

What can we learn from serial celebrity break-ups, billionaire bust-ups, misbehaving spouses, pants-on challenged politicos and the ever-shifting landscape of divorce law? Question is, "What CAN'T we learn"? With latte in hand and clicky finger at the ready, dive in for the best in divorce news, views, gossip, and buzz – assembled below for your reading pleasure.
Our current contributors are Jill Brooke, Maureen Dempsey, Naomi Dunn, and Linda Lee.

Moses may have passed the Ten Commandments on to the Israelites, but a preacher has added a new one. Thou must have sex every day for a week. And guess what? Couples say it is helping their marriage.
As The New York Times reported, on November 16, Rev. Ed Young, a TV host and pastor of the evangelical Fellowship Church in Texas, told his parishioners to have a week of "congregational copulation." He did so while preaching in front of a large bed and reading from the Bible.
In encouraging people to have more sex, he noted that it would turn people from "whining about the economy to whoopee."
And having more whoopee certainly has helped improve people's moods and mindsets.
Lisa Young, the pastor's wife, who gamely dressed in knee-high black boots and jeans, noted that a week of sex may even help people forgive infidelities, addiction to pornography and bitter hurts, although, she said, in addition, “there’s been some pain.”
As we've reported, infidelity is hard to forgive; maybe sex can be as helpful as therapy, which many can't afford right now. It's hard to have sex with someone you feel betrayed by, but maybe the lack of sex was a cause of problems too.
After all, in the early stages of courting before marriage, most couples are having a lot of sex. That eventually tapers off with the strain of kids, jobs and mortgages. The Youngs, parents of four children, have been married for 26 years and can relate to these real-life problems. As Rev. Young jokes, kids stand for "keeping intimacy at a distance successfully."
If you make the time to have sex, it will bring you closer to your spouse and to God, he said. You will perform better at work, leave a loving legacy for your children to follow, and may even prevent an extramarital affair.
read more »
This was something that former View host Debbie Matenopoulos didn’t want to see. On Internet sites, there were rumors that her husband was cheating. Now to her shock and dismay, her husband, the music executive Jay Faires, has surprised her by filing divorce papers in California.
"I am deeply saddened by the dissolution of my seven-year relationship with my husband, a man I truly believed I would be with forever," Matenopoulos said in a statement to E! News, where she now works. “Although my public persona may seem unconventional at times, I do not take marriage and family lightly, and I am quite traditional.”
Faires filed for divorce in Los Angeles Superior Court citing the usual — irreconcilable differences. He also said that, since the couple does not have any children and she is gainfully employed, he should not have to provide any spousal support.
It appears, he wasn’t supporting the relationship for some time. The couple, who married in July of 2003, did separate in March of this year. But like many women, Matenopoulos thought they were going through a rough patch and that maybe a separation would give them time to appreciate what they had.
But perhaps she should have read How To Tell If Your Man Is Cheating. Although she may have known that less than 5 percent of couples who separate ever get back together, hope is something all of us have when it comes to reviving troubled relationships.
Before it is truly over, women try really hard and are willing to forgive many sins in an effort to keep their marriages afloat. However, the boat has now left the dock and Matenopoulos will sail on solo, seeking a safe harbor with someone who will appreciate her, which is just what she deserves.

“I’ve been trying to sell this house for two years,” Chris Wealty said. He dropped the price from $850,000 to $599,000; still no interest. The house sits empty, once home to a married couple. They are trying to divorce, but settling the financial terms depends on selling this house in College Park, a neighborhood north of Orlando, Florida.
So he decided to advertise. On a large (and not very attractive) sign in the front yard, he wrote “3,400 sqft Lake View House: $599,000. Helping me get divorced: $ priceless $. 407 592 4964 (Husband)”
As he told the Orlando television station WESH, he and his wife had been married for 17 years, and had been in negotiations for several years over a divorce settlement. The house is in one of the nicer areas, former orange groves surrounded by lakes near the well-known Winter Park. It is not far from the modest bungalow where Jack Kerouac wrote Dharma Bums, a home that is now a writer’s colony.
But a nice four-bedroom, three bath house, a pretty view, a good neighborhood have not been enough. Housing prices in Orlando, which went up 34 percent from 2004 to 2005, have now dropped by 20 percent. One leading real estate expert, Robert Schiller, says Orlando prices will drop another 30 percent this year.
