Good Divorce

 The title of this post is misleading: Divorce is difficult and painful for everyone involved. I've never known anyone to have a "good" divorce, in that way you have a good meal or good sex—even when divorce was the right thing to do for everyone, including the kids.

Divorce is the hardest, most painful thing I've ever done. And I had a "good" divorce.

Still, divorce is often better for kids and mental health than a deeply flawed marriage, and some divorces are better than others. Divorce can be done well, in a mature way that puts the kids' needs first. There is a lot of research examining what makes divorce more beneficial, or at least less damaging for kids.

Here is the main take-away from all that research: Divorce is not permission to hate.

When there are kids involved, you don't get to throw in the towel and walk away from your ex. You don't get to stop trying to make the relationship work. Divorce is only a way to change a relationship. You go from married and living together to co-parenting as divorced people living in separate households.

Also, and I know this is obvious, but: Hate is not a happiness habit. It will not make your life better or happier to indulge a hatred toward someone, no matter how evil they seem to you. It will not make your kids resilient in the face of your divorce. Your hatred will hurt them, and yourself.

In a "good" divorce, both parents work together to solve this problem that they have—that they can't get along, they can't live together anymore, or whatever. When parents establish a functional working relationship that puts their kids front and center, kids tend to have fewer problems.

The research points to a handful of other things that make divorce less damaging for kids.

—Consistent contact with both parents is important, unless you just can't keep conflict low. Sadly, the benefits of having a relationship with both parents doesn't always outweigh the disadvantages of having parents who hate each other.

—Money matters: Many problems kids have after divorce, particularly academic ones, stem from economic hardship. Single parents are less likely to be able to pay for music lessons, high quality childcare, tutors, a safe neighborhood with good schools—you name it.

—"Good" divorces minimize the number of major transitions that kids need to make, because transitions usually bring stress. Generally speaking, the fewer household moves, the better. Remarriage can solve some problems, like those associated with economic strain, but it can bring more stressful transitions. It helps to be mindful of these stressors, and to look for ways to minimize their effects.

When parents take care of themselves during a divorce, kids do better. For that reason, the "well-being of children is positively associated with the post-divorce psychological adjustment of the custodial parent." In other words, how well you are doing tends to predict how well your children are doing. So lean on your friends. Get therapy, or get a massage. Get enough sleep and exercise.

However, having a good divorce doesn't have to be only when there are kids involved in the marriage. Even when there are no kids, good divorce can be for the sake of relatives and personal happiness.

My ex wife  and I took this very literally during our mediation. We sat side-by-side and looked at all of our paperwork together. Together, we were solving a problem. Together, we were trying to work out the best future for ourselves. This isn't to say that it was easy. We were constantly set up as adversaries competing for limited resources.  But we knew from all the research that discord and conflict are for families and relatives. So even though there was no kid as at then, it will be disastrous for our mental health and relative.

My ex and I knew we have to be on the same team and keep conflict low. This took a huge amount of forgiveness. We had to forgive each other for all the things we'd done to damage the marriage, and we had to forgive ourselves for not being able to make it work. It also took a good deal of acceptance. In order to justify getting divorced, I found myself keeping a running list of all the things that were wrong with my wife  and our marriage. Constantly ruminating on her  flaws and our broken marriage made it hard for me to feel anything other than pissed off at her, and deeply distraught about the situation.

But when I accepted the situation as though it was more of a natural disaster than something I could stop from happening—because at that point, I couldn't stop it from happening—I could stop ruminating and feeling awful long enough to get through the day. This acceptance went something like this in my head: I am what I am, and right now I am getting divorced. The best I can do right now is to be present in this situation, and deal with it as it comes.

In the end, I find that again and again it all comes back to conflict: If we can't keep conflict low in a marriage, often the best thing for the kids and our well-being is to end the marriage. In so doing, we may very well create more conflict. But when we take the long view and the high road, the best thing for the kids and our own happiness, is to end the war with peace, compassion, and forgiveness.

Joseph Abdalla