If you’re like me, you’re reading a stranger’s divorce blog because that’s a whole lot easier than talking about the subject with your friends. But I hope you’re not like me, because if there’s one piece of advice I’d like to foist on the unhappily coupled (or uncoupled) of the world, it’s quit brooding and start complaining out loud.
Of course yakking about your troubles easier said than done. After all, if you never talk about it to anyone, it’s practically as if the problem doesn’t exist at all, right? Plus there’s that so-wrong-but-so-strong desire to be perfect that afflicts pretty much everyone. And don’t forget the silencing power of plain old embarrassment.
For me, it took about three years of therapy and painful experiences too numerous to recount before I finally picked up the phone and spilled my unhappiness to a friend. I’d recommend getting there more quickly if you can (and sharing on this blog might be a good start).
As I came tearfully clean, I was amazed to see that the sky didn’t fall and the earth didn’t swallow me up whole. In fact, it felt pretty good. When it was over, I still had a miserable marriage to contend with, and a scary divorce ahead. But I also had a friend to help me handle it – a friend who loved me no less for being, in that moment, about as far from perfect as it’s possible to be. And in the end, that made all the difference.
Addendum
True and important: Talking out loud about your relationship problems is not just a great way to get beyond a bad marriage – it’s also an essential skill for saving a good one.
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Tagged: divorce · divorce advice · divorce coping · life after divorce · women's divorce experience
I’ve got a problem with the phrase “my ex.” It might just be that it makes me feel like a character in a bad country song, but I think there’s more to it.
It’s the “my” part that bugs me. I prefer to reserve that descriptor for the positive things I cherish: my family, my friends, my work, my fabulous haircut. And while the man I once married is not so bad as exes go, cherish him I do not. So without conscious effort, I’ve become an expert at avoiding the possessive.
Of course my discomfort with “my ex” is silly, and probably a little juvenile. As the father of my children, he is unquestionably “mine” – bound to play a significant role in my life. And to pretend anything else would be a disservice to the kids. I understand all of this, and work hard to live by it.
Nevertheless, when it comes to casual conversation, I’ll keep the “my” for myself.
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Tagged: divorce · divorce etiquette · ex husband · women's divorce experience
When I realized my marriage was over, the predictable array of scary topics ran rampant in my brain. I worried about my kids, of course. Then there was the issue of money. And what about lawyers? And where would I live?
But it might surprise you to learn that in between all the hand wringing and nail biting, I somehow found time to indulge a racy fantasy or two. Or three. Right there in the midst of what was surely the saddest and most frightening experience I’d ever had, I couldn’t help but dance a little jig over the prospect of new, and better, sex somewhere on the horizon. Fulfilling sex was one of the many doors to happiness that had closed in my marriage – and one of the first that I realized I held the power to re-open.
Just a day or two after my Big Decision, I sat in my therapist’s office. “Has your fantasy life changed?” she asked. I was shocked. Although on one level I was enjoying my unexpected friskiness, I was also a little embarrassed. After all, I’d decided to divorce less than 48 hours earlier. Didn’t dignity and propriety demand some kind of dry spell?
But like the good therapy patient I am, I spilled the truth. The doctor’s smile washed over me like a balm. “Congratulations. That’s one of the healthiest things you’ve said in a long time,” she told me. And she was absolutely right.
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Tagged: divorce · divorce and sex · divorce therapy · sex drive · women's divorce experience
I spent two years tucked in the corner of a therapist’s couch. My husband sat to my right, my shrink faced us in her chair. Week in, week out, that was my place and I occupied it faithfully, even when I went to therapy alone.
It was in one such solo session that I decided to leave my husband, and made plans to break the news to him there in the office at our next shared appointment.
I arrived bleary-eyed, buzzing with queasy anticipation. As I took up my miserable corner perch, my shrink (God bless her), casually remarked “perhaps you’d like to try a different chair today.”
What a concept. How easy it was to shift from one piece of furniture to another, and view the familiar office from an entirely new perspective. How simple to break a pattern and suddenly see the world afresh.
I learned a powerful lesson that day about being stuck, breaking loose and choosing to define your own point of view. From my new post in the armchair, ending my marriage felt less like the desperate escape it had seemed, and more like the well-considered, rational and self-affirming decision it was.
A person “backed into a corner” is someone with no choice. But on that day, I knew that choices were, in fact, just about all I had left. And with a nudge from a very wise therapist, I was finally in a position to make them.
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Tagged: divorce · divorce therapy · women's divorce experience
My husband had always been the tech guy in our house, and in a tender moment he created a Joanie-loves-Chachi-style scrolling text screensaver on my computer. Naturally, after he moved out, this was not a welcome greeting each time I logged on.
With more effort that I care to admit, I figured out how to edit the message, conjuring the great Helen Reddy with the words “Hear Me Roar” in big, bold type.
Imagine my surprise when I went away for the weekend, and returned to find my computer silently scrolling “Hear me roar all the way to the bank” – a creepy reference to the financial nuances of our divorce negotiations.
Now, an ex breaking in and tampering with your stuff is not funny. If it happens to you and feels unsettling, call the cops first and your lawyer second. But ultimately for me, no harm came from this one-time event. And although it was anything but amusing in the moment, it’s pretty damn funny now.
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Tagged: divorce · women's divorce experience
