Jenna Dewan Tatum and Channing Tatum have ‘lovingly chosen to separate as a couple’

One of our favorite Hollywood couples, Jenna Dewan Tatum and Channing Tatum, both 37, announced they are splitting after nine years of marriage. The couple posted an announcement to multiple social media accounts, noting that as parents to 4-year-old daughter Everly, they’ve “lovingly chosen to separate as a couple.”

In the joint statement Dewan and Tatum note that “love is a beautiful adventure that is taking us on different paths for now,” and that they “are still a family and will always be loving dedicated parents to Everly.”

A post shared by Jenna Dewan Tatum (@jennadewan) on Apr 2, 2018 at 6:13pm PDT

Experts say society needs to reframe divorce to see it more like Dewan and Tatum do, not as an ending, but transformation.

In her book, Conscious Divorce: Ending a Marriage with Integrity clinical hypnotherapist Susan Allison writes “It’s time to replace terms like ‘broken’ or ‘split’ family for terms like ‘bi-nuclear’ or ‘blended’ family, showing that the unit is not lost but restructured, that the bonds of kinship continue long after a divorce.”

Divorce isn’t easy, but the approach Dewan and Tatum seem to be taking is one way that parents can make it as easy as possible for kids. They’re maintaining a united front, and they’re committed to being a family even if they are no longer a romantic couple.

In a recent interview for the March cover of Health, Dewan explained that it’s been difficult being seen as #marriagegoals. “When people say you guys have such a perfect life, I want to scream and tell them no one’s perfect,” she explained. “We fight like other couples, we disagree about things, we have days where we don’t really like each other.”

Dewan told the magazine she believes in the concept of ‘great fits’ and that she and Tatum were a great fit for a long time. “I think up until this point we’ve really grown together. Even if one starts to grow, the other catches up and vice versa. But I think a couple needs to be conscious and to want to do the work and be willing to look at the parts of you that need work. Both of us have been pretty aware and willing to do that,” she said.

They’ve been willing to do that in marriage and in this separation. They may not be perfect, but the way they are separating is still #goals, just a different kind.

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