Dr. Laura often gets calls from people who have a minor child and these parents are engaged, in a relationship, dating, etc., or considering it. Dr. Laura will tell them that marriages in which there's a stepchild (that's what their child would be to their spouse) have a 70 percent divorce rate, and that the rest of the marriages aren't all happy ones. She says this to discourage them from bringing more chaos and conflict into their child's life; to tell them that their minor children shouldn't even know they are dating. Indeed, if they've married or shacked up, whatever the child is doing that the parent doesn't like will be attributed to this fact, even if children in intact homes do the same thing.
Concerned for the child(ren), she drives the point home by asking "Would you go on an airplane if it had a 70 percent chance of having a terrible crash?"
Of course the answer is no.
But what's the divorce rate for first marriages without stepchildren?
