I told him how I had my own little boy, who could sometimes be very careless indeed.  I mentioned how my own little boy had once phoned me for help very late at night from London, because he had unfortunately dropped his flat keys down the lift shaft. As the boy tut-tutted, I went on to tell him that because I was 300 miles away at the time and it was the middle of the night, there was little I could do. I also pointed out that my little boy is a whole 20 years older than him!

“Well, I’m very careful with my padlock”, said the boy, while his mum laughed proudly.

Looking at this gorgeous little three-year-old, as he chatted away merrily, I wondered whether I’d go back 20 years if I could, and do it all over again. Back to the days of Ben and his cousins all growing up together, playing and having fun. Those were great years: the photo above has pride of place in my home, and makes everybody who sees it smile.

But you can’t turn back time. Instead, time rolls on and people grow older. That truth is beautifully captured in The Lion King, a magical show that the children loved to watch. They first saw it when they were all around six to eight years old, and it was probably the first time they ever had to think about the meaning of life, although as little children they couldn’t have understood it properly.

The “Circle of Life” is The Lion King’s best known song. As we adults know, that circle never, ever, stops. We can’t keep that wheel from turning: however hard we try it won’t stop, not even for a minute. Time never stands still or goes backwards. Millions of people are born onto the wheel and millions of people leave it. It is the way of Nature.

Those carefree cousins are now 20 years older. They have finished their education and are out in the wide world. They have started to live their own lives, make relationships and move onwards. Their grandmother is also 20 years older – and she is now very ill. She is fighting hard and is, as always, brave and uncomplaining. It is incredible how she handles it all. There is no bitterness. Her frail body may be betraying her, but her mind is still as sharp and as bright as ever. She keeps smiling!

In extremis last week, she responded to her devoted husband as he sang “Unforgettable” to her, quietly, over her hospital bed. She opened her weak eyes, looked up at him and smiled. Her watching children, every one of them heartbroken by the sight of this ever-loving couple, were in tears. And then amazingly, she rallied again overnight, as she has done in the past.

My sister, known to our family as “Aunty Doo Doo” from those early years when the children made it up and loved to keep saying it instead of her own name, has devoted herself to rebuilding our mum’s strength as best she can. Last week she was searching around for a wide-necked flask which would hold not only her own special chicken soup, made at night when she came home from the hospital, but homemade kreplach and knaidles too. Unhappy with nurses run off their feet and high levels of MRSA in our mother’s hospital ward, she has scooped up our beloved mother and our father as well into her personal care. She has taken them to her home and, if sheer willpower, round-the-clock dedication, chicken soup and good haimische food will once again get them both back on track together, she will do it. She has done it before.

It has now been two years since my mum was last very ill, with what was then the first terrible impact of type 1 diabetes. The young adult cousins, coming to terms with their grandmother’s increasingly debilitating illness, have responded selflessly. They are travelling from all over the country to visit and help. My brother knows how to supply the humour – and even Mum, tired as she is, can’t help but laugh. It’s a pleasure to see.

Thinking of how we are all coping in different ways, with the very heart of our family in turmoil, I have been thinking back more than 20 years ago –to when Aunty Doo Doo started “big school”, and I was a year ahead. On her first day I went to see how she was doing – and I found her in the sick room, crying. She wasn’t crying for herself, but for our mum and how she would cope without my sister at lunchtimes!

Aunty Doo Doo has never changed. She has always been the same. She has looked after her family, her parents, the young cousins, all of us, as only the most devoted daughter and family member ever could or would. Her parents, of course, set her that example. They did the same for their parents. And it’s because of our mum that my sister can now turn out the perfect Dutch apple pie (big or individual size), every variety of kuchen, darkest ginger cake, chocolate cake, strudel and double cream velvet cheesecake, besides the obligatory (and perfect) fish balls, holishkes, tsimmes and pot roasts.  Not forgetting that chicken soup filled with onions, carrots, thick knaidles and kreplach. In fact, when I think of my mum’s cooking, the most simple food always tasted delicious, especially her pastry – and it’s no wonder I was a chunky teenager! I loved her warm buttered scones and jam tarts that were just coming out of the oven when we came home from school…

