Divorce

A few weeks ago, on Al-Watan TV program a well known presenter Barakat Al-Wgayan held an interview with three members of MBC Kalam Nawa’em team on his talk show Hayakom.

Kalam Nawa’em is an Arabic talk show that resembles and is based on the the American women’s talk show The View.

Three women appeared from this show on Al-watan TV. The ladies who appeared on Hayakom were: Mona Abo Sulayman (Saudi Arabian); Fawzia Salama (Egyptian) and Farah Bseeso (Palestinian).

Each of the above women are successful in their own right in addition to being well-known in the occasionally controversial women’s talk show Kalam Nawa’em.

I found the candid discussion of their personal lives during the interview attention grabbing. Mona AbuSulayman, had talked about how important it is to have a concrete support system inside one’s family in order to pursue a certain career, or several paths as she has done. She talked about the divorce she had to endure with her ex-husband Ahmad, who has since remarried and has a son with his new wife. She brushed on the difficulties of continuing life as a single mother but again reiterated the significance of the support of her parents and immediate family particularly in raising her two adolescent daughters. She brought up the magnitude of discussing the divorce with her daughters and how she never spoke badly of their father or his life with his new family, but in fact they still communicated with each other with regards to matters related to their children.

Although Mona AbuSulayman divorced at an early stage in her marriage, Fawzia Salama was married for about 18 years before separating from her first husband. She stayed in the marriage to keep a stable home for her daughter although she was not happy.

There was a time when discussing divorce was a taboo subject in society. The two women discussed their divorces as a positive move individually but did not harbor any pessimistic emotions (at least outwardly) towards their ex-husbands and exhibited a sensible unemotional demeanor on the show.