移民之后，婚姻如何继续：从一对 Irvine 夫妻的官宣说起
10月31日，Irvine 的华人网红地产经纪人 CoCo Yu 在自己的视频频道发布视频，宣布与丈夫纪超结束13年婚姻；同一天，纪超也发布视频作出回应。两人相识约20年，从上海来到洛杉矶（Los Angeles），育有三个孩子。她多次在视频中说，自己是所在地产公司的销售冠军。两人曾以「夫妻看房」的搭档形象一起经营地产业务，是南加州华人圈里不少人熟悉的面孔。
她在题为《13年的婚姻结束了！一年了！》的视频中说，两人实际上已经分开一年；走到分开，是因为性格不合、生活方式和节奏差异太大，长期相互迁就之后，仍无法继续共同生活。纪超已经离开她的地产团队，她将独自带团队继续做下去。
纪超在自己发布的视频中确认婚姻结束。他说，自己为体面和孩子沉默了一年，这次是第一次、也是最后一次公开回应，希望两人各自安好。
他们婚姻破裂的具体细节，本站没有去了解；真正的原因，只有当事人自己清楚。能确认的，是这样一组事实：相识20年、结婚13年、育有三个孩子的一对普通移民夫妻，最终走到了分开。他们不是明星。这件事之所以被许多华人读者议论，是因为它问出了一个许多移民家庭都绕不开的问题。
移民之后，婚姻如何继续？在国内的时候，婚姻有一整套熟悉的环境托着：双方父母、亲友、共同的语言、稳定的工作与社会位置。移民把这一切整体搬走、从头来过：身份要重办，事业要重打，钱要重挣，孩子要在另一种文化里长大。当别的一切都在变，两个人之间的关系靠什么继续下去？以下几位普通华人的经历，是这个问题不同的截面。
冯景涛与田丽：在中国离完的婚，在橙县又打了三年
据加州上诉法院公开意见书，冯景涛与田丽2003年在中国结婚，在中美两地经营多家企业、持有多处房产。2015年3月，两人在中国签署书面协议离婚，财产与子女的安排都写进了协议，自以为已经分清。但协议没有提到一处加州房产和一笔在美国的生意投资。2017年，冯景涛在橙县高等法院立案，就这两项财产的归属兴诉；案件一路打到上诉法院，2020年10月出具意见：那处加州房产被认定为田丽的个人财产，生意投资则属夫妻共同财产；意见书同时认定，冯景涛曾未经田丽知情同意，抵押了属于她的个人财产，致使房产被法拍，构成对配偶信义义务的违反。一个在中国「已经离完」的婚，在美国又走了三年多法律程序。夫妻共同经营、资产横跨两国时，离婚要「分清」的，从来不只是感情。
Don Wong：一种孤独的生活
据非营利新闻机构 Documented 的报道，来自香港的长途卡车司机 Don Wong 实名受访时说，长途货运意味着常年在路上、与家人聚少离多，他先后两段婚姻都因此拖垮。他的原话是：「当上卡车司机，离婚是真的很难熬。我离过两次。这是一种孤独的生活。」到现在的这段婚姻，他每周也只能见妻子一次，「她需要我的时候，我都不在」。这是「太空人」式分离的另一个版本：不是夫妻分居两国，而是一个人被职业常年放在路上。
数字里的华人婚姻
把镜头拉远，在美华人其实是美国离婚率最低的族群之一。按美国社区调查（ACS）与人口普查数据的口径，在美华人成年人中离婚者约占4.4%至5%，美国整体约为10%，这一比例在亚裔各群体中也低于越裔、菲裔等群体。但换一个参照：有学术研究显示，在美华人的离婚或分居比例（男性3.5%、女性5.3%），约为同期中国大陆本土居民（男性0.7%、女性0.3%）的5到10倍。同一个族群，移了民之后，婚姻解体的比例明显更高。
一项基于美国社区调查数据的研究还发现，入籍之后的移民，离婚的可能性比尚未入籍者高出至少25%。研究中常被提到的解释是：移民早年，身份未定、生存压力大、孩子尚小，许多矛盾被现实捆在一起压了下去；等到身份落定、经济独立、孩子长大，捆绑逐条松开，早年压住的问题才集中显形。
结构上的压力是全方位的。对丈夫，常见的困境是事业和人脉从零开始，过去的社会位置一夜清零，不适应又往往沉默；对妻子，常见的是工作与家庭的双份疲惫，以及有了自己的收入之后，对婚姻的期待随之改变；对孩子，语言和文化的适应比父母快得多，家庭里的话语权常常悄悄倒置。再加上不少移民夫妻共同经营生意，事业与家庭的边界消失，一处摩擦，处处摩擦。在国内，父母亲友是婚姻的缓冲层；到了美国，这层缓冲大多不在身边。缓冲变薄的同时，选择却变多了：美国社会对个人感受更为宽容，离婚在华人圈里也逐渐不再是难以启齿的事。这些变化无所谓好坏，只是让「凑合下去」不再是唯一的选项。
有矛盾时，可以走向哪里
矛盾出现之后，华人家庭的做法也在变。南加州不少华人教会和社区机构设有婚姻与家庭辅导，心理咨询在华人圈也逐渐被接受；也有家庭在走到诉讼之前，先经家事律师调解，把孩子和财产的安排谈清楚。这些路径没有哪一条是标准答案，能确认的只是：越来越多家庭开始意识到，有矛盾时求助并不丢人。
继续，各有各的方式
回到标题的问题：移民之后，婚姻如何继续？上面几位普通人的经历，给出的答案并不相同。有人把财产和生意在法庭上一项项分清，有人在常年分离里熬到婚姻散场，也有人走向教会与社区的辅导，有人先坐下来调解；还有人像 Irvine 这对夫妻一样，把该安排的安排好，体面地分开，各自把日子过下去。留下来不自动等于成功，分开也不等于失败。移民把生活的其他部分全部推倒重来，身份、事业、语言、朋友圈，婚姻是其中最难重来的一件，因为它的重来，需要两个人同时愿意。能认真对待这件事，本身就是一种「继续」。
出品：《The Star》栏目组
注：本文 CoCo Yu 与纪超部分引自双方在公开平台公开发布的发言；其余个案分别据加州上诉法院公开意见书及非营利新闻机构 Documented 的公开报道，个案细节以法院文件与原报道为准。如文中当事人认为涉及隐私，或有需要更正、回应之处，请与 GSM 联系，本站将及时处理，并为当事人保留回应版面。
After Immigration, How Does a Marriage Go On: From an Irvine Couple's Announcement
On October 31, CoCo Yu, a Chinese real estate agent in Irvine with a wide online following, posted a video on her own video channel announcing the end of her 13-year marriage to her husband, Ji Chao; the same day, Ji Chao also posted a video in response. The two have known each other for about 20 years, came from Shanghai to Los Angeles, and have three children. She has often said in her videos that she is her real estate company's top seller. The two ran a real estate business together as an on-camera couple who toured homes side by side — familiar faces to many in Southern California's Chinese community.
