Believe it or not, deciding when to separate and when to divorce takes just as much thought and planning as your wedding did.

The urge to take flight may be hard to resist, but before you take off remember, there are things you can do to help make the decision to stay or go easier.

What Causes Marital Trouble?

Unfortunately just about everything does.

Today, married couples want to leave their relationships for reasons that revolve around incompatibility, or sex, or finances, or drugs or alcohol, or fear, or adultery, or a job transfer, or jealousy, or simply because they have fallen out of love. They even leave because of the way someone leaves the toilet seat or toothpaste.

In a recent AOL survey of marriage, more than one third of the women polled said that, if they had to do it all over again, they would not marry their current husbands and almost three quarters said that they fantasized about other men. While 80 percent of the female respondents believed in soul mates, only 52 percent thought that they had found theirs. These results even startled the survey organizers.

How Do You Make The Decision To Stay Or Go?

If your relationship is abusive emotionally, physically or mentally you should have a plan in place that enables you (and your children if you have them) to make a rapid exit.

If children are involved, and abuse is not a factor, you must take extra care to ensure that you have put their needs first. Children need security, and to know that both parents love them and will remain active nurturers and protectors in their lives if a separation or divorce occurs.

Where abuse is not a factor, write down your values, goals, aspirations, life directions, beliefs and preferences and then write down your partners as well. Then you can compare the two lists. Are you compatible? Is there the chance that you can support either others aspirations or goals? Does your partner seek the same things as you?

If the answer to any of these questions is yes, you might have a chance of saving your relationship and making it even stronger with some commitment from both of you and if needed some help from a therapist.

Until you try, you will never know and you might find that instead of separating or divorcing, you will be wondering how soon until you will be back in the arms of your sweetie!

8 Positive Tips To Repair An Unhappy Relationship If you think that there is the chance to save your relationship, adopt a positive attitude (as hard as it seems right now) and try changing your own behavior as a first step. Once your attitude and behavior towards the relationship changes, you might just see a change in your partner too.

Practice being kind, attentive, patient, honest, funny, flexible, gracious, available and intimate towards each other. Learn to listen and communicate.When you are emotionally off balance it can be tempting to play games with one another or seek revenge for things that have happened. Do not do this. You need to be mature about your relationships. Do not play the victim. Victims blame the other person for all their own problems it is your entire fault that my life is so awful right now mentality and while your friends and family will support you for awhile, most people have no respect for victims if they continue to wallow in their own self pity.Do not play the martyr either. A martyr sacrifices and suffers for the sake of principle such as I would really like to help you by washing all your clothes and folding them into a neat stack, but I am so busy trying to get your three children ready for school that I simply do not have time. You will just end up spending your time bickering with one another. If you argue, avoid launching into personal attacks. These simply make the other person feel defensive, and back them into a corner where they either shut down to what you are trying to say or fight back with equally hurtful comments.Do not let in laws or other people around you meddle or interfere in your relationship. Whether their intentions are good or bad, interference will not be helpful to your situation. And do not ask mutual friends to become involved either.Keep your confidantes to a very small number and make sure that they are people you really trust. If you have children, organize a night where the two of you regularly get a babysitter and head out for the evening for a meal or to see a movie.