Finding Middle Ground in Your Life and Divorce

This week it began, the holiday lights being strung throughout the neighborhood and a few brave souls are lighting up the pitch darkness of 5 pm already. It is without a doubt my favorite time of the year. There is hope. People are a bit softer and kinder, reaching into a bit deeper into their pockets and cupboards wanting to assuage hunger and prevent disappointment in children during this holiday season. With a brief whiff of evergreen, I am transported back to time when it was just pure joy, even as a child of divorce. It is the one time of year where we pause and think of family no matter how far away or nutty they may be, honor our traditions while we pass them along and make new ones. There is a general shift focus on making other people happy. In a time when there is so much sadness, glimpses of a smile from another weary traveler or a beleaguered gate attendant reminds us we are not alone. There is joy and accomplishment in each cookie baked, present wrapped and warm greeting...

"Stay the hell out of my office" seems an unlikely mantra for a 20-year veteran of the practice of family law. My job, after all, is to get you out of an often-giant mess as quickly and as painlessly as possible. The older I get, the clearer the statement "if I only knew then what I know now" becomes to me. When clients are in the midst of their heated battles, frustrated, angry and full of hatred for someone they once loved, I often think,  why don't people listen to that little voice?  I sometimes have to gently remind them they didn't ask me for my opinion "before that train left the station." It seems remarkable a majority of people who come through my office admit they knew the very thing about their partner that now drives them running out the door before they married their spouse and married them anyway. What were they thinking? Well, they thought either "it" would get better, or thought "it" would change. People l...

Why this Divorce Attorney May Send You on Your Way Someone once described my job as that of an undertaker, saying that "divorce is not the death of the marriage, it is the funeral."  For the majority of people who come to my office for a divorce, that is true.  For many, the marriage ended long ago, sometimes months or years before people come into my office to finally move forward.  There have been years of disconnect, of fundamental irreconcilable differences.  Sometimes there is fighting-- lots of fighting.  Sometimes there is just silence.  For some, there are years without sex. Yes, years.  Fights about money, children, or family and the list goes on.  Specific reasons are as varied as the people who walk in my door. However, the often familiar lament of “we just fell out of love" seems to me the saddest of all.   Fell out of love?  They make it sound like they fell over a misplaced shoe.   What? No bird...

Embrace your Less than Perfect Life and Find a Happier Marriage Perhaps the worst thing anyone ever came up with is the idea we can "have it at all".  The idea that we can be perfect partners, parents, lovers, friends, and employees.  We can do it all and can do it all without help, support, and complaining, all the while looking like a supermodel.  The idea that we can be all things to all people sets us up from the start to fail.  The eternal quest for more money, more affirmation, and to "have it all", is frankly, exhausting.  In my experience as a divorce attorney, this leads to two very tough problems to overcome, resentment and disappointment, as life is less than perfect, sometimes culminating in a trip to my office. I have a sister-in-law who is beautiful, smart and ridiculously talented.  She does it “all” and recently moved into a beautiful new home, all the while planning a big family party within a week’s time.  Of course, she will...