stept one of the seven step divorce recovery process

How to get a Divorce without all the Drama.

Chapter 1WE COULD HAVE HAD IT ALL

“The time has come to lay that baggage down and leave

behind all the struggling and striving. You can be set

free as you journey forward into a balanced healthy

and rewarding future.” HYPERLINK

"http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/404176.Su

e_Augustine"Sue Augustine, HYPERLINK

"http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/752854"W

hen Your Past Is Hurting Your Present.

Step 0ne:

How to get a Divorce without all the Drama

Unpacking The Emotional Baggage

When you first hear the words. I want a divorce the first

reaction most people have is shock it is as if your whole

world just came crashing down just before your very own

eyes. You may have been in a good mood before you heard

those words, but the person asking for the divorce obviously

does not care if this is a good time for you or not they only

care about there feelings, it is a good time for them to get it

of their chest.( people are so selfish and self absorbed) time

will just stand still for you as you replay this moment in your

head over and over and over again.

It is the same feeling that a person who believes that they

they are healthy goes through after they have gone to the

doctor for a routine check up and is expecting to hear that all

is well but your body and your family doctor a man you have

known all your life, a man who did a pap smear on you every

year for the last twenty years has betrayed you by telling you


in a very sad way that he is sorry, very sorry but you have

Cancer. Every one hates to hear the “C” word, just as much

as they hate to hear the “D” word.

You leave your doctors office and you get into your car

hoping that you make it home with out getting into an

accident and killing someone. You go right to bed to deal

with the shock of the word you just heard and all you can do

is cry. Cry in disbelief because you are not sure why this is

happening to you, you were so careful you thought that you

were doing every thing right. You are healthy and excersied

everyday, you also did everything in your power to avoid

stress, but the result is the same. You question yourself as

to where you went wrong. You search your mind for

answers. But you are unsure of the questions. Then you

think maybe it is a family history if that is the case you could

not avoid it, so now you have to deal with it, only your


blessing is that your family will be right beside me and this

gives you the greatest comfort.

Hearing the words I want a divorce is not any different, you

made sacrifices to ensure that your marriage lasted forever.

You always put yourself last when it came to your

happiness, your children, your soon to be ex spouse, and

your mother in law. You were hoping that being a team

player you would have your life and your marriage forever,

because that is how it is supposed to be after all you stood

before God with witness and made that vow. Where did it all

go wrong? Who is to blame or is there blame to go around?

Can a marriage just fizzle or does it happen because

someone injects themselves into your marriage, and what

kind of a deplorable person does that, obviously it is a

person with no morals or intergrity. How do you deal with

such a person or thing and would you have the strenght to.

All you can do is try your best to get through this for your

childrens sake. Even though you are devastated your


children needs you now. You are a mother and they are the

only ones that matter. Even though you could not protect

your marriage for the despicable interloper, you have to

protect them during the divorce or they could be scared for

life.

You are in shock so you place yourself in a self imposed

isolation because your sadness and pain is so apparent that

you can not bear the thought of anyone seeing you when

you feel so low as they will see right through your soul and

see the pain, the hurt and the grief, you are not ready to

share this private pain with anyone, not your best friend, not

your sisters, not your parents, and especially not your

children.

Your marriage has failed and your only concern is finding

the strength to get your children through this difficult time to

ease their pain of having a part time father or losing him

completely. You never know what is going to happen in a


divorce. I never thought that my ex would abandon his

children but he did. I never thought that he could be that kind

of a man but he is and was. My children do not receive,

birthday cards, christmas cards, even if they are sick and I

notify him through his lawyer he would not even send an

email to say how are you doing. If that is not abandonment I

am not sure what is.

Try not to end up with this type of a relationship because you

will be the one who will be blamed for the outcome

regardless of the age of the children. My ex did blame me

even though it is his responsibility to call his children and to

maintain a relationship with them. He blames me, he blames

them. He assumes no responsibility for the destruction of the

father son relationship, this he handled by saying our son is

not his, yes he is not the biological father, but he has his last

name and he raised him from the time he was five years old.

If that is not being a father I don’t know what is. My children


lost all the family members on his side of the family, and they

did nothing wrong.

Divorce does not mean that family has to take sides where

the children are concerned, they are already loosing their

father to an interloper, and now the family they loved, tosses

them in the garbage and welcomes the interloper who has

destroyed their family. Is blood really thicker that water? I am

not sure I guess it does not extend to nieces, nephews, or

grandchildren once a marriage ends.

