36 Facts About Divorce - Corrected Version

Why exactly the Huffington Post thinks it needs a special section on the subject of divorce is beyond me. I never turned on the news to hear "And after the sports headlines we'll be getting a brief update on global divorce news". And for the record I don't think sports are news either!  Today a particular piece caught my eye and ire. And I do have some experience in the matter so here's a corrected version of "36 Things I Wish Someone Told Me About Divorce".


"1. It's nothing at all like when your husband was away on business and it was nice to have the bed to yourself. That gets old. You get lonely."

1. Once you're divorced you can sleep around guilt-free.

"2. He's not going to be there. Ever. Never again in the way that he was. He's gone. For good."

2. That was the point. If you wanted him around you wouldn't have gotten divorced.

"3. Don't rush things unless you are in an abusive situation."

3. Don't waste your life putting up with something that isn't right and doesn't make you happy.

"4. You may want to hide when you are first going through divorce. You won't want to talk about it with anyone."

4. Yes you may feel this way. Or you may not. You may want to go out and enjoy yourself. That's ok too.

"5. You will have to remind yourself that you are not a failure. That the relationship simply ran its course, it had an expiration date."

5. If anyone tries to suggest that divorce is a sign of "failure" stop being friends with them and don't go to their church.

"6. You may never feel truly sure you made the right decision particularly if you have children together."

6. Or you might be confident that this is the best thing for you. And the best thing for you IS the best thing for your kids, they don't want to be raised by two people who don't want to be together.

"7. There is going to be an in-law situation and you won't know how to carry on your relationship with them."

7. You can stay friends with the in-laws if you want. You don't have to. Mine are lovely, we hang out.

"8. When your kids are sick, you are the only one home to care for them and he's not there to ask him for help."

8. You might need childcare support. The absent parent should help with this, financially or practically.

"9. When you are sick, he is no longer there to care for you."

9. Lets hope your hot new boyfriend knows how to stick a Lemsip in the microwave.

"10. You will miss his cooking, even if he isn't a good cook, but simply because there was someone else there to make meals and it isn't all on you. And if he was a good cook, it's going to be even harder."

10. If you had a long day - you can order delivery food. Or just have a sandwich.

"11. You still may call him by the pet name you had for him and it slips out when discussing a matter and it hangs there in the air and hurts."

11. If you ever called him "snugglewumps" in Starbucks you are weird.

"12. If you thought talking about money with your husband was hard, try talking about money with your ex-husband."

12. If it was always a problem talking about money, you were right to consider divorce.

"13. There will be no more "stay here with the kids for an hour so I can run out to do errands.""

13. You can say "stay here with the kids for an hour so I can run out to do errands." to neighbours, friends, relatives, that hot new boyfriend or your lodger. Also you can drop them off with an absent parent and have a spa day.

"14. It may feel natural to reach out to hold onto his arm when you go out for coffee to discuss the kids, but you aren't supposed to hold onto his arm anymore."

14. Missing out on intimacy? Buy a dildo.

"15. You will miss your wedding ring... feeling it there on your finger and what it represented."

15. Your wedding ring represented a relationship that wasn't working. Take it off.

"16. Your wedding album is like a ghost."

16. Why are you sat around flicking through old photos? Go out and get laid.

"17. You won't know what to do with your wedding dress."

17. The only people who ever get to re-use a wedding dress are divorcees.

"18. If you knew what you knew now, you wouldn't have spent all that money on that wedding dress. Instead you should have banked it to save for couples' therapy."

18. Couples therapy is usually overpriced.

"19. You might have to politely ask your parents to take down your wedding photo they still have hanging on the wall in the living room because it hurts too much to see it."

19. If your parents keep some photos up it should save you all that time spent flicking through old albums.

"20. It's not easy. Not even if you are the one who wanted a divorce."

20. Being in a relationship that doesn't work is exhausting. Making some meals for one is not so bad.

"21. You'll wonder if he's dating someone new and if he's thinking she's better than you."

21. You'll start dating someone new. That'll take your mind off things.

"22. When he gets serious with another woman, dealing with that woman being around your children is going to be harder than you could ever imagine."

22. Great news, if he starts seeing someone else she can help look after your kids while you run those errands. Plus kids benefit from relationships with a wide range of adults.

"23. After all the hurt subsides, you remember all the good things and sort of forget the bad and the hurt starts again but in a different way."

23. The relationship ended for a reason. It wasn't working.

"24. What if... there will be lots of these."

