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What to do if your husband leaves you

9 Kick-Ass Things To Do If Your Husband Leaves You

Adulting isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially when painful adult experiences throw you back into an emotional childhood. If your husband leaves you, for example, you may feel the somatic eruption of memories from long ago. Abandonment. Disapproval. Rejection. Being unwanted… and the last to be chosen (if chosen at all).

It’s remarkable, really, how instantly a painful experience can connect the dots separated by a veritable lifetime.

Your psyche, though, never forgets. It stores the most affecting memories in every cell of your body.

Even if your husband leaves you and you have no point of reference for the emotional flood, the abandonment will still be all-consuming.

And with that abandonment and the litany of emotions tied to it comes a wave of destruction to all that is self-defining.

Your self-esteem, your self-worth, your self-confidence, your dreams for the future, your belief that you can survive…even your identity. They all take a beating.

Perhaps the most egregious feeling that comes from abandonment is powerlessness. 

With the swipe of one person’s actions, you become helpless to control a huge part of your own life. And you’re left standing alone with that new reality.

Is there anything you can do to re-empower yourself if your husband leaves you?

You know, don’t you, that we are here to restore the inherent yes in your life?

This is the place where others who have already earned their stripes are going to surround you and lift you up with a resounding “Absolutely!”

Here are 9 powerful things you can do now if your husband leaves you and you are feeling powerless:

  1. Be TOO proud to beg.

    It doesn’t matter what your husband has done or why he has chosen to leave. In the movie Where the Heart Is, Ashley Judd’s character says to a young mom-to-be (Natalie Portman), “I know [he] left you. But that’s what makes him trash, not you.”

    If your husband leaves you, he does so with forethought and planning. And trust us, you are above begging for that kind of base energy to come back into your life.

    Do. Not. Beg.

  2. Document, document, document.

    This isn’t about revenge – although success and happiness earned through integrity make for the suh-weetest revenge!

    This is about being smart and protecting yourself and your children.

    If you’re going to have to look out for yourself going forward, the time to rehearse is now.

    Save everything. Documents, emails, texts, voice messages (let your voicemail pick up instead of answering your phone), pictures, everything.

    Keep a dedicated journal for documenting dates, times, communication, and financial actions.

    Basically, be a grown-up Girl Scout: Be prepared. You’ll reap the merit badge in the battle to come. Read our “If You are Thinking About Divorce: Important Steps to be Prepared.

  3. Think like a lawyer, but hire a really good one.

    This isn’t the time to DIY your future. There is too much at stake if your husband leaves you.

    Chances are he has been preparing for a while, and that means you have catching up to do.


For both healthy and smart things to do if you are thinking about divorce, or not wanting to be taken advantage of, read our “36 Things to Do If You are Thinking About Divorce.”


It’s important that you learn to separate your emotions from the pragmatics of this severance.

By researching how to find a divorce attorney and in particular the right one for you, you will learn how to prepare for the most advantageous outcome.

  1. Join a support group, or two… or three.

    This is a time when you need support.You need the professional support of legal and financial experts. And you also need the emotional support of others who have been where you are.

    Be prudent about where and with whom you share this journey.

    Consider hiring a female divorce coach to keep you on-track through this painful and confusing journey.

    And join a group or two (one online and one in person, perhaps) to give you a sense of empathetic community.

    Annie’s Group, for example, is an online divorce support group and program for women who are thinking about or just beginning divorce. What a godsend opportunity to surround yourself with assurance, compassion, and guidance in a confidential place.

  2. Keep the details off social media.

    As I mentioned above, prudence is key at this time. You want support. You need support.

    And you also probably want to drag your husband through burning coals, literally and figuratively.

    But let’s review the previous two points: Think like a lawyer…and seek support in the right places.

    It’s all part of the next point…

  3. Take the high road.

    Remember Michelle Obama’s famous tagline? When they go low, we go high.

    Politics and political preference don’t even matter. It’s an awesome mantra to live by, no matter what the circumstances are.

    Taking the high road has nothing to do with acquiescence or playing weak.

    It has everything to do with staying out of the muddy trenches and connecting your energy only to people and choices of integrity.

    Never, ever, ever doubt that staying on high ground will deliver the best results.

    You may feel the temporary agony of delayed gratification, but stay true to what is right and good.

  4. Protect your kids and prepare for their future.

    If you have difficulty standing up for yourself or fighting for what you deserve, think about your kids (if you have them).How you navigate the aftermath if your husband leaves you is about more than just getting through the divorce process. You need to look far down the road while also checking your rear-view mirror.

    Children are expensive. They need health insurance, food, clothes, tuition, activity fees, college funds, and on and on.

    This is one of the most important reasons to build the strongest professional team you can afford.

  5. Find a new place to live.

    No matter how much you love your home, clinging to it will only keep you attached to someone who has abandoned you.This is the time to recreate yourself and your life.

    Give yourself permission to enjoy the creative process of choosing and nesting in a new place that belongs only to you (and your kids).

    Sure, you may have to downsize for the time being. But that just means less “stuff” to take care of while you do the following…

  6. Take really good care of you.

    If your husband leaves you, he may or may not ever look back.

    While it’s natural to want him to miss you and regret his actions, you are now in the process of clearing out his negative energy.

    Practicing self care is no longer about making his head turn in desire or regret.

    It’s about stepping out of rejection and abandonment with limitless energy, health, and self-confidence.

    Your kids need you, your friends need you, you need you.

    So, whatever that self-care looks like—exercise, good food, sound sleep, continuing education, spirituality/religion, hobbies, social gatherings—do it.

    Consistently.

Abandonment is a vile, passive-aggressive form of rejection. It hurtsdeeply. And the wound doesn’t simply “heal” with time.

While there is no panacea for that kind of betrayal, one truth will ground you so you can step forward into healing:

The only abandonment with the power to destroy you is the abandonment of yourself.

And the only vow that must unequivocally last a lifetime is the “I do” you say to you.

Notes

Whether you are thinking about divorce, dealing with it, or recreating the life you deserve, one thing we see making a significant difference for women is the conscious choice to not do it alone. Since 2012, smart women around the world have chosen SAS for Women to partner them through the emotional, financial, and oftentimes complicated experience of breaking up and reinventing. 

SAS offers all women six free months of email coaching, action plans, checklists and support strategies for you—and your precious future. Join our tribe and stay connected.

Life After Divorce: Grief

Life After Divorce: The Grief You Didn’t Count On

There comes a stage in our life after divorce that we’re often not prepared for. It arrives after the legal issues are settled, most of the fighting is over, and we accept the fact of the divorce and its outcomes, they are what they are. At such a moment, we might be thinking we should be finding bliss now, but instead we feel sadness (again). Memories and dreams come back to haunt us at the same time “negative” emotions circle up. This may be a natural part of our life-after-divorce grief and healing.

Of course, holidays like Valentine’s Day don’t help.

It’s time to welcome your post-divorce grief.

Divorce is one of the top reasons for grief in virtually any conversation about loss. Divorce can cause us as much distress as the death of a loved one or a treasured pet. But with divorce, we very often lose multiple things at the same time: a partner, a friend, and a home. If we look at the Holmes-Rahe Stress Scale that lists events that cause us to feel grief, we can appreciate that divorce gives us several stressors, not one. You are not crazy or weak if you feel sad or overwhelmed because these are indeed tough times.

Post-divorce grief can be aggravated by wrong expectations – namely, the idea that it should pass within 6 to 12 months after a divorce document is signed. That’s the general timeframe we expect close friends to be sensitive to us. After 12 months, it seems, we should be “getting on with it.” 

Another incorrect expectation is that the person who initiated the divorce should be happy and relieved rather than bereaved. That was my experience.

