The 1970s was the decade when divorce stopped being something people whispered about at church and started being something a lot of people actually lived through.

Maybe you moved into a smaller apartment with furniture that did not match. Maybe you were suddenly cooking dinner for one, or figuring out how to be a single parent on weekends. Whatever your situation looked like, there was a good chance a record player or a car radio got you through some of the hardest nights.

Divorce in that decade did not come with support groups on every corner or a phone full of people to text at midnight. It came with a stack of records, a bottle of wine maybe, and songs that somehow understood exactly what you were going through before you could put it into words yourself.

These are ten songs a lot of people remember leaning on during that particular kind of heartbreak in the 1970s.

I Will Survive – Gloria Gaynor

By the time this song hit in 1978, it became something close to an anthem for anybody starting over after a marriage ended. It did not matter if you were the one who left or the one who got left. This song made you feel like you could actually do it.

People remember playing this loud in an empty apartment for the first time, maybe dancing around alone in the kitchen because there was nobody there to see it. There was something almost defiant about turning the volume up on this one.

If your marriage ended anywhere near the late 1970s, chances are this song played a role in helping you feel like a person again instead of just somebody’s ex.

You’re So Vain – Carly Simon

This one came out in 1972, but it found a whole new life among people going through breakups for the rest of the decade. There was something satisfying about a song that basically told an ex exactly what you thought of them without ever having to say it out loud.

People remember playing this one with the windows down, driving somewhere they did not really need to go, just to have a reason to blast it. It became the song you played when you needed a little bit of anger instead of sadness for once.

Whether or not you actually thought the song was about your ex, it sure felt like it some nights.

It’s Too Late – Carole King

Carole King released this in 1971, and it became one of those songs that people who were going through a separation held onto tightly. It is quiet and honest in a way that a lot of louder breakup songs are not.

This was the song people played after the anger wore off, when what was left was just sadness and the realization that things really were not going to work out. A lot of people remember sitting with this one on repeat, letting themselves actually feel it instead of pretending to be fine.

If you went through a divorce in the early 1970s, there is a good chance this song was part of the soundtrack to those first quiet, lonely nights.

50 Ways to Leave Your Lover – Paul Simon

This song came out in 1975 and gave people something a lot of breakup songs did not offer at the time, which was a little bit of humor. It made light of something that felt heavy, and sometimes that was exactly what a person needed.

People remember singing along to this one with friends, half laughing about their own situation for the first time since it all fell apart. It gave permission to not be completely devastated all the time, even when you were.

If your friends dragged you out after your divorce and this song came on, there is a good chance somebody made a joke about it that actually got you to smile.

Torn Between Two Lovers – Mary MacGregor

This one hit in 1976 and captured something a lot of people going through a divorce were feeling but were not exactly proud of. Relationships in the middle of falling apart are rarely simple, and this song leaned right into that mess.

People remember hearing this on the radio and feeling like somebody had been reading their diary. It was not a song that made you feel better exactly, but it made you feel less alone in a complicated situation.

If your marriage ended in a way that was messy and not black and white, this song probably found you at some point during 1976.

Go Your Own Way – Fleetwood Mac

Released in 1977, this song came directly out of the very public unraveling of the band members’ own relationships, and that honesty came through in every line. People going through their own splits recognized it immediately.

This became the song people played when they needed to feel a little bit powerful about walking away. It was loud and a little bit angry and completely unapologetic, which was exactly the mood some nights called for.

A lot of people remember this one blasting from car speakers on the drive to pick up boxes from an old house, or the drive away from one for good.

You Don’t Bring Me Flowers – Barbra Streisand and Neil Diamond

This duet came out in 1978 and it hit different for people who were actually living through the slow, sad ending of a marriage rather than a sudden dramatic breakup. It captured that quiet drifting apart that a lot of divorces actually looked like.

People remember hearing this on the radio and having to pull over for a minute, because it said out loud the thing they had been feeling for months but had not said to anyone.

If your marriage ended less with a fight and more with a slow fade, this song probably found its way to you at some point in the late 1970s.

I Am Woman – Helen Reddy

This song had already become an anthem by 1972, but for a lot of women coming out of a divorce, it took on a whole new meaning. It was about standing on your own two feet, and that was exactly what a lot of newly single women in the 1970s were figuring out how to do.

People remember playing this while cleaning out a closet of an ex’s belongings, or while filling out paperwork for a new apartment lease with just one name on it.

For a lot of women starting over in that decade, this song was less about heartbreak and more about proving to themselves that they could handle whatever came next.

Lyin’ Eyes – Eagles

This one came out in 1975 and told a story a lot of people in unhappy marriages recognized a little too well. It was not necessarily about divorce directly, but the ache underneath it spoke to anybody who knew a relationship was not what it looked like from the outside.

People remember this playing on long drives while they thought through decisions they had been avoiding for a long time. Something about the storytelling made it easier to think clearly about a messy situation.

If you were sitting with a decision about your own marriage around 1975, there is a good chance this song was part of that thinking.

Alone Again (Naturally) – Gilbert O’Sullivan

This song came out in 1972 and became one of those tracks people reached for on the loneliest nights, the ones where the apartment felt too quiet and too big for one person.

It is not an angry song or an empowering one. It is just honest about how hard it is to suddenly be alone after building a life with somebody else. People remember sitting with this one late at night more than once, letting themselves feel exactly as sad as they actually were.

If your divorce left you with a quiet house you were not used to, this song probably understood that better than most people around you did at the time.

Looking back, divorce in the 1970s did not come with a manual. What it came with, for a lot of people, was a stack of records that somehow understood the anger, the sadness, the humor, and eventually the strength it took to start over.

Whether you played these songs loud to feel powerful again or quiet to finally let yourself grieve, they became part of a chapter that a lot of people are still not shy about talking about, even decades later.

Follow Listen In The Loop for more daily music nostalgia and classic entertainment stories.