If You Want The Rainbow, You Have To Put Up With The Rain - Dolly Parton

Author’s Note: I’m never sure if writing about my feelings is an act of courage or an act of self-aggrandizement. But, I am sure that reading about others’ experiences has helped me when I need to process something I’m going through. So, I keep doing it. Maybe it will help someone else. Maybe it will only help me. Either way here goes.

Last year, I made the heart-wrenching decision to divorce.

Divorce sucks. Plain and simple. It’s not a nice process. It leaves you wrecked.

But, the older I get the more I know if you are able to really take experiences in, even the crappy ones, especially the crappy ones, you will grow and come out the other side with more humanity and humility.

With something as hard as a divorce there are ample opportunities to learn - about yourself, about others, about the legal system, about financial decisions, about love, about endings, about beginnings, about pretty much everything. Sometimes there’s so much learning happening all the time in every direction, you want to cry ‘uncle’.

But, since I couldn’t find a way to stop time from marching on, those lessons kept on coming, and I’m sure will continue to do so for years.

Here are the top things I learned so far and the advice I wish I could go back and give myself at the beginning of this process.

1. There are some really kind people in the world. People who will rush to your side to help you and support you. Those are the people you should surround yourself with - don’t worry about anybody else right now.
2. Because some people will disappoint you. People who you never expected would judge you, shun you or take sides against you, will. It’s going to feel terrible.
3. The courts and family law aren’t about fairness. They strive for equity. It will feel bad. But, it feels bad for both parties and in the end I can’t think of a better way to do it, so it is what it is. Just make sure to get a good lawyer who will listen to you complain but move you along in the process despite your complaints.
4. If you have kids, you will be dealing with your ex-spouse for a long time to come. Full stop.
5. Sometimes the good memories are harder to deal with than the bad ones. The pain of it feels like someone died. Because, in a sense, your relationship with the other person died. Your dreams for a future together are gone. Your family unit is broken. It’s okay to feel grief.
6. The sense of freedom from leaving an unhealthy or unhappy relationship is amazing.
7. But, on the flip side, being alone, mid-life, without a partner can bring on a loneliness and fear that can only be described at times as crushing.
8. The most important thing you can do is take good care of yourself because you are worth it. Also, that's the only way you can take good care of your children and be there for them.
9. Which means doing whatever it takes so that you can foster a healthy relationship for them and their other parent. Therapy. Meditation. Church. Stand up comedy. Basket-weaving. I don’t care. Just find it and do it. You owe it to your kids and yourself and the other parent.
10. Everyone deserves to be happy in this world, but you have to go out and work pretty hard to have that happiness. It rarely just comes to you.
11. The thought of opening yourself up to someone again is terrifying. And, that’s okay. You will be fine.  Just breathe through the fear and do it anyway.
12. Forgiveness is the best gift you can ever, ever give to yourself.  Please don’t dwell on hurt and pain for too long. Life isn’t forever and you need to get out there and get on with the business of making yours count.

I’ll say it again because it bears repeating. Divorce sucks. But, life doesn’t have to perpetually suck post-divorce. I’m trying to take all of this advice and apply it every day. I’m not always successful. But, I will never stop trying. Because one of the other things divorce has taught me is that I have a lot of personal resilience!