I am not overly social but I know many people and can talk to anyone from any type of background or employment experience. An ability to relate to people and draw them out in conversation is a skill learned over time. For some it may come naturally. For others, it may take real effort and actions outside your comfort zone. My job has forced me to become good at talking to people over the past 25 years. As a younger man, I didn't really care to know people or take interest in them even if I was fully capable of talking and becoming socially active. I just wasn't drawn to idiots and men under 25 rarely offer much in terms of intellectual conversation and humility.

Life and work experience have changed my approach and sense of awareness. I now like to ask people questions and engage in conversation often with total strangers. I want to know what has happened in their life. This may flow from generic conversations that are random or from the need to get information so I can help clients get the best possible result. 

I say all this not to point out how good I am with people, but to let you know that there are many men who are probably going through what you are regarding divorce and child custody yet don't talk to anyone about it for various reasons. These men mostly suffer in silence because they don't know anyone they can talk to who can relate or understand. Men also by nature keep their pain inside. We live in a society where women are praised for sharing their pain and too often exaggerated claims of victimhood. Men are shamed and insulted if they dare speak out on the injustice that is family court or how their ex wife uses the kids as pawns to destroy him emotionally. Can you imagine a world where post split men claim the kids as theirs and deprive women of equal access to their children forcing them to prove to a Judge why they should get equal custody? Watching how women would respond to this scenario would be scary. Men handle it and still more often then not work and pay the support ordered by a court. Deprive women of her kids and tell her to work and give some of her earnings to a man and you can only imagine how society would become. Women would be screaming about injustice. Men have been trained to accept things and continue working in silence.

Men also face a difficult time building relationships that don't center around sports, money, female conquests, and overall self inflation. For all the shallowness of females relationships, men aren't much better. Unlike women who maintain fake and shallow relationships their whole lives, quality men will outgrow these relationships and find that men they have known for a long time suddenly get cut out of their lives especially when they reflect during the divorce process. Men simply don't want to talk about women, sports, and the degradation of other men once they get a certain age. You simply stop talking to most of the men you know. Men still need friends though and we need to encourage each other to seek out relationships where we can get real advice and support and not just hide things will we talk sports or brag about women we have dated.

Meeting fellow men is not that hard. As little as I interact with others in my personal life, when I am out and run into people I ask them about themselves. I am genuinely curious. Why does a man have the job he has? Why is he divorced? Why is he still married? How is his relationship with his kids? These are generic topics but when you ask a man about them and you have life experience to share, you will be surprised what a man will tell you.  Unlike women who feel they are being cross examined if you want to learn anything about them beyond their financially related desires, men are almost shocked and genuinely happy another man asks them questions about life. You don't need to be a lawyer or have experience as a life coach to create a strong conversation with another man. I cant tell you how many men I talk to because we happen to be at the same place or function and how quick it can turn to divorce and family. There are a lot of men going through divorce or have done so while their ex tried to ruin them financially or alienate them from their kids. The pain comes out and it is obvious yet they are glad to talk about it because I can match their story.

Talking about things with quality men who have been through what you are facing or have faced is worth its weight in gold. Do not think you are the only one dealing with these issues. While having a life coach on speed dial or regular appointments with one is great, I tell all the men I know to also focus on meeting quality men who have been through the family court system. There are many men that despite professional success, a big personality, and the appearance that life is fine, are really hurting on the inside because they feel like they are alone and no one they know can relate to them or brushes them off when they try to talk about it. These men are out there just like you are.

While you are facing a divorce or going through an ongoing child custody battle, use this as an opportunity to evaluate all your relationships. You don't want to be married to the mother of your kids because you think that little of her yet you continue to hang out with dudes who could care less what you are dealing with and constantly want to brag to you about their lives? Are these your friends or just self centered people who only want to share and discuss good times? You would be surprised how exhilarating it is to divorce all the men you know who are losers from your life. Find some better men who have the ability to communicate and relate. One new relationship with a man who you can talk to without feeling like you have to out do him in everything is worth way more than all the grown up frat boys and Don Juans you still talk to and tolerate because you like to get out on occasion.

