I was lucky to have the support of my friends and family when I went through my divorce.  While I’m grateful, I also recognize how those closest to us can hold us back and prevent healthy closure.

Upon hearing the news of my cheating husband and pending separation, a co-worker advised, “You’ll want alimony.  You’re lucky that you can get it these days.  It hasn’t always been so easy.”  When I told her that I was looking forward to financial independence, she was shocked.  “You never know,” she warned.  “It would be nice to have some extra money.”

“Make him pay,” a friend told me as she handed over the phone number for her attorney.

Yet another pal educated me about fault divorces and suggested that I expose my husband’s infidelity through the court system.  I was instructed to slash his tires, take his business and smear his name all over town.

I obeyed only a few of those suggestions.  I made threats and held on to some petty treasures.  Ultimately, that behavior benefitted nobody.  It proved only to stall the process, thus delaying my decree of liberation.

My friends meant well and did exactly as they thought they should.  They stuck by my side and defended me.  They wanted to protect me from the perceived enemy.  The problem was that I didn’t want to fight against my ex to obtain a divorce.  I intended to work with him to reach our common goal of dissolving the marriage.  That’s really what divorce is all about, isn’t it?

The truth is that our well-meaning friends and family can retard our healing.  While it’s often true that we need support in the beginning, the time will come when we can again stand on our own.  Unfortunately, we might not realize it if we are surrounded by loved ones who remain depressed, angry, confused, bitter or vengeful on our behalf.

Attitudes and emotions are contagious.  It’s impossible to move on when Mom is still coddling us.  It’s hard to forgive and let go if our best friend reminds us every day that the ex is a piece of trash.  How can we find compassion in our hearts while our co-workers are coaching us to exact revenge?  Remember that old saying about sleeping with dogs?  You get the idea…

Remaining angry and re-enforcing negative aspects of the relationship or separation will not propel you closer to freedom.  Rather, it will ensure that you remain a prisoner of your pain.  The opposite of love is indifference.  If you’re hating, you’re not healing.  And if others are helping you hate, they’re hurting your game.

For maximum mental health, pay attention to the attitudes of those around you.  Focus on the present and ask your friends for their encouragement toward your new and improved life.  Learn from the past and then let it go.  Your future will thank you.

Author Bio:

Tara Eisenhard is a pro-divorce enthusiast.  She believes that a marriage should not survive at the expense of its participants and that families evolve, not dissolve, as a result of divorce.  She loves dogs, drives a Saturn and happily cohabitates with a divorced dad.  Tara is the author of the blog “Relative Evolutions” located at thedivorceencouragist.wordpress.com.  She tweets @dvrcncouragist and welcomes feedback via divorce.encouragist@gmail.com.

Question:

Dear Shelley,

I am going through a divorce after suffering abuse for two and a half years: emotional, verbal, and physical. I turned to my parents to let me live with them in my old bedroom until my divorce gets sorted and they agreed. I am independent, have no children, and I financially help my parents now.

The problem, however, is that I have a controlling sister who runs the house of my parents. She constantly picks on me and says I am causing depression in the whole house because of the worries I bring with my divorce.  Now my parents have stopped talking to me and constantly tell me I have to leave as soon as I am divorced.  That won’t be for another couple of months.

Can you please tell me something about parents’ favoritism, unfair treatment, abandonment, and rejecting their divorced kid because she’s a “burden”?

Thank you
Sam

Answer:

Dear Sam,

Here is what I can tell you about parents favoritism, unfair treatment, abandonment, and rejecting a divorced kid because she’s a burden:  sometimes our reality is not what we might have planned or freely chosen, but it is our reality.  To try to explain your sister or your parents without knowing your situation in detail is impossible.  It does seem to me that the situation is untenable for you and that you need to claim responsibility for your life and move on.  Your parents are your parents. Your sister is your sister. I doubt that you can change them BUT you can choose the best way to handle the situation. Living there is not serving you. It is upsetting and damaging.  You might want to consider how you want to live your life and start taking steps towards that life.

Do not take your parents asking you to move as a rejection…it is just who they are.

