How to Survive a Divorce
You must forgive yourself.
How to survive a divorce While your best friend along with her “perfect” soon-to-be-husband is about to cut her Fruit cocktail cake which was specially prepared for her wedding, you receive a text from your soon-to-be-exhusband: “I’d like to file for a divorce next week. And I’ll pull out my stuff from home by tomorrow. Moreover, I still remember the night when I proposed you, where we were having Jewish apple cake on a candle light dinner.
Good bye.” Receiving a text like above however soothing your surroundings at that time maybe, it could shatter your heart into pieces. For some, this may come out as a surprise and for others, who knows pretty well that their relationship is not working, they might simply expect it but it’s just a matter of when. Coping up from a divorce like break-up is hard. Acknowledging this initially is the biggest dead weight that you can put down. Because most people who look forward to recover sooner from a divorce, beat themselves up that they should be recovering faster while their sub-conscious mind is still clinging onto the guilt-ridden past and anxious future.
Having accepted the fact that this is going to be around for a while, there are a whole lot of other things that comes gushing into your mind – A feeling of left behind or regression or a step back that your friends whom you grow up with are getting married, giving birth, breastfeeding and so on, while you’re let alone, reading and signing divorce papers. You look at their social media accounts saying, “Happily married” and you feel that sharp feeling of regression. Adding to your friends, your ex-husband also might be posing with his soon-to-be-wife which might also make you feel like you want to hang yourself. After the initial bad phase of thoughts where you’ve been comparing yourself with others and feeling frustrated about it all the time, you move on to next bad phase where your suddenly realize that the “couple goals” which you planned all along for the future were all burnt into ashes.
Hours you both spent choosing a perfect place to settle down or fighting over potential names for a to-be-born-baby were all ruined. Coping up with an uncertain future where you have to re-think and re-imagine your entire future makes you anxious and unwilling than grievance about the past. Reality kicks in at the hard time and you gradually realize about your failing finances, uncertainty about the kids and their future, conveying the bad news to parents, etc. There might be a whole ton of other bad stuff that you might be facing through but there’s a way to deal all those. First off, accept the fact that coping up with a divorce is hard and it takes time to recover.
Acknowledge the fact that pain is also a part of life and experiencing it beautifully while you’re in it begets new wisdom since every situation is a give and take in life. You’ll be more patient and kinder with people, empathizing with people who are suffering mentally and spiritually which is not something that one typically gains by posing to pictures with their husband or wife. Secondly, shut off from social media and have some compassion upon yourself. While you’re in a turbulence of bad emotions and feelings, anything that adds to it may turn out to be bad for you. Smiling faces of your married friends where you should supposed to be feeling happy for them, you’ll feel jealous and a whole lot of other negative stuff. Social media immediately puts you in a state where you are comparing your life versus others even before you realize. So, loving yourself and finding strength upon yourself can save you a big time.
