DIVORCED AND MILLENNIAL

Ending a marriage has changed in the era of Facebook, dating apps and digital legal services

Rosina Bosco and her then-husband were like many couples she saw on Facebook.

They regularly posted photos on vacations, at concerts and of the activities they did together. Her social media feeds were always bombarded with images of friends getting together and having families. “All you see on social media is weddings and babies,” she said.

So when it came to updating her profiles after her divorce, it was “incredibly painful.”

“All of a sudden I have to basically shed half of my world,” said Bosco, 34. “Five years of our relationship was up on Facebook. Like, what are you supposed to do?” A friend came over one day to go through it. “She would say a name, and I would say, ‘yes,’ and she would de-friend them,” Bosco said. For photos, the task became too challenging, so she created a new profile.

Today, Bosco is in increasingly rare company – divorced and millennial. In September, millennials made headlines for “killing” divorce when research found that the U.S. divorce rate dropped from 2008 to 2017 and that younger couples were driving the trend.

Even so, those getting divorced face an array of changes – decoupling on social media, swiping through dating apps and utilizing online legal services – that comes with splitting in the digital era.

Social splits

“Social media can be this knife that stabs into your wound and makes it worse,” Bosco said. Dealing with her social media presence was one of the hardest parts of moving on. She said she wished there was a “101”-guide on being a divorcee online.

New York divorce attorney Bryan M. Goldstein, a millennial himself, said he’s seen firsthand how social media impacts his clients.

Whether it’s deleting accounts or seeing posts from an ex, using the platforms can be challenging right after a split, said Goldstein, 35.

Dating apps also present new hurdles.

Swiping on the apps after a longterm relationship felt foreign, Bosco noted. “I had to pretend I wasn’t recently divorced,” she said.

However, apps can make it easier to “get back out there” once a person is ready, Goldstein said.

New lawyer’s office

New digital tools can help with navigating the tricky and sometimes archaic process of legally splitting. Storey Jones, 55, founded dtour.life as a platform to better facilitate divorces in the digital age. One goal: remove some of the financial stress.

“There’s so much chaos and lack of clarity about what (divorce) is, it becomes a black vortex of fear,” Jones said.

Dtour.life users can create a dashboard to navigate documents and financial records. They enter bank account information, log assets and debt, track expenses and manage other aspects of their divorce.

While Jones knows technology alone won’t make divorce easier on couples emotionally, she hopes the product can make the process more straightforward.

“So much of the ‘hating’ and animosity honestly comes from a fear of not knowing how they’re going to be at the end of the day,” Jones said.

Processing a split in a digital way is essential for millennials, Jones and divorce attorneys say.

For one, legal bills shrink because attorneys spend less time sifting through paperwork, and clients can have a “smarter hour” with lawyers, Jones said.

“It certainly makes my job easier,” Goldstein said. Because millennial clients are digitally organized, using an online tool is natural.

“Rather than making a phone call, a digital platform allows them to communicate when they want to, on their time frame,” said Dallas-based divorce attorney Elizabeth Hunter. “And it allows the lawyer the same thing.”

Millennials are also looking online to prepare for marriage. For example, writing up a prenuptial agreement.

“I don’t have to go to an office and sit in a big leather chair and wait in the lobby. I can ... pop open the app and say, ‘Let’s do this together,’ ” said Dave Coffey of LegalShield.

LegalShield connects clients with attorneys for a variety of legal services.

LegalShield has seen a seven-time increase in users’ prenuptial agreements within the app in the past year, with millennials contributing to 40 percent of that growth, Coffey said.