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Heidi Klum, Drew Carey and More: Is January a Cursed Month for Celebrity Splits?

Thu., Jan. 26, 2012 6:15 PM PST by Leslie Gornstein

INFphoto.com

Why are so many stars breaking up in January? Is it awards season stress?
—Honey, via the inbox

Right, right, all the anxiety that comes with choosing between the chartreuse Hervé Léger gown and the ruby Hervé Léger gown—how do these poor waifs cope?

Yes, a whole crop of breakups have our E! News rabbits on overdrive, including Heidi Klum and Seal; K.D. Lang and her domestic partner; Drew Carey and That Lady He Dated For Five Years; Katy Perry and Russell Brand. (Well, OK, Brand filed for divorce Dec. 30, but close enough.)

So is January to blame?

MEANWHILE, IN DEMI-LAND: Moore Released From Hospital

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Yes!

Divorce lawyers confirm that January is a high-traffic time for splits and divorce filings in general, but for celebrities as well.

"People go through a very exhausting year, and people looking at the new year as a new life," says family law specialist Marilyn B. Chinitz of Blank Rome LLP. "So as soon as January rolls around, people think, ‘This is my new beginning.'"

The holidays are also stressful, what with traveling and whiny families, and can lead to big fights that end with a divorce filing. Celebrities are not immune to this; reports indicate that things started to get particularly tense between Perry and Russell in early December.

Finally, couples often decide to break up earlier in the year but wait for the holidays.

"Usually there's a big lull in filings of new divorces between Thanksgiving and the first week in January because people don't want to ruin everyone else's holiday," family law attorney Steve Mindel, of Feinberg, Mindel, Brandt & Klein LLP, tells me.