Now is the time to reshape your entire life. You are not alone. 

Hindsight is always 20/20 in every aspect of life. We always learn things from experience and the lesson typically isn't too expensive. It might be getting out of a bad investment or even getting rid of a person in your life who you mistakenly thought was your friend. You can get away and move forward with life and learn while being more confident and self aware. This isn't so easy when it comes to matters of the heart and the natural desire to create a family. Men who come from good family backgrounds want to be married and have a family like they their parents did. Growing up with parents who stayed married and being able to see mom, dad, and my sister every day in a loving and team minded household was worth more than I can express even with limited financial resources. This set up isn't easy to find in todays Instagram and Swipe Left world where women have trained themselves to value attention and status more than ever. The end result of trying to create a Leave it to Beaver life in a Jersey Shore world is men will make huge mistakes to try and create a family. Sadly women don't want families like men do in the modern world. They are too busy being career women and hypocritical feminists. The idea of marriage and a traditional family is pretty much gone in their mind. This does not mean they wont get married and have kids and will do anything necessary to get what they want whether it be children, money, or both. 

Young men need to learn from us older men how to spot the type of women who act like they want to be married and have a family when they really don't so we can run the other direction and avoid mistakes or atleast understand the deal with the devil we will decide to make when we have aged out meeting a quality woman. The inability to spot this type of woman is only going to lead to heartache, broken families, and the mans financial destruction. While no amount of knowledge can guarantee you wont be tricked by this type of woman, the failure to see what is right in front of you will cause you more pain than you can imagine and such pain should not be wished on any man, even your sworn enemy.

Let me help get you thinking about this type of woman as you may be looking for answers why your marriage broke up despite you being a great husband and provider or most importantly to maybe get you thinking before you decide to marry the wrong woman just because you want a family like the one your parents created.

Imagine meeting a pretty woman. She probably has a college degree, a great personality, or both. Men want her. You want her. She gets lots of attention even at an age where men might see her as getting old. Odds are she is pushing 30 or even slightly past it. You wonder how such a beautiful woman who has her act together on the surface is not married and does not have kids. She's probably been married before yet didn't have kids with her first husband. Her excuse as to why varies from they were building their careers or they weren't mature enough. The translation means her man wasn't making enough money or the relationship was filled with emotional or physical abuse because of her behavior. She will lie about why her relationship ended but it was probably her fault leaving a man, probably the one she dated all through college(but not without cheating on him repeatedly) who truly loved her with a broken heart. 

When you meet a woman at any age, you can tell when she is in to you. How she looks at you and how she treats you shows she wants you to be special. As a woman ages, if she is not sincere in her desires, this behavior is not so easily faked. The pretty ones can still do it and men don't spot the fake behavior because they are enamored with her looks and how beautiful their kids will be.

These women do not want to be with you in a family environment. She wants a baby but she wants it with the right man who genetically and financially will give her the best offspring. That is normal as men want pretty women for the same reason but they want it in a family environment for lots of reasons which includes a biased court system. Women however have this ability in a subtle way to make it known that they just want the kids and financial security especially if their work history is spotty and she is broke. If you don't understand what I am saying, learn about who reproduces in the USA. 20% of men reproduce with 80% of the women in this country. In other words, 80 % of men never get to have kids and only 20% of women never have kids. Eliminating the people who are just absolutely never going to have kids because they don't want or cant physically have them and the illegitimacy rates in certain communities and you have a country where women are controlling who gets to reproduce with them. If you are one of the 20% of men who gets to reproduce, you are likely at the top in income and looks etc that you have more women than you can handle. Most men in this 20% are men that want kids but still have to work very hard to get one woman to have kids with him. The woman you desire has many suitors and you hope that she hasn't had sex with her whole graduating class by the time she chooses to be with you. He knows the statistics and will tolerate a lot as his desire for kids and family is strong. This is why women have an ability to use men like yesterdays garbage when it comes to creating kids and having families. While many nice women cant get a date for whatever reason, there are a lot of men more men who would make good dads and fathers who never get the chance.