24. What if you meet someone great? What if you get a job on a tropical island?

"25. You will look at your kids, that are his kids too, and wonder how in the world are you going to be able to make it through all these holidays for the rest of your lives and still figure out how to be a family that is no longer living together."

25. Your kids will grow up. Then they can choose where to spend Christmas. As can you.

"26. You may notice it feels weird to still have the gifts he's given to you over the years, even if it's something as mundane as a toaster. And you may start having nostalgia about the toaster."

26. You may need counselling.

"27. You might fondle the silverware gifted to you at your bridal shower and feel bad that all your friends and family gave you all these wonderful gifts for a marriage that didn't last."

27. Who the hell fondles silverware? Get a vibrator.

"28. You may worry some of your friends might be thinking about those gifts they gifted you."

28. Anyone more bothered about the gift they bought you than about your wellbeing is not your friend.

"29. You may lose some friends."

29. You'll have more time to spend with your friends. You may gain some friends, reconnect with some old ones.

"30. Some of your family may not understand why you are getting divorced and that can be very challenging to deal with on top of dealing with divorce itself."

30. If your family are unsympathetic, divorce them too.

"31. There will be a bit of pain when you refer to him as "Daddy" to your kids, but that's his name and how he's addressed, so you must deal."

31. Use whatever term you're comfortable with. Your kids will adapt.

"32. You are going to want to confide in your ex because you are so used to doing so, but you have to learn how to stop doing that."

32. You're going to want to spend more time with friends. That'll be nice.

"33. It may take a long time for you to be "friends" -- whatever that means. It may never happen."

33. You can stay friends. You don't have to.

"34. There will be a time when your kids will wonder how the two of you were ever together in the first place. They may never even remember a time when you were together."

34. Your kids will grow up. You will wonder if they were ever small. You will be glad you didn't raise them in a house full of arguments.

"35. You remember what it was like to fall in love with the man you married and you truly wonder how in the world did it all fall apart."

35. You might wonder how you hung in there so longer.

"36. The above makes you terrified to ever get married again."

36. Next time you get into a serious relationship you'll probably do things differently.

Words and Their Meanings

There are many excellent dictionary sites on the internet, most are available for free. What a shame that well-paid lawyer Yale Galanter hasn't logged on to one lately. BBC reports that Charlie Sheen put a knife to Brooke Mueller Sheen's throat and threatened to kill her. Mr Galanter responds by telling the media that they are "very much in love". Err no, she may be in love with him (she'd have to be to put up with that behaviour) but the whole knife-throat-death-threat-thing is the big clue here about his feelings for her. "Love" is more of a cuddles-poetry-flowers-dinner-dates-fireplaces-long-walks sort of a thing. Knives and death threats would be "hate".

And before you ask - yes those are my skinny knuckles biro-ed up in the photo. Am going to try to use my new phone to take my own photos for the blog this year rather than borrowing from around the web as I have in the past. Well we'll see how long that lasts!

Spot The Class-A Arsehole

It won't take long. In the second sentence he 'hilariously' jokes "calm down feminists..." and then a few paragraphs later we are reading "The second time I married, it was mainly to avoid AIDS.". Yes really - he wrote that and they printed it with the nonchalance of a light-hearted celebrity fluff piece. And now sports...

Hobbies Include Swimming, Reading and Wife Beating

It's late and I should be working but I'm procrastinating, ambling around the Guardian website and there's a pop-up for the Guardian's "Soulmates" dating site, and I'm wondering what sort of stuff people put on there so I click it. Guess what comes up? This guy. I don't know how long before the Guardian take his profile down (I did write to them immediately) but here's the bit I'm a little unsure of: "If you gonna tell me your deepest darkest secret.. and look for a shoulder to cry on, you'll get a smack." Is that how ingrained into our culture domestic violence is? Puke! And apparently he's the third most popular guy on the site. Mmm, hate to meet the rest.

You Shouldn't Have, Thanks!

There's nothing so flattering for a blogger than having the author of a mainstream media piece that you've criticised respond in person, and run out of things to say so quickly that she resorts to unfounded personal insults. So thanks very much Karen Barichievy. I criticised you here. And you countered here. You answered only one of my points - arguing that you did in fact know more than one rich guy, and that they are in fact ALL horrible. But as I mention in my piece I've met nice rich guys, I'm friends with some. If all the ones you met were horrid to you then (1) maybe you were very unlucky. Or (2) maybe they were only horrid to you - perhaps because you entered the situation with such a negative attitude. Or (3) maybe you just go for the wrong kind of guy. Actually I might even suspect that (4) maybe you assumed the nice guys were poor and avoided them.

