Golf a major handicap to marriages staying the course
That's according to a US psychologist who has studied the sport's effect on relationships extensively - and who is to lecture on the topic in Ireland in the near future.
Golf is "the new number-one cause of marital break-up in the US", Dr Richard Lavelle said yesterday. "The people who come to see me, namely golfers, appear to prefer golf to the marital bed."
The psychologist was speaking on 2FM's Gareth O'Callaghan show, after a woman from the midlands emailed the programme to tell of her despair at being a so-called "golf widow".
The woman, identified only as Linda, said her life had been put "on hold" because her husband of 24 years was spending all his time on the golf course since taking up the sport 18 months ago.
"I never see the man I marry, and if I died tomorrow, my funeral might clash with his game of golf," she said.
"I don't think I'm depressed, but I do know I'm completely neglected and taken for granted. He still expects his dinner - that is, when he hasn't eaten with his friends at the club - and expects his golf clothes to be cleaned and ironed and ready to wear first thing every morning."
The woman said she had decided to leave him, "even though I don't think he'll actually realise I'm gone".
Dr Lavelle said her case was not unusual.
"With golf, it's all about focusing on yourself. It's always 'me, me, me' and not 'we, we, we'. So any person who thinks that they can enter a relationship that will last with a golfer [is] only fooling themselves because the golfer is focused purely on their own interests," he said.
"The golfer believes there is nothing wrong with what he's doing, and can't see that by working all week, and then at the weekend hitting the golf course, he is mentally hitting his wife. Golf is a form of abuse."
He himself was a golf widower, he added, having divorced his wife after she became entranced by the sport.
The golf-widow syndrome has recently seen several high-profile examples emerge.
The impending divorce of one of the professional game's leading players, Colin Montgomerie, from his wife, Eimear, is blamed by both on his obsession with the sport, cited as the primary cause of the break-up.