As you understand the behavior of these women, you either have to accept it knowing what is likely to happen which is your financial destruction and potential loss of access to your kids all because of your desire to have kids. Even if you are a top notch man who should fall in the 20%, life's circumstances can cause you not to be able to meet a woman who will not only be a good wife and mother, but who is also someone you want to have kids. Your 20's turn into your 30's real quick and your biological clock isn't much different than a woman's. Women who truly want to be married and have kids get married young and are more likely to stay married. If you miss out on a quality woman, you need to be aware of what you are going to likely end up with assuming you don't end up alone.

As you make decisions to have kids with a woman and potentially get married, you need to spot the signs that the woman has no interest in you despite her willingness to do whatever she needs to have kids and provide for her financial future. The behavior may not show itself immediately but as a man you need to prepare yourself to spot the behavior that is coming so you make decisions with a full understanding of what you are getting in to and what can happen when you can no longer live the lie you created for yourself. As you meet these women around 30 with their prior history of marriage or just a life screwing bad boys until they are ready for a provider type to take care of them who may or may not be exciting. When she does pick you and says and does all the right things to make the relationship progress, understand she does not want you, she wants what you can provide. Your money and your genetics are all that matters. You have to know the tests to help you discover this type of woman before its too late.

If you can be a provider for a woman, these women will either be direct or deceptive to get you to give them a baby. Once they get it, you are dead to them other than your wallet and she will be out of your life before the baby turns one using the court system to get money. She is now a mom and now she has a check from you for 18 years. Despite her mindset, she may feel that she needs to pretend to be a family and get married or despite her lack of interest in marriage, she knows you wont have a baby with her unless its in a marriage. She will not love you but will marry you and go through the motions. The mistake most men make is that they are blinded by her lack of love and desire to be a partner because the man wants kids and he is getting married to a woman who is pretty and who wants kids. Your early to mid 30s are a dangerous time for a man who despite his success couldn't find a wife in his 20s. You are about to be used and destroyed and you don't even know it. 

The woman's plan is to be a single mother. How and when she times it depends on her and your knowledge of what she is doing. She wont tell you that but after the baby is born you will see her behavior change without telling you that she wants a divorce. After you marry her, she will isolate you and spend more time with her friends than you. Sex will be rare and timed around the days she ovulates with. Post marriage she stops showing any type of interest in sex but you still see her physically as a goddess. A wife who looks like a Ferrari but without an engine is pure torture for a man but that is your life. Its like having a strip club in your house. These brazen women will make her wedding ring disappear and basically behave as a single person no matter how nice you are. She was never interested in you the person. Its about what you can provide and she has it once the babies are born. She will behave poorly toward you because she knows what you will lose if you choose to leave and leaving her allows her to play victim to all who will listen and everyone will believe her lies.

After you get married, your wife will spend time with her friends and family excluding you and avoiding intimacy by spending any free time either outside the house or on the computer. She sees you as the provider of the sperm and the money she desires but also the biggest idiot on the planet. She will prepare her victimhood narrative long before you might consider leaving. She wont divorce you but once she has her kids, she will do everything to drive you to divorce her. The longer it takes you to leave, the less she respects you. How can any man tolerate his wife not wearing her wedding ring ever, denying sex, and enjoying her friends day to day and not working while you pay all her bills she wonders. She wants to protect her lifestyle. Your enemy status is confirmed.

