Nobody puts on a pouffy white dress with sleeves big enough to hold roast turkeys and thinks she will get divorced, but that's exactly what happens about half the time. The average cost of a wedding ceremony is $18,000 ‑- but you do get free toasters and cake out of it. Interestingly, the average divorce also costs about $18,000 (for each person!), but only one of you will get the toaster, and if you want cake, well, you'd better bring your own.

Odds are you'll also need pie, ice cream and brownies. When I went to my divorce court dates, I used to bring along a sports bottle filled with classic Hershey's syrup. Every time something didn't go my way ‑- which was pretty much every moment I was there ‑- I'd pound back a few gulps of that lifesaving elixir.

As a Grrl Genius relationship expert, I am here to tell you that life after divorce can be tolerable, or even wonderful. The statistics back me up: According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the rate of divorce for second marriages is lower than for firsts, with first marriages failing at a rate of 51 percent and second marriages calling it quits 43 percent of the time.

Here's what happened to me: I got divorced, thought I was going to die, didn't, and then met the love of my life. Divorce was painful, but now, a couple of years after the fact, I can honestly say my life is so much better. Getting out of my marriage was good for me the way that getting out of Austria was good for Maria von Trapp.

One of the (many) problems with divorce is that there is no standard ritual to commemorate the event, such as there are for other life-changing occurrences like births, graduations, weddings (of course) or the release of a new Denzel Washington movie. Most rituals include some kind of social gathering. You might be thinking, Hey, divorce is awful ‑- why would you have a get-together for that? The fact is, we have rituals and parties for bad things all the time. I mean, what is a funeral after all, except a party to make you feel better about something really, really bad.

If we had funerals for dead marriages, at least the guest of honor would be able to hear the condolences and drink the margaritas.