Shelley

Shelley Stile is an ACC certified Divorce Recovery Life Coach and author who guides her clients to let go the pain of their divorce and move on to create new and vibrant lives after divorce. Shelley has been through her own divorce so she knows first-hand about the journey of divorce recovery. Receive her free, powerful e-book, The 10 Secrets to Coping with Divorce’, and her monthly ‘Take Back Your Life After Divorce’ Newsletter by going to: http://www.freedivorcesupport.com.

Can family help when you’re going through divorce? You bet. But when it comes to this particular bumpy road and the months that follow, don’t discount the importance of friends.

Don’t get me wrong – family is fantastic – and the more supportive they are, the better. Have kids? You’re all the more fortunate if parents or siblings can take them for a day, provide continuity in routines, and surround them with a sense of love and security. It will give you a break and ease your qualms, your guilt, your anger, your grief, and your worry. And yes – you’ll feel all those things. Divorce sparks so many emotions, unfastening your dreams, destabilizing your beliefs, and tossing your reality onto another planet.

But girlfriend – those other girlfriends can really be your anchors.

Think you needed good women in your life before? You need them more than ever now. To share confidences as you rediscover yourself. To vent, to rant, to cry, and simply to hold you. To reassure you that moving on was inevitable, or in your best interest.

One of them may have been through it herself, and can provide genuine empathy – as well as practical advice. Some will assist with childcare, others will offer coffee and a kind ear, or a few hours at the movies, sharing laughter.

Reasonable expectations

If you’re being slammed by every sort of change possible – revealing disclosures about your spouse’s infidelities or business dealings, financial stress, the need to sell your home, children who require comfort and clarity during a time of turmoil – what’s reasonable to expect from your friends?

• Will a friend of six months be as likely to help as a friend of ten years? Of course not.
• If your divorce drags on and you rant every time you’re out with friends, is that reasonable? Definitely not.
• What about married friends who shared couples’ activities with you and your spouse? What if they feel put in the middle?

Be mindful – and considerate – even when you’re at your worst, and struggling through what may feel like the rockiest time of your life. Steadfast friends who have shared your ups and downs for decades will stand by you, but friendship is a two-way street. It cannot always be about you, your kids, your problems. Your friends have issues, too. They still need you – as a friend. And I learned this the hard way. I was so lost in the thick of my own troubles, I was unable to give.

Post Divorce Friendships

Coming out the other side, now many years after divorce, I have two friends who remain from the time “before.” One lives hundreds of miles away; we’ve been girlfriends for as long as I can remember, believing in each other through good times and bad, and we keep in touch through letters, emails, and phone calls.

The other friend was a caring shoulder during my divorce, and in the early years after. It wasn’t easy on her, but she stuck it out with me, and I’ve never forgotten her kindness and courage in doing so.

On your post-divorce planet, you’ll be seeking new relationships. Romantic and sexual liaisons are fantastic – and part of the process of finding a single “you” again. But remember that friendships are elemental. Cherish those you have, and continue to expand your community of great women – and men. Be there for them, as they will be for you.

© D. A. Wolf

These days, Big Little Wolf (”Ms. Big”) reflects on life and her Daily Plate of Crazy, where she writes essays on everything – sometimes serious, sometimes fun – whatever strikes her on a given day as interesting, unusual, entertaining, or of concern.

I have a friend who is really down in the dumps.  It seems to be pretty prevalent these days.

She’s strong, she’s independent, she’s wise and she feels beaten.  Her life has so many dark corners in it right now and she finds some comfort in staying in those dark places where the shadows match her moods.

I can give all sorts of advice about how I have crawled out of dark places but I can’t force her to take the advice.  I can beg her to go to her doctor, get a check-up, get her blood work done, talk, tell her doctor how she’s feeling.  I can describe the feeling of a new haircut but when the chair swivels around, the face is still the same, lined in grief.  Still the sensation of someone else touching my hair, the lovely snip of scissors, the fresh feeling when I reach up to feel healthy ends.

I suggest massages, opening up to hands on her body to knead out the knots from too-tight shoulders or an aching back.  I have heard tales of masseusses who have had their clients crying from deep inside, the kneading of their torn hearts moving through the aching bones and muscles. It’s part of healing to lose those tears when they come freely.