You have searched your mind for a reason why your

marriage ended, but you can not find one, and if you do not

know why your marriage has come to an end how will you be

able to explain it to your children, your family or your friends.

You are desperate for an answer.

When you are over the initial shock of I want a divorce you

become angry. You are at first angry at the person who said


those terrible words to you “I want a Divorce” because you

were not prepared this was unexpected. How could this be

happening to me? Is the one questions that you keep

repeating in your mind, but you can’t seem to find and

answer to that question you will have to give up trying to find

an answer for that question. If yo do not it will destroy you

emotionally, you will continue to become angrier, and

angrier………………

What will the children think of this? How will they handle

this news?. How am I going to tell them?. You realize that

you do not have an answer to any of the questions that you

have. So your anger is now overwhelming and you are not

sure how to handle your emotions. The pain, the anger.

How are you going to deal with your feelings especially the

anger and bitterness, you are not sure how to deal with

being that angry because you have never had to deal with

any angry, traumatic or devastating feelings before. You find

that you are not prepared. If you do not deal with your anger


you will not be able to move forward with your life, so you

need to know that it is ok to be angry you just have to do it in

a way that is health and promotes healing.

I was speaking to one of my nursing colleague we once

worked together in the Intensive Care Unit but she moved to

psychiatry before she retired. In our discussion about dealing

with your anger when you are dealing with a traumatic

situation she told me that on psychiatry they used a jar

method to help there patient deal with their anger. I have

modified the technique a bit to fit the unexpected feelings of

pain, anger and the end of a love cycle. I ask my clients to

place all of their anger in a jar, and place it on a shelf, they

are allowed to open the jar and release a little bit of the

anger every day or every other day what ever works for them

to deal with it. It is very important that they only release one

issue at a time that they are angry about and they must

decide how long they would deal with their angry feeling


before they open the jar. You are not allowed to move to

another angry feeling until you reslove the one you are

dealing with. Once you put the jar back on the shelf you

have to change the frequency of your emotions from being

angry to bosting your happiness. If what you are angry

comes to mind you have to find a catch phrase to get rid of

it. I use the one from “The Secret by……….. which is change

frequency. That was good enough and it worked so I did not

feel the need to make one up, but you can.

This way you have control over your feelings of anger, how

long you are going to be angry about an issue, and how

much time you want to spend in a day stewing. Once your

time is up you place the jar back on the shelf until you are

ready to deal with the issue again. Allowing yourself an

amount of designated time everyday to deal with your feeling

of anger will help you to not constantly think of the problem,

you will not be living in your head, and you will be able to


enjoy moments of happiness even when you are not happy

at all.

I have used this method in my coaching but I added another

dimention. I ask my clients to also label a jar which they will

fill with the pain that they are also feeling, the pain of

sadness, the pain of loniness, the pain of losing your

security, the pain of losing love, the pain of emptiness, the

emptiness from losing all that you hold dear to you your

family.. You will no longer as a family watch your children

grow up, you will not be at graduations, weddings, or the

birth of your grandchildren together these were all taken for

granted because you were a family, now with a divorce you

risk losing it all and there is nothing you can do about it or is

there. The third jar I ask them to label love, and when they

are ready and I grantee you that you will be after the seven

step divorce recovery program they will fill that jar up with


love, love for themselves first, and then the love they now

can share with someone in a new relationship.

If you do not deal with your anger it will turn into

resentment. You become resentfull of all you put up with to

make your marriage work to avoid the “D” word. You did it to

protect your family and the outcome is the same. Your family

has fallen apart. You resent yourself, You resent your ex-

spouse for being such a coward for taking the easy way out

instead of working on the vows he made to you and to GOD.

You resent the reason why your marriage has fallen apart. It

could be because of abuse, gambling, money issues, or the

dreaded interloper, or simply your love cycle has ended.

Regardless of the reason there will be pain and you will feel

hurt but you will have to recover in your own way. No one

can do this alone so you will need all the support that you

can get to move from Resentment to Acceptance. You may

choose a therapist or a coach, choose the best person for


you. The person that will allow you to move forward with the

“WHO” you are becoming.

It is not until you move towards acceptance that you are

able to shift emotionally with hope to start a new life. So a

drama free divorce is the furthest thing from your mind.

All you want to do is throw something at someone. You

want to hurt the person who is the cause of the pain you feel,

the pain of someone putting a knife through your heart and

pulling it out over and over again. You try to understand why

this is happening, what have you done wrong but nothing

makes any sense. But you have to move forward like it or

not.

