Posted: Friday, 4 January 2019 @ 13:43
So according to media reports, the celebrity couple, Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin will end their marriage amicably ... in part(mainly, maybe) because they do not want to be entwined in legal documents, the finances or the PR damage. They also may have genuine concerns about the other and for their children. To me on the outside, the attempt at an amicable breakup looks genuine, rather than superficial.
With respect to us mere mortals, in her latest book, Dr Penelope Leach Family Breakdown: Helping Children to Hang on to Both Parents, to be published in June, advocates two enmity-free households, working together, to make the best of a bad job for children when their parents opt to go their separate ways.
The key, she says, is to separate parenting from partnership; so much easier said than done, as she is the first to acknowledge. "Research tells us parents matter even more and for even longer than everybody knows already," she says. "No child is too young or too old to be affected."
And this is the rub and why divorce may be being done differently now. People are more aware of the impact on children and each other.
There is certainly a shift in attitudes of divorcees now in the conduct of proceedings compared to say 10/15 years ago.
1 Dealing with money. Economically people cannot afford to have an acrimonious divorce which is not a problem which Paltrow/Martin have though they must be aware of the financial impact. People cannot afford an expensive divorce.
2. Divorcees/Those in a Break up with children are much more aware of the negative impact on children of an acrimonious break up and will work harder in dealing with the relationship fall out. This could be because a number of those people breaking up are children of divorcees/people who have broken up. They do not want to hurt their children and they do not think that winning that extra dose of money in Court is necessarily the way forward.
3. The Internet Underpins Power. Individuals are more confident and knowledgeable in asserting their rights.They have access to information and instinctively want to bypass an often complex, expensive and aloof legal system. Often, people think they can do a better deal themselves than via the lawyers. If things get complex or nasty, they may still need lawyers, but the base-line position is to try do it themselves.