In Conclusion: The Top Ten Things To Know When Contemplating Divorce

Keep your emotions in check.  Select the right lawyer and learn your rights.  Protect your children from the divorce by insulating them as best you can.  Gather as much information and documentation as you can.  Identify your main issues and how you would like to resolve them.  Most importantly, develop a strategy with your attorney to meet your goals and pursue that strategy diligently.  However, periodically perform a “cost-benefit analysis” to determine if your strategy makes fiscal sense.

In the end, a well thought out consensual settlement is almost always preferable to a result after trial.  Keep in mind the words of President Lincoln:

“Discourage litigation.  Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can.  Point out to them how the nominal winner is often really a loser — in fees, expenses and waste of time.  As a peacemaker, the lawyer has a superior opportunity at being a good man.  There will still be business enough.”