However, a drama free divorce is possible but not easy if

both couples sit down and talk about how they are going to

show up in the divorce for the sake of their children. Couples

have to keep in mind that even though they are getting a


divorce and going their separate ways they will be forever

linked because they still have to co parent their children.

If all you want to do is separate or uncouple and to move

forward, with respect for each other you will be able to

achieve a divorce without all the drama, and save on your

legal expense. This is very difficult I know I have been there

and experianced one of the most volitile divorces. A divorce

that was so unpleaseant that I ended up in criminal court. I

did nothing wrong but when you are dealing with an ex

spouse who is filled with false pride and is with out gratitude

and their only goal is to destroy you anything can happen.

You also have to keep in mind that your ex spouse now has

a partner the dreaded interloper whose only mission in life is

to hurt you even if she does not know you. The interloper

feels that in order for them to be loved, to feel loved or to

know for sure that your ex spouse loves them is by the way


he treats you. And that could mean that you are in for the

worst journey of your life. So please do not try to understand

why you and your children are being treated with disrespect,

because your ex spouse does not understand it himself. He

is now trying to find his place in his new love cycle and he

has to please the person he is with he does not have a

choice or else he would not be happy. The thing you have to

understand is that, there is only one dominant emotion as

humans we can not live in love and fear at the same time.

Once your ex hates you he can never love anyone you

control his emotions. The interloper is not smart enough to

understand that. Remember you are in control so play fair,

and play smart. Avoid trouble by trying to understand why

you are being treated with contempt.

You see it does not have to be your fault emotions will run

high even from the leaver. Some times all they want to do is

punish you even though they are the one who distroyed the


marriage. You will have to put that behind you, and treat the

divorce as if you are desolving a partnership.

In doing so you will as a couple be able to achieve fair and

equitable division of property, child support, and spousal

support. Keep in mind that most of the division of asset and

child and spousal suppot is already set out by the family Law

act. There is a guideline that tells you exactly how much you

are expected to get for child support per child based on your

income and your soon to be ex spouses income, the same

goes for spousal support all you have to do is look up the

spousal support advisory guidelines, it is what your lawyer is

doing. So all you are doing is paying a lawyer to implement it

for you so the less drama or conflict you do it with the more

you reduce your legal bills. I wish I knew that when I was

going through my divorce. This is how a divorce coach can

help you.


If you opt for a drama free divorce you will save yourself

thousands of dollars and retain yourself respect. Who really

wins in a costly court battle anyway and do you really want

to air your families dirty laundy out in court for the public to

have access to it. No one in their right mind would so be

sensible. If you keep in mind that your children are your

most important asset and their emotional well being is of the

utmost importance then you will be able to work towards

obtainting a drama free divorce especially if you implement

my “Seven Step Divorce Recovery Process”.

Life is a journey that is filled with detours and we will all

experience a few crashes at some point during that journey.

Some crashes will be predictable and some will hit you like a

ton of bricks and throw you off course. Anyone who has met

with an unexpected detour knows that nothing is more

destressing especially when you are left with out the

direction to put you back on the road to complete your


journey. So if you are put in the situation of an unwanted

divorce you know first hand the devastation of knowing that

your family life has fallen apart and your children now has to

be parent by parents who do not like each other enough to

stay together not even for the sake of the family. Someone

has destroyed your family values, and broken the bond of

marriage.

Your emotions will continue to vacillate from shock to anger

to resentment and no one can comfort you and your situation

is made even worst because you can’t seem to give yourself

permission to get out of the self imposed isolation that you

keep putting your self in. Firstly because you are trying to

figure out what went wrong, but mostly because you are to

ashamed to let anyone know what you are going through or

what you are feeling.


Most nights you cry yourself to sleep and hope that the

emptiness you feel inside will subside by morning, but

morning after morning as you awake you feel the same

emptiness. The way it feels when you have lost a loved one.

You are greiving the loss of your marriage because divorce

is a death - the death of your marriage, your family life, your

security, everything you have worked hard for is over. You

realize that that all your dreams has came to an end, and

you now have to divide everything in half, and that includes

your children. The dreams of your children going of to

college with both parents, is not going to happen, your

daughter may not have her father to walk her down the isles

when she gets married if you can’t work out a family friendly

divorce. Every thing as a family is going to change.

