26 April 29, 2010 MAZEL TOV! www.jewishexponent.com

ABar Mitzvah that Mrs. Gattended in early Marchserves as a primer, she

believes, for how a divorced par-ent should not behave.

Mrs. G’s best friend, who en-joys primary custody of thechild, ran the show. She and hersecond husband, not the boy’s fa-ther, stood beside the Bar Mitz-vah boy during his speech. Avideo of the honoree included noimages of his father.

“That Bar Mitzvah was sad.If you want your son to be amensch, how can you have madeit so obvious to him of youranger toward his dad?” said Mrs.G, who lives in a Philadelphiasuburb and requested partialidentification out of respect forher ex-husband.

Mrs. G endured a difficultmarriage and divorce, but her re-lationship with her ex-husbandis “in a good place now” as theyplan their son’s Bar Mitzvah, shesaid. Both mom and dad will

stand on the bimah when the boyreads the Torah. They and Mrs.G’s ex-in-laws intend to sit to-gether at the meal, and “whenwe do the slide show, you’d bet-ter believe that dad will be inthere,” she said.

Enlightened parents agree onthe need to shield children fromadults’ tension after a divorce —all the more so for a Bar Mitzvahor Bat Mitzvah. The child’s shin-ing moment is no time for par-ents to evince mutual hostility;rather, interviewees stated, theymust unite in celebration.

As in an intact marriage, di-vorced parents should jointlyplan their B’nai Mitzvah cele-brations, social workers and par-ents explained. They under-scored a cardinal rule: It’s notabout you; it’s about the child.

One family that Arlene Rosen

counsels is “handling it beauti-fully” by “really thinking of thechild and making adult deci-sions between the two of themwithout bringing the child intoit,” she said.

“As a family therapist, I’mthinking that what would bedetrimental to a child is fightingbetween the parents or havingthe child privy to discussionsabout the finances, which par-ents will participate in the Baror Bat Mitzvah and who will beresponsible [for what],” saidRosen, who works for JewishFamily and Children’s Servicesof Greater Philadelphia.

“The child should be concen-trating on becoming confident inwhat they’re going to be doingthat day, like preparing theirTorah portion or their mitzvahproject. Parents should be think-ing of keeping the child in themoment and keeping them [fo-cused] on what they’ll be per-forming at the service.”

Fayanne Kuttler, a familytherapist in Florida (and thiswriter’s sister-in-law), advisesclients who fare poorly with ex-spouses to take the high road.Marginalizing the other parentbefore and at the simcha — or,even worse, holding separateevents for the son or daughter —means brainwashing the childagainst mom or dad, she said.That, she continued, is known as“parental alienation” and mustbe avoided.

“If parents are not gettingalong, it’s hard to do anything.But if you maintain the per-spective that it’s not for you, it’sfor the child, anything can gosmoothly. You’ve got to pull your-self out of the mix and do what’sbest for the child.”

When Jeffrey Kapelus and hisex-wife Leslie planned their son

Split DecisionsDivorced parents still have to share

Big Day responsibilities.

By Hillel Kuttler

S T E P H E N S TA R R E V E N T S

L O C A T I O N S D É C O R R E N T A L S K O S H E R S T Y L E F O O D

2 1 5 . 9 2 3 . 2 6 7 5 O R S T A R R E V E N T S . C O M

A M A Z I N G M I T Z VA H S!A M A Z I N G M I T Z VA H S!

Enlightened parents agree on the need to shield children

from adults’ tension after a divorce—all the more so for a Bar Mitzvah

or Bat Mitzvah.

www.jewishexponent.com JEWISH EXPONENT April 29, 2010 27

Max’s 2004 Bar Mitzvah, theirpost-marriage relationship wasat its harmonious peak. Theysometimes drove together to vis-it synagogues and interviewcaterers, photographers and mu-sicians. Not knowing any better,one rabbi referred to Leslie asKapelus’s wife.

“You could not tell that wewere a divorced couple. We gotalong very, very nicely,” saidKapelus, an executive recruiterin New York City. “We looked at10 or 12 places. We walked in,and the way we talked, we wereon the same page with every-thing, so every caterer thoughtwe were a married couple.”

Not that their messy divorceduring Max’s infancy was for-gotten. But in preparing for theBar Mitzvah of their only child,they agreed on the basics: theirtaste in synagogues, splitting thecosts and covering overages.

The parents, who shared cus-tody of Max and were remarriedto other spouses, compromisedand adapted when necessary. Be-cause Kapelus lives in Westch-ester County and his ex-wife onLong Island, they decided on aneutral-site synagogue. When aphotographer whom his ex-mother-in-law recommended ap-peared biased toward her fami-ly, Leslie was the one to suggestthey dump him and interviewsomeone else. Kapelus wantedan open bar and Leslie didn’t, sohe offered to pay for it and sheagreed.

Driving back from meetings,“we talked about what we justsaw, like a strategy session,”Kapelus said. “It was almost too

good to be true, the way we didthe arrangements.”

Better still were the Bat Mitz-vah events that Kuttler and herex-husband MichaelSchwarzberg hosted for theirdaughters, Rebecca and Danielle.

To be sure, Kuttler andSchwarzberg are models for di-vorced couples. They and theirpresent spouses vacation to-gether and host each other forThanksgiving dinners andPassover sedarim. The childrenof their subsequent marriagesshare overnights at both fami-lies’ North Miami Beach homes.

Because they attended thesame synagogue, the former cou-ple knew where to hold the B’naiMitzvah and that many commonfriends would attend. Kuttler de-scribed the experience of plan-ning each simcha as “emotion-ally charged” not only becausetheir marriage had ended —“You don’t dream of having yourchild’s big event without beingtogether with the child’s motheror father,” she explained — butbecause their remarriages in-jected new spouses into the dis-cussion.

“It was not stress-free, but noplanning of a Bar or Bat Mitz-vah is stress-free — with or with-out a divorce,” she said. The 2007Bat Mitzvah of Talia, Kuttler’sdaughter by her second hus-band, David, “was less stressfulbecause I had one person to ar-gue with, not two.”

That said, she continued, sheand Schwarzberg “generally hada cooperative relationship” inplanning their events. They com-pared guest lists, divided ex-

penses equitably and signed offon each other’s preferences.

“I can’t remember any majordifficulties,” Schwarzberg said.“As we got closer through theyears, it got easier. The biggestconcern was bringing everybodytogether in the same room andhoping that nobody said any-thing rude to each other.

“Everybody has their ownversion of who was the bad guy[in the marriage]. But every-thing went very smoothly andwas beautiful. I don’t think ourkids felt any different than achild who had both parents to-gether. If anything, they hadmore families, including step-families — a bigger party witheven more presents!”

Indeed, this writer’s endur-ing memory is of the confetti-sprinkled dad and stepdad set-tling the bills, writing checksand shaking hands in the emp-tying hall.

“I tried to make the party thesame for the child as if we weretogether. You swallow your prideand do what you’ve got to do. Inthe speeches, you’d thank yourwife, so now you thank your ex-wife,” Schwarzberg said.

“When you split up, you say‘mazel tov’ to each other becauseit’s a new beginning, becauseyou’ve made a decision to behappier than you were before.So, why would you want to har-bor resentment and then take itout on the kid?”

Hillel Kuttler is a Baltimore-based freelance writer and afrequent contributor toSpecial Sections.

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