You don't bother to address any of my other points but you do seem to know so much about me...

"... one rather po-faced Guardianista calling herself Cruella..."
If you listen to my podcast you'll see I read the Independent, and usually the Mail or the Express to see what else is in the press. My facial expression, like that of so many people I know, varies throughout the day. I try to keep "po" down to 5 or 10% of the time.

"...living in a vegan commune in Archway..."
Is there one? How do I apply?

"...the whole ungroomed, too-intellectual-to-brush-my-hair look..."
Ha! Nice, good image. Doesn't quite correspond with the photo you can actually see on my blog but I don't care. I might stop brushing my hair...

...when you get round to actually responding to my points Karen! Tut tut tut.

How (Not) To Marry A Millionaire

This article has so much wrong with it it's hard to know where to start. But lets run in the order the article says these things.

Firstly a survey reveals 75% of women say they "would marry for money". Now that's not much of a statistic because we don't know:

1) How much money - millions? billions? a tenner?
2) How much compromise they would make for this money? Would they have to like the guy too? Fancy him?
3) How poor were they to start with? I mean sure I'd marry for money rather than watch myself and my own kids starve. Who wouldn't?

But lets go along with the number anyway. Now Karen Barichievy, our resident expert, explains that she dated a rich guy for four years. And based on her survey of, erm, one rich guy she informs us that they all don't like to go out and party. In fact "for nearly four years I had a 10pm curfew. My (now ex) banker boyfriend insisted on it.". Curfew? that ain't a boyfriend - that's a slave-owner.

She continues to expand on what all wealthy men are like based on her survey of, as I mentioned, only one such man. They have a limited sex drive, are anally retentive about household organisation and wear CK undies and Patek watches. So now you know. Then apparently they'll take you on flash holidays and ignore you in favour of chatting away on a Blackberry the whole time. Anyone think Ms Barichievy's boyfriend just didn't really like her all that much?

Eventually she realised that "such men will always love their money and their jobs more than you". Another bold conclusion on the basis of a single specimen. In defence/critique of men both rich and poor... Some poor guys might love their Playstation more than they love you, or their Internet porn. And some rich guys might love you, and you might actually be the kind of person who gives their partner enough space to have a career as well as a relationship.

Having "realised" this our unlikely heroine joined a dating agency for millionaires (against her own declared interest) and was disappointed to find that the guys she was introduced to weren't a great match for her hobbies and interests - which after all her puff about how rich guys like to be tidy and organised included "spit and sawdust pubs and camping". Except that she'd already insisted on one big criteria - she only wanted to meet millionaires. Maybe the problem was this: the average dating agency doesn't have thousands of clients - they have to introduce you to someone.

I've always thought the best plan was to make money myself, rather than trying to date it out of people. But I can sympathise with people - guys or girls - who consider it a bonus in a potential partner, who wants to be penniless? Of course Ms Barichievy knows this herself - presumably why she's writing piffle easy-to-sell articles for The Times.

Ask The Sexperts!

I only just found this piece by "sex expert" (as you like, I'm not bad myself) Dr Pam Spurr - it's a couple of months old. The feature in The Times claims that feminism "is killing sex" and - in their own words - that career women are risking their relationships by saying "no". Hmmm.

Now to start totally the wrong way about I should point out that her concluding paragraph I (almost) wholeheartedly agree with:

"Never be bullied into sexual activity that turns you off or be pressured into sex that doesn’t satisfy you. But always be prepared to discuss your feelings and desires and listen to his. Hopefully, that will improve your sex life and help to strengthen your relationship in other ways, too."

I just don't get why it's listen to HIS feelings and desires. Doesn't she mean YOUR PARTNER'S or is Dr Spurr's advice only for women?

Well evidently the article is about women and what we're doing wrong. Here are some choice extracts:

"With increasing frequency, women in their twenties, thirties and forties take a pragmatic, postfeminist view that sex is something over which they have no need to negotiate."

Surely negotiating is a pretty odd way of sorting out what you do in bed. How about doing all the things that both you and your partner enjoy and want to do. Negotiation implies some sort of compromise - doing things you don't really want to.

" When [case study woman] found that the stress of their differences diminished her sex drive, she felt completely justified in suggesting separate bedrooms. As she recounted to me – with bitter regret, after their divorce – sex had been the last thing on her mind. Her biggest mistake was not considering what was on his mind."