In her video, titled "Our 13-Year Marriage Is Over! It's Been a Year!", she says the two had in fact been apart for a year; they reached the point of separating because their personalities were incompatible and their lifestyles and rhythms differed too much, and after years of mutual accommodation, they still could not go on living together. Ji Chao has left her real estate team, and she will carry on leading the team on her own.
In the video he posted, Ji Chao confirmed that the marriage has ended. He says he had stayed silent for a year for the sake of decency and the children, that this is his first and last public response, and that he hopes both of them will be well.
GSM has not looked into the specifics of why their marriage broke down; only the parties themselves know the real reasons. What can be confirmed is just this set of facts: an ordinary immigrant couple who had known each other for 20 years, been married for 13, and raised three children has, in the end, parted ways. They are not celebrities. The reason this matter has been so widely discussed among Chinese readers is that it raises a question many immigrant families cannot avoid.
After immigration, how does a marriage go on? Back home, a marriage is held up by a whole familiar environment: both sets of parents, relatives and friends, a shared language, steady work and an established place in society. Immigration moves all of that away and starts it over: status has to be rebuilt, a career has to be rebuilt, money has to be earned again, and the children have to grow up in another culture. When everything else is changing, what keeps the relationship between two people going? The experiences of the ordinary people below are different cross-sections of that question.
Feng Jingtao and Tian Li: A Divorce Finished in China, Then Three More Years in Court in Orange County
According to a published opinion of the California Court of Appeal, Feng Jingtao and Tian Li married in China in 2003 and together ran multiple businesses and held multiple properties in both China and the United States. In March 2015, the two signed a written divorce agreement in China, with arrangements for property and children spelled out, believing everything had been divided. But the agreement did not mention one California property and one business investment in the United States. In 2017, Feng Jingtao filed suit in Orange County Superior Court over the ownership of those two assets; the case went up to the Court of Appeal, which issued its opinion in October 2020: the California property was found to be Tian Li's separate property, while the business investment was community property; the opinion also found that Feng Jingtao had, without Tian Li's knowledge or consent, mortgaged her separate property, causing it to be foreclosed, in breach of the fiduciary duty owed to a spouse. A divorce that had been "finished" in China spent more than three further years in the American legal process. When a couple runs businesses together and their assets span two countries, what a divorce has to divide is never only the relationship.
