I don't have an ex-husband, and neither should you.

Four and a half years ago, when my children were one and three years old, their father and I got divorced. At the time, I had been a divorce attorney for nearly ten years, with the first few of those years spent in court, and more recently, as a private attorney-mediator.

In those ten years I had seen the best and worst of divorce. I'd argued over wedding cake toppers, whether breast implants were refundable community property, why it shows bad judgment to give a high school kid pot brownies in his lunch. I saw a father convinced by his wife that she was pregnant with his child, then learn it was the child of a friend. I represented a client who was hospitalized for domestic violence injuries, then ordered pay spousal support to their abuser.

I was pregnant with my first child when I left court forever to build a cooperative divorce practice from the ground up, and by the time she was born, I had seen people put everything aside for their children, hug each other in the lobby, and slog, Spartan-race style, through all their emotions in order to get to acceptance, generosity, friendship, resolution.

My younger child was barely a year old when his father and I divorced. He'd never remember living with us together. Our daughter was three. She mostly remembers the fighting. Divorce gave us an opportunity to pivot, to re-establish a relationship that created security for our children, minimized conflict, modeled cooperation, and made good memories. Having seen the worst of divorce, I knew how important this was. Having seen the best, I knew it was possible.

Still, I was devastated. My children had a broken home. I had an ex husband. And we'd never be a family again.

This was 2014, and my mediation business had been growing like a snowball rolling down a hill. Free from the law firm model of practice, I had created an agile business model that provided affordable, efficient, positive and productive divorce solutions like nothing else in the marketplace. Every aspect of my practice was intentionally designed to support cooperation, and this included a general prohibition on terms I deemed either too legal, too fussy, or too negative. My clients are "spouses," not "parties," who "resolve" rather than "settle" and end up with "agreements," not "orders." Shifting toward positive or neutral speech whenever possible made a powerful difference.

I'd forgotten this one summer evening. While I was filling the bathtub, my one year old had pulled the trash can into the hallway and knocked it over, covering both kids with coffee grounds and orange peels. As I tried to clean the mess, the bathtub overflowed, and I was so alone and so exhausted that I yelled at my babies. I yelled at babies. All of us were crying. This was a broken home. This was an ex-wife. This wasn't a real family.

After a margarita and a good night's sleep, I rallied (single parenting is great for developing that skill). I remembered what I told my clients, and I told these things to myself:

You do not have a broken home. Before divorce, you had a household that was full of pain, conflict, trauma or grief. That's broken. Now, even though there are hard times, you have peace. You have children who are free from conflict. You are fixing yourself, so your heart may still be broken, but your home isn't. Your children have two homes.

You do not have an ex-spouse. In the military, "ex" refers to a dishonorable discharge. Someone who has been honorably discharged after fulfilling their duties is respected as "former" military. You can choose to consider your spouse honorably discharged. You have a former spouse.

You didn't lose your family. It just changed. Something that looked "right," but was toxic for everyone, became something that looks different but provides health, security, happiness. Your children are still half mom and half dad. Both of you are family to them. You are still family to each other, even if it's not what you imagined. You're a divorced family, and that can be a beautiful thing.

This is why I don't have an ex-husband. And this is why you don't have to have one, either. You may or may not have chosen divorce. But you can choose how you see it, how you live it. Be a two-home family. Be a former spouse. Be happy, and be well.

Erika Englund is a family law attorney-mediator-strategist, amateur disruptor, and believer in positive, productive, affordable & efficient divorce. She's a legaltech evangelist, because she hates justice gaps, a former law school professor, a professional speaker and continuing education provider, and a happy co-parent (usually; she's not perfect) of two young children in Northern California. She wants you to know that this isn't legal advice.