Weird - has anyone else on here ever moved into separate bedrooms from their partner without thinking this might have some impact on their sex life?

"too many women see the sexual side of their lives as something to be claimed completely and utterly as their own"

Yes, it is. Who the hell else "claims" my sex life?

"At the risk of being called ... antifeminist, I’d go so far as to say that for both partners sex could be considered a duty, if it is something that one partner knows would make the other happy."

Personally I think I would rather eat my own vomit than have sex with someone who was doing it out of duty. Also having sex out of a sense of duty when you don't really want to is more or less guaranteed to put you off wanting it again.

"Does he really want to go up on the roof to repair a leak on a Sunday afternoon? Does she really want to take out the rubbish in the pouring rain? No, but partners in relationships do such things because they know that it makes the other happy. Sex should be seen in the same light."

Sex should be seen in the same light as taking out the rubbish or repairing a leaky roof? How bad is your sex life Dr Spurr? And no they're not comparable because sex is an act of intimacy so it makes no sense to do it unless both partners actively want to.

"Why should the sexual area of a relationship be ringed by an emotional fence that makes it a no-go zone for discussion, while other areas are discussed openly, argued over and resolved?"

This Dr Spurr is only true in your world, everyone else I know talks about sex.

"I have spoken to a fair few thirty-something women who settle down with a “decent chap” knowing that he’ll make a good father. On producing babies, though, many such men find themselves left out in the cold when they still desire the sexual warmth that they initially enjoyed. "

Here's some advice for men feeling sexually frustrated after their wife has had a baby: put some more hours into taking care of the child, make sure your wife gets at least some good night's sleep and maybe she'll feel up to it again. Don't for crying out loud suggest it's her "duty" to put out after two days in labour and two hours sleep.

"[If you don't have much sex with your man] You may find ... that he will seek sexual satisfaction without you. I certainly don’t justify infidelity but I can often understand why it happens. In contrast, when a woman’s sexual needs are denied, Heaven help the man responsible."

So Dr Spurr can sort-of understand why men not getting much sex would go and have affairs but considers it outrageous for women in the same situation to complain about it. Remind me next time I'm seeking a relationship counselor not to call her.

"In other cases I have found an even more disturbing attitude: that it’s fine to use occasional sex in a cold-hearted and calculated way as a favour or bartering tool for jobs well done by the man."

So we should be negotiating about sex, and it is the same as household chores but we shouldn't be negotiating household chores in exchange for sex. Keep your story straight please!

And as if the story itself wasn't bad enough there are comments after it...

"All women treat sex as a weapon. Lower testosterone, lower needs. But they have the power to choose, something we men do not have. And so they use us. Over, and over, and over, and over...

Gerbil, Los Angeles, U.S.A."

Hmm... Gerbil (fitting rodent-based name by the way) if you don't have the power to choose whether or not you have sex, you should hand yourself as a potential sex offender.

And then this one which I think rather speaks for itself:

"I'm a 44 yr old man having twice a year sex.I am not a good husband ,i dont wash up,i empty the dishwasher;i dont do the laundry.I pay bill for the washer -dryer and iron my clothes and the childrens .When i come in from work i find at times the house is not clean to my standards ,so i get out the hoover i bought and sort it out.As mentioned by others my marital problems stem from money...having paid £108,000 in mortgage payments over the last 15 years my wife had to recently step in and make these payments for 5 to 6 months while i was unemployed(previously she had been through the same experience for over 12 months) strangely at that time our relationship did not change.But since my bad luck it has,i married a woman i felt i was compatible with;modern appliances take away her "tired" excuse...selfish control is what's occuring here..if i wanted a "companion" i should have bought a dog ...

derek, kingston, surrey"

Should really have added "I don't entirely speak comprehensible English" in there somewhere!

Match Made in Hell

I have just read this story about a guy who's been serially drugging and raping women he met on match.com. It comes with all the usual women-not-being-believed crap and it's taken forever to get a conviction but it comes hot on the heel of a friend of mine telling me a real horror story about a guy she met on an online dating site. I don't want to get into detail because of course she told me what had happened to her in confidence but trust me it was awful.

Years ago before I met Mr Cru I went on a few of these sites and dated a few guys. I think my batting record was:

1 I didn't fancy and didn't meet up with again.
1 I slept with and dated again but it petered out shortly.
3 I didn't fancy but became friends with (and still am).

