ALL marriages are happy – it’s the living together afterwards that causes all the trouble, someone once said, and research has shown that might be right.A survey from leading market research company Ipsos Mori has revealed that newlyweds may not be living happily ever after, with one in five admitting they had some regrets about getting married within the first year of their big day.
The poll further found that 20% of 16 to 54-year-olds looking back at the first 12 months of their marriage felt they had "occasional" or "many" regrets.
Almost one in five said their first year of marriage was more difficult than expected.
Asked why they felt regret, 27% said it was due to the fact they "got married because they felt they had to", while a further 27% said the regrets stemmed from the feeling they "married without being in love".
Men experienced this pressured feeling more, according to the poll, with more than two in five regretful husbands admitting they felt marriage was something they had to do.
Almost half of divorcees quizzed admitted they had regrets about their union within the first 12 months of married life and this stemmed from the belief that they got married without really being in love.
The poll was conducted for Channel 4’s Cutting Edge documentary Newlyweds: The One-Year Itch, which looks at the reality of modern-day married life.
The documentary, which will be aired at 9pm tomorrow, followed the fortunes of 50 couples who married last year and revisited six of those couples a year later.
The programme was made as figures indicate that marriages are most likely to fail in the first couple of years.