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Divorce Support
Divorce is a complex and stressful process. According to psychiatrists Holmes and Rahe divorce is the second most stressful life event there is. So, it just makes sense to seek out support during this time.
Although people refer to divorce as a single event, we believe there are five different facets of divorce that each person moves through over time. These facets are the legal divorce, the emotional divorce, the social divorce, the financial divorce and the functional divorce. The five divorces overlap and interact with each other in ways most of us could not anticipate, much less understand without going through it personally.
The Legal Divorce is usually the first one that comes to mind when we hear the word “divorce”. The Legal Divorce by itself involves the dissolution of the marital contract by the state and all the legal matters that must be addressed to complete that. This is the piece typically handled by attorneys and is legally complete when the divorce decree is signed.
The Emotional Divorce is a process. It involves feelings of denial, fear, hope, loneliness, guilt or rejection (depending on if the individual is leaving or is being left), grief, and anger. You can go through these emotions one after the other, get stuck in one or more of them, or repeat them in various orders depending upon the situation or triggering events. The Emotional Divorce is complete when acceptance is reached and you are emotionally detached from your former spouse.
The Social Divorce is all about the realignment, loss, and creation of friendships. After divorcing, you may find that some of the people you socialized with as half of a married couple are no longer wanting to socialize with you or you may no longer want to socialize with them. This is natural. There are four primary reasons for this. First, as a single person you are now eligible to enter into another relationship and married people often shy away from single people. Second, oftentimes friends will take sides during the divorce and you will lose the ones that take your spouse’s side. Third, people can have the irrational fear that your divorce is contagious. You will most likely need to build new friendships as a result of these losses.
The Financial Divorce refers to the division of your financial assets and debt. It also encompasses the decisions made about other monetary matters such as child and/or spousal support. In theory, the Financial Divorce should be complete in conjunction with the Legal Divorce. In reality, financial matters that you considered resolved can often times become active again due to things such as failure to comply with court ordered payments. This can reopen old wounds; create financial unrest or even financial and or emotional chaos in your life. You may end up spending much more time being “financially married” to someone with whom you have successfully divorced in other facets.
The Functional Divorce is important because it involves a physical lifestyle change. This facet of divorce is where you transition from being a member of a “marriage team” into a “single person”. During the Functional Divorce, you learn to embrace yourself as an individual, full and complete human being and not part of a married couple. Along the way you will develop new skills, improve your self-confidence and create a new support structure for yourself. The functional divorce is complete once you are thriving as a single person.
When people go through the complicated process of divorce, it is natural to feel confused and lost. We believe that divorce support groups are a fantastic resource to anyone going through a divorce. We seek to provide additional support to these people while working through their Functional and Financial Divorces. Our work allows us to be volunteer resources within a divorce support group environment as well as provide individual and group workshops on a fee basis outside of the support group.
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