You may be in that position now and not sure what to do. You finally accepted what she was doing and the marriage ended or you still cant quite pull the trigger because you have small kids. Whether you married her or not, following the end of the relationship she does not want you to see the kids. She will hire a lawyer who, like most family lawyers, absolutely has no care for the best interest of the kids to write you a letter offering you as little as one weekend a month with your kids. These lawyers should be disbarred and the women who asked them to handle their custody case with these crazy positions regarding custody are the worse kind of women. These women are ruthless and predatory. She planned his destruction from day one and plays victim to the court system who eats it up.  She does not care about the kids and sees them as possessions caring only about what she can get and not the fact her daughter wont get the input she should from a great dad.

Some very high level men have fallen victims to these women. Men who are great fathers, great husbands, and great providers are faced with staying in marriage  where the wife is so disrespectful and likely unfaithful that seeing how his life is he has to leave costing him everything or stay waiting for her to pull the plug which she will. If he waits to do anything, he will come home one day to an empty house with personal possessions gone destroyed by a wife who sees your personal items having no value because you have no value. The women know they married and had kids with a top man but their goals of being a mom with dad having little contact with the kids after the relationship ends far outweighs the value of any man or a relationship. Women take pride in being single moms. The lies it affords them to tell while being faking being self sufficient pseudo feminists only gives them more energy. 

While it may be too late to fix, if you still aren't sure if you married one of these women, ask yourself how she handled custody of the kids. Did she hire a lawyer straight away to offer you one weekend a month hoping you would just accept it and walk away like most men do. If she refused equal custody why do you think that is if there is no reason for a court to see you as anything but a good dad and provider. Kids are not possessions and they need their dads involvement just as much as moms. If you fight for equal custody how does she coparent once its determined and she does not get what she wanted in terms of custody or child support? These women will not coparent and will pull you back in to court at the slightest chance to take your custody time. You will soon learn that no contact is a must and co parenting is not possible causing your kids to suffer even more. 

Young men need to learn how to spot these type of women. Men who are married to them and see the behavior but stay in the marriage for the kids need to learn who they married and leave the marriage as soon as possible with help from the right lawyer or coach to formulate an exit plan. Leaving on your terms and not hers is the only way to help offset what is coming while salvaging your pride as a man. Doing nothing is not an option. It is easier to face the custody battle and her blatant attempts at parental alienation once you have real time and real custody. It will take work but men's biggest failure is not knowing their enemy and thinking that if a woman married you and had a baby with you that at some point she actually cared about you and only wants the best for you.

Men United has men on staff who have experienced this type of woman and took steps to walk away. The stories are endless and single young men need to be educated while married men contemplating or facing divorce need to understand what they face so they can cut their losses and work on rebuilding their emotional health. Ignoring your situation is only going to make it worse.

Once a man realizes he is going to be a divorce statistic, how he responds to this adversity will go a long way in determining how the rest of his life will be going forward. The proper way to respond is something not often seen because you are being asked to rise above the natural response to divorce which is essentially anger, hate, self loathing, and revenge. 

The views typically expressed on this blog are not those that involve cooperation, friendliness, happiness, or much positivity when it comes to divorce and the unequal burden it shifts to men. There simply isnt any positivity other than the joy you will feel, albeit often intermittently, of having your freedom and the confidence that comes  with being able to take a stand against a horrible person and leave your marriage no matter what it will cost you when it comes to money and access to your children. There is a reason so many men get divorced and it is expensive. If you manage it correctly it is worth it.

Although the negativity of divorce can be found easily and repeated in many places, what we as men fail to do when the divorce train is passing through our lives is totally ignore what we can do to make the negatives of divorce into something positive. No matter how hard it is to find positivity and behave accordingly, if you don't do that, you like most men will quickly spiral out of control with depression, only express your anger through violence, start drug and alcohol use or abuse, while losing the respect and admiration from his children who are at an age where even if they knew the truth, they wouldn't quite understand why dad feels and behaves the way he does. One often ignored negative of this reckless behavior is the joy your ex takes from seeing you implode. It takes a nasty woman to choose to have kids with you, then when she decides you are of no use or someone better has come along, she then uses the court system to destroy you financially while lying to keep you from getting equal access to your kids. However, there is a special place in hell for the same woman who wants you mentally and physically destroyed so she can take the joy from it. Even if you don't change your life for yourself post divorce, you don't want her to see you as defeated. 

