A Woman's Guide to Surviving Divorce

CHAPTER 1

IT HAPPENED

Everything that you have known and believed to be your life, is gone. You take inventory of the people you love. What about the kids, how are they going to take it? What about my parents, will they be ashamed of me? What about my brother or sister, will they be there to support me? What about his family, will they blame me? Panic sets in.

You make a mental list of everyone you know, worried about their reaction when they learn about your break-up. What about our friends, will they choose him over me?" What about the people at my church, will they judge me? What about my neighbors and co-workers, will they think less of me? A new thought hits you, how will I tell them? The panic gets worse. Then you wonder, has he already told them? Outright panic takes a hold of you. What did he tell them?

You crumble into the nearest chair. What about my home, will I lose that too? What about my car, will I be able to make the payments? What about the credit cards, how will that work? What about food, electricity, water? How will I keep the lights on, and my kids fed?

You cover your face with your hands and begin to sob. Thoughts pop in your head like corn popping in an air popper. What about my future? Will anyone ever love me again? Will I have to move away from everything that I know? Will my kids choose him? Will I lose their love and respect? What about my job, how will I work? Oh my God, will anyone hire me? Am I going to end up an old woman, with no way to support or take care of myself? Complete hysteria takes over you. You can only see pain all around you. You are sobbing so loudly that the house echoes with every new cry.

Your chest feels like a long-distance runner that has hit the wall. You can’t breathe. Every muscle in your body aches. You’re afraid if you stop running you will collapse on the spot. You can’t keep going. You are too scared to stop.

The sounds emanating from your throat are involuntary. Who is that woman shrieking like a banshee? you wonder. You are frozen in place, unable to move. Your brain is exploding. Thoughts of every bad thing that could happen are flashing before your eyes. You are in shock. The first stage in the grieving process has hit hard.

You have worried about your relationship with your husband. You knew something was wrong. It doesn’t matter if you knew in your heart this moment was coming. You may have even prayed that this day would come and free you from your marriage. Maybe you thought about this moment, but never believed it would really happen.

You sit there frozen, crying, trying to breathe. Your head is stopped up, and your nose is running. You’ve got to catch your breath. You can’t move. How long will I survive without air? you wonder. How long will it take for someone to find me, sobbing, suffocating, gasping for air?

Your instinct to survive kicks in. You NEED Air! Shakily you get up and steady yourself on the armrest of the chair. You grope your way to the box of tissues you know is across the room. You pull a tissue from the box, look at it, trying to reconcile the flimsy piece of paper in your hand with something that will help you to breathe, and save your life. Raising the foreign object to your nose, you blow until your ears feel like they are going to burst.

Gradually, oxygen begins to make its way to your brain. There is only one thing you want to do. You reach for the phone. After a moment of hesitation, you dial the only number that you can remember. Your hands are shaking so badly that you hit a wrong number. You hang up and try again.

You wait. One ring… Two rings… You hear someone say hello. You sob something incoherent. You hear your best friend shouting your name through the phone. You just keep sobbing. I will be right over! you hear her shout before the line goes dead. Slowly, you put the phone down. You feel yourself collapsing into a heap on the chair next to the phone. You hang your head, and sit, and wait.

In the back of your brain, a thought starts to take shape. I can’t let Deb see me this way. You sniffle, then wipe your nose with the wadded-up tissue you find clutched in your hand. You don’t know why, but you begin to pick up the dirty dishes and put them in the sink. You lean on the counter and sniffle again. The small amount of oxygen you have been able to inhale has begun to resuscitate your brain. I must pull myself together, makes its way into your thoughts. You splash cold water on your face. You grab a paper towel to dry your hands and instead use it to blot away the makeup that has run down your face and is smeared under your eyes.