Not to mentions how insensitive your friends and family can

be at this time because they feel that you should be

capable of adjusting to the change and move on. As a


person going through a divorce even though you are grieving

the death of your spouse and the loss of your family you are

treated very differently from the person who loss their

spouse because he/she died. For some reason one grief

takes presidence over the other even though the loss of a

spouse through divorce is worse that through death.

You see both people lost a spouse and even though they

may not have had a say in the matter. The decision for one

was made by a Higher Power and the other was made by

ego. You will need to give yourself time to heal to get over

the initial shock and deal with the anger and resentment.

The anger you are feeling can be external or internal. You

start to lash out at your ex spouse for destroying the family

and at yourself for not seeing this coming. The “ever after

has come to an end, and with it your security, dependable

future and now you are being left with the full responsibility


of raising your children part time or being kept away from

your children as you might be denied visitation. You feel

over whelmed and stupid because you are unsure of how to

proceed with the divorce process there is so much to do right

now. You may now have to be responsible for paying the

bills, and you may have never done that before you end up

feeling insecure about your financial future.

If you feel rejected, sad, lonely and afraid, express your

fears and voice your anger holding in your emotions or trying

to convince yourself you are fine when if fact you are not is

very unhealthy. Go ahead and cry if you feel the need to.

You have to release your anger to be able to move forward

with your life. I can’t stress that enough. You will need to

face the situation head on and accept the fact that your

marriage is over.


To cope with the emotional pain start a journal many

people find that journaling gives then a safe place to process

their thoughts and express their feeling of anger and

resentment.

For your journaling to be effective set aside a certain time of

the day where you can write uninterupted this might be a

time for self discovery and growth you can start your

journaling by writing what you are unhappy about to release

all of the negative thoughts. It might be a good idea to write

down all of the advantages to staying married and the

disavantages to staying in the relationship you might be

surprised by the outcome. Put your journal in a safe place so

that you alone has access to it.

Also be patient with yourself journaling will help you move

forward a little to relieve some of the pain, and it may seem

that you are taking one step forward and two steps

backwards you will have some good days filled with laughter


and some days filled with sadness. Allow yourself the time it

takes to deal with the pain so that you can be healed

emotionally.

Attitude is every thing. You do not want to be one of those

people who allow the end of their marriage to destroy them.

Do not hold onto painfull feelings, resentment, and fear or

else you will spend the rest of your life stuck in the past. You

can refuse to give into negative feelings by working through

the Divorce Recovery Process in a pro-active way, you will

find that divorce is not the end of your life but the beginning

of your new life.

It takes determination and willingness to heal old wounds

and you have to deal with them in a healthy way before you

are ready to accept that you have to move on. By honestly

dealing with the anger and resentment you have toward your

ex, yourself and the reason your marriage fell apart will help


you to forgive and move forward. I know this is easier said

than done but forgiveness is a way to empty your heart of

the negative emotions that will affect you emotionally,

spiritually, mentally and physically if you continue to hold

onto them you can never move toward hope for a happy and

healthy life.

Lets face it, it takes two to make a marriage work and two to

destroy a marriage. Sure one might have played a larger role

in the destruction of the marriage, but what you should focus

on is coming to terms with the role you played accept

responsibility for it then let go of the anger and move forward

with your life.

When you are able to do this you will be ready to move on to

step two, of the Divorce Recovery Process and you will be

well on your way to a drama free divorce.


Tools For a Drama Free Divorce:

Divorce Recovery Assessment to dertimine: How likely is it

that you will recover from your divorce and find true love

and happiness again. How you will show up during the

divorce, How you will react when you are under stress.

Values Assessment

Journaling to document your journey during the process

and to evaluate your progress

Embodying The “WHO”- I am statement

I am good enoungh

I am dignity

Developing ways to regain your emotional and spiritual

strength and power.


Home Work Assignment:List all the words that describe your feelings.

List all the words that describe your feelings of Anger

Who are you angry at?

What are you angry about?

List all the reasons why you feel resentment.

What are you most resentful of?

List your feelings of fear

What are you most fearful of?

List all the advantages of staying in your marriage.


List all the disadvantages of staying in your marriage.

What does happiness mean to you?

Describe your feelings of happiness.

When was the last time you felt those feelings?

List your Values Assessment

What are your Core beliefs?

Write your “I am Statements”

How do you want to show up during your divorce?


To go through the other six steps call me. I am here to help you recover and move forward

in a positive way.

stept one of the seven step divorce recovery process

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