Thus Wealty’s desperation. If he doesn’t sell the house soon, he said, he faces foreclosure. One of his neighbors opined that putting up a sign airing dirty laundry was kind of “white trashy,” so the experiment hasn’t endeared him to the community. But his life, and his wife’s life, have moved on.
When asked what his soon-to-be-ex wife thought of the sign, Wealthy answered: “Well, to tell you the truth, I'm not real sure. We don't talk much these days except through lawyers.”
No kidding.

For every bride who discovers she had an ally, a mother-in-like, after the wedding, there are those who realize they have a monster-in-law. My monster-in-law gave me a fuzzy sleep suit with a big zipper up the front the first year of our marriage, possibly the least sexy piece of clothing ever. I felt like the Easter bunny. It was royal blue.
But the mother-in-law in the beautiful coastal town of Ravello, on Italy’s Amalfi Coast, must have been a doozie. The Italian press was all over the story of a man who got his marriage annulled this week because of interference by his wife’s mother. One Italian newspaper talked about mother-in-laws who put themselves between husband and wife, “with the docile tenderness of a Rottweiler.”
The Italian press readily conceded that it’s usually the husband’s mother, and not the wife’s mother, who acts like a Rottweiler. Last year a poll by Eures, a job portal on the internet, said that 3 out of 10 Italian divorces were due to "the unusually close attachment of Italian men to their mothers." The mothers sometimes move in, take care of the house, and often criticize their daughter-in-law’s housekeeping, cooking or child rearing.
This case was not nearly as severe; it hinged on an oral contract. Antonio Paolillo, a car dealer, was set to marry Maria Assunta Gemma Criscuoli in 1998, and there was a little bambini on the way. Paolillo, 27 at the time, apparently was apprehensive about his mother-in-law-to-be. So just before the wedding he told his bride, 21, that she had to keep her mother out of their marriage.
If not, he said, he would get a divorce.
read more »
Does your spouse chew too loudly? Maybe he can't beat his smoking habit. Or perhaps he's garnered a bit too much attention from the ladies? According to The Times of India, these minor annoyances have morphed into major grounds for divorce. If you follow our Relevant News coverage, you may have noticed a trend. Some of the most unusual divorce stories come from one country: India.
Taking a cue from Western culture (unfortunately, that would be us), Indian couples have increasingly rushed to the courthouse should a facet of the beloved's bother them. Of course, these are just a handful of cases of the already low 1.1% divorce rate for the country.
Couples have supplied a plethora of off-the-wall reasons to split. We recently wrote about the man who filed because his wife's acne was "traumatic" and he could not share a home with her. A few weeks back, a homemaker gambled in the temperamental stock market and her husband wasn't willing to shoulder the financial loss with her. Just a few months ago, a frustrated husband drew up divorce paperwork should his wife light up one more cigarette.
read more »
Have you ever wondered how difficult it must be for Jennifer Aniston to see Angelina Jolie portrayed as a model mother on magazine covers? To her credit, Aniston, who divorced Brad Pitt after he started an affair with Jolie while filming Mr. & Mrs. Smith, has stayed mum about their relationship. She did slip once when she mentioned how Pitt and Jolie were insensitive for portraying a 50's family scene in W Magazine when the wounds of her break-up were still so raw.
But she didn't unleash — except to girlfriends like Courteney Cox — her feelings about the woman who seduced her husband. Until now. She is promoting her Christmas movie, Marley & Me, and it seemed the right time to unload. (The title of her next film, He’s Just Not That Into You, might be too close to home.)
In the December issue of Vogue magazine, Aniston commented on her annoyance at Jolie for recounting a detailed timeline of how she fell in love with Pitt.
"There was stuff printed there that was definitely from a time when I was unaware that it was happening," said Aniston, who could have benefiting from reading our story on How to Catch a Cheating Husband.
"I felt those details were a little inappropriate to discuss,” Aniston said. “That stuff about how she couldn't wait to get to work every day? That was really uncool."
Yet she seems to have less icy feelings toward her ex, Brad Pitt, who was equally responsible for the affair. After all, it takes two to do a tantric tango.