And there’s a term for this phenomenon, this experience of grieving the separation with a spouse who was abusive, or who was highly unpleasant for at least some of the time married. Such sadness is called “disenfranchised grief”, a term coined by Kenneth J. Doka. Disenfranchised grief is not openly acknowledged, socially validated, or publicly mourned. The danger of it is that “the lack of support you get during your grieving process can prolong emotional pain.”

Welcome your more difficult feelings

The inability to be open about our life-after-divorce grief can lead to shame, confusion, and feelings of guilt for letting yourself down. It can develop into depression with the sufferer not recognizing that they need to ask for help.


You are not alone. 

Check out our “How to Overcome the 6 Hardest Things About Life After Divorce.”


However, there is good news. Once we look grief in the eye and process it, we can make room for a new life with new routines, rituals, and — if we want to and are ready for it — new partners.

To help ourselves through the tough times and process the loss, we should remind ourselves that however bad the end of the marriage was, there were always good things to grieve about.

Letting go of past love

Usually, when we are living through it, we see divorce as a sequence of legal, financial, and children-related processes and negotiations conducted in a lengthy and sterilized manner. It’s easy and even pleasant to demonize your Ex. For some of us, anger is necessary to give us the courage and energy to separate and break the system. Unfortunately, it’s also easy to get stuck in anger and hatred; they serve as a backdrop for our own self-righteousness. However, staying angry and blaming him* is not the path to closure, but a waste of our time and energy keeping us more often in a spin cycle of repeating and repeating the narrative we tell ourselves.

In the grander scheme of things, divorce is the loss of love. It’s broken promises. It’s the loss of companionship, the meals, the walks, the trips, the lifestyle. Overall, it’s the loss of sharing and an end to a valuable human connection. Without the support of the former structure, we can be left lonely and confused.

Admitting that love existed and died is harder than being angry. While the earlier stages of marital rift can make us think of a reconciliation, after divorce we definitely know that we can’t do more. We feel sad and helpless. 

For some people who like order and control, being helpless is the hardest feeling to endure.

However hard it may be, accepting the inevitable and our helplessness can take us to a new level. An English theologian Thomas Fuller said, “the night is darkest just before the dawn.” He added, “But keep your eyes open; if you avert your eyes from the dark, you’ll be blind to the rays of a new day.”

It’s only a dream

It often appears in relationship advice columns that what we are mourning is not the relationship itself, but the dream of a happier life. However, that doesn’t make sadness any easier. As Dr. Ann Gold Buscho writes in Psychology Today “the loss of the hopes and dreams you had on your wedding day is like a death. Allow yourself to feel that grief and trust that it will pass”.

The importance of hopes and dreams is that they cultivate our future. They give us the strength to carry on through hard times. Many of us dream of growing older with our man, seeing the kids off to college, downsizing, maybe moving to a different town, getting a bed-and-breakfast, or opening a café by the ocean. I did. Now that the person is no longer your partner, it may feel like there is no more future, nothing to work for. Even if a new man arrives, I will never have another chance to marry someone I met at 20. I will never have a chance to grow old with the father of my children, who loves my kids as much as I do.

Acknowledging the life-after-divorce grief is one step towards laying to rest the old dreams to make way for new ideas and hopes.

Goodbye, my friend

Divorce is highly likely to affect our circle of friends. Frankly, I was even looking forward to saying goodbye to a judgmental toxic woman or two. In reality, after divorce, we can pursue those who are more in sync with us. They may be especially funny, intellectual, or spiritual. Childhood friends may reappear or disappear. The loss of the familiar is worth acknowledging and grieving about. But it’s helpful to remember that with each loss comes a new space and opening for new people, experiences, and things.

Find a helping hand

Therapists suggest asking for help and accepting help during grieving. I’ve found it helpful to ask for support, whether it’s accepting invitations to dinners or watching a film together just to feel someone’s presence. But let’s remind ourselves of whom we are turning to for moral support and words. In my experience, it was exactly my poor understanding of my grief that drove me to hide from some friends. And elsewhere, I discovered that even some friends who had been through divorce themselves (and had the best of intentions) hurt me as they wanted me to get over my sadness or dark emotions quickly.


With all you’ve been through, do you wonder if happiness is even possible after divorce? 


Some cultures and social groups are better at managing negative feelings than others. If you are part of a culture where you are supposed to keep a stiff upper lip and get on with it, I encourage you to look outside your usual social circle for support.

Grief is personal and lonely

In our precious life after divorce, let’s do our best to steer clear of labels and boxes we put ourselves in. Let’s accept that grief is personal in the way we experience it, how it impacts us and how long it takes. It’s normal that it should make us feel very lonely —  like we are the only people in the world experiencing such pain. That is why joining groups of women in similar situations is so important. 

My personal divorce journey included learning to deal with loneliness, becoming my own companion, and learning not to fear being without a partner. I am very glad I took that journey. It gives me a feeling of strength and of heaving a choice whether to be on my own or with someone I chose.

Is it possible to grieve together with your Ex?

You can try it! I planned and offered to my former husband an invitation to gather and give ritual to the good things in our marriage, say our thank yous, and grieve together the breakup, but he wasn’t interested. This may be because we are in different places emotionally. I also discovered that my suggestion to grieve together could appear to be a reconciliation proposal.

Things will never be the same again

As we move forward with our life after divorce, one thing that will never be the same is us. We need to say goodbye to our old selves, mourning the choices we made, the sacrifices we undertook for the benefit of the marriage and our family.

As we say goodbye to the younger, more naïve version of self, we acknowledge how much we have been through, how much we had to lose, and how important these losses were. That self-care and respect may be something we have forgotten in the process of divorce. Now we are rediscovering it as we process life-after-divorce grief. And the good thing  is that this self-respect skill can now stay with us forever.

By letting go of the old structures and dreams we create space for new traditions, new rituals, and new versions of ourselves on the way to the future.

Notes

Anna Ivanova-Galitsina is Russia-based communication and storytelling expert. She is rebuilding life after divorce and misses international travels. You can reach her at anna.i.galitsina@gmail.com

Since 2012, SAS for Women is entirely dedicated to the unexpected challenges women face while considering a divorce and navigating the divorce experience and its confusing afterward. SAS offers women six FREE months of email coaching, action plans, checklists, and support strategies for you, and your future. Join our tribe and stay connected.

Surviving Infidelity

Surviving Infidelity: Should You Stay or Should You Go?

You and your husband are in a committed relationship—or so you thought. You love your husband and your life together. Your husband’s law practice is thriving. Your three children are all happy and healthy and you’ve recently been chosen to head up a major fundraiser for underprivileged children. Then, by chance, you discover titillating emails your husband has sent to his long-time secretary Jennie, a married mother of two pre-school-aged children. The four of you routinely socialize and you and Jennie frequently share confidences. Your head is spinning. You’re in a state of shock. Your wonderful, secure life is unraveling right before your eyes. What to do? Surviving infidelity may feel impossible.

You call your husband and tell him to come home immediately.  He asks first whether something happened to one of your children. You tell him that the children are fine, but that you are not. He agrees to come home early. The question then becomes, what do you do with your cheating spouse.

Infidelity Statistics in the USA

Did you know that in the United States studies show that between 25%-60% of Americans cheat on their spouses? Male respondents in the 51-59 age group have the highest infidelity rate at 31% and 16% of women in their 60’s reported infidelity, the highest rate among female respondents. Studies estimate that 10% of affairs start online and 40% of online affairs turn into real-life affairs. Although cheating was once considered primarily a male activity, the incidence of women cheating has continued to climb. 

As a psychotherapist and sex therapist with over 35 years of clinical experience, I have treated thousands of men and women both individually and in couples therapy and have discovered the primary reasons why people choose to engage in extramarital affairs. 