As man you need to accept what your ex or soon to be ex wife is now that you are divorcing. She will likely be worse than she was when you were deciding whether or not to divorce her. You are seeing the real her, not the lie she perpetuated to get you to marry her just in case her giant breasts or fake accommodating personality did not get you to do it. You are now free from a horrible person. That has real value and will allow you to do things you wouldn't be able to do while married to her.

As the process moves forward, you will be confronted with challenges that you need to meet head on. Don't devalue yourself because your wife did. That is what she wants. She might be the prettiest woman you ever knew, but she isn't young and she will soon be dating men who understand what she is and know how to use her like she used others. She wants you to question your ability to be a parent so her lawyer, too often with the help of your own lawyer, can convince you to accept a parenting agreement that is less than 50/50. Fight with all you have not to make that happen even if you are feeling at your lowest point and just want it all over. We live in a system where a man loses his home, his money, his family, and he is expected to ready to battle an ex for access to his kids with a strong frame of mind all while years of work are being wiped out by the stroke of a Judges pen or the ability of a lawyer to place a stamp on a letter sending you bill after bill for what are mostly conversations about what you wont get it if you continue to fight. You can laugh all you want about the value of a life coach but this is the time you need one and a good one with life experience will help you get your mind right to not give up on what matters, which is your children and your mental health.

While you go through the child custody process, talk to your kids about what is going on especially if they are pre teens and up and they ask why mommy wont let them see or talk to you like they want. They will understand and it can be achieved without the need to put down their mother in their presence. The more you show that you are willing to be a dad, you will see your ex do even more to destroy the very kids she wants you to be away from. This hate and mental illness she has for such actions is a much bigger sickness than the one you are facing as you try to navigate a new and better life. While the process is going on and she is acting like its about the kids best interests, she will devalue their education and deprive them of opportunities all with the help of willing female teachers at the kids public school and an administration that does not want to get sued so they will do whatever needed to please the mentally ill mother who accepts no responsibility for the cause of her divorce and plays victim to get special favors. Call out this behavior whenever possible.

While your ex will try to convince judges she only cares about the kids to deprive you of custody and decision making ability, all while getting your kids dependent on prescription medication for made up academic woes, social inadequacy, or to help her manage her Munchausens Syndrome, you can do positive things rather than try to focus on the moms negative behavior. Find out about your kids interests beyond surface conversation and get involved with them. Instead of just dropping them off for their activities while mom brown noses and tries to embed herself into the groups of coaches/leaders, why not coach one of your kids teams? You can coach softball or soccer without knowing anything about it and your child will be so happy to see you involved. You will find joy in the appreciation of other kids that someone will take the time to help them enjoy a sport. The bond with your kid will grow while your kid grows up to resent the mother who put them on medication for no reason and who tried to hinder educational achievement all because she needed conflict or problems to exist so dad could not get equal custody. Your kids will get older. They will see your positive interaction and also moms destructive behavior toward their growth. The payoff will be invaluable especially if you are a father of daughters.

While you fight for equal custody or spend crazy amounts of time trying to maintain equal custody, make the most of it. Always be engaged and talking to your kids and help them learn about the real world, not the one that is hidden behind a fence of rainbows and butterflies perpetuated by mothers who have no ability to communicate even with children. Your ability to be real will cause your kids to open up to you about their personal issues and this trust and openness will help your kids navigate this me first world with values that still matter.