"[We've exchanged] a few very kind hellos ... and congratulations on your babies," she said.
read more »
Rebecca Romijn knows a thing or two about X-Men and wants to set the record straight. In an interview with Page Six magazine, Romijn, who starred as Mystique in the X-Men movies, refuted rumors that her divorce from John Stamos happened because she didn’t want kids.
“There is absolutely no truth to that,” said Romijn who has a recurring role in the hit television show Ugly Betty. “I desperately wanted kids. I was never a girl who dreamed about what her wedding day would be like, but I’ve always dreamed about decorating my baby’s nursery.”
Well, her dream is coming true. Now happily married to Jerry O’Connell, who played a detective in the TV series Crossing Jordan, she is seven months pregnant with twin girls and looks, as she says, like a “beached whale.”
Romijn was married to Stamos (best known from ER) from 1998 to 2005. But one can suppose that she may have had lingering doubts about the relationship, and wanted to wait until she was certain about the marriage before building a family. Sometimes you don’t really know someone until you live with them for a while. They can be fun boyfriends or even a romantic husband but a wife might wonder if they have the qualities to be a good family man.
As for O’Donnell, Romijn said, “I knew early on he would be a fantastic dad. He’s a pragmatic, smart, savvy, enthusiastic person. He really lives his life with tremendous integrity and he’s a healthy person in every single way.”
The couple married in 2007. O’Connell had to backtrack on a comment he made on Conan O’Brien’s show in September, when he called his wife “huge.” He told People magazine, "I meant to say that there are specific areas of my wife that are larger than normal and growing every day. All other portions of my wife are quite petite. I apologize to her and will be coming home with flowers."
read more »
Some call it karma or comeuppence, or stars colliding but not in your favor: Sienna Miller's romance with "Brothers and Sisters" star Balthazar Getty now seems over. Sources say that Getty was stalling getting the divorce he had promised, and now the relationship is over.
As we reported, Miller was caught canoodling with the very married Getty this summer. The affair sparked a lot of criticism since Getty has a wife and four children, one just a baby.
Although his representative released the standard defensive, that the actor had had problems in his relationship before this happened and he and his wife were in the midst of separating, the news came a shock to his wife, Rosetta.Last weekend, Miller acknowledged to Us Magazine that it's "nice not to have a relationship that the press constantly want to scrutinize."
Well Sienna, the press wouldn't be scrutinizing it as much if you were not with a married man.
read more »
The British comic John Cleese has felt, three times, that it was time for something completely different in his personal life. He is divorcing wife No. 3, the psychotherapist Alyce Faye Eichelberger Cleese, after 15 years of marriage. In a recent interview with The Times of London, he had some bitter things to say about divorce, and some funny things to say about marriage.
This marriage was his longest. His marriage to Connie Booth lasted from 1968 to 1978, and the one to Barbara Trentham lasted from 1981 to 1990; both included a daughter.
That is Gripe No. 1 in this divorce. “I'm paying more than £1 million a year right now,” he told the newspaper. That’s $1.6 million at today’s exchange rate. He said, “And we never had children.”
He has also given her $10 million in marital property, which is presumed to include their $1.5 million apartment in New York. But he would hardly be left homeless. Cleese has four homes in California, three in London and a villa in Jamaica.
He has said that if the weather in California could be dragged to London, he would never leave London. But, alas, London is dreary so he spends much of his time in California, or Jamaica.
Gripe No. 2: He is 68, and he’s going to have to keep working to pay spousal support. But keep in mind, work for him is doing voice-overs for animated films, playing Chief Inspector Dreyfus in "Pink Panther 2", due out next year, and doing other films; making various television shows, and appearing in comic but inspirational business training videos.
read more »
We all know that physical infidelity is wrong. Whether you blame it on genetics or lack of control, both men and women agree that having sex outside the marriage isn't okay.
Emotional infidelity, however, is another matter. According to ScienceDaily.com, researchers in Ireland have found a difference of opinion when it comes to Internet flirtation and cheating.
According to the study, men perceived physical infidelity as more upsetting, while women were more upset by emotional infidelity.
What, you may ask, is emotional infidelity? Any online relationships or acts, including cybersex. It may be easier than you think to get wrapped up in a virtual love affair.
Can't say the results are too surprising, but an interesting confirmation of what we already suspected. How many wives are or have been suspicious of their husbands' online activity? Turns out, he doesn't think he's doing anything wrong. Perhaps those husbands should be more careful where they point and click.