GREEN & GLOVER: Divorce for dummies

Divorce for dummies

With more than half of all marriages ending in divorce, the soon-to-be-split need somewhere to go. Enter Ellen Gray and Jane Fields. Lifelong friends who grew up together in Alexandria, the two ladies have created lousyspouse.com, a “comprehensive divorce resource.”

Ms. Gray and Ms. Fields, who both have small children, discovered their husbands’ affairs around the same time early last year and turned to each other for support.

“I had no idea what the words ‘abandonment’ and ‘discovery’ meant,” Ms. Gray, a 30-something professional, explains to G2. “I had planned my wedding online and chronicled both of my pregnancies online so was surprised not to find the helpful resources I needed during my divorce on a Web search.”

Since launching lousyspouse. com this summer with a kickoff soiree at the Sequoia in Georgetown, Ms. Gray and Ms. Fields have had more than 1,000 visitors to the site, which features downloadable work sheets and forms, priority checklists and question-and-answer forums.

The Celebrity Lousy Spouse Survivor Guide, with its stories of shafted divorcees such as Jennifer Aniston and the late Princess Diana, is especially popular, Ms. Gray says, because it provides examples of courage and inspiration.

Ms. Gray, who lost 20 pounds because of the trauma of her ordeal, loves to think of herself as part of a “First Wives Club of Washington, D.C.” but says, “We are modern and young and are just trying to keep ourselves upbeat for our children.”

• To contact Stephanie Green or Elizabeth Glover, e-mail undercover@ washingtontimes.com.