Quite often clients come to us with the problem of life after divorce. Oddly enough, both men and women turn to them, so you shouldn’t think that turning to a psychologist is an exclusively female feature.
And by the way, it doesn’t matter whether the marriage is official or not. Any break in a long-term close relationship is extremely painful, regardless of the stamp in the passport.
- It is important not to isolate yourself within the experience of your tragedy.
- It is important to acknowledge the fact that this happened. Life does not end with your divorce, because you lived before this relationship, and you can live after it. This relationship probably had both good and bad, it ended, now you have a new stage of life.
- Blaming yourself solely for a breakup is a dead end that leads to depression.
- It is important to help yourself cope with your mental state.
- You can do things that you didn’t have time for in your marriage or things that your partner protested against.
- You can change your appearance, take up a hobby that you like, you can go somewhere to the theater or cinema, or maybe on a trip.
- Create new emotions and memories that would separate you from the memories of your partner.
- Make cosmetic repairs, rearrange furniture.
- Update the interior - in general, fight with what reminds you, and vice versa, form new pleasant associations with things.
- Try not to isolate yourself from communication with other people.
- Don’t stop communicating with your friends, acquaintances, and relatives.
You want to avoid communication because your loved ones want to show sympathy and start asking about the breakup. Pity and sympathy are not what you want to hear from loved ones, so communicating with them is scary - In order to avoid such unpleasant emotions, ask not to touch on the topic of your divorce/separation in conversation. Usually people are sympathetic to your request and will not touch on these topics.
- New acquaintances are important, friends are for expanding your social circle, and not for finding a new partner.
- You shouldn’t rush to search for new love and jump into new relationships.
Usually in this case you won’t find someone who is really needed, but just an object to show your ex what a valuable, sought-after and wonderful person you are, and to him/her It's worth regretting that you were lost. As a rule, such relationships are unpromising and their rupture will only hit your self-esteem even more.
As for online dating, it is better to transform such relationships into real ones as quickly as possible, so that there is no disappointment due to the inconsistency of the fantasies that developed during the virtual communication and a real person.
How long does it take to recover after 
развода
As a rule, the experience of separation or divorce lasts from three months to one year. Depending on how long you have been in the relationship, the experience may last longer or shorter. Recovery from divorce is similar in time to recovery from the death of a loved one. It’s not for nothing that there is a phrase “separation is a little death.”
Recovery is especially painful if the divorce process was difficult.
How can you find out whether you have recovered after a divorce or not?
One way to understand this is by how you evaluate a potential new partner. If you are assessing whether a person meets your requirements and are thinking about the prospects for living together, most likely you are already ready for a new relationship. If you constantly compare him with your ex and remember how this person behaved in similar situations, then you have not yet experienced a breakup.
When you gratefully perceive this relationship as a good life experience and can let it go, this is an indicator of that that you have experienced a breakup.
There is no need to rush to make serious decisions, it is better to double-check. On the other hand, until you meet, you will not know the real person. It is very important to understand the real picture and not feed on fantasies.
Fears are justified, because distrust of new relationships has already been formed. But this is not a sentence. Such fears can be worked through. Although there is no standard solution for all situations, you need to work with each client individually, since the causes of the problems can be exactly the opposite. This is exactly what a psychotherapist does.
Will the next marriage be more successful than the last?
Most likely, if a person has not worked with a psychotherapist or has not realized his mistakes in his last marriage, he will step on the same rake. It doesn’t really depend on who exactly the marriage will be with. After all, both are always to blame in a divorce. Therefore, to build a healthy relationship, it is important to correct the mistakes of previous relationships.
In any case, do not despair. Despite the fact that divorce is a serious test for everyone, and for some it can be a tragedy, a new happy relationship is possible.
Unlike a man who returns to single status and can start again with a “clean slate”, on Society labels a woman a “divorcee.” There are many offensive labels that interfere with the restoration of a woman’s status after a divorce.
How to behave so as not to do something stupid?
Divorce brings a person into a state of acute psychological pain at an emotional peak. In such a state, a person can commit many illogical, thoughtless actions that will simply aggravate an already difficult situation.
A few thoughts on this topic:
1. Don't try to get your husband/wife back
Women, and men too, often believe that their partner simply made a mistake, it’s not serious, and everything will return as it was. Accordingly, they are looking for different ways to get in touch. They come up with endless excuses, including illness, some kind of accident and a flooded apartment, they manipulate children or simply ask for help.