Reasons Why People Have Affairs

  1. Marital Dissatisfaction
  2. Sexual Dissatisfaction 
  3. A Desire for Variety.  (“I love my spouse, but…”)
  4. A Surprise Unanticipated Encounter That Turns into An Affair
  5. Do I Still Have It? A Need for Validation from Someone Other Than My Spouse
  6. My Spouse Has a Chronic Illness and I Need Some Emotional and Physical Intimacy 
  7. Retaliation: I Want to Punish My Spouse for Having an Affair
  8. Plain and Simple: Sexual Chemistry
  9. Consciously or Unconsciously, Affairs Are Wake-Up Calls That Something Is Amiss in the Marriage.

After the Affair: Should I Stay or Should I Go? It Depends…

Virtually every couple I see contacts me for therapy because of infidelity. And by the way, more and more women are engaging in extramarital affairs than in previous generations. Once one spouse discovers the affair (and they usually do, sooner or later), both spouses will need to figure out what to do. What will the next steps be?  Do we still love each other?  Will I ever be able to forgive? Should we get a divorce?  Should we try to mend our marriage? Do I want to leave my marriage for my lover?

Whether couples choose to stay together or to divorce, expect there to be lots of ups and downs. People can learn over time to forgive. However, they will never FORGET!  

The couples that I work with are often able to acknowledge that their marriages have been coasting along for many years. I have encouraged people who listen to my ASK BEATTY SHOW on the Progressive Radio Network and who see me on television and who attend my lectures to remember to keep their marriages at the top of their priority lists. However, the reality is that their children, careers, and financial concerns, coupled with the pressures of day-to-day living, almost always occupy the number one spot in people’s lives. And herein lies the lethal mistake that couples continue to make. 

Plants and flowers will die if they are not watered and tended to. The same goes for a marriage. 

Points to Ponder

  1. Is the couple sincerely interested in mending the marriage?  If the answer is yes…
  2. Is the couple willing to work with a competent marital therapist who can help them to fully understand what happened and aid them in moving forward?  

Buyer Beware: Therapists are not the same. Do your homework and get a referral from someone whom you trust.

  1. Mending a broken heart and a broken marriage takes time. Are you willing to participate in a painful process with the hope that your marriage can potentially be better and stronger than ever before?
  2. On the other hand, you may find yourself in a situation where either you or your spouse wants a divorce. If that is the case, you need to find yourself a competent divorce attorney who will help you to protect your interests in terms of custody, visitation, alimony, child support, and even hidden monies that you may be unaware of. If there’s been deception in the marriage, you don’t know what other surprises you may discover.

Learning what your next steps are in terms of finding the right lawyer, and how to keep your emotions out of the legal negotiation, and how to support your heart, is the work of a divorce coach. Her job is to help you feel anchored as you learn about the process and take steps, step by step.

In over 35 years, the vast majority of couples who have worked with me chose not to divorce. Rather, they put their time and energies into trying to resurrect their marriages. And the good news was that most were successful.  

In fact, many couples have told me that their marriages were happier and stronger and more sexually and emotionally satisfying after the affair.

Lessons Worth Learning

  1. Prioritize your marriage.
  2. If you find that your own individual issues, be they emotional, psychological, psychiatric, physical, or sexual are getting in the way of your life and relationship, give yourself permission to seek help.
  3. A good marriage is dependent on two emotionally healthy individuals.
  4. When problems arise, as they do in all marriages, don’t bury them or deny them and avoid tackling the various issues head-on, pretending that they will disappear on their own. That’s magical thinking!
  5. If you and your spouse are unable to successfully acknowledge, address and RESOLVE  your problems on your own, don’t hesitate to reach out and ask for professional help.

 

Beatty Cohan, MSW, LCSW, AASECT is a nationally recognized psychotherapist, sex therapist, author of For Better for Worse Forever:  Discover the Path to Lasting Love, columnist, national speaker, national radio and television expert guest, and host of THE ASK BEATTY SHOW on the Progressive Radio Network. She has a private practice in New York City and East Hampton. To date, she is still seeing clients on ZOOM. Check out her website or write her at BeattyCohan.msw@gmail.com 

 

Since 2012, smart women around the world have chosen SAS for Women to partner with them through the emotional and oftentimes complicated experience of divorce. We invite you to learn what’s possible for you. Schedule your FREE 15-minute consultation with SAS. Whether you are thinking about divorce or already navigating your life afterward, choose to acknowledge your vulnerability and not go it alone.

Healing a broken heart

Healing a Broken Heart and Moving On

In a poignant twist of synchronicity, I was tasked last week to write a piece on healing a broken heart – not realizing at the time that it would echo a much larger collective voice – that of American leaders describing the heart of a nation that broke — hopefully open — on January 6.

This follows in the wake of Wednesday’s riots on Capitol Hill, the scaling of the Rotunda, the breaching of the Chamber of Congress and even individual leaders’ offices by American citizens – a violent desecration and display of disrespect and hatred designed to overthrow our democratic process. These actions were inspired by the words of Donald Trump, who will continue to serve as United States President for two more weeks unless he’s impeached.

Or, as Republican Senator Mitt Romney described him, “a selfish man who cannot accept defeat”.

Americans also witnessed an undeniable, stark contrast in the forces called (or not) to manage the armed, and mostly white January 6th rioters, referred to by many congressional leaders and journalists as seditionists, versus the preemptive National Guard presence, the rubber bullets and beatings meted out during the largely non-violent Black Lives Matters protests earlier in the year.

Author Parker Palmer describes that contrast of white privilege vs. Black targeting as “the politics of the broken hearted,” and the term “heart-broken” was repeated over and over again during the news coverage of the riots — almost unanimously by congress and journalists alike — as they described what they were witnessing to a public glued to their screens.

Healing a broken heart begins on an individual level, and in the instance of this piece, it begins after a divorce. But it expands ever outward, into our families, our communities, our cities, states, the nation and the globe.

Many Americans saw something on January 6th that horrified us, cementing a truth about ourselves we wished did not exist. It was a profane and shameful exhibition of something that most of us do not want to be. The hope, though, is that the worm of truth has turned and that we as a nation recognize we must begin partnering ourselves and our neighbors and our communities differently.

The hope is that, finally, we are divorcing from a mindset that denies humanity and inclusion, decency and respect. We are leaving an abusive relationship with ourselves – leaving behind a self-serving, entitled, cruel and exclusionary way of thinking that should have died long ago, or indeed, should never have existed in the first place.

But healing a broken heart occurs in stages and the more we speak to the process of healing, the more familiar that terrain of recovery becomes.

So…

We Grieve

Grief is the beginning. And know that no one does grief quite the same as another, so it’s important to not judge ourselves (or our friends and neighbors) for too much or too little emotion or for taking “too long” to heal. Grief is an emotional stealth bomber, it’s quicksand, a tightrope, a whip, a hydra: cut one head off and another one sprouts. It’s often best to just accept that it will bite you, and hope that, often, you’ll be able to bite back. Eventually, it does die a natural death.


Check out, “14 Ways I am Going to Get OVER My Ex.”


We Take Responsibility for Our Own Behavior

Forget the occasional loss of temper or sharpness that occurs in the course of a healthy marriage; that’s normal. We can offer an apology. But other behaviors we need to do more than apologize for; we need to own them and address them. It’s often difficult to see ourselves and our own behaviors clearly. Complicity is insidious. So is being ruled by our fear of loss or change, our insecurities, to the point that we manipulate or become sneaky, passive aggressive or blatantly aggressive (as in the case of the riots), or abusive – either as a spouse, a national leader responding dismissively or punitively to racial protests, or neighbor against neighbor. Facing that in ourselves, in our families, owning how we negatively impact others, how we communicate, the power plays we engage in, how we handle stress or conflict – all of that can be a sticky pill to swallow. An even bigger one is active abuse, not just the domestic abuse we find in marriages, but the abuse we’ve seen for centuries in this country against huge and dark-skinned swaths of the population.

On an individual level, we must embrace the idea that we co-create everything in our lives, even if it appears to only come at us from the outside. With every choice, conscious or unconscious, we create our reality.