The stuffiness in your head is still there, but you are finally getting enough air. Your breathing has become a little more regular. You look out the window and see a car rounding the corner on two wheels, turning into your driveway. You see Deb jump out of her car, barely taking the time to shut the car door. You watch her run up the walkway, yank open your front door and rush through the house into the kitchen. You look up and weakly smile at her. You open your mouth to speak. A sob escapes, and you collapse into her arms.

What happened? you hear your dearest friend whispering in your ear. You can’t get it out. Bits and pieces of sentences make it through your moans. Somehow, she knows. It’s going to be okay. you hear her try to reassure you, you are going to be okay.

No, I’m not! you choke. I’m never going to be okay again.

I’m here for you, she comforts. I’m going to help you through this. Somewhere in all the panic, the weight gently lifts from your shoulders and silently floats away. Who do you want me to call? she gently asks. Where are the kids?

She leads you to the table, and you both sit down. She brings you a glass of something, and you take a sip without tasting the liquid sliding down your throat. You sip again, recognizing the tang of the wine and begin to piece together what happened. You tell her everything. You re-live every word, every accusation, every emotion that you felt. With an unexpected finality, you announce to her that your marriage is over.

Deb sits with you quietly, giving you time to think. Naively you ask, What do I do now? as if she would have the answer. You see the blank look on her face letting you know she doesn’t have a clue what you should do, and you go numb.

Over the next few days, you find yourself telling your family and friends what has happened. Your kids tiptoe around you with a look of bewilderment in their eyes. You have told them that, both you and their father still love them. You make the tough phone calls. You call your parents. They beg you to come home.

Everywhere you go there is someone you know, someone who asks how you are doing, wanting you to confirm what they have already heard. Words pour out of you in knee jerk fashion; the story scripted; the scene etched in stone. You are numb to their reaction. What an idiot! How could he? You deserve better. I never liked him. It’s his loss! You will find someone that will treat you right! I just can’t believe it. Is repeated by everyone you tell.

You go to work and try to act like nothing is wrong. Your boss suggests you take some time off, clear your head. You think about it, wondering if taking time off will put your job in jeopardy. You decide to keep working, rationalizing that no matter where you are, the buzz in your brain will still be there.

You do what must be done, nothing more, nothing less. You go through your day like an automaton, exerting no more effort than is necessary. You speak. You move. You exist. Your actions are automatic, reacting to the people around you without thinking, without feeling. I’ve got to snap out of this, pops into your head a hundred times a day. I’ve got to get a grip; you tell yourself more times than you can count. For the sake of the kids… runs through your head in a never-ending loop.

You are going through the motions of living as unconsciously as you inhale and exhale each breath you take. You are emotionally paralyzed. Subconsciously you knew this was inevitable. You may have even planned how to tell him you were leaving. Somehow it didn’t happen the way you had imagined it, practicing the moment in your mind. But you knew, and maybe even wanted this to happen. You thought you were mentally prepared for your marriage to end. You weren’t.

You re-live all the telltale signs that your marriage was over. You chastise yourself for being a fool. You should have put two and two together. This should have happened sooner. You knew that you were unhappy. You knew that you deserved better. You knew he would never change. You knew you wanted more. And yet, here you are, the shock has set in, and you feel like it has taken up permanent residence.

You torture yourself with memories of how your relationship was in the beginning. He thought you were beautiful. He told you he loved you. His thoughtful gestures, the way he made you laugh. You liked his smile. You loved the way it felt when he held you in his arms. You couldn’t wait to see him again, jumping for the phone every time it rang, wanting it to be him.

You remember the way he proposed. The hope in his eyes when you said you’d marry him. The way you felt when you said, I do. The tenderness in that first kiss as a married couple. The way you laughed together as you muddled your way through those first few months as husband and wife.

You recall the routine that became your life as Mr. and Mrs. and the security that worked its way into the core of your being. You run through the list of things that you were going to do, the places that you wanted to go together, the dreams that you shared.

You re-live the years you spent as his wife; the meals you shared, the celebration of a new job, the birth of a child, the sleepless nights, the financial struggles. We had it all together, you think to yourself. What went wrong?