So there's certainly a positive side to these sites, I met some cool people (then I went out and picked Mr Cru up in a late night bar. Ha!), but there are risks too. Now of course I'm not trying to write some patronising "women warned about dangers on online dating " piece. I neither think women should stay home nor that the Internet has mystical powers to corrupt your soul (from the woman who blogs ten times a day!). My point is that there are different ways to meet guys and the risks are different:

Through trusted friends is always the safest - because at very least they know it's going to get back to them if they don't respect you.
While out with friends is safer - because your friends are there to make sure you're ok.
On a late night two-person date after randomly meeting on a dating website is riskier, where possible better to meet in the daytime, or meet with a few others. Also better to meet for a meal/cinema/theatre trip rather than straight on to the alcoholic drinks.

Also safer to meet in a country where the police take rape victims seriously and attempt to prosecute cases wherever possible, and where public attitudes towards rape have left the middle ages, i.e. not here.

Maybe match.com and co. could introduce a "see other users ratings" section to their site so you could give jerks no stars!

Yet More Patronising "Advice for Women"

Do women need any more advice on having babies? Apparently so, the American Society For Reproductive Medicine has teamed up with Comment On Reproductive Ethics and the BBC to patronise us all a bit more.

They want to let us know that having your eggs frozen doesn't "guarantee" that women will be able to conceive with those eggs. Which is probably why only 185 women in the UK have had eggs frozen - many of them cancer patients eager to avoid the mess Natalie Evans got into by being unfortunate enough to be dating a complete wanker at the time she contracted cancer. Out of a UK female population of child-bearing age (15 to 44, I'm counting, assuming that a cancer-suffering 15-year-old might consider egg freezing and that by the age of 45 you're not likely to be freezing new eggs) of around 12million, that's tiny. So I can't help thinking it would be easier to ring the 185 personally than to insist on publishing your story in a national news source. I'm sure the 185 all know this and have had the risks explained to them.

So what is the story really about? Women's "lifestyles". Or in other words how us silly girlies have got it all wrong and should be sat home embroidering doilies and pinging out sprogs as soon as we're old enough to menstruate.

Firstly the BBC says quite matter-of-factly, this is not a quote from anybody, "An increasing number of women are choosing to freeze their eggs for social reasons in the hope they will be able to have a child when they are older." So by "an increasing number" the BBC means less than two thousandths of a percent? For any individual woman, a 0.000015 probability. And that's only if we are allowed to include being diagnosed with cancer as a social reason. When you take those women off the list, the number will be even lower, not to say negligible.

Secondly - still the BBC's words "Critics argue they are delaying motherhood for the wrong motives, such as climbing the career ladder or until they have more money." Sorry - who decides what the right and wrong motives for delaying motherhood are? If a woman decides she doesn't want to have children until she can afford to send them to a good school and raise them in a comfortable home who is the BBC to describe those as the "wrong motives"? And is it even true? A small survey on the Mothers 35-plus website gives the number one reason for delaying motherhood as "Lack of suitable partner".

In fact the evidence doesn't even suggest that women are delaying motherhood really. This chart of data from Scotland shows that older mothers are having slightly fewer children than they did in the 1950s and 60s. The difference is that younger mothers are having significantly less children.

And now some patronising advice from Comment On Reproductive Ethics: "The best solution to lifestyle problems is to change one's lifestyle. Have babies naturally at the time nature intended..." Got that ladies? Magically make the right bloke/financial security/feeling of broodiness come along at your fertility peak.

Now the second worst thing about the article is that it totally focuses on WHEN in their lives women SHOULD have babies. It doesn't say anything about the option of NOT HAVING BABIES! Globally we really don't need extra babies. And a very real alternative for older women who regret not starting a family earlier is adopting an older child in need, there are plenty out there desperate for help. And besides, if you don't want kids at 25, maybe you won't want kids at 35 either, as the chart shows the main trend is that women are really choosing to have less children, not the same number later in life.

But the very worst thing about the article is that it addresses itself 100% to women. What about men? Should we be warning men that if they want kids they should settle down with their woman before she hits 32? I have several women friends who are keen to start a family but are waiting until their partner feels ready too. It takes two to make babies.

And if there's any truth in the idea that women delay motherhood because they feel they can't have a career and a family while they're young then we should be warning employers that they're breaking the law by discriminating against pregnant women and working mothers and failing to offer flexible working hours to those with young children!

Good news for Mr Cru

Feminists do it better. Yes, scientists have proved feminists have better relationships. A discussion of the report in Science Daily says "They found that having a feminist partner was linked to healthier heterosexual relationships for women. Men with feminist partners also reported both more stable relationships and greater sexual satisfaction." And the whole thing about us being unattractive and unshaggable is crap too, in fact "feminist women were more likely to be in a heterosexual romantic relationship than non-feminist women."