Cooking is very much about love and passing it down the family. Aunty Doo Doo has learned it all from her and is continuing the tradition. Aunty Doo Doo’s daughters are learning from her in turn. Although I can claim no credit at all, my son Ben is also tremendous in the kitchen.  He may be careless with his door keys, but he is a diligent cook and he loves to cook for our family. Ben served lunch to all 18 of us, including my parents, at the Jewish New Year. His beaming face said it all.

As time relentlessly turns, we face what the future has in store for us. Our family is the same as every other family. We have our ups and downs and highs and lows. However because of the three-year-old boy in the changing room yesterday, the memories have come flooding back and I am filled with gratitude, respect and love for my family, with whom I am so privileged to travel the Circle of Life.

New Year's Day 2011: my husband makes a miraculous recovery

“How about a bottle of your Montagny Premiere Cru?” asked my husband in his best courtroom voice. We were having lunch in Scott’s Restaurant in London on New Year’s Day. It’s a smart restaurant just off Park Lane and a perfect place in which to splash out and toast the New Year.

Or should I say, it’s a perfect place if you are in London… And we should have been in the USA.  Because of the snow at Heathrow and then the blizzard in New York, we couldn’t fly – despite the best efforts of the brilliant Virgin Atlantic. So London it was, and probably a good job too. My husband went down with a severe dose of Man Flu: a condition that seems to last forever, borne bravely over several long days and even longer nights.

I tried very hard to be the dutiful wife, exercising great forbearance with all the incredibly loud coughs, sneezes and wheezes until one sneezing, wheezing, coughing fit made me say in exasperation:

“I bet George Clooney wouldn’t act like you do with a bad cold”

To which the reply was:

“I bet Nigella Lawson would be a much better nurse than you. She’d have got me better in no time.”

Well, we can both dream!

On New Year’s Eve I climbed into a taxi cab and chatted to the Cockney cabbie who knew everything about everything, including how to be a divorce lawyer.

“D-Day soon”, he said, referring to “Divorce Day”: the first Monday back to work in January when, traditionally, there is supposed to be a rise in instructions. I maintain that Divorce D-Day is something of a myth. Even so, I told him that when the annual stats are next released, there will probably be a rise in the divorce rate. This may be due to the effect of the recession on “Middle England”: the cost of living rising significantly against a fixed income, increasing pressure on families.

I didn’t find a receptive ear.

“Nah”, said the Cockney cabbie. “I put it down to gettin’ married too young and then, when you ain’t expecting it, fallin’ in love with someone else.”

It turned out that a few years ago, he had fallen madly in love with another woman. Unabashed he described to me, a complete stranger, the extent of his feelings for her: how he had “fallen in love”, experiencing passionate feelings he had never had for his wife. But he didn’t get divorced. Instead, he and the great love of his life went their separate ways.

“Never got over her”, he added. “It would make a great film.”

But then he added that his feelings for his wife were “only the same” feelings that he had for his parents and his children. What did he mean? How could he minimise those feelings? I didn’t interrupt him, even though I wanted to. He had taken stock and his passion for the other woman had not been able to drive him from his feelings for his family.

I had the worst New Year’s Eve ever, due to my husband’s Man Flu. We decided to listen to Big Ben chiming midnight from our bed.

“Good job we aren’t in Times Square”, said my husband as he took some more aspirin with a hot lemon drink, before blowing his nose loudly and climbing into bed.

We heard the Millennium Wheel fireworks exploding loudly overhead. At least, I did.  My husband was already in the Land of Nod. When the countdown began I nudged him (gently, I thought) in the ribs. One eye opened. “Yow! What’s happening?” Then, as realisation dawned: “Noisy outside, isn’t it?” He wished me Happy New Year, gave me a quick peck on the cheek, turned over and went back to sleep. And coughed and sneezed all through the night.

