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The Gay Berliner: Divorce for all?

The world of divorcees is relatively straight, but our columnist has crashed the party – and had a lot of fun doing so.

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Illustration by Agata Sasiuk

The world of divorcees is relatively straight, but our columnist has crashed the party – and had a lot of fun doing so.

Did you know that the 1934 Ginger Rogers-Fred Astaire musical The Gay Divorcee was originally called The Gay Divorce – but was condemned by the moral standards brigade at Hollywood’s Hays Office for frivolling the concept of divorce? And coincidentally, did you know this tantalising morsel of period trivia aptly applies to me? At a cost of over €2000 (for me and my soon-to-be ex), you might not consider divorce a gay matter in Germany! However, I’m coming out here: I am, or will be, a gay divorcee.

I’ve been quietly married to a man for over 10 years now. It was a novel thing in 2009 for two men to get married (although technically a registered partnership); but in 2021, as a gay divorcee, I’m an absolute trailblazer. I was getting divorced in Berlin before it was cool! If you’re among the queer people I know who’ve got married, you’re either in it or you’ve tucked it away to some corner of your mind where it only comes out over one too many Aperol Spritzes, most likely remaining in that marriage by rationalising to yourself that marriage doesn’t mean much… so why get a divorce? And on a lot of levels, marriage is a dying institution, but as an institution, it’s not dead yet. For me, it was always in the back of my mind.

What will my life look like as a gay divorcee? The second I decided to take the plunge, I had visions of cruising down some South American coastline with my hot boyfriend, free and untethered.

Since in most gay cases there aren’t children involved (at least not yet), getting a divorce is relatively painless. It’s just a trip to a lawyer (in Germany they have what’s called Anwaltszwang), a court appearance and, of course, a lot of waiting. Admittedly, the costs are exorbitant, especially if you compare it to neighbouring countries like Denmark where the cost of divorce is approximately €56 (and I was told at one point they allowed you to do it online). But it’s not getting any cheaper here and I’m not getting any younger.

What will my life look like as a gay divorcee? The second I decided to take the plunge, I had visions of cruising down some South American coastline with my hot boyfriend, free and untethered from a man that I used to go to Berghain with every weekend. I’ve split with that different, less sophisticated me. People would refer to me at cocktail parties as the gay grass widower who let his marriage fail, while I flashed a devilish smile back at them. Life would be a whole new adventure, one that’s broken up with the matrimonial past.

In truth, the divorce procedure isn’t over yet and the reality is more that I’ve become a divorce doula. I’ve been guiding lesbian friends who have a more practical approach to their divorce than my bon-vivant fantasies: they don’t want to be a burden on their former partner in the future. That’s commendable and cute. As for me, someone’s got to take on the role of escort to a group of people who never really had the opportunity to divorce in the first place – the straights I talked to about their divorces could offer shockingly little advice on what they’d already gone through. Maybe it’s just no fun for them anymore.

That’s because they were never gay divorcees.