Here in this lifetime, we are born, we are raised. For the sake of this subject, we choose to marry and we choose to divorce. We can choose to believe that events “happen to us,” or we can choose to believe that we created the experience unconsciously in order to find the freedom of becoming fully self-defined, to claim our own territory, to seek adventure, to pursue creative expression in our work, or to become fully independent and answerable only to ourselves (and of course, any children we choose to have). Caroline Myss teaches that every moment, exchange, relationship we have is meant to “empower, not disempower us.” The idea of choice can be difficult because it means we have to stop relying on that nice, bracing, pain-numbing anger at everybody else — anger that feels more powerful than sadness and also lets us off the hook of self-development. It also means we can step out of the investment we tend to have in outside opinions of us. It’s lovely, and it’s liberating.

Forgive — and Let It All Go

For some, visualizing a cleansing out of all of the old “stuff” – the attachments to status or material possessions, to a patriarchal, “daddy knows best” idea of security, anger, shame or feelings of failure, the biting sense of unfairness or betrayal, the breaks and bruises of physical abuse, memories being taken for granted, dismissed, or patronized — whatever it is: let it go. Of course, like everything else, it’s easier said than done; sometimes it feels like you have to catch a negative belief and toss it away every 5 seconds. Get elemental with it. Picture it all washing out with the tide, burning off in a comforting hearth fire, gently blowing the dust of it out of your hair or sinking into the earth to fertilize your new growth. This may be too New Agey for some, so another approach is to treat your Ex (or your beliefs, for that matter) like a habit you’re breaking; those are long-established patterns, but the love and happiness you created with this person is far from your only source of those delicious endorphin bubbles. Like any other habit, these patterns can be broken, but it takes repetition and vigilance to move past the grief of divorce. It’s easy to become frustrated with how often we have to do this, how frequently it’s necessary to stop a thought from taking full flight.

In any habit-breaking regimen, cultivating patience and compassion for ourselves is necessary, along with a profound recognition of how corrosive perfectionism is for the spirit.

As Elizabeth Gilbert put it, “perfectionism is just a high-end, haute couture version of fear… just fear in fancy shoes and a mink coat.”

No one goes into a marriage with a “How to Do a Great Divorce Later” manual, which is, of course, why hiring a divorce coach and a therapist are such incredibly smart gifts to ourselves – a therapist to help work through the root causes of why we made the choices we did, and a divorce coach to help you heal and learn all the ways to make savvy and sustainable new choices.

In healing our broken hearts and letting go, ladies, we might do well to take a page out of the Book of Men — keeping in mind that both genders bear traits of the other. Generally, men are great at compartmentalizing, and I think this is a skill that women would do well to emulate a little more often. Acknowledging that this is leaning on a stereotype – with an eye on the fact that gender concepts are shifting more and more as women become highly successful bread-winners for their families and men become more full-time parents and house spouses — I think this ability comes from that basic biological male imperative of the hunter, vs. the stereotypical female role of the gardener/gatherer. One chases things down, the other watches and encourages things to grow. Which is more likely to be able to leave something behind? Exactly. You compartmentalize by putting your knapsack of stuff under a rock and take off after that gazelle. Or that distant horizon of self-transformation.

And speaking of self-transformation…


Commit to steps each day. Read our powerful, “46 Steps to Your Divorce Recovery: A Definition and A Guide.”

 


Find Your Joy

For some, this may be the challenge of finding happiness and fulfillment in their work, getting past the fear of starting their own business or freelancing, trusting themselves to thrive and maintain independence without the safety net of a regular paycheck and company-sponsored health insurance. For some it may be more of a reaching for something larger than the self and the family unit to be of service to – volunteering, starting a Facebook group to support a small business, joining a church or a dojo.

The more we heed the quiet, persistent inner voice, we recognize that perhaps we are afraid, but we are also awake. And as you get more adept at telling your fears to ‘have a seat and get their crayons out’, you get better at taking a deep breath and seeing that you’ve got this well in hand.

Do what makes you happy. Choose happiness. Accept that healing a broken heart is always a process, that perfection is never the goal, but learning from each moment and returning again and again to the exercise of choosing to love and respect ourselves and be happy no matter what that looks like – that is the goal. Launch it like a precious stone into the water, and leap in after it, watching rings of your own little pond purl outward toward the shore. Make big waves. And hope that they spiral ever outward, to encompass and embrace the world around us.

Jennifer Bent is a freelance writer, former print journalist and feature writer living on the West Coast. Nicknamed Verbose at a young age, she loves word craft but has to keep a short leash on her fondness for the profane. Jennifer enjoys compelling content and the liberty to write about interesting contributors and innovative ideas. Connect with Jennifer at verbosej@hotmail.com 

 

Since 2012, SAS for Women is entirely dedicated to the unexpected challenges women face while considering a divorce and navigating the divorce experience and its confusing afterward. SAS offers women six FREE months of email coaching, action plans, checklists and support strategies for you, and your future. Join our tribe and stay connected.

Manage divorce pain

How to Manage Pain During Divorce

When we’re in the midst of the visceral and all-encompassing agony of divorce, it’s difficult to cope with each breath, let alone remember that the pain eventually ends. The last thing we think about, but should address, is how to manage pain during divorce. The emotions are so strong and wide-spread that they often manifest as a physical presence. But it is a presence of emptiness.

This void contains the grief of losing love and the optimism that comes with it—that sense of possibilities that were open to us and now are not. There is the bruising nature of rejection, the fear of time wasted or of loneliness (a feeling exacerbated for so many now during the Covid quarantine), a sense of self and our own wholeness that seems to have vanished. The shock and anger over betrayal or having the bottom suddenly drop out from under us, the doubt that we can ever trust our own judgment again. But rest assured: the pain of divorce will not last forever.

To Manage Pain During Divorce, Allow Yourself to Feel.

It may seem counter-intuitive, but managing pain during your divorce means you have to actually allow yourself to experience these feelings—give them room to run and swing wildly. Allowing yourself to feel grief, fear, loneliness, and anger is exhausting and frightening; it feels like you’re in the middle of a stampede with no horse.

Even feeling hope can be painful in the aftermath of divorce, because the loss of your old hopes is fresh, and trusting that new ones can exist takes a while.

But it seems to be the consensus that healing requires you to face the full range of your emotions during divorce. Trying to reign in your emotions or muffle them with a smiling facade only works temporarily. Tamping down these feelings might be best saved for the times when you don’t want them to become a burden on people who are depending on you, like your children.

Trying to keep a permanent lid on emotions, though, is like trying to muffle a trashcan fire with a lid that doesn’t quite fit. It might seem to work, but the damage still spreads if you don’t actually address it. Putting off the experience of an emotion just gives it breathing room with no supervision. When we finally turn around and face it, we realize it’s only gotten bigger.

What actually helps with this pain management technique is to not just let the feelings run over you, but to run with them. It may sound ridiculous, but don’t worry: if you have enough emotional capacity to have a feeling, you are most likely strong enough to move with it.

So, What Are Effective Strategies to Manage Pain During Divorce?

One of the best ways to cope with divorce pain is to write your feelings out in a free-flow journal. Especially if you write without pausing or self-editing, you can scream as loudly as you want to on paper. Pouring all that angst, pain, and emotional murk through the sieve of a journal on a daily basis clears your mind so that you begin to address your own healing with acceptance and develop some rational ideas of what you need to do to rebuild. When you engage with your feelings in this way you become an active participant in them.

Seek Support

Another way to manage divorce pain and confusion is to reach out to a divorce coach, who can be one of the best sources of complete support for what you are going through. A coach can help you with all the logistical, financial, emotional, and practical issues that may overwhelm you. A coach, experienced in what is normal and what is not, is trained to help you embrace your emotions and heal so you can move forward completely and healthily.