George Clooney, meanwhile, was probably having dinner and champagne with some glamorous woman, on the terrace of his villa on Lake Como.

The next day we were due to go to Scott’s for our New Year lunch. Thankfully my husband felt a little better: not totally better, as he said, because he was still coughing, but almost better.

As we were being seated on a banquette at the back of the restaurant, I looked to our left and noticed a very well-known couple.  My husband didn’t see them at first.  Instead he was coughing, then diving into the bread and reading the menu. He declared that he would go easy on the wine and food because he “still wasn’t himself”.

Then, glancing round, he too noticed the famous couple and his mouth dropped open. Yes, his favourite Domestic Goddess, the gorgeous Nigella Lawson and her husband Charles Saatchi were sitting only a few feet away from us, having their lunch.

My husband’s immediate recovery from his illness was nothing short of miraculous. He ordered the bottle of Montagny Premiere Cru, all traces of a croaky throat gone, and tucked into a fabulous lunch. “How’s the Dover sole?” he enquired of the waiter while gazing in the opposite direction, towards Nigella.  He couldn’t hide his delight.  All trace of the cold disappeared. We had delicious wine and food, we laughed at the terrible night before and soon the memories of that grotty New Year’s Eve had simply floated away with his Man Flu….

We watched Nigella and her husband leave and my own husband, with his inimitable sense of humour, said: “You know, I bet plenty of people think I deserve a medal after 29 years of marriage to you.

“But it’s flown and I wouldn’t swap you for Nigella, even if she can cook like a Goddess – and she isn’t bad looking, either.”

I knew what he meant. I fancy George Clooney too and wouldn’t say no to living by Lake Como; but in real life my husband’s not bad looking, when he doesn’t have a cold. And he can always make me laugh. As for all the bells and whistles, so what? Life, not make believe, is what counts.

That clever London cabbie knew it too. When he had to make the choice, he knew the true value of what he already had.

Happy New Year to everyone.

As the writer explains: “How do I love thee? I love thee with serotonin produced by my raphe Nuclei. I love thee with testosterone receptors deep in my hypothalamus. I love thee with dopamine that floods my primitive lizard brain.

“Actually, I hope I love my wife with all my major brain parts – but who knows? The truth is, I don’t know how I love her. That’s the whole point of today’s experiment.”

The scientists who carry out the experiment believe that love is created by three distinct brain systems: one for sex, one for romance and one for attachment. Each system is affiliated to a different part of the brain. The MRI scanner monitors the activity within each system, by capturing moving images of blood flow in Jacobs’ brain as he looks at his favourite pictures of his wife and thinks about her.

To add a little more spice, the scientists take their experiment one step further and see how his feelings for his wife compare to his feelings for Angelina Jolie. When I read this, I thought that his wife sounded like one brave lady.

The results, when they come back, are interesting.

He has a high level of attachment to his wife, but his result for romance is not what he expected. The scientist tells him: “Your brain is not just seeing pure reward, the way it is in the beginning of a relationship. Your brain is seeing some difficulties.”

As for sex: he has been married to his wife Julie for nine years and has three children, which should in theory mean that the writer’s testosterone levels are relatively low. According to the scan, his libido is “surprisingly strong”.

“Even when I was in the romance phase of the test, the sex regions of the brain lit up. This is beginning to look like quite a message for women, Brown [the scientist] writes me. Men always tell us that sex is important to them, that they are always thinking about it, it’s always a factor when looking at women, but these data are making it really sink into my thick skull and take notice.”

And what about Angelina Jolie? Again, the results were unexpected. The scan found that Jacobs found his wife and the Hollywood actress to be equally attractive. Overall, however, his wife beat Angelina Jolie hands down.

The conclusion was rather charming:

“”You do love your wife,” says Brown. “It’s just in a more complicated way. The way most people love their long-term spouses.”

“I love her, but not with the junkie’s high. “But don’t give up on that,” says Fisher. “I think those children are going to grow up and you’re going to have the experience of being madly in love.”"

