Divorce Guidelines and Operating Instructions

Divorce Guidelines

Once a decision is made to divorce, the following six basic guidelines, adapted from the CS guidelines, can make your transition a saner one:

Moving Out. Decide which party will move out and when.

Filing for Divorce. If the decision is made unilaterally, soften the blow by advising your spouse of your intentions before papers are filed.

Caution: this rule does not apply if you are concerned about your safety or that of your children.

Legal Counsel. It's advisable that you be represented by your own lawyer.

Children: Maintain Sensible Rules.

Alert the children two or three days in advance that one parent will make a change in residence. This gives the youngsters sufficient time to react, ask questions, and express their feelings. As you and your spouse express your own feelings of sorrow and regret, the children are spared as much angst as possible under the circumstances.

Arrange for joint custody or other custodial arrangements that ensure your children are not deprived of reasonable access to either parent.

Discuss phone arrangements, meeting times, family events, and sharing vacation time and holidays with your children.

Finances: Division of Property and Monies. Anticipate your children's education needs. Update your will, medical insurance, and life insurance policies to include your children and, at some point, to exclude your former spouse, if so desired.

Exes' Continuing Relationship. Discuss potential phone arrangements, personal meeting times and family events that do or do not include your children.

Modify the rules to fit your situation. Be optimistic as you agree to set aside your animosities for the sake of your own health and the protection of your family.

Operating Instructions
for a Good Divorce

Controlled Separation parties have had practice in being separated and are most amenable to negotiating a divorce fairly. Divorce need not be a do-or-die process. The following nine standards of excellence serve to benefit all in shaping a good divorce:

Be convinced your decision to divorce is not a choice made impulsively.

Agree to dignify your divorce and to be civil, courteous, and respectful to each other.

Recognize the benefits of being objective, keep your emotions in check, and be reasonable in negotiating your divorce stipulations.

Accept responsibility for yourself. Refuse to be dragged into stale conflicts that won't go away. Stay cool and let your adversarial spouse shadowbox alone.

Agree to keep your children out of your marital conflicts. Do not use your youngsters as "political footballs" or as "go-betweens."

Keep your communication straightforward and honest.

Agree to be advocates on a limited basis to assist one another in emergencies.

Accept mediation if negotiations break down.

Acknowledge that one or both parties may remarry, that the complexities of blended family kinships cannot be avoided, but that interfamily relationships are handled far better as friends than as enemies.

A good divorce is in reach if you are willing to bend, if you acknowledge your part in the breakup, and if you are determined to minimize the drama and maximize the advantages in store as you rebuild your life.

This is an excerpt from Chapter 19, pp. 251 - 253 of Should I Stay or Go? How Controlled Separation Can Save Your Marriage (Contemporary Books,1999) (More information located here.)