For women going through the divorce process regular everyday life can become hard to figure out. Most women get married early in life before they have had time to truly find their own identity. This makes it extremely hard when the only thing that has identified you for years, your husband and children are suddenly not the same. When you have given up everything and are left without anything a mix of emotions can run through you: anger, fear, betrayal, sadness and depression.
Going from living with your family and having other people in on every decision that is made to being the sole decision maker is frightening. At first it will be difficult to adjust to deciding things on your own for you and for your children but with time and a few tweaks and adjustments in your thought process you will come out just fine in time.
Divorce does give you a sense of freedom you may not have ever had before. This is especially true in cases that joint custody has been arranged. Every other week you are on your own. Breathe! At first this is a very scary and unique feeling. It is one that has never been experienced prior to the divorce. Coming home to a house without anyone else in it can soon become liberating. You don’t have to rush home from work as no one is waiting upon you for dinner. You can stop at the book store, get take out and sit in a long hot bath for the entire night. No one but you is responsible for your decisions any longer.
Yes, women will feel sadness, disappointment and hurt when going through a divorce. This is a very natural feeling and in time will lessen. Whether you wanted a divorce or not will not matter. You will feel let down, either by the way he treated you throughout the marriage or because you could fix it and make the dream a reality. It will hit you like a brick. Some days you will think you are perfectly fine and then wham; it will hit you that you are no longer married.
At times you will feel incredibly angry. You are now on your own financially on your own and are left with the majority of responsibility when it comes to your children. Anger is a real fierce emotion and you will experience it for a while. Take time to be angry just make sure that you do this on your own time and not when your children are around.
Yes, it is easy to be angry when you are paying bills, doing dishes, folding laundry and carpooling all alone but this is never a child’s fault. Anger should be placed in the right direction. Perhaps now is the time to find a support system to release some of these built up emotions?
The hard part when it comes to divorce is your experience will be completely unique to you. No one will be able to predict the emotions you will go through during the course of your divorce and for a period of time after. Let these feeling come and go as they will. As time goes on you will begin to heal and will find that the emotions have run their course. You will feel normal once again. It is only a matter of time. There is no right way or wrong way to process your emotions.
Just be sure to keep yourself happy and healthy for your children and for yourself. The sooner these emotions take over your life the sooner you will be back on track to living free from the chaos of your divorce.