Talk to the Hand

Sometimes it’s helpful to identify a particular emotion, name it, and talk to it as if it were an actual person. Snark helps. Anything that helps you laugh at the situation and at yourself helps. Pretend the feeling is one of the neighborhood kids who’s trying to sell you really ugly Christmas ornaments. You’re going to be friendly but firm and you’re likely going to be able to say no without many qualms. (And of course, since it’s not a real person, you’re free to be a little… tart):

“Well, good morning, Anxiety. Love the outfit. You seem to be doing just peachy today. I’m not in the mood for peaches, though. I see you, and I understand why you’re selling this wagon-load of crap, but it’s not your turn today.” Or something to that effect.

This acknowledges the feeling but externalizes it in a healthy way. It allows you to get far enough away from it to see it more clearly, and it also acts to separate you as a person from your actual feelings, which may be strong and feel like they’re trampling you at times, but are not actually you.

Laugh at Them

Do anything you can to laugh at your situation. Find the irony in it; snark it up, burn your bra while you dance around and film it (though if you do this, recall that you are not PBS; laughter only works therapeutically when it’s for your own satisfaction, or shared only with your closest, most trusted friends). Blow up balloons and write the things that are pissing you off on them and then get out your safety pin; swing an imaginary lasso around your head and yodel like a cowgirl when the feelings go rogue on you.

Said with brevity and levity, divorce is not exactly a party on two legs, but if you can laugh at it while you’re in it, you will move from survival to thriving a lot faster.

Turn Off the Anger Drip

For a lot of us, anger is easier to bear than pain. It feels more powerful than sadness, and it acts on neurotransmitters like an anesthetic. Anger can also be justified (often), and for women who have been emotionally or physically bullied by their husbands and/or painted into well-behaved corners, it’s especially important to speak that feeling. For others who might be inclined to run rampant with it, though, the thing to remember is that it does act like a drug. Too much anger for too long is corrosive to you and anyone in your vicinity who it might spill on.

Know When to Put the Thoughts Down

When we’re in the midst of a complex situation like divorce, it’s natural and healthy to think about where you are in the process, to consider how you got there, your own role in it, and how you might have done things differently. This kind of reflection is healthy, but it stops being a pain management technique when we begin steeping in thought patterns for too long. Brooding over a situation is called perseverating or ruminating, and it can eventually stain our thought processes the way tea that brews too long can stain a cup.

You need to grieve the possibilities that were a part of your union with the person you were married to. Sadness and all the other emotions that come with divorce should be felt. But new possibilities grow in their place. Like us, they change, and there are always more of them. Life never just boils down to one event or another; we are meant to be dynamic and each of us is bigger than a particular occurrence—even one as daunting as divorce.

 

Notes

Jennifer Bent is a freelance writer, former print journalist and feature writer living on the West Coast. Nicknamed Verbose at a young age, she loves word craft but has to keep a short leash on her fondness for the profane. Jennifer enjoys compelling content and the liberty to write about interesting contributors and innovative ideas. Connect with Jennifer at verbosej@hotmail.com 

Since 2012, SAS for Women is entirely dedicated to the unexpected challenges women face while considering a divorce and navigating the divorce experience and its confusing afterward. SAS offers women six FREE months of email coaching, action plans, checklists and support strategies for you, and your future. Join our tribe and stay connected.

 

Emotional stagesof separation

The Emotional Stages of Separation

Nothing nips at the Achille’s heel of normalcy quite like impending separation or divorce. A move to a new home is just that – an enormously chaotic and stressful task, but in the end, a relocation. A job change is fraught with nervy uncertainty, learning curves and new personalities — and it’s directly linked to survival, as so many are experiencing during the Covid-19 crisis — but as long as a job change doesn’t end in job loss, it involves the professional aspect of life, not all of them. You may not love your new coworkers and colleagues, but if your personal love life is intact, it’s much easier to push through professional stressors. A separation or divorce, though, usually encompasses all these aspects and more; it’s frequently a sandstorm of fear, pain, stress and emotional severings, unfamiliar decisions, diminished financial security – the list goes on. 

It can be nearly impossible to see our way to the next step in such a maelstrom, let alone out of it. It’s helpful to know that this is a common experience; it is normal for life to be completely abnormal for a while, for extremes to take over, for us to be unrecognizable to ourselves for periods of time. 

It is even more helpful to have a guide through the chaos, to know that there are emotional stages of separation common to all of us. Identifying these and trusting that they’re real can act like a lead rope in a blizzard, something to hang onto as we make our blinded and blind-sided way from the old doorway that is closing behind us, to the new one just opening.  

Emotional Stages of Separation: Fear and Denial 

We hear about fight or flight as a reaction to fear, but freezing is another, and with that response comes denial – a state of mind that so many of us are distressingly good at. Being afraid of any part of separation and divorce is understandable; it’s a rare person who can stare unflinchingly at that hydra of change and loss, betrayal, abandonment and all the other painful states of being that come with it. So, we freeze up and hide from it under a blanket of denial. We can stay under that blanket for a long time, often years, before we finally face that we need to leave a marriage.

Negotiating (a.k.a. Bargaining) 

While these emotional stages of separation don’t necessarily happen in this order (and many of us cycle through repeat performances in more than one stage), bargaining or negotiating the inevitable choice usually follows denial. When we finally pull off the blanket of denial and look at the truth, we often try to bargain for a version of it that is more livable in the short-term, and less daunting. We make trades: “If he (does this) or (doesn’t do) that for the next three months, I’ll throw away the divorce attorney’s phone number,” or “If we can get through R’s recital and K’s graduation without fighting about it, then I’ll have a sign that we can make it work.” 

This is the bargaining stage of separation, and it’s kind of like the lighter version of denial: you’re about to cross the Rubicon but you’re digging your heels in and looking for a way around it. 

Bargaining is normal, but eventually you recognize that you’re playing a delaying game with yourself. 

Anger

The anger stage of separation is where, between fight or flight, the fight response makes a grand entrance, and it is a diva in spurs.  

This is where we finally recognize that it’s over and we have to make this choice and we resent it; we are angry that it didn’t work, that we have to surrender that dream, that our spouse did something so intolerable that we can’t live with it anymore. This is the stage where we sometimes let the crazy out a little, where the “hell hath no fury” rips, where we place blame anywhere besides ourselves. We throw things, over-serve ourselves during cocktail hour and beyond, and have to apologize to people for taking their heads off for innocent remarks.

Generally accepted advice during this emotional stage of separation is to let yourself feel it, provided you’re not being self-destructive or actively taking it out on the people around you, particularly your children, who are going through their own emotional response to the upheaval in their lives. Feel it and let it be vented, but with someone safe, like a therapist or a divorce coach.

For women who have come out of abusive marriages or have been repressed, silenced or psychologically controlled in any way by their spouses, allowing your anger to have a voice is especially important.  

But, it’s also important to remember that anger can be destructive, particularly when paired with habits that can become addictive or corrosive (i.e. alcohol, cigarettes, other drugs, shopping sprees, etc.). So, allow it, but best to find a healthy outlet for it (journaling, working out, or talking with a coach or therapist, etc.) and not let it too far off the chain.

 Grief

This is the darkest part of any loss or change, and like the anger stage of separation, we’re encouraged to give it room and let ourselves feel it. Grieving the loss of a marriage, the ending of a dream, the alteration of a love to something much cooler, distant or reduced to ashes is healthy, even though it feels like we won’t survive it. Grief is awful; there’s a million ways to describe it, but boiled down to basics, it’s the stage you don’t think you’re going to survive. It is the stage that should lead you to a therapist or divorce coach (who may recommend a therapist), even if you feel like you can survive it. A professional can help you reroute your thinking and refocus, and can help you determine if your grief is morphing into a longer-term depression. In other words, allow yourself to feel it, but don’t allow yourself to wallow or stay in it too long without some support. Friends are wonderful but they are not professionals. 

