CANADA First lesbian divorcees speak out

One woman said she didn't set out to be part of a bigger cause.
TORONTO GLOBE AND MAIL
TORONTO -- Theirs was like any troubled relationship, with its spats and dreams and an overriding hope -- naive, in the end -- that marriage would somehow make it better.
So remarkably common was the 2003 wedding of two Toronto lesbians that it went virtually unnoticed in the euphoria of same-sex unions that captivated Ontario that spring.
Which was just the way they wanted it, even when the relationship soured five days later and the two women embarked on legal history, making them -- unwittingly -- the first same-sex couple, in Canada and perhaps the world, to win a divorce.
"I would say I wanted the same rights as everyone else in the heterosexual community who has entered into a marriage and made a mistake," said one of the women, who can be identified only by the initials M.M., which are the same as her lawyer, Martha McCarthy.
"It was important to me to be able to legally dissolve it. It was a personal need, and I reluctantly became part of a bigger cause. I wasn't going to shy away from it because of the possibility of it becoming a bigger issue. But I didn't start out to make a crusade."