At the same time, states that do not recognize same-sex marriage also decline, at least officially, to dissolve marital bonds formed elsewhere. An exception is Wyoming, which as a result of a State Supreme Court ruling allows divorces for same-sex couples who married in other states. In some states, sympathetic judges have quietly granted divorces, but for the couples involved, the emotional turmoil of the split is often compounded by the fear that someone will challenge its legality.

Even when same-sex couples divorce in states that recognize their marriages, the process is often more complex than for heterosexual couples. The Supreme Court’s decision may correct some of those inequities — the division of retirement funds and tax deductions for alimony payments, for example. Peter Zupcofska, a family law and divorce lawyer who practices in Massachusetts and New York, said that in light of the court’s decision, married couples living in states where they can divorce “really should look at estate planning documents and prenuptial agreements,” because federal regulations governing the division of assets may now apply.

But discrepancies are likely to remain, he and other lawyers said. One example is that although many same-sex couples have lived together for years or decades before marrying, assets in most states are considered divisible only if they were acquired after marriage. For couples with children, difficulties can arise if they have not been legally adopted by the nonbiological parent.

Some same-sex couples have been startled to find their divorces as politicized as their efforts to marry. In Texas, two same-sex couples who sought to divorce met with fierce opposition from the state’s attorney general, Greg Abbott. Both cases have been appealed to the State Supreme Court and are awaiting decisions on whether they will be heard.

In Ohio, Jonathan Baize, 32, was scheduled to have his divorce granted by a private judge last year when a group opposed to same-sex marriage filed an amicus brief objecting to the proceeding. The divorce went through anyway, but Mr. Baize said he was so rattled that he had blocked out much of what happened.

“I think that if I had not been able to finalize the divorce, it would have been pretty devastating to me mentally,” he said. “I would have felt like there was no chance of me being able to move on, to find normalcy or happiness or anything.”

Mr. Baize said that in seeking a divorce, he and his husband had no intention of challenging Ohio’s same-sex marriage ban. They simply wanted to put a painful part of their lives behind them.

Said Ms. Schwartz, the lawyer in Miami Beach, “If you’re going to let people into a relationship, you’ve got to let them get out.”