Acceptance 

Altogether the very best stage of separation — even more so than the moving-on stage because of the contrast between it and the rending angst, acceptance is when your shoulders drop, your whole body sighs in relief, the sun comes out again. By now, we’ve gained some insight and perspective, as well, and while we might still miss some things, regret some things or have anger, we’ve embraced the new reality and are beginning to find the many gifts in it.


Learn more about the steps you can take to further your healing.

Read our “46 Steps to Divorce Recovery: A Definition and a Guide.”

 


Celebration and Moving On 

This is the stage where random pieces of furniture combine in geometrically fascinating ways with a hot new guy who may even make your ex-husband look like a bit of a candy-ass — which frankly, may not quite make it all worth it (for all of us), but it certainly makes us feel pretty fabulous about writing chapter two.

 

Jennifer Bent is a freelance writer, former print journalist and feature writer living on the West Coast. Nicknamed Verbose at a young age, she loves word craft but has to keep a short leash on her fondness for the profane. Jennifer enjoys compelling content and the liberty to write about interesting contributors and innovative ideas. Connect with Jennifer at verbosej@hotmail.com

 

Since 2012, SAS for Women is entirely dedicated to the unexpected challenges women face while considering a divorce and navigating the divorce experience and its confusing afterward. SAS offers women six FREE months of email coaching, action plans, checklists and support strategies for you, and your future. Join our tribe and stay connected.

divorced women

What All Divorced Women Have in Common

Years ago, when I was still shell-shocked from learning of my husband’s infidelity and angry that I had become a divorced woman, I went out to dinner with two friends. Both were divorced women, so we had that in common. But one was talking easily about co-hosting her son’s graduation party with her Ex and his new wife—the woman he’d left her for.

She barely even rolled her eyes when she said his name!

I couldn’t believe it. “How can you stand to be in the same room with him?” I asked, thinking of my own Ex-husband and the knot of dread and anxiety I felt just seeing his name pop up on my phone.

“It’s been five years,” she said. “After a while, I stopped caring about the past. You’ll get there too.”

She said this casually, with so much assurance, that I felt I had to believe her. But how could I?

I couldn’t imagine a day when I could be civil to my Ex

And I considered this pretty normal. Certainly, my other girlfriends who were newly divorced weren’t planning parties with their Ex-husbands. Like me, their scars were too fresh. They were still reeling from divorce fallout that seemed unending: Sandy was constantly facing her Ex in court, while Roxanne’s Ex refused to see or speak to her for more than a year. Linda was grieving not just the loss of her husband but the loss of her best friend, with whom he had an affair. Katie, in her sixties, had given up her retirement plans and savings for her second husband only to be abandoned and forced to navigate the harsh realities of a grey divorce.

What I knew for sure was that my friends and I, and many women like us, had been thrust into situations we never asked for.

As divorced women, how could we stop caring about the past when the past wouldn’t leave us alone?

I gave this a lot of thought. And I kept hearing my friend’s confident voice saying, “You’ll get there too.”


For more suggestions on how to move forward, check out What to Do After Divorce: Your Top 15 Best Moves


Then a funny thing happened. The more I thought about the past, the more I began seeing it through a different lens. In the same way that I had never imagined getting a divorce, I’d never imagined doing other challenging things, like not getting permission from the judge before moving my children to a safer, less expensive apartment. Or buying my own car without consulting with my Ex. Or enrolling in a course to become an energy medicine practitioner. Or learning to say no (full stop!) when my Ex tried to control my life.

When I focused on all the strong, independent moves I made throughout my divorce, the past didn’t seem so suffocating. In fact, I saw that I actually came through my divorce with the best gift imaginable: I met the best version of myself.

And this has been true for my friends too. We have something wonderful in common.

Divorced women have a secret superpower; it’s the strength to rise again

Not all of us look wildly successful on the outside. All of us still face challenges and struggles, but we share an inner strength that we never knew existed.

Here’s what that strength looks like:

Sandy spent so much time in court that she connected with someone who offered her a job as the office manager of an all-female law firm.

The extended cold shoulder Roxanne got from her Ex gave her the space to meet an amazing new partner.

Linda kept loneliness at bay by focusing on her education and career. She earned a doctorate degree and became a department head at a Big Ten university.

Katie, like me, wrote an award-winning memoir about surviving divorce.

Now, when I meet someone going through a divorce, I want to be the one offering assurances. I want to share what my friends and I have learned. I want to take that baffled, disbelieving woman gently by the shoulders, look her in the eyes, and tell her to have faith.

Divorced women are the strongest women you’ll ever meet

A divorced woman knows that the best version of her has gone ahead and is pulling her forward.

A divorced woman has earned a seat at a table loaded with resilience, clarity, wisdom, and freedom. And yes, it’s the very same table where she may, one day, have dinner with her Ex and her Ex’s new wife.

And it will be no big deal. I promise.

Tammy Letherer is an author and writing coach. Her most recent book, The Buddha at My Table: How I Found Peace in Betrayal and Divorce, is a Gold Medal Winner in the Living Now Book Awards and in the Human Relations Indie Book Awards. It was also a finalist in the 2018 Best Book Awards and National Indie Excellence Awards. 


Change the course of your life — AFTER DIVORCE!

Paloma’s Group™: Learning the Art of Reinvention.

For newly independent women, post-divorce. Over the course of (only) 3 months, each live-coaching, online class ​builds on a core theme required to ​design a life you deserve. Schedule a FREE, 15-minute coaching session to explore (and experience) how this remarkable group of post-divorce women will plan and act on creating a life they love.

We promise — whether you join us for Paloma or not  — you’ll walk away from your complimentary coaching-session discovering a next step in your unique After Divorce journey. 

“We choose not to do it alone.” ~ SAS for Women

* At SAS we respect same-sex marriages, however, for the sake of simplicity in this article we refer to your spouse as a male.

You Are Not Alone: Women Reach to Kavanaugh

You are Not Alone: Women React to Kavanaugh Confirmation

Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony in Justice Kavanaugh’s nomination proceedings, the #MeToo movement, and the appointment of Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court will and have had a lasting impact on our everyday lives. Whether you’re a political person or not, conservative or progressive, single, married, or divorced, women are feeling the Kavanaugh effects. But today, this post is here to remind you that if you are hurt, if you feel silenced, if you feel powerless, you are not alone—other women are not only feeling the same way as you but are here to support you.

Women across the political spectrum have reached out to SAS for Women to share their reactions to the Kavanaugh nomination hearing and Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony. You may see yourself in some of their experiences and emotions. Even when things look darkest, we have other women whom we can create a community of care and support with.

The women below wished to be kept anonymous, so all names used are fictitious.

Mariana P.

Twenty-three years ago, Mariana P. was in college when she was sexually assaulted. She didn’t report it. “Right now, my brain is consumed with the fact that I’m thinking about divorce, have a lot of work-related stress, and parenting a special needs child,” she said. For her, living now in Madison, Wisconsin, “the Kavanaugh nomination [now confirmation] and testimony has opened up old wounds.”

Thursday after work, I found myself buried under the covers of my bed and just cried for a couple of hours . . . I felt completely alone.

It’s amazing how quickly 23 years can disappear, leaving one feeling like a scared college girl again, trying to make sense of something terrible that’s happened to you. Mariana’s husband, soon to be Ex, knows of her past and her story but couldn’t be there for her.

Divorce is hard for so many reasons—not just because of the problems driving us to end our marriage but sometimes because we feel like we’re losing one of our closest friends and confidants. Even if those beliefs are fantasies (and he was never there) or actually based on another time when your marriage was stronger, the revelation hurts. Other times, political or social issues underscore the rifts and disappointments we are feeling in our intimate world. Survivors like Mariana are finding themselves triggered by Christine’s testimony and the appointment of Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by those emotions, find community, a guided support group, a friend or family member, or a professional.

Lorraine T.