You recognize the events that signaled the changes to come. The first time you looked forward to girls’ night out with your friends. The freedom you felt when he announced he would be taking a weeklong trip. You re-live the gradual slide from being eager to hear about the events of his day, to quietly nodding, not paying attention to a word he said.

You replay the things you each did that hurt the other. You remember the time he bought a new car without telling you. You think about all the times he wanted his friends to come over and play cards, but you said no. You get mad just thinking about the time the kids were sick, and he dismissed your important meeting as if it were a given that you should be the one to stay home. You think about the concert you missed because he didn’t like your favorite band. The baseball game he missed because you didn’t feel like going. The names he called you. The names you called him.

You recoil as you think about the night it all fell apart. What were we arguing about anyway? What happened that made him so angry? You question yourself. What did he say that made you feel so hurt? You try to remember. What was the final straw? What was the line that had been crossed? You ask yourself for the thousandth time. Where did the words come from that ended it all?

It is as if you are watching your lives together played out on a movie screen. You bought tickets to see a romantic comedy and have found yourself left hanging, mid-plot, in a tragic love story gone wrong. You want to get out of your seat and leave the darkened theater, but you can’t remember where you came in, and there is no exit sign in sight.

You blame yourself. You think through the scenes that made up your marriage, each time changing the plot, re-enacting each act, re-scripting the dialogue. No matter how hard you try, you cannot re-write the outcome. Every scenario leads to the same conclusion, leaving you without any way to salvage the story and come up with a happy ending.

You operate on autopilot. You move through your day without noticing the world around you. You go to work. You come home from work. Just like every other day, there’s Spot waiting at the door, wagging his tail. You bend down, pick him up and cuddle him to your chest. For just a moment you let him lick your face, cringing at the dog drool on your cheek. You smile, just briefly, for half a moment and then it’s gone. What just happened? You wonder to yourself. You try to remember what that feeling was, and why it felt good. For an instant, you let the world back in. You felt something.

You don’t want to feel anything. You don’t want the world to intrude into your space. But it will. When you least expect it, something will trigger that first flash of feeling again. You have been numb. And then, something will break through, for a moment, like a flash of light, thawing your heart for the briefest of moments. You snap back to numb. You want to stay there.

Numb is safe. You are not ready to face the world. You do not want to face him. You cannot wrap your brain around the idea of getting a Divorce. Little hints of emotion creep insidiously back into the periphery of your world. It may be the pleasure of hearing a familiar voice on the phone. Your son’s team wins the big game. Your daughter comes home with an A on her report card. Your manager tells you you’ve done an excellent job on the big project he gave you. Some feelings aren’t so good. You slammed your hand in the car door trying to juggle your purse and stop your toddler from running off all at the same time. Spot crapped on the carpet.

No matter what happens, you feel guilty. You feel guilty for being happy. You feel guilty for being proud. You feel guilty for being successful. You are ashamed of yourself for swearing in front of your children. You feel awful about kicking the dog. I know, you didn’t really kick the dog, you don’t believe in cruelty to animals. You are shocked that you can still believe in something, anything.

You feel guilty about failing at your marriage. You feel guilty for feeling guilty. After all, you are not in this alone! It takes two to tango. He isn’t exactly Mr. Perfect, is he? You go numb again. You switch between feeling and numbness so often that you are not sure what you are, or aren’t, feeling at any given moment. Gradually your emotions come back, each one increasingly more pleasant, or painful. You are not sure you like all these emotions drowning you, sweeping you along with the current. You are paddling as hard as you can to get back to a safe place, the shallow spot at the edge of the water. You fight to get back to the place where you were numb.

Water flows wherever it wants. You know that. Remember the time the washing machine overflowed, and the water went everywhere? It went under the wall in the laundry room into the bathroom. It went behind the dryer. It soaked the carpet two rooms away. Your emotions are like that