Don Wong: A Lonely Life
According to reporting by the nonprofit news organization Documented, Don Wong, a long-haul truck driver from Hong Kong, said in an on-the-record interview that long-haul trucking means being on the road year-round and rarely together with family, and that it had worn down two of his marriages. In his words: "When you become a truck driver, divorce is real hard. I divorce twice. It's a lonely life." In his current marriage, he can see his wife only once a week: "The times she needs me, I'm not there." This is another version of "astronaut" separation: not a couple split between two countries, but one person kept on the road year-round by his job.
Chinese Marriages, in Numbers
Widen the lens, and Chinese immigrants in the United States are in fact among the groups with the lowest divorce rates. By American Community Survey (ACS) and Census figures, about 4.4% to 5% of Chinese adults in the U.S. are divorced, compared with roughly 10% of the overall population, and the share is also lower than among Vietnamese and Filipino Americans. But change the point of reference: academic research shows that the share of Chinese immigrants in the U.S. who are divorced or separated (3.5% of men and 5.3% of women) is roughly five to ten times the share among residents of mainland China in the same period (0.7% of men and 0.3% of women). The same population, after immigrating, sees markedly higher rates of marital dissolution.
Another study based on ACS data found that immigrants who have naturalized are at least 25% more likely to be divorced than comparable immigrants who have not. An explanation often cited in the research is this: in the early years of immigration, with status unsettled, survival pressures high and children still young, many conflicts are bound together and pressed down by circumstance; once status is settled, finances independent and the children grown, the bindings loosen one by one, and the problems pressed down in the early years surface all at once.
The structural pressures run in every direction. For husbands, a common predicament is a career and network starting from zero, a former social position erased overnight, and difficulty adjusting that often goes unspoken; for wives, a common one is the double fatigue of work and family, and, once they have their own income, changing expectations of marriage; for children, an adaptation to language and culture far faster than their parents', so that the voice of authority within the family quietly reverses. Add to this the many immigrant couples who run a business together: the boundary between business and family disappears, and friction in one place becomes friction everywhere. Back home, parents and relatives form a buffer around a marriage; in the United States, that buffer is mostly not there. And as the buffer thins, the choices grow: American society is more tolerant of personal feelings, and divorce in Chinese communities is gradually ceasing to be something hard to speak of. These changes are in themselves neither good nor bad; they simply mean that "getting by together" is no longer the only option.
When There Is Conflict, Where Can a Family Turn
How Chinese families deal with conflict is also changing. Many Chinese churches and community organizations in Southern California offer marriage and family counseling, and psychological counseling is gradually being accepted in Chinese communities; some families, before it comes to litigation, first work through a family-law attorney's mediation to settle arrangements for the children and property. No one of these paths is a standard answer; what can be confirmed is only that more and more families are coming to realize that seeking help when there is conflict is nothing to be ashamed of.
Going On, Each in Their Own Way
Back to the question in the title: after immigration, how does a marriage go on? The people above give different answers. Some divide property and business interests item by item in court; some see a marriage worn out by years of living apart; some turn to counseling at churches and community organizations, some sit down to mediate first; and some, like the Irvine couple, make the arrangements that need making and part with dignity, each going on with their own life. Staying does not automatically mean success, and parting does not mean failure. Immigration tears down and rebuilds every other part of life — status, career, language, circle of friends — and marriage is the hardest of them to rebuild, because rebuilding it takes two people willing at the same time. Taking that seriously is itself a way of going on.
Produced by: The Star features desk
Note: The portions of this article concerning CoCo Yu and Ji Chao are drawn from statements the two parties published on public platforms; the remaining cases are drawn, respectively, from a published opinion of the California Court of Appeal and reporting by the nonprofit news organization Documented, and case details follow the court documents and original reporting. If any party discussed here believes their privacy is affected, or has anything that needs correcting or a response to offer, please contact GSM; we will handle it promptly, and we reserve space for the parties to respond.
来源：GSM·美国（原文链接）
图片来源：尔湾 Mason 公园（William R. Mason Regional Park）的湖景：平静的湖面、湖心喷泉与开阔草坪，是 Irvine 居民日常休闲的一景。图片来源：GSM 供图。 The lake at William R. Mason Regional Park in Irvine: calm water, a fountain at its center and broad green lawns — an everyday leisure scene for Irvine residents. Photo: GSM.
GSM Global · 本篇英文版 English edition of this story