I’m not a therapist, but I do spend my days working with couples in conflict. As a family lawyer, I meet many long-term spouses who feel, for whatever reason, that they have fallen out of love – or that their spouses have fallen out of love with them.

Over the years I have learned that more often than not, the ultimate reason for the breakdown of a relationship is a symptom of that breakdown, rather than a cause. So an adulterous affair that brings about a divorce may not be the initial cause of that divorce: the marriage may, to all intents and purposes, have broken down beforehand.

At some stage, however, these people were happy together. They must have been in love and must have been sexually attracted to each other. Can such feelings be recaptured? AJ Jacobs’ MRI “love scan” results and the scientists’ conclusions suggest that it can. Long-term love is “more complicated” – but it is still deep and abiding.

Even as a hardened divorce lawyer , I advocate holding a marriage together whenever possible – assuming the co-operation and willingness of both parties.  To me, the writer’s somewhat unexpected reaction to Angelina Jolie merely serves to demonstrate that the grass elsewhere is not always as green as it may seem.

Image credit: Heungsub.

How many parents really understand what their children want and what they need?

Perhaps it was my reaction to the McCartney divorce that prompted me to take some time out for a week’s vacation with my son. At the request of a journalist, I had been considering what Beatrice McCartney’s feelings may be if, when she reaches an age to understand, a kind “friend” shows her a copy of Mr. Justice Bennett’s gruesome judgment of her mother. At the very least, it could cause her a lot of pain. And how will her psychological development be affected by such turbulence within her family?

People talk a lot about the impact of divorce on children. Even so, when I listen to some of them, I have the feeling it is only lip service. How many parents really listen to their children, to try and understand what they want and what they need?

I am not divorced myself, but I do have a child. On an impulse, I decided to whisk my son away to the heat of the desert in Eilat, Israel for a week. I hoped to find out how he was faring in his student world. He has certainly been working very hard. As it turned out, he wasn’t the only one with plenty on his mind.

It certainly appears that university life is as stress-filled as I remember it. Thousands of students, my son included, are currently waking up to the inescapable fact that exams are only a few weeks away. Like my boy, they are fending for themselves in rundown student houses that could do with some deep cleaning. They have to do their own shopping, washing, cooking and ironing, manage their own budgets and pass their exams. They also have to manage their relationships with others. Like many at university, my son has a girlfriend – whom he adores.

For much of the week my son and I lived in different time zones, even though we were staying in adjoining rooms! Every day I got up very early, so that I could go for a run before the heat made it impossible. I loved the desert, the mountains and the sea. I loved the wind, blowing in off the sea.  I got to wave to people running along, trying to cope with temperatures in excess of 30°C. I enjoyed fantastic Israeli dairy and fruit-filled breakfasts, and went to cycling classes run by a muscular Russian woman, whose favourite phrase was “Sprint!” I walked all over the place in the afternoons and felt wonderfully, physically fit.

My son’s girlfriend was in the USA, and he talked to her on his computer long into the night. So he never got up before noon, and spent most of his afternoons studying in his room. In the evenings we met up for dinner, and chatted over some wine and good food.

As I discovered, he had a lot of questions. What makes a successful relationship, he wanted to know? How do you know that a relationship is going to work out? If a relationship feels good, how do you know it will feel good always? What’s the secret?

I don’t know if there is one, “catch all” reply, but I gave his questions a lot of thought. As I was running along one morning, grateful that the wind had dropped and that the sun had only just begun to show over the horizon in adjoining Aqaba Jordan, the answer came to me out of the blue. I wonder if my thinking is right?

I think that a relationship works when both partners want and do more for one another, than they want and do for themselves. By this I mean that a relationship will work if both parties are able to put the good of one another before their own good.

It doesn’t mean that their relationship will be perfect. Sometimes, through sheer boredom and becoming accustomed to one another, it may just be about going through the sameness of the motions of giving – and often is. But giving something positive to one another, and continuing to put giving first and one another first, means that a relationship can last.

