Why the Third Time Can Be Charmed
I have spent my career untangling marriages that did not make it. So, when I tell you I am walking down the aisle again, this time with Bradley D. Sharp, on July 11, I imagine a few eyebrows went up. Third marriage. From the family law attorney. I get it.
But here is what forty-plus years of family law, two marriages, and a whole lot of "Ask Stacy" correspondence has taught me: Love is not the problem.
Love is easy. It is beguiling, even. It shows up, it convinces you, it feels like certainty.
The problem is that people do not remain static. Two people can start a marriage completely aligned, with the same values, same rhythm, same vision of a Tuesday night, and grow apart anyway. Life reveals things. Character flaws surface under pressure that never showed up during courtship, or maybe they did, but you thought they were managed or eradicated. People change, sometimes together and sometimes not, and a marriage that made sense at 30 does not automatically make sense at 50.
I have watched this play out in my clients' lives more times than I can count. And I have lived it (rather transparently for my followers, I might add) myself. Twice. And that second one was to a wonderful, brilliant man, deeply wedded to his alcohol (see my writings on that elsewhere).
So a third marriage is NOT a leap of blind optimism for me. It IS a clear-minded decision made with open eyes, by a mother and grandmother who has a loving family, has done lots of work to understand what went sideways before, and who is choosing, on purpose, to do it differently. Because of love. And because my fiancé, Brad, and I both believe life is better shared with a loving partner.
If you know me, you know I tend to think in threes. So here is the advice I would give anyone, myself included, walking into a new marriage with marital or merely relationship history behind them.
1. Know your own patterns before you ask someone else to love them. Every failed marriage has fingerprints, yours as well as theirs. Before you say "I do" again, you owe it to your new spouse and yourself to know what you bring into a room when you are scared, stressed, or hurt. Growth is not optional the second or third time around. It is the price of admission.
2. Talk about the hard, unromantic things early. Money, family obligations, health, and how each of you defines loyalty and partnership. Say it out loud before the wedding, not after. In my practice, I've seen how much heartache is prevented by conversations couples were too nervous or too in love to have. Being clear-eyed is not unromantic. It is how you protect the romance.
3. Let this marriage be its own thing. Do not marry the echoes of your past mistakes, and do not marry someone's past either. Every relationship carries its own weather patterns -- storms and sunshine. The instinct to compare, to brace for old wounds to repeat, is natural, but it will rob you of what is actually in front of you. Brad is not a redo. He is new. He is emotionally sound and mature. He knows my flaws and accepts them, as I have come to understand him.
I will not pretend that marriage, any marriage, comes with guarantees. Nothing does. But I have learned, the hard way and more than once, that a bad experience you do not learn from stays a bad experience. Learn from it, and it becomes growth. I am choosing to believe that this time, love and everything I know now can finally be on the same page, together.
So, three cheers to the third time. May this one be the charm.
Stacy D. Phillips, Esq, is a partner at Blank Rome LLP. Based in Los Angeles, she is regarded as one of the top family lawyers on the West Coast and nationally. She represents high-profile, high-net-worth clients, many of whom are well-known, have massive careers, and even bigger personalities.