Now that you are single you also should have access to new ladies for dating. You are still desirable even if you think otherwise because your marriage didn't work. While dating soon after divorce is not recommended when it comes to forming relationships, you can enjoy the company of new ladies while working on your skills at being a better partner. If you havent already, start learning all you can about the women you meet. Practice your social skills and make them chase you. The reckless behavior post marriage is not something you want to do, but if you put yourself out there you can meet the right person who might be worthy of being in your life. Dating can be fun even if you rightly have no intention of ever marrying. You can control the narrative. Let women see you as the prize. If they test you with their behavior thinking they can get away with it because they are pretty and so many other divorced men continue to kiss their butt despite their bad behavior, you will be surprised at how easily you can walk away and go no contact. If you aren't 20 trying to get as much sex as possible and the women you are talking to aren't the mother of your kids or someone you loved, it is so easy to walk away. You lose nothing. Its time for it to be about you and your happiness. Your wife may have been beautiful and you may have kids with her, but you walked away once already. How much easier is it to not put up with female nonsense going forward. As you age and gain confidence from your success, beautiful women don't mean anything like they did before. They realize they cant control you and if you don't have children with them and aren't married to them, the state cant rape you for leaving.  A quality woman will like you for you and not what you provide for her monetarily and this divorce experience will help you recognize these women and not just settle for the next pretty one you meet after your wife.  Marriage is your world of lemons, but post divorce is now lemonade. Your confidence will guide you to a life of either no relationships or only those with the rare woman who is everything your past girlfriends and wife were not. This revelation is one of the best things to come out of divorce.

While you were married, you were likely the guy that put everyone before himself. You were a strong earner and a great partner. You did it all while your wife took advantage of it. What you didn't do was understand that no matter what you did for your family and wife, you married a crappy person who only cared about her own needs and there was nothing you could do to make her want you. She might not have left because she had a good life without you in her face day to day or was building to later time with a better financial payout but dont think because she wasnt leaving you that she hadnt already left you. Your lack of sex and communication was all you needed to know no matter how many days you lived under the same roof. The longer you allowed her to control things with no regard for you, your stress was high and your own health was ignored likely causing issues that made you gain weight or just not seem as appealing as the guys she saw at the gym every day in her leisure life while you worked yourself into an early grave. You cant change what happened or even the idiocy you feel for letting this go on for as long as you did, but you are now gone from her life by the grace of God. Now that your wife has to get a job and work post divorce, she has less time to flirt with random men at the gym who give her attention because they want sex not because shes this amazing person. Shes tired from a long day working and dealing with people who take advantage of her like she did you while you essentially worked for her. You are now working on yourself whether it be exercising or doing activities you like instead of trying to please an ungrateful wife only doing things she likes or more likely watching while she does things with everyone but you. You are your focus, not someone who shows nothing but disrespect while taking advantage of your character.

Divorce is never easy and no one facing it is glad they are having to deal with it. I delayed it for a long time and still didn't want to do it when I made the decision to walk out. The frustration and anger is still there. However, I did not wallow in it. I bettered myself. I enjoyed things that I could not before because I was too busy trying to take care of the wife and kids. I created a better living environment. I also became a better father helping my kids become better while becoming directly involved in their lives. If I had stayed married maybe I would not have done these things instead just seeing how much money I could make while my wife turned my kids into zombies with no ability to communicate or challenge themselves.

As you sit there reading trying to figure out how you will get through the process, take a step back and ask yourself how you can be better now that you don't have to take care of someone who didn't take care of you. The older you are and the longer you wait to pull the trigger on a divorce, the worst the recovery is and the ability to make lemonade is tougher. It can still be done at any age as you are not dead yet despite your wife secretly wishing you would drop dead so she can collect insurance or years down the road walk in to the Social Security Administration and collect your higher monthly check because she managed to stay married to you for 10 plus years. While you are busy having all the negative shoved in your face, understand there is a new life facing you and you will find that you lost nothing when your wife goes away(other than the money the state will take from you) and your self esteem and relationship with your kids will get better while you see the confidence in yourself that only comes from a man who is educated as to the ways of women. This knowledge and attitude will make you a better man and have relationships with better ladies rather than living a life of hard work and settling for less than you deserve. Your Lemonade is out there. Go make it gentleman.