not as "wedding rings" that represent a love that is gone but as "family rings" of some sort that mark the continuity between your grandmother and your daughter (or hypothetical grandchildren).

Rings are symbols. What they symbolize can be public (everyone recognizes that a certain type of ring on the ring finger of the left hand indicates that the wearer is married) or private (each of us has fond, personal associations with our rings and the ring derices personal symbolism from those associations). And symbols change as our associations change.

My two-cents for everyone is: take off your ring when you feel like it. And if you don't want to take off your ring for some reason, do whatever feels comfortable to change its public symbolism.

Emi

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-24-2003
Mon, 01-03-2005 - 7:44pm

I agree with Emi...take it off when it makes sense to YOU to take it off. For myself, that was months before I left him. We had a getaway for our 17th anniversary during which a few things happened that showed me just how over it was. I reflected on that weekend, contemplated its meaning, and realized that the marriage was dead. Once I came to that conclusion, I took off the ring. About five months later, I actually left him. I've toyed with a few ideas about what to do with my rings, but oddly enough, they still mean too much to me to break them down and turn them into something else. So, for now, they stay in my jewelry box until it makes sense to me to do something else with them.

Lucky

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-22-2004
Mon, 01-03-2005 - 11:28pm

What really use to bother me was my husband would never even wear his ring. What a waste of money that was.

I don't understand what the big deal is. Just take it off. Sorry for my bluntness.

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-02-2004
Thu, 01-06-2005 - 10:49am

Call me childish if you will...but I FLUSHED mine!!!!!!!!!!! And it made me feel absolutely MAGNIFICENT!!!!!!!!!! After all the abuse my ex put me through, the ring felt more like a handcuff keeping me enslaved than anything with positive memories. Purging myself of that feeling was definitely worth it!!!!!!!!

Cupcake

PS Several months after the divorce, my ex asked what I did with my ring--I guess he wanted me to give it back. (The diamond was 38 points, but had a chip, so wasn't worth any $$-but he didn't know that.) When I told him what I did, and that it was probably somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico, he nearly exploded. It was worth it just to see his fit.

Seriously, IMHO the ring is totally yours to do whatever you wish.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-28-2003
Thu, 01-06-2005 - 11:43am

oh cupcake - this is wonderful! i just love it!!!


(*I* could never do this, of course, my jewish-polish roots would never allow me to throw something out just to "feel good"! you know, "waste not-want not" and all that....)

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-02-2004
Mon, 01-10-2005 - 1:57pm
Yeah, I guess my frugal Scots ancestors are probably spinning in their graves...
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-10-2005
Mon, 01-10-2005 - 6:13pm

It was great reading what all of you had to say. My husband just announced that he was leaving me on Friday. By Sunday he had taken his ring off. I asked why and he said he just wanted to. I asked him to put it back on because I am not wanting to seperate at the moment. I took my rings off and put them in the jewlery box. I told him they were his to keep. I figure if he ends up not giving them back to me, I will ask for them back for our daughter.

I like the idea of putting a different ring on. I am going to have to try that. It has only been one day but I keep on looking down at the emptiness I am feeling.

Megan

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