If you are at the point of asking this question, you have some distinctions to consider. If you have children, you want to be able to have an answer for them when they ask you “why did you and Dad/Mom break up our family?” If you can answer this question (without blaming of course), you may be ready to move on. If not, you have work to do. It is time to really look at your marriage and see what is going on. Never threaten your partner with divorce to get his/her attention. Never make the divorce decision during a fight. No exit doors allowed in your fighting. Divorce is a serious life lesson for everyone and should be decided upon only after a lot of serious conversations. Read more here.

Assuming you and your partner have fought for your marriage and you now have decided to get divorced, it is time to move forward. I hope you both know why your marriage didn’t work and I hope you each know your part in why your marriage failed. Read more here.

I think we are all in agreement “settle out of court”. How can a couple do that when they are fighting to the extent they are filing for divorce? You are probably going to get tired of hearing me say first always “Fight for your Marriage.” Read more here.

1. Fight for your Marriage

This tip is probably the most important for a good divorce. If you have worked hard in workshops, individual and couple’s therapy, with your spiritual advisors, and you still feel you need to divorce, you both will have had a chance to fight for the marriage. You also will be able to report to the children you really fought for the family to stay together. This process will help you move forward and hopefully NOT repeat the same mistakes in the future. Continue reading here.

Unfortunately, there are several types of people who are going to be contentious in a divorce and they have to be handled differently. And many personnel involved in the divorce process do not prepare or educate the spouse of a contentious person correctly. If you have ever been told or if you suspect you are married to a borderline, psychopath, sociopath, narcissistic personality, or untreated chemically dependent person, for openers pay attention. For the purpose of this discussion we will call this person contentious. Continue reading here.

No one plans on getting divorced when they get married, and yet that is a possible outcome for some. If you have spent your life mastering people pleasing, always saying yes, being diplomatic, and putting everyone else’s needs before yours, you will suffer tremendously if you are confronted with going through a divorce. The following are some areas of negotiating a divorce that people pleasing needs to be replaced with having a Backbone. Read more here.

Do treat your Children like Gold!

Remember you just turned your children’s life (and they didn’t have a vote) upside down. They now have to decipher new rules, new logistics, probable logistical chaos until their stuff finally gets where it is supposed to be, emotional land mines, and they have just inherited all the things you divorced your “ex” about. Maybe you were able to shield your children from some of the “bad stuff” going on and now they have to figure things out on their own. Read more here.

Dear Mom and Dad,

Please remember my life has been turned upside down and I never had a vote. I don’t have a rulebook to negotiate waters totally unfamiliar to me. It is really hard for me to understand that my family has broken up. I feel scared that I will lose one or both of you. I don’t know what to do with all the bad feelings I have. It would really mean a lot to me if you could do a few things to help me with the land mines I seem to be stepping on. Thanks for taking the time to listen.

Read more here.

One would think after going through a difficult, and many times nasty divorce from a contentious (narcissistic, borderline, psychopathic, or sociopathic for example) partner he/she might be done with you and want to move on. You will probably find this will not be the case especially if there are children involved. Continue reading here..

Mom and Dad, what do you think it is like for me 3′-4′ high weighing in at 90-100lbs when I hear the “our family is getting divorced” conversation? I think the way things happen in life is somehow two people get together and create a family with little people like me growing up trying to figure out the world. I never really thought about all this until the day I was told my family was breaking apart. All of a sudden having a family became really important to me. I didn’t want my family to break up. Continue reading here.

As we know from previous discussions about divorce, children are innocent victims and often find themselves on a road filled with emotional land mines. When a child loses his in-tact family good, bad, or ugly as the family may be, he experiences abandonment. However the family system has been set up, the system is no more. Parents may be blind to how the system is set up, but most children unconsciously know exactly how things work. Continue reading here

It really is up to you every day whether you see support as a curse or a blessing! Whether you are the giver or the receiver, I recommend you reframe it as a blessing. Is this easy? Of course not! However, if you actually go through the trauma of getting divorced and you stay married through your anger that seems pretty self-destructive! Remember, “Letting someone live rent free in your head” has bigger costs than a monthly check. Continue reading here

The definition of betrayal: “an act of deliberate disloyalty,” “destroying someone’s trust” suggests why it is one of life’s more challenging lessons. Betrayal, particularly in a marriage, is done by someone close to us which contributes to the devastation. The one person we thought we could trust has been lying to us, and betrayed us emotionally and physically. Continue reading here.

In our first article or what we will call Stage I of Infidelity in your Marriage, we discussed the challenges of confirming the infidelity, the boundary I recommend you set and then two possibilities that can result from that boundary. Now we are going to explore Stage II with both scenarios that we addressed in the first article. Continue reading here.

Stage III is important for one reason, you must not get STUCK as the victim of betrayal in either scenario. Let’s look at Stage III from both scenarios. Read more here.

In Stage IV the focus will be on reinventing yourself. Now you are living your life either as a single/parent or a couple healing from the betrayal in your marriage. When you are successful in this healing process, you will string days, weeks, months, and eventually years together where you don’t think about the infidelity that at one point you thought might be the mountain you couldn’t climb. Read more here.