Odds are – you hear the word divorce and cringe.  Why is that?  With half of all marriages ending in divorce, we all know someone who is divorced, has been divorced or who is going through a divorce.  In fact, many adults are divorced.  Of all the people we just identified, would any one of them wish they were remarried to the person they divorced or who divorced them?  I venture to guess you will find very few in that camp.  Most of us who have been through divorce or seen family or friends through divorce know that on the other side is: happiness, contentment, strength, and a new beginning.

So why do we cringe?   I suspect we cringe because we all know how bad the process can be for the individuals going through it.  We know there is heartache, money lost or spent, houses lost or sold, and kids moving from house to house.  We all have friends who became former friends and family members became former “in-laws.”  These painful are surely the painful experiences that make us cringe.

While this is true, for those who have traveled through the river of misery and divorced a spouse, what has been found on the other side?  A new relationship with someone you are more compatible?  A new career you took a chance on because you needed an income?  New financial awareness and independence?  Change of such a magnitude as divorce will always be difficult, but when continuing a marriage causes more harm than good to the husband, wife and children, the decision to stay married may be the scarier option.  

Here are some suggestions to clean the word DIVORCE.  Find common ground with your spouse and put it in writing.  What can you agree on as far as who should have what, who pays what, who gets the kids and when?  Share all your financial information and be up front.  You are required to share financial information under the rules.  If you do this in advance, you can save a lot of battles that waste time and money.  Think about your kids instead of yourself or hurting the other person.  I have found that most kids don’t like switching homes…especially teenagers.  They want their room with their clothes and their things.  They want both parents to talk to each other because they don’t want to pass messages; and, odds are, they will forget or misstate what they were told to say.  Don’t say mean things about the other parenting in front of kids…they know they are related to both parents so, when you say mean things about the other parent, they take it personally.  Kids want to be loved by both and, when you treat the other parent badly, they feel it too.  Lastly, this too shall pass.  The faster you both let bygones be bygones and paddle to the other side of the river of misery, the faster you get to your new future.

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