In fact, such painful behavior only delays recovery, ruins the life of an ex, and negatively affects the psyche of their common children.< br />After a divorce, it is advisable to reduce communication with your ex-partner to a minimum. To avoid unnecessary communication, it is important to discuss possible topics for discussion in advance and divide property, financial support and time devoted to children so that there are no grounds for complaints
2. Do not use children
It’s hard enough for children. Often they are the ones who blame themselves for the fact that mom and dad don’t live together. This feeling in itself is already a big trauma for them, which leaves an imprint for the rest of their lives.
Therefore, do not drag children into your showdowns. Don't manipulate your days in an attempt to punish your ex-husband or wife. Often, in the heat of a showdown, parents completely forget about their children and their feelings. In most cases, women are guilty of this - when, with the help of a little man, they manipulate and try to keep their husband or hurt him.
3. Talk calmly to children
Talk about divorce with your child calmly, without screaming, tears or lamentations. Don't blame, humiliate or insult your ex. There is no need to say “we were abandoned,” “they fell out of love,” “they found a new family.” Even if this is the case, let the child draw his own conclusions when he grows up. There is no need to put psychological pressure on him and shift the burden of emotional pain.
4. Give vent to your tears in private
Tears are the companion of any grief, divorce is no exception. The full range of painful feelings is difficult to express and understand. Hatred, resentment, anger, guilt are better to cry out. Tears are the best way to cleanse yourself of negativity “cry out your grief.”
Cry when you are sad. Holding back tears can lead to psychosomatic problems. That is, the body will begin to hurt.
Find a comfortable place for tears - a car, a shower, a forest and cry as much as you want. At this time, the stress hormone cortisol is released along with tears. And even if others see it - don’t be ashamed of tears - you have every right to cry.
Therefore, you don’t need to stop your tears and listen to those who stop. Grieving is normal, grieving an important part of the process of recovering from loss. When they say “she/he is not worth your tears,” don’t listen. Tears are a great emotional release. Without mourning your old life, you will not be able to let new relationships into your life. Let tears wash the earth like rain and new flowers of relationships can grow on it.
5. Give yourself time to recover
Self-esteem after divorce is greatly reduced. Especially if the husband or wife left for someone else. To prove their worth and attractiveness, the abandoned spouse embarks on casual relationships.
Jumping from one relationship to another, they only aggravate their trauma and feed the illusion that in the new relationship everything will be different for them. But if time has not passed and there has been no awareness, the chances that your favorite rake will not return are small. It is advisable to start a new relationship no earlier than in a year.
6. Start living again
Of course it’s hard to go to those places where we went together. When everything reminds you of a loved one who is not around.
Any places where we were together - parks, common friends and common hobbies only open the wound. There really is a feeling that over the years of your life you have become one whole and half of your body has simply been cut off, your soul has been torn apart.
This is especially difficult when a woman was immersed exclusively in everyday life and did not have any hobbies besides her family. In this case, it is important to find a hobby, take care of your health, figure, get a new hairstyle. Stop endlessly analyzing past relationships, we tend to forget the bad and remember only the joyful moments. There is no need to cling to them until you let go - you won’t be able to start a new life.
Don’t let yourself go, even if there is no one to kiss - still brush your teeth, eat healthy food regularly. (Of course, if it’s covered, then you can have ice cream). Don’t blame yourself if your diet goes wrong, return to a healthy diet without reproach and try to exercise yourself physically, this also helps to process stress. No matter how strange it may sound, life routine helps to maintain a clear mind
7. Don't endlessly check his/her social networks
It is advisable to temporarily change the profile display settings or delete them until better times. What your ex writes on his page will not change anything in your relationship. Nervous anticipation of photos with a new guy or girl will only plunge you into even greater emotional stress and will torment you. There is no need to engage in masochism. Let go.
Help from a psychotherapist during divorce
As a psychotherapist, I often help people overcome grief. After all, it is in such critical situations that people resort to help. Therapy and communication can help you feel relief, let go of your past relationship, and find ways to cope with the loss. It is psychotherapy that creates a safe space of love and unconditional acceptance, a place where you can release the strong negative emotions that rage inside destroying you, cry, realize yourself, and how to build new relationships.
It is important to understand that this type of work takes time. Don't judge yourself harshly; it's normal to grieve over a breakup. This is a healthy process. It is much worse when this does not happen, then the person cannot let go of the pain all his life and cannot enter into a new relationship.
There is no hard and fast rule about how long it may take you to recover. There is a myth that the recovery process takes half of the time spent together. This is wrong. Everything can be much faster. Maybe it will be a couple of weeks, or maybe several months or a year. All people are very different.
I will be glad to support you in this difficult process of going through a divorce, regain your love and become stronger. You can make an appointment with a psychotherapist online or in person in Kyiv. To register, click the button below.
Take action and you will succeed!
Date of update: 04/18/2024 Mikhail Dickey - certified psychologist - psychotherapist - coach. Read about the author