New Year's Resolutions

So how are those New Year's resolutions going?  Given up yet?  Perhaps you need different resolutions.  Try these on for size: 

• One day every week, refuse to complain, criticize or make a single negative comment. 
• Make eye contact and smile at someone every day.
• Keep a gratitude journal, every day writing down ten things for which you are grateful.

These three simple steps can turn your life around.  If your marriage is struggling, you might just be able to avoid a divorce.  If you are already divorced, making these positive changes could help you have better relationships in the future.  Either way, if you make these attitude changes part of your life, you will be a more optimistic, happy person.  And it doesn't cost a cent!

Divorce and the Holidays

Is this your first holiday season after divorce?  Are you going through a divorce right now?  Does life look bleak and your future uncertain?  Focus on your health and well-being.  Resist the temptation to stay out late and drink too much alcohol, but don't be a hermit.  You need to get out some and socialize to feel a part of a community.  Take care of yourself.  Treat your self to a massage or a manicure, or if funds are tight, call a friend and give each other manis and pedis while listening to holiday music.  You will get through this, and you will be happy again.

Your Child Can Be Happy After Your Divorce

Many parents worry and stress about the impact their getting a divorce will have on their children.  From what I have observed over the 25+years that I have been a lawyer, I can tell you that the children usually bounce back quicker and better than the adults.  Often the kids are happier after the divorce than they were when living with two parents who were fighting or who simply did not want to be together.  The children are often relieved that the parents finally did what the kids wished they had done years before.
  There are several things you can do to help your child be happy after your divorce.  Do not fight with your spouse in front of the children.  No child should have to live in a war zone.  Do not bad mouth your spouse.  Get the child into counseling.  Do not discuss child support or other financial issues in front of your child.  Do not be so busy chasing after a new relationship that your child feels left behind.   Take the time to enjoy your child for the short period of time you will have before your child grows up and moves out.  This time will pass quickly and you cannot get it back.  Follow these tips and your child will be happier after your divorce.

Holiday Gifts For Children After Divorce

Believe it or not, the holidays can actually go smoothly and be a happy, fun time for your child after divorce.  Here is one tip:  Every year, you and your ex compile a list of what your child would like to receive for Christmas or Hannukah.  Discuss the list with each other and decide who will purchase which items for your child.  It can be a good thing to choose one big gift that will be from both of you, and split the cost.  It can mean a great deal to a child when his or her parents love the child enough to work together on a gift for the child.  Remember to put your child first.

School Issues and Divorce

This is the time of year when people tend to be in a hurry, thinking about and preparing for the holidays.  This is also the time of year when children's grades fall.  If you are going through divorce or are already divorced, your child may be attending events in more households this year than in the past.Your child may be distracted by the excitement and chaos of the holidays, and be giving less attention to the schoolwork.  Help your child remember to get homework completed and turned in, and to prepare for upcoming exams.

Holidays And Custody - How To Make It Better

Thanksgiving is over.  Good, bad or somewhere in the middle - it is behind us.  Take time today to reflect on what worked well for your children and what did not work well.  Talk with your ex about how to make the holidays better for your children.  Raising children after divorce is a constantly evolving process.  Make it better.  Your kids will thank you.

Halloween and Custody

Have you made arrangements with your ex yet for how Halloween will be handled this year?  If not, better get on it - Halloween is just around the corner.
Try not to view this as a situation for custody conflict.  Instead, try to view it from your kid's perspective -- an opportunity to get twice as much candy!  Keeping that in mind may help you work out this issue smoothly.  And face it, if you were a kid, wouldn't you want to trick-or-treat in two places instead of one?  Make this fun time work for your child.

Holidays and Custody

It is mid-October.  Fall is in the air.  The leaves are changing.  You want to sip a cup of tea (or a glass of wine) on the deck and savor the moment.  NOT SO FAST!  Have you nailed down your holiday custody and visitation schedule in writing?  A big mistake many people make after divorce is not addressing the holiday schedule issue until right before the holidays.  Then it is often too late to avoid problems, as both parents may have made plans.  Take care of the holiday scheduling now, then enjoy that glass of wine.

You Are Never Really Divorced If You Have Children

Ok, you may be technically and legally divorced, but if you are "co-parenting" children with your ex, you are still having to make your way through the minefield of coordinating kid schedules with parent schedules. You still have to agonize over whether you are making the right decisions that can impact your child's future. You still have to discuss "all things child related" with your ex and try to reach a good result by agreement (unless your ex has fallen off the face of the earth or is an uninvolved louse). So, when it comes down to it, about the only difference between you and married parents raising kids is that they might still be covered under their [ex]spouse's health insurance. For a great discussion of this subject, read more here.