If this stops being consensual, if a couple stops doing this for each other – or even if just one of them stops – the relationship will falter and grind to a halt.

I decided to apply this test to people I know, some of them married for many years and others who are clients, either getting divorced or thinking about it. And it seems to work.

Am I right? I’d love to know what you think.

Now we have returned to England. I have returned to my partner, and my son has returned to his. What is more, he has given me something to think hard about and to advise my clients. Despite our different time zones, we had a great week!

Romance is for life, not just for Valentine’s Day

A reporter from a local newspaper called me to discuss top tips for Valentine’s Day. She wanted to know what a divorce lawyer would recommend to keep a marriage together.

I’ve seen some interesting clients recently, whose experiences enabled me to give an opinion.

The first was a lady in her late 40′s. She was complaining about the breakdown of her marriage which she attributed to her husband. He drinks too much, he is usually down at the pub, he pays her little attention, he always watches TV when he is in the house and they have no sex life. She added as an afterthought that the lack of a sex life was due to her- she is going through the menopause and finds that she has no interest in sex and most especially not with him. She can’t bear the thought of another 30+ years with her husband.

Then a new client experiencing a severe downturn in his business came to tell me how his wife of 20 years had suddenly “prettied herself up” – she started having regular hair and nail appointments, she was buying nice clothes and had lost weight. He knew she was having an affair, and as this clearly very proud man told me about all his problems, to which he could see no way out, he broke down unable to stop his tears.

Another client came to see me who had done more or less the opposite. He had made a lot of money in his business and his wife of 25 years was no longer attractive in any way to him. He claimed she took no interest in her appearance, she was overweight, she had no interesting conversation and she bored him rigid. He wanted out of his marriage because he couldn’t imagine spending the rest of his life with her.

Another client and I were in court last week. As I watched him, and then saw his wife surrounded by her lawyers, I couldn’t see how they had ever been a couple. They looked so completely different.

So with all these people going through crises in their life, to which I am a witness, what positive comments did I make to the reporter?

I started from the basis that at some stage all these couples must have been happy. They must have been in love, must have been sexually attracted to each other and must have enjoyed their relationship sufficiently to marry and have children together. Years later the thrills have gone and for one of them in each of these marriages, they considered the end had come. Yet their spouses did not. They were still anxious to remain together in their marriage.

But in the face of obvious reluctance by one spouse to save their marriage, is it still possible to do so?

I think it is, but I think it’s tough.

It’s too trite simply to say “Try harder” or “Keep your sense of humour” or “Respect each other”

What these individuals are experiencing is a feeling that their marriage has stalled because of its everyday sameness and they hate it. They are living every single day in the same routine with the same inability to get off the constantly turning treadmill and they have no wish to rekindle a flame that had once burned so brightly. Yet their partners all think differently and are prepared to continue their marriage.

That, for me, is the tragedy of marriage breakdown. It doesn’t often happen that both people agree the marriage has broken down and go their separate ways. Often it is happens only to one person and the other has no choice and with greatest possible sadness, but to accept that decision.

So I suggested to the reporter, a positive step for her readers is this;-

Put together a few mantras in your mind and keep repeating them to yourself over and over again.

Tell yourself first the grass is not greener on the other side. All my years of working in divorce suggest that within a few years the same patterns repeat themselves.

Tell yourself: There is a difference between doing right and wrong.

Tell yourself:  You are going to hold your head high and set your family a standard.

Tell yourself: Throwing away an investment of 10, 15 20 years or more, is madness.

Tell yourself: You can’t have everything you want.

Tell yourself: Life is about how you react to a challenge.

Tell yourself: accept what you have, and cherish it.

Tell yourself: value the good that is in your life already.

Not everyone is emotionally strong enough to take the pain for continuing gain. Not everyone is able to see that the ups and downs of the years spent with a spouse, an equal partner in the marriage is worth preserving at whatever cost. Not everyone is able to realise that sometimes what we have only becomes really valuable when we are about to lose it.

Happy Valentine’s Day.