Lorraine T. has been married for 10 years, with the last five years of her marriage described as rough. She loves her three beautiful children and is in school working toward a degree, but she also feels trapped. Her husband gaslights her. She feels like she can do better on her own without his lies and manipulative behavior. She feels so consumed by her own life and sense of loss that she hasn’t even been able to turn on the TV and listen to the news about Kavanaugh.

And that’s totally fine. When our own lives get overwhelming, sometimes it’s too much to look beyond our immediate problems at the bigger social picture. What’s most important is getting yourself and your situation sorted so that you feel like you are in a safe space. Piling social problems on top of personal problems only adds to feelings of being overwhelmed and isn’t healthy for anyone.

If you are in an abusive marriage and want to figure a way out, you will want to read: “Leaving an Abusive Marriage? There are Steps You Need to Take First”

Frieda N.

Representing another point of view is Frieda in Utica, New York.  A registered nurse, who is divorced after 28 years of marriage and the mother to two young adults. Frieda says, “Frankly I am starting to feel sorry for the men. No one can give a woman a compliment for fear of losing their job. Women can accuse men of things with NO PROOF whatsoever. No one deserves to be raped but when a woman uses her feminine wiles to appeal to a man’s baser instinct to get a job or promotion (and yes this DOES occur), they should own up to the fact that they ‘played the game’ and expected something in return. Pretty soon, we won’t be able to speak to the opposite sex. I am disgusted with Dr. Ford. This guy had some fairly big jobs before, and it took 40 years for the ‘trauma’ to emerge?”

Frieda, thank you for taking the time to share your view. Your perspective and conflation of Dr. Ford with other experiences you’ve observed points to the complexity and emotional volatility related to these issues.

Heeyeon S.

You are not alone women respond to Kavanaugh

Credit: Weheartit

Living in New York City, Heeyeon S. is angry. “[I’m] very angry with the Brett Kavanaugh nomination, appointment, and the way Christine Blasey Ford has been treated by the Republicans and other Americans throughout this process.” She sees this as “a manifestation of how men in power can force their will on all of us. What’s happening is a metaphor for sexual assault itself. The more we say ‘No, stop, this isn’t right,’ the more they insist, force, and bully us.”

Anger is a valid reaction to what is happening and to what is going on in American politics right now. Heeyeon elaborates, saying “I don’t know what to do with this anger. Suppressing it is not an option. I have enough suppressed anger to last me various lifetimes! I would like to use this anger in a constructive way to make a change, but that’s easier said than done.”

Heeyeon is also adjusting to life as a recently single woman after 35 years of marriage and is trying to “reevaluate and reconcile my past” with “how to go on in a productive way, with me at the center, for the first time ever.” Trying to find the center and balance in a newly single life is already rough, but add to that the anger and resentment many women across the nation are feeling about Kavanaugh and life gets a little bit harder. In times like this, it’s good to remember not just your own past but also the fact that other women out there feel the same way you do.

If you feel like Heeyeon too—angry with the strong need to do something—keep reading below.

Matilda F.

Married for 28 years, divorced now for three, Matilda is an art teacher doing her own work and “loving life and my freedom.”  However, when it comes to the Kavanaugh confirmation, she’s so angry she wants to put her emotion to work. “I WANT TO GET INVOLVED in something related to our politics because I am outraged and tearful. Would love to hear what others are doing!”

As we say, keep reading.

Women react to Kavanaugh Confirmation

Credit: Unsplash

Katrina V.S.

As if in answer to Matilda’s and Heeyeon’s rage, Katrina, widowed and living in Brooklyn shared this link with the SAS community on how Democrats can regain the House in November by getting out the vote in key swingable districts.  “If you or anyone you know wants to channel their outrage into useful action, this organization—Swing Left—is a good place to start,” says Katrina.

Volunteer in the midterms

Celine D.

“Neither the Kavanaugh/Ford situation or the #MeToo movement play any role in the downfall of my marriage,” says Celine D. Celine has been married for ten years and is a teacher and a mother to two in Austin, Texas. “My husband decided he no longer wanted to be a husband. He was unhappy and wasn’t going to change, he told me. He refused marriage counseling, individual counseling, and anything else that represented him not quitting the marriage. He said he didn’t want to answer to anyone and wanted to do as he pleased (staying out all night drinking). Picking up the pieces of a broken family and learning a new normal as a single mom is what I am facing.  My marriage had its issues well before these things made the news.”

We get it, Celine. It’s hard to imagine how headlines can impact our own fight for survival. And yet we know, when the dust settles after “resolving” your relationship, you will want the best options available to you as a newly independent woman. And we hope your health insurance and your ability to exercise choice when it comes to freedoms for your body and your daughter’s is not mitigated as a result of these political times.

Eliza C.

“It’s as if we continue to hit these watershed moments, points of no return, when the rifts in our country our ripped open so seismically that the gap seems impossible to mend,” says Eliza C., an educator who is divorced and living in Minnesota. “Each time, we think it’s a new reckoning, a new all-time low—or for some, a long-awaited vindication, a new dawn. What’s clear is this gaping wound is not being tended to but fed. The leaders who might be trying to help us learn what healing looks like (the Martin Luther Kings, the activist peacemakers) are not given airtime. Their message doesn’t sell. Mutual hate is amped.

It reminds me of a marriage spiraling out of control, where both spouses believe they are the one who is right. They are unable to communicate or hear each other. Vilification of the other is easy. Hitting pause to listen and really hear what is going on is the work we must do.

Believe me, I have to check myself for I too am growing intolerant of this dated white male privilege we see personified by Kavanaugh’s confirmation. But is my participation in ‘the hating’ moving us along the evolutionary path? I don’t think so. Trying to forge through conflict with an eye toward healing is the hardest thing of all. My divorce taught me that.”

Susan M.

Separated and the mother to one young adult son in Manhattan, Susan, like other women who wrote us, feels the urgency to channel her rage into action. “There’s Postcards to Voters which anyone can do from home, as many or as few as you have time or energy for. I’ve been writing these with friends. We get together for tea … and other drinks, and instead of just kvetching, we are doing something! Well, we kvetch, too. But it sure feels good to vent and take action.”

Volunteer with Postcards to Voters

Helena W.

You are Not Alone. Women react to Kavanaugh

Credit: Unsplash

Helena W., still married, shares that “watching the Kavanaugh hearings and knowing of his appointment has been an overwhelming experience for me as a woman. I remembered so many times during my life when I felt cornered or uncomfortable around men and frighteningly aware of my own physical vulnerability.” But there is hope out there, and Helena has tapped into it. “Since the Kavanaugh hearings,” she writes, “I have been in touch with a wide range of friends from ages 27 to 85—all of whom have stories about work-related sexual harassment.”

The Senate confirming this man feels like a blow. The message is clear—the men with the greatest power in the country do not care about women. They do not believe our stories and they do not feel women should have control of their own bodies.

But Helena, living in Upstate New York, does find a silver lining despite Kavanaugh’s confirmation. While the stories are sad and the situations are dire, she is working on building herself a network of support and care through reaching out to her friends and sharing stories. “I heard the wonderful, clear and expressive voices of the ‘elevator women’ who confronted Senator Jeff Flake. I heard their pain, and I saw his expression when he was forced to face a concept that had dissolved and took human form.”

‘Don’t look away from me,’ one of the women cried. That battle cry alone gives me hope for the future.

Brenda S.

Brenda, divorced and living in Columbus, Ohio, is rebuilding her life after 42 years of marriage. The pain, the loss, and the learning that presents itself after such a momentous break up has Brenda considering things in a different way. We like so much what Brenda says (born from her firsthand experience) that it inspires us to end this post with her words:

“It’s fall: election season. I’m watching what everyone else sees: polarization and a reduction in civil discourse. But I thought of something today. Just as in a “carbon footprint,” what if we had a “civility footprint”? Except this one you want to grow larger, not smaller.

