"Divorce has become glamorized in this country, and people think it's okay," says Cohen, who has himself been through two. "But it's really not okay. It's probably the most horrible thing you can go through other than a long and suffering death. It's the death of a family. And that's only the beginning of what's been destroyed. The house is going to go. You may see your kids only once every other Thanksgiving. Assets you thought were safe are going to disappear. You may even be thrown in jail on bogus abuse charges. Everybody is going to have to start new. It is a predictably negative experience, and nobody goes through it without a tremendous amount of pain. I always want very badly to tell people they should not be going through this."
He even wrote a book that will almost certainly cost him business.
Reconcilable Differences: 7 Keys to Remaining Together From a Top Matrimonial Lawyer covers all the typical flash points (sex, money, and in-laws) and suggests a new role for the divorce attorney: that of trying to send a client home instead of leading him to court, because once a troubled marriage reaches a stage where attorneys enter the mix, the discussion starts to become surreal. The world divides into two realms: Real World, where your heart is being barbecued, and a parallel paper universe-call it Legal World-where grumbling about your last vacation is labeled "mental cruelty" and you're forbidden from even talking to your wife.
Cohen successfully talks his clients out of pursuing a divorce only about 10 percent of the time. The rest of the couples wind up filing papers, and that's when the real hell starts.
"You can't turn back," he explains. "The professionals are at each other. Positions harden. It spirals out of control. The process is just so ugly, and it affects everything that's important."
In the long run, he says, there are generally more benefits to staying together than to splitting, even when couples are in seemingly bad marriages. As a matter of pragmatism, it makes sense for you to exhaust all possibilities before calling the executioner. At the very least, Cohen advises, don't think that calling a law office is going to solve your problems. It may make things worse.
"Going to see a lawyer should be at the end of the line, when you have absolutely no other options. We're not that good at putting Humpty Dumpty back together again."
So how can a divorce attorney take a position so contrary to his job description? There is a pragmatic answer for that, too, which is why you want to listen to him off the clock rather than on.