That is not Mr Cru pictured by the way. You can go congratulate him on the good news here.

In Your Face-Book

I'm not even sure why I started reading this article - about people who decided to close their Facebook accounts - but what a weird find when I did. I can well understand people deciding they spend too much time online, that social networking sites, online games and blogging can be highly addictive. Whether they distract you from your work or leave you with too little time to do other things, fair enough. The author however has quit Facebook for a totally different reason - her jealous partner!

"it ... made my boyfriend Danny ... incredibly insecure. As one of my friends, he could view my profile page, my friends’ list and my ‘wall’"

"Reading my ex’s flirty messages, however innocent, made him insanely jealous. He hated the fact that I was in touch with men I’d once slept with and that some of them had posted up old pictures of us together which I had no power to remove."

Hold on - that's not internet addiction - that's having an unreasonable, controlling partner. How insecure is this guy that he can't bear to look at a picture of his girlfriend with an old flame? And of course he doesn't HAVE to look at these pictures if he doesn't want to - he only looks at them because he's snooping through her site, digging for dirt. And it's quite frightening that the article totally glosses over that, acting as though that sort of behaviour is normal.

Makes you realise how lucky you are - at the end of last year Mr Cru and I went away to a music festival with an old flame of mine and his new partner and, err, we all got along great. In fact I know she reads this blog, Hi Abi!

Will Shag For Laundry?

Feministing has picked up on this rather worrisome article on CBS apparently the author is advising men that doing more housework will get them laid more often.

Over on Feministing there's lots of discussion of what share of the housework is a fair share. I'm sure that 50% is the obvious answer assuming that both partners have a balanced relationship in other areas. And also on whether men should get extra praise for doing housework since it constitutes a break-out from traditional gender roles. Well I'm happy to give them extra praise but I want it right back for me when I get a job, wind up as primary breadwinner and manage to unscrew tight jar lids on my own.

What bugs me more though is the other end of the deal... the idea that women will (sub-consciously mind) trade sex for housework. This rather assumes:

1) The woman doesn't actually want sex.

2) The woman, despite not wanting sex, is prepared (sub-consciously anyway) to do it in return for other things.

3) The man wants sex all the time.

4) The man wants sex with the woman even if the woman doesn't want sex and presumably therefore even if the woman isn't enjoying it.

5) The man is comfortable (consciously to his mind) trading other things for sex.

If any one of those things was true of my relationship, I would be seriously worried.

More Thought Needed

There are some aspects of David Cameron's suggestions about fathers looking after kids that I approve of. I do think that father's should be expected to put in the hours in terms of parenting as much as mothers. At the moment if a child is found abandoned on the streets - the mother is prosecuted, clearly it would make more sense if both parents were prosecuted. The idea needs more consideration though. We need to look at the 25% of women in this country who experience domestic violence. Clearly these women need the same level of support but not from their actual partners.

His second point - tax breaks (more tax breaks) to "help families stay together" is nonsense. It's much cheaper to share accommodation than to live alone, there are inherent savings in having a live-in partner. This really amounts to bribing people to stay in relationships that may not be working out. Those relationships are not the kind of places children benefit from growing up in.

We have to steer away from making rules that mean support is reduced for "unconventional" families: single mums and dads, step-parents, extended families and co-habiting partners and friends. children are best raised in happy homes, well above the poverty line. Biological parentage is not what counts.

Cru vs Stringfellow

Your top blogstress Cruella (that's me) was on BBC Radio Leeds again today. Didn't get much notice so couldn't really advertise. The Liz Green show was covering the Chris Tarrant affair and his suggestion that affairs were just "something men do". My "opponent" in the debate was none other than be-mulleted fake-tan embalmed sleaseball Peter Stringfellow. A couple of cool exchanges took place.

Firstly he said that he'd been unfaithful to his wife back in leeds in the 70s but that thing were different back then. I asked whether weddings were conducted without vows back then or whether he'd just said them for a laugh. He said no-one really thinks about what those vows mean...

Then he said that having affairs was "natural" for men. And I said it was natural to dig a hole in the ground and defecate in it but I didn't want to live with men who did that!

I got the last word on the matter pointing out that I really don't have a problem with people who decide they want to have multiple sexual partners, lifestyle choices, go for it. I have a problem with people who mislead others about what they're going to do.