Divorced means you are wrapped up in grief because the dream of the family is lost. Being divorced is really about having a whole new world view come into play. Just like grief, being divorced takes a good amount of time to recover.
It takes time to begin to think your way through all the feelings & to begin to care about life again after getting divorced.
If you are the one left behind in divorce, then you are drowning in a whole lot of shock & surprise. Often the one who leaves hasn’t said enough about the why. This is complicated because the one who was dumped probably avoided dealing with the hard truths & hasn’t been able to hear them. It almost always takes two, whether you want to believe that, or not.
Prior to being divorced, there is a lot of avoiding that is going on. This happens in divorces because someone is “afraid” to hurt the other person with the truth. Really they are deflecting their own responsibility to be authentic about the problems & struggles that are part of every long-term relationship.
Prior to getting divorced, one of the biggest betrayals that generally occurs; there were massive layers of resentments that have been stashed & hoarded over time so that any possibility of problem solving was extinguished.
Growing from dealing with this after being divorced means either 1. learning to be more direct with a new partner or 2. Don’t trust silence or never fighting in a relationship. Silence simply means someone is swallowing their differences which always bites you in the butt down the road.
Divorces are always caused by a lack of respect. Remember you will have a chance to live your life differently with this crucial ingredient in the future.
A second massive betrayal in being divorced, would be that you must now reenter the world alone, that buddy who acknowledged you & who really used to “get” who you are is gone. You must now reenter the world unacknowledged by someone else. Even if you have kids, your peer is absent now (& kids should not be your replacement buddy no matter how lonely it gets).
The loneliness can be very daunting when you are first getting used to being divorced.
What’s the growing opportunity here you may wonder? I once read “Solitude is the nurse of the soul”. I can’t remember where I read it & googling did not work. I do know this to be true. Being divorced can offer you an opportunity to remember who you are, separate from anyone else in the world.
Both before & after divorce take the time to grieve and balance this by not getting so lost in grief that you lose your inner ballast.
Being divorced is complicated, messy and may seem completely unbearable in the beginning. Know that you will find the strength to bear it with more time under your belt. In a year & a half it will be bearable and you will not only glimpse light at the end of the tunnel, but you will be certain the light is there.
Being divorced means you will need to take care of yourself with the basics; enough sleep, healthy eating & 150 minutes of exercise a week. Sleep requires going to bed at the same time & wake up at the same time & a minimum of 7 hours. Pick one of these three, to put in place for 90 days & then choose another.
Being divorced means that you need to build a larger support system. Try volunteering, join a church for the community it offers or try a meeting of Parents without Partners. You will also need to make some new friends who are single.
