COLLATERAL DAMAGE

I’ve just heard from a cousin that her son is just coming out of a ‘nasty divorce’. Strangely we all know what this means and this almost requires no further details these days.

Among other things, two people have decided that they aren’t getting along. It may be that they want different things now. Almost regardless of the details, one or the other of them feels they can’t continue in the existing relationship and they have decided to split up.

I think about this a lot, especially when I hear there are children. No matter why or when these divorces happen, there are a lot of lives effected permanently. 

The couple and their children are at ground zero but beyond them, their larger families and friends as well need to find a way to adjust and accommodate the new families that this one is breaking up into.

The words ‘nasty divorce’ however are the ones I worry most about. They imply anger, recrimination, blame. These two words also imply a lot of grief. 

Something that was functioning as one thing together is now split into a lot of other things. In addition, there is not a smooth transition happening either.

Usually everyone is angry about something and that is what is on their minds and in their hearts. This is what their lives are now about, and unfortunately this is what they will be about for a long time, possibly forever.

In the ‘perfect world’, where none of us lives, you imagine that two people quietly and calmly agree that they need to lead separate lives. They separate their lives and calmly and easily wish each other well. They are friends and expect they always will be. It is just time to pursue other things and directions separately.

Back on planet earth however, it seems that not only do some of these people have children but also, one or both of them, is not ready to end their relationship without a fight.

Once the lawyers and especially the courts are involved, it becomes a matter of rights and obligations and money matters. The actual nuts and bolts of the split are often worse than the decision that was made to break up.

The way the split itself is done is, I think, most responsible for many years of carrying around the bad feelings, unkindness to each other and other fallout that, I think, makes things worse than they ever needed to be. This is what leaves the bitter taste in our mouths, perhaps even more than the breakup itself did.

I don’t have children of my own but see the children of divorce, whatever their ages now, often having divorces of their own later on. Somehow, even when the parents were mature and reasonable (so rarely the case), there is fallout around whatever arrangement is made for the children of the former family.

Worse still, and I fear, usually the case, the parents anger with each other, the legal wrangling, the dynamics of the split and the ‘new life’ afterwards that each tries to create for themselves and their children, always involves major life changes that are not easily made. All too often, the children are almost asked to take sides against the other parent. Sometimes, sadly one parent or the other demands this from their child.  

We all recover from pain and loss and separation. Like grieving and mourning, each situation is different, yet each situation involves loss and separation and change. We change throughout life anyway, but when we need to adjust and move past this sort of cataclysmic life change, it is understandable that it is harder to view it as a ‘fresh start’ because we are bringing so much of the past along with us.

I don’t look at any loss as being easy, but breakups of relationships really hit us where we live. They take us, and all of those around us at the time, with them. 

We can’t help but feel we have been uprooted, disturbed and distressed and tossed head first into chaos. In some ways, it might be compared to a tornado; a lot of debris from your past life, but we might be grateful no one died. We may also be determined to build something even better.

It is only by allowing ourselves to find and identify what we want and need to do next that we can begin the process of recovering our balance, rebuilding our lives and moving forward.

You may have torn the house down but how you choose to rebuild it can, I think, make a big difference on how quickly you can build a new place for yourself and make it into a happy home of your own.