I know from experience that all meaningful change happens at the personal level.  Therefore, what if you leaned into discomfort and listened, actually listened to those around you who have ideas widely divergent from yours? What if you gave them respect, instead of dismissing, or worse yet, yelling at them or shutting them off? What if, when they are sharing the ideas most different from yours, you allowed yourself to be even more uncomfortable and said “TELL ME MORE….”

Here’s the thing: ‘PEOPLE ARE HARD TO HATE CLOSE UP:  MOVE IN!!!’

Those are not my words about moving in, but Brene Brown’s. ‘The point.’ says Brown, “is that we are all vulnerable to the slow and insidious practice of dehumanizing, therefore we are all responsible for recognizing and stopping it.’

We cannot ask politicians to reach across the aisle unless we ourselves are doing it. TAKE THE CHALLENGE!”

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While these women have had a vast range of reactions and experiences throughout Dr. Ford’s testimony and the Kavanaugh confirmation to the Supreme Court, all have felt the need to share their stories to help other women experiencing similar emotions feel less alone. Among these sisters, too, are those who build upon the momentum of sharing and offer us resources or a challenge to inspire us to be more and do more. If any of these stories connect with you or if you simply feel like sharing your thoughts or a resource you know, we would love to hear from you. We invite you to comment below.

 

Whether you are considering a divorce or already navigating the confusing experience, one thing we see making a significant difference for women is the conscious choice to not do divorce alone. Since 2012, smart women around the world have chosen SAS for Women to partner them through the emotional, financial, and oft times complicated experience of Divorce. “A successful divorce requires smart steps, taken one at a time.” – SAS for Women 

Image about breaking up with a narcissist

Divorcing a Narcissist? Here’s What You Need to Know

Calling someone a narcissist is so commonplace these days that, in many ways, the term has become nothing more than a buzzword. People use it loosely to refer to someone who’s behaving “selfishly”.

But a true pathological narcissist is a person who’s much more than selfish. According to the Mayo Clinic, narcissistic personality disorder “is a mental condition in which people have an inflated sense of their own importance, a deep need for excessive attention and admiration, troubled relationships, and a lack of empathy for others. But behind this mask of extreme confidence lies a fragile self-esteem that’s vulnerable to the slightest criticism.”

Most women who fall in love with a narcissist do so because narcissists are so charming. They’re incredibly loving and affectionate. They treat you like no one has ever treated you before and sweep you off your feet. They seem too good to be true.

And that’s the truth of it—they are too good to be true, and their personality and behavior will change dramatically over time.

If you recognize the following as being “normal” in your marriage, you know you’re divorcing a narcissist:

  • Your husband* is controlling.
  • He doesn’t listen to or care about your opinions.
  • He makes everything about him.
  • He lies often.
  • He is emotionally abusive.
  • He has no emotional connection to your children.
  • He blames others for his actions.
  • He is manipulative.
  • He is exceptionally aggressive—perhaps dangerously so.
  • He is unaware of his bad behavior.
  • He feels entitled to what he wants.
  • He sees himself as perfect and worthy of unconditional admiration.
  • He rejects change initiated by anyone but himself.

Because of this last point, divorcing a narcissist is extremely challenging. He will fight you every single step of the way. He believes he is a victim and is willing to do just about anything to prove it.

Some of the biggest and most predictable challenges of divorcing a narcissist include dealing with the following behaviors and beliefs:

  • A narcissist MUST “win.” Because of this mindset, negotiating in good faith with a narcissist is impossible. He must prove he is right and a victim—regardless of what the truth is. He doesn’t care what it takes to “win” the divorce, even if that means depleting the marital finances (except for money he’s hidden), destroying relationships, and destroying you.
  • A narcissist will play games with you as long as he can. He needs to feel in control. He does this by being manipulative. He will keep you off balance by making false accusations, criticizing you one minute and telling you how much he loves you the next—anything to wear you down, so he can win.
  • A narcissist doesn’t care how anyone else feels about his actions, including his children. Narcissists only care about their own needs and desires. If someone can help them get what they want, then they will use that person without regard for the consequences.
  • A narcissist will use you to feel good about himself. By engaging you in a court battle (which he will absolutely do), he is using his control of you to make himself feel powerful. He wants the divorce process to take as long as possible. Yes, that does mean he will lie to prolong the process. It’s unlikely he will stop trying to use you after the divorce settlement—even if he is in another relationship. The more people a narcissist can control the better.
  • A narcissist wants you to admit defeat. He wants you to give in to his demands and bow to his power. But not just once—he won’t ever get tired of you surrendering to his superiority.
  • A narcissist wants everyone else to see him as a victim. No matter how horrid he is behaving toward you (and maybe even his children), he craves the pity and support of others, so he can use that pity against you.He will lie repeatedly and quite convincingly (especially if he is charming and wealthy) to perpetuate his role as victim and paint you as a heartless villain. He will even lie to your children and family about you. He wants to turn those closest to you against you because he wants you to have nothing left.
  • A narcissist will attack your weaknesses. That usually means he will go after your children and money. He will remove you from joint accounts or withdraw all the money from them. He will hide money. He will run up your bills any way he can think of. He will also do his best to turn your children against you.
  • A narcissist will take you back to court again and again. As far as he is concerned, the battle is never over so long as he has some leverage. And the leverage is usually your children. He will register the children for activities during your time with them without consulting you. He will “forget” to pick up the kids when he knows you have other plans. He will return the children later than agreed to. He will not respect the custody agreement.

But since you now have an idea of what divorcing a narcissist is like, you can prepare for the battle ahead instead of being ambushed.

Here are some steps you’ll want to take to minimize the damage you suffer during and after your divorce:

  • Make sure your attorney is aware of the problem and is proactive. You want your attorney to have experience dealing with high-conflict divorces and know what to expect from a narcissist. When they’re properly experienced and prepared, they can shut down at least some of the standard tactics a narcissist will use in court (if you must go there).
  • Get a therapist who specializes in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). If you were married to a narcissist, your marriage was full of emotional abuse. Any kind of abuse can lead to PTSD. You will probably want to consider working with a therapist to help you regain your emotional footing.
  • Hire a divorce coach. Learning how a divorce coach can help you stay anchored (and using one!) could be one of your most important moves for securing perspective, strength, and support. Your divorce coach will also help you process the grief, loneliness, anger, and other tumultuous emotions you’ll have before, during, and beyond. If necessary, your divorce coach can even join you throughout the court proceedings. But your “beyond” is critical. Your divorce coach is going to make sure you stay mindful to creating the life you DO deserve.
  • Keep copies of EVERYTHING. Especially when it comes to expenses, you’ll want to keep detailed records of everything. It’s VERY likely that you’ll be going to court repeatedly. The only way you’ll be able to quickly put an end to each new drama when it arises is to have indisputable facts. And that’s what the detailed records are—indisputable facts.
  • Assume all communication with a narcissist is risky. Whenever you communicate with a narcissist, keep things direct, to the point, and non-confrontational. This is the only way to prevent him from using your written or spoken words against you.

When divorcing a narcissist, you must prepare for war. You will face many battles because a narcissist wants to destroy you at virtually any cost.

But when you understand more about a narcissist’s profile (what you can and cannot expect from him) and begin to value your own self-worth—getting the full support you need and deserve—you will eventually have the peaceful life you’re looking for, the life you were meant to live.

SAS women are those amazing ladies you meet who are entirely committed to navigating divorce—on their own terms. If you are considering or dealing with divorce, you are invited to experience SAS for Women firsthand and schedule your FREE 15–minute consultation. Whether you work further with us or not, we’ll help you understand what your next, black and white steps are for walking into your brave unknown—with compassion and integrity.

* SAS for Women fully recognizes same-sex and common-law marriages. But for the sake of simplicity in this article, we refer to your spouse or mate as “he,” “him,” or your “husband.”