Or even something as trivial as going out to the mailbox to get your mail.  Instead of slippers and sweatpants, forcing yourself into nice jeans, a top that accents your eyes, a little mascara and brushing your teeth.  Taking that step past your mailbox and taking a deep breath.  Moving on.

I bought myself an ipod and loaded songs from every single chapter of my life on to it.  I found a walking track very close to my home and started to walk.  I’d have to shove myself out of the door every day at the beginning but I had a job to do ~ for myself ~ and no one was going to do it for me.

Watching cooking shows and being inspired with fresh foods, colours and crispness.  Focus on things other than what surrounds you, instead open yourself up to what is right about your life because there is so much.

Try a gratitude journal.  Every day write ten things that make you feel grateful.  Some days it’s enough just to think, “I woke up”  and “I’m breathing” and “I have eyes so I can see.”  But if you begin to take notice of things to appreciate, more things come into view.

Read good books.  Read funny books.  Read Janet Evanovich.  Laugh our loud.  Dance behind closed doors, smile at the face in the mirror.  Find your good side.

You can wallow or you can move.  You can shrink or you can grow.  The bottom line is that it is up to you, how you choose to look at your life.  Be kind to yourself, look for bliss.  In the smallest of places you will find a forget-me-not.  Look for it.  Don’t give up, don’t hide away.  It’s all up to you…

More Articles:

What do You Say to a Grieving Friend?

Turning an Unwanted Divorce Into an Opportunity

Depression…Do You Get It?

A very special friend of mine, very recently divorced after having too long a wait, is torn about her friends.

That’s the excess that comes from divorce, how badly it hurts everyone else.  The families ~ who do they go to for Christmas?  Can they invite one parent (children negotiable), leaving the other to their own devices?

The soccer team, dance school, teachers, school… How do we finesse this?

And the friends.  Once a large and boisterous group of pranksters, mothers, party-goers, trivia night experts ~ how do we do that great divide?

I did what worked for me, what hurt me badly ~ but because I run from confrontation, I made it easy for all of them ~ I evaporated from the scene.  I shut my door and didn’t make any calls.  And I stared and stared at my answering machine that read a constant ‘0’ calls received.

I wanted them to reach out to me but I gave the impression that I wanted to be left alone.  My loneliness was immeasurable and I could not speak.

My (heart) friends, the ones who have been with me for lifetimes, knocked on my door and embraced me.  They taught me how to walk again.  And as I re-entered my life I saw the faces of those who never made the effort.  The pain came tumbling in on me all over again ~ a far different pain than that of being abandoned by my husband.

With HIS pain I found my feet because I had to, no one else could do it for me.  But that searing pain of seeing that face, that woman who had sworn eternal sisterhood with me, who knew my confidences, who walked breezily through my home as if it had been her own ~ and who had never even made an effort to acknowledge me in my aftermath, burned even deeper than the lost love of my childrens’ father.

I spent a lot of time ducking, just in case…  Why?  Why should that woman’s rejection of me hurt so deeply?  Why, when I finally ventured out into the world, should I be ready to run in case SHE were there?

The answer is simpler than I thought.  She hurt me because I LET her hurt me.  I gave her permission to hurt me. I handed her my devotion like a piece of delicate glass, expecting that she would treat me carefully, honouring me as I honoured her.  I offered myself freely and without hesitation she let me fall, shattering into a thousand sharp-edged glittering pieces.

So we have choices. If I choose to become one with someone, I have an awareness that this intimacy allows abuse of my character.  I don’t want to be selfish with my love but I will be more careful, less forgiving of those small signs of imbalance.  I learned a magic word ~ BOUNDARIES.  I now know to shut a door quickly when things start to go awry.  I have learned how to keep control of my essence.

Eleanor Roosevelt said, ‘No one can make you feel inferior without your permission.’  I think that says it all.  If they hurt you, if you doubt them, release them… like that old adage, ‘If you love something, let it go.  If it comes back to you, it’s yours.  If it doesn’t, it never was…”   And the final thought?  You are better off without the dramas.