TS Shenanigans and A Change of Heart

March

Trial Separation (TS) Shenanigans

Unfortunately, the twists and turns of experimenting with separation tend to bring out the worst in people. Living apart apparently gives many parties license to be petty, nasty, or rude. Partners find insidious ways of inflicting all kinds of indignities on one another. In no time TS shenanigans exacerbate couple conflicts, and the parties are out of control. Even the most sensible among us can fall into these dismal TS traps:

Making harassing phone calls at 2 A.M.
Forgetting to pick up the kids
Walking into your spouse's home uninvited
Being inaccessible at home or at work
Flaunting a brand-new paramour
Emptying the savings account
Disappearing for days without accounting for your whereabouts

Although it may not have been either partner's original intention to be retaliatory or vindictive, "get even" tactics soon force your mate's hand. Should you be feeling incredibly "wronged", you might hightail it to the divorce attorney and thereby plunge prematurely into an ugly divorce, convinced it is the only route left.

A Change of Heart

Countless people have second thoughts about a TS. A mix of acute loneliness, emotional attachment and doubt tugs at the heartstrings and pulls mates back to the hearth. Eminent psychologist Robert S. Weiss (Marital Separation, 1975) puts it this way: "Attachment gives rise to a sense that home is where the other is. It persists even in bad marriages, even when the ultimate result of going home is that things, [the bickering, distancing, the whole thing] start up again."

If your differences are not resolved, if promises "to be better and do better" are just so much hot air, what purpose has your TS served?

If you are stuck in a go-nowhere TS, you will find practical solutions for breaking your marital impasse in Lee Raffel's recently published book, Should I Stay or Go? How Controlled Separation (CS)^® Can Save Your Marriage, (Contemporary Books, 1998).

This is an excerpt from Chapter 8 of Should I Stay or Go? How Controlled Separation Can Save Your Marriage (Contemporary Books,1999) (More information located here.)