Tareq Salahi has filed for divorce from Michaele Salahi, White House gate crasher and one of the Real Housewives of DC.

Tareq accuses Michaele of desertion and adultery with Journey guitarist Neal Schon.

In the Complaint, Tareq claims Schon sent Michaele a picture of a part of his body via email.

There is no lawyer’s name on the Complaint, but it appears to be drafted by someone who knows divorce law.  There is no mention of a prenuptial agreement.

Comes word of a study, as reported by Timothy Boyer on EmaxHealth.com, of a common personality trait among people who fared better than others in divorce.

“Self-compassion—a combination of kindness toward oneself, recognition of common humanity, and the ability to let painful emotions pass, says psychologist David A. Sbarra “can promote resilience and positive outcomes in the face of divorce.”

According to Dr. Sbarra,” Understanding your loss as part of bigger human experience helps assuage feelings of isolation.  Mindfulness—noting jealousy or anger without judgment or rumination—lets you turn your mind to life in the present without getting stuck in the past.”

Dr. Sbarra believes that self-compassion can be learned and should be part of counseling for people going through a divorce.

Real world relationships are tough enough but MapleStory, a free online role playing game, has a divorce rate of 75%.

Andy Chalk writes at EscapistMagazine.com that it costs $25 real dollars to get married in MapleStory.

“I was young, naive, and thought I had met ‘the one.’ says 20 year old Tyler, and 19 year old Seth says “She was only out there to get free things off of me.”

On the bright side,MapleStory divorcees don’t pay alimony or child support and they don’t have to go to court.  I wonder if this will be good practice for  these people when they get married in real life.

Resorts offer Wedding and Honeymoon Packages.  It was only a matter of time until someone came up with a Divorce Vacation.  Casa Velas, a resort in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico is offering a Divorce Package from August 1 through December 22, which includes:

# Luxury Accommodation in our Presidential Suite
# Full bar in the living area of the suite.
# A private in-suite welcome dinner.
# Private farewell cocktail party for the wedding ring (coffin for the ring included!)
# VIP night on the town to kick off the single life right.
# A jewelry consultation to redesign your ex-engagement ring.
# A shopping tour to start enjoying that settlement.

More Divorce Vacations

Henry Silverman, 68, of New York, married Nancy Silverman, 66, in 1978.  In their 30 years of marriage, Henry built Cendant Corporation into a multi-billion dollar company that provides car rentals, travel reservation services as well, real estate brokerage and hotel franchises.

Then he got a divorce in 2008 and soon after became engaged to yoga instructor Karen Hader.  In dividing up the marital assets, Henry submitted that he was an innate genius and Nancy had no part in his financial success.  He alone, through his unique personal traits, was responsible for accumulating a $450 million fortune during the marriage.  To support his theory, he submitted affidavits from three psychologists who would testify at trial about his intelligence.

State Supreme Court Judge Laura Drager rejected the evidence, saying that although “the husband brought to his work innate abilities and acumen that helped cause the business to succeed, ” the wife also contributed by “managing the couples’ domestic and social life and raising their daughter, and the social introductions and other efforts she claims to have made that assisted the husband in business.”

Read more.

Some clients ask me the best way to bring up the subject divorce with their spouse.  I’ve always said, you might try asking questions, like “Are you happy in our marriage?” and “What do you see in the future for our marriage?”

If that doesn’t work, or you don’t want to do it, I’ll do it for you by sending a lawyer’s letter to your spouse to begin negotiations on a separation agreement.

Today, however, I found a better answer in a thoughtful article by Harriet Lerner, Ph.D. in Psychology Today, which I am going to start giving to clients who ask me that question.  She says, you don’t want to bring it up in anger, or to punish, shape up, or shake up the other person.  And you don’t have to mention divorce every time it passes through your head.

Instead she counsels basic fairness.  She says it’s not fair to conceal crucial facts that affect your partner.  Divorce should never come out of the blue.  Talk frankly about divorce with your spouse and first give your spouse a chance of deciding whether to make the necessary changes to make your marriage work.

“Never tell me the odds, Kid.”  That’s what Hans Solo said to Luke Skywalker just before they flew through the asteroids in Star Wars.  And I hear it in my head every time a client asks me what I think their chances of winning are.

First, the Code of Professional Responsibility prohibits me from giving you percentages, because each case is unique with its own set of facts.

Second, the judge weighs the testimony and credibility of the witnesses, and there is no lie detector at the bench.

Third, the judge doesn’t always get it right.

Fourth, you might win or you might lose, or it might be something in the middle.  Usually there is a least one thing in the judge’s decision to feel bad about.

Fifth, my crystal ball is cloudy.

Sixth, two judges trying the same set of facts, will give different opinions.

Seventh, judges have their own filters, feelings, history and perceptions.   Did the judge have an absent father and nurturing mother?  Is the judge divorced and mad about having to pay alimony?  Did the judge have a good breakfast or an argument with their spouse on the morning of your trial?

So your chances of winning?  It all depends.

This excerpt from an article by Jane Eaton Hamilton struck me as a particularly poignant description of the losses felt by people going through divorce:

“We had lost our wives and husbands. We had lost our best friends. We had lost sex. We had lost our children. We had lost our animals. We had lost our homes. We had lost our furniture. We had lost our gardens. Our incomes had severely plummeted. There were new therapists to pay, and lawyers to pay, and moving costs to pay. Some of us had to replace even the spices in our cupboards and the toilet brushes behind the bowls. We moved without screwdrivers, without our art, without our shampoo.”

With Social Security and entitlements under debate, baby boomers are hitting their 60’s and guess what else.  They are getting divorced.

Long term marriages account for nearly a quarter of divorce filings in recent years.  This is attributed to many factors, including the growing financial status of women, and couples drifting apart after the kids are gone.

Many of these “gray divorces” are less hostile than the usual divorce.  The marriage ends with a fade away divorce rather than a divorce by crisis.  The parties just want to separate their finances and move on with their lives. Another interesting statistic is that once divorced, more boomers are staying single.

Source:  KansasCity.Com

Today I received an order from the court notifying me that my opponent’s motion to dismiss my complaint was denied.  Only problem is that I never received a copy of the motion.

Since I won anyway, and my opponent is not a lawyer and she is representing herself, I am not going to complain.

I did let her know, however, that she must mail or deliver a copy to me of any future pleadings she files, so that I will have an opportunity to respond.

Maryland Rule 1-321 says in part “Service…shall be made by delivery of a copy or by mailing it.”

And Maryland Rule 1-323 provides in part:

“The clerk shall not accept for filing any pleading or other paper requiring service, other than an original pleading, unless it is accompanied by an admission or waiver of service or a signed certificate showing the date and manner of making service.”

If you are a do-it-yourselfer, don’t forget to mail a copy to the other side and put a certificate of service on the pleading you file with the court.