Dreaming about separation or divorce: what it means

What this dream usually points to (and what it does not)

Dream interpretation is not prediction and not diagnosis. This article separates what sleep research observes from what popular interpretation associates with the theme, always saying which is which.

Dreaming about separation or divorce does not mean your marriage is going to end, nor that someone is hiding something. It is not a sign either that, deep down, you want to split up. This dream usually appears when the relationship is taking up a lot of room in your head: a recent argument, a phase of distance, a change in routine, or the end of a marriage of someone close to you.

When the couple in the dream is someone else (your parents, a sibling, friends), the scene usually speaks of worry about those people or of the fear that your own family might change shape. When the person who comes back is someone you really did separate from, the theme is different: see dreaming about your ex.

Read also: Dreaming about a wedding and Dreaming about your husband.

What research observes in dreams about a partner

A study by Dylan Selterman and colleagues, published in 2014 in Social Psychological and Personality Science, asked people in relationships to write down their dreams. Those who dreamed of conflict or jealousy involving their partner tended to report, the next day, more friction and less of a sense of closeness; dreams about the partner were also linked to more intimacy when the tone was good. The dream did not predict the couple's future: it reflected and colored the mood of the relationship.

Research on the continuity between waking life and dreaming helps complete the picture. The day's worries come back at night in different clothes. A friend who told you she is separating, a divorce case in a soap opera, a fight about bills: all of it can turn, in the dream, into your own divorce papers on the table.

Source: Schredl and Hofmann, Continuity between waking activities and dream activities, Consciousness and Cognition, 2003.

The most common versions of this dream

If the reason in the dream was cheating, it is worth reading dreaming about being cheated on too.

See also: Dreaming about an uncle or aunt and Dreaming about Pomba Gira.

When dreaming about separation or divorce calls for attention

A single dream about divorce does not point to a problem. If the scene keeps coming back, you wake up with strong distress or the dream starts to breed suspicion and real fights with your partner, it is worth talking to a health professional, and sometimes to your partner too, about what has been weighing on you. Recurring nightmares have treatment: see how to have fewer nightmares.

Source: Morgenthaler and colleagues, Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 2018.

Psychoanalysis, symbols and faith: another look at dreaming about separation or divorce

In Freud's psychoanalysis. Freud saw the dream as the disguised fulfillment of a wish, which frightens anyone who dreamed about divorce. But the disguise is exactly the point: through displacement, the emphasis shifts, and the request for a separation may stand in for something smaller, like wanting more space, more quiet or a conversation that keeps being postponed. His method was to break the dream into parts (who asked, where, what that paper was) and ask what each one brings to mind.

In Jung's psychology. For Jungian psychology, the partner in the dream is not always just the real person: they may carry traits of the anima or the animus, the figure of the other sex inside each of us. In that key, a dreamed separation can be read as distance from a part of yourself. And, through the compensatory function, the dream sometimes shows the rupture precisely when the person pretends, while awake, that everything is fine.

In symbols and faith. In A Dictionary of Symbols, Chevalier and Gheerbrant read the wall as an image of separation, between peoples, families and people: communication cut off, which gives security and suffocates at the same time, defends and imprisons. They also recall that, in the order founded by the poet Rumi, the reed flute sings the pains of separation. In the Christian tradition, Ephesians 4:26 asks: "do not let the sun go down on your anger".

Bringing both readings together. Science shows that the dream mirrors the mood of the relationship; tradition invites you to ask where the wall is. Instead of waking your partner with accusations, it is worth noticing the feeling that was left behind and bringing the subject, calmly, into the day.

Sources: Freud, Die Traumdeutung, 1900; Jung (ed.), Man and His Symbols; Chevalier and Gheerbrant, A Dictionary of Symbols.

What dream dictionaries record

In O Livro dos Sonhos, a Brazilian dream book, L. P. Baçan gives the entry for divorce a short reading: in life, illness; in love, dissatisfaction. It is a folk-tradition reading, which diagnoses nothing and announces the end of no marriage.

Freud knew this kind of book well. He called the method "decoding": each image in the dream is swapped for another word, according to a fixed code, without asking the dreamer anything. His example: in one dream book, "funeral" translates as "engagement". For Freud, that path was not enough.

Sources: Freud, Die Traumdeutung, 1900; L. P. Baçan, O Livro dos Sonhos, 2014.

What folk tradition associates with this dream

In folk reading, dreaming about your own separation is usually seen as a call to pay attention to the relationship, not as a warning of its end. Dreaming about your parents' divorce is read as longing or fear of change in the family; about another couple's separation, as a sign that something in that relationship caught your attention. Some also read the dream as the end of a cycle, at work or in a friendship. These are cultural readings, for reflection. See what dream meanings look like according to science and culture.