Caught Red Handed!!!

If you are caught having an affair and it ends up being the demise of your marriage, who is to blame? Can you sue the person or persons who revealed your secret to your spouse? What if the person who revealed your secret was actually a corporation? That is exactly what a Toronto woman is doing as a result of a cell phone company wrongfully combining the woman's private cell phone bill that was in her maiden name with that of her husband's. She is suing for breach of contract among other things and blames the cell phone company's wrongful act for her divorce and loss of job. While I believe that the breach of contract claim has merit due to the cell phone company's unilateral termination of her cell phone contract, I am not sure whether her claim that the cell phone company is responsible for her divorce has any merit at all. If you committed adultery and someone inadvertently reveals this to your spouse, should you be able to have any monetary recovery from that person or company that revealed your secret? What about personal accountability for your actions? Where do we draw the line? I am interested to hear any one's thoughts on this subject.

To read the article for which this blog is based, please see:

Daddy has a new girlfriend?

I sometimes come across issues when my clients' are going through a divorce that I have no legal remedy for. The biggest non-legal issue that comes up when dealing with children is when is it appropriate to introduce children to a new girlfriend/boyfriend and whether or not there is anything legally you can do to stop that from happening. Unless this new person is a sexual offender, child abuser or somehow a danger to your children, you have to come to terms with the fact that the courts cannot do anything to stop your ex-spouse from introducing whomever they feel appropriate to spend time with your children. However, many psychologists and experts would agree that there are many reasons why you should wait before introducing your children to your new girlfriend or boyfriend. When going through a divorce, its important to separate your feelings about your your ex's new friend from your children's feelings and do your best, no matter how angry you are, to co-parent your children with your ex. Your children will thank you for it in the future.

Do I Need To Get An Attorney For My Divorce?

Lately I have been doing a lot of consultations simply providing people with preliminary information and advice, however I have also been helping people fix some of the problems that were created in their initial divorce. Sometimes the problems are created by lack of legal counsel in the initial divorce proceeding. Often times people ask me whether they actually need to have an attorney represent them in their divorce, and the simple answer is that you never really "need" an attorney and there are some cases which simply don't warrant the cost. If you are asking yourself whether or not you need an attorney here are five simple things to ask yourself before you go ahead with the divorce proceedings on your own:

1. Do I understand all the forms that I need to file in order to proceed without an attorney.
2. Do my spouse and I have children?
3. Do my spouse and I have large assets, pensions, 401(K)s and/or liabilities that need to be divided?
4. Are my spouse and I going to be fighting over any aspects of our divorce that may require Court intervention and guidance?
5. Do I have questions about whether I am agreeing to do something that I'm not legally obligated to do or waiving something that I may be legally entitled to?

If you answered yes to any of the questions above, it is in your best interests to at the very least consult with an attorney. Sometimes you end up spending a lot more money on attorneys' fees and costs trying to fix something that happened in the initial divorce proceeding than paying for the attorney to start off with. I often times send people off with divorce forms if I feel that they don't need the assistance of an attorney and the following are common characteristics of a person who does not need an attorney to assist them in a divorce:

1. The parties have no children or large assets that need to be divided and/or have already divided all of their assets and liabilities;
2. The person understands all of the divorce documents and is perfectly capable of filing them out without the assistance of an attorney;
3. The person and their spouse are in no hurry and have no specific time line that they are looking for to finalize their divorce;
4. The money that it would take to hire an attorney is more than the value of the assets or debts the parties are fighting over; and
5. Alimony and child support is not at issue.

In a case as stated above, I send these people on their way and tell them that they don't need my assistance. Having an attorney is not always necessary but may be nice to have to insure that everything is done legally and properly.

Surviving Divorce

Divorce is a scary thing and often times people feel alone in the process. It can be emotionally, financially and mentally draining and knowing that there are other people out there that are going through the same thing as you can be tremendously comforting. There are many memoirs out there written by people who have gone through a divorce and have gotten through to the other side in one piece. I've always been an avid reader and encourage people to escape their own worlds into another person's world for a period of time. A new book written by Stacy Morrison is one woman's story about her own divorce and how she was able to go through it in one piece and live to tell the story. You can read about Ms. Morrison's book at the following link:

Please share your own stories of survival with our readers.

Can Divorce Make You Fat?

There is no question that divorce is emotional and often times the emotional part of divorce can have physical implications, whether that is anxiety, high blood pressure, stress headaches or weight gain/loss. It seems that even pseudo celebrities are blaming their divorce for weight gain. This just goes to show you that no one is immune to the emotional aspects of divorce. If you are feeling any physical effects from your divorce, its important to get help if these symptoms are causing your quality of life to suffer. Exercise, proper diet, good sleeping habits and having a good support group can help insure that this physical manifestations of divorce do not spiral out of control.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1262302/Kevin-Federline-Divorce-Britney-fat.html

Things I Learned From My Divorce

I was listening to the radio the other day and they were talking about a Cosmopolitan Magazine article that addressed positive things that people learned from their divorce. So much about divorce is negative, but there are positive things that are learned and after searching the web, I found that there is a lot of information out there about the positive things that come from divorce. Here are just a few of the positive things that I found people saying about their divorce.


1. You can face anything, meaning that divorce was really difficult and after knowing that you could get through something that difficult, you had confidence in yourself that you could face difficult things in life and be able to get through them.

2. Positive things can come out of something so negative. No matter how awful something is, there is always something good that has come out of it.

3. You can't control everything, so sometimes you have to let go. Divorce teaches you that soften times things are out of your control. Learning how to let go of things and allow some things to run their course can be quite liberating.

4. Looking forward rather than backwards can solve a lot of problems. In order for you to move on in a divorce, which includes letting go of your anger towards your cheating spouse in order to co-parent your children, helps you heal and move on. Looking backwards does not solve problems, looking forward does.

5. You are never too old to start over. Embracing change no matter how old you are is a good thing and can open doors that you may have thought were closed forever, whether that is going back to school, venturing into the work place for the first time or moving to a new home.

Please let me and others know what positive things have come out of your divorce.

Death and Divorce

As a family lawyer we often say that we get to see good people at their worst while criminal attorneys get to see bad people at their best. Unfortunately, in some cases, divorce not only brings out the worst in people, it sometimes leads to unspeakable crimes. There was a case in California in the early 1990s about a woman who killed her ex-husband and his new wife out of rage. She was tried and convicted of two counts of second-degree murder with back to back sentences of 15 years to life. Ms. Broderick is now seeking parole. I don't know all the facts of this case, but it seems that she broke into her ex-husband's house and may very well have had the intention of killing him. I never think that hurt feelings or trying to wrong a right that occurred in your marriage is justification for violence. I encourage all of you out there who are feeling out of control anger and the need to hurt your ex-spouse, please get help and do not act on those feelings. While anger, disappointment and sometimes rage can be normal feelings in a divorce, getting help when those feelings cannot be controlled is in every one's best interest, including your own.