A Celebration of Women on International Women's Day

Today, on International Women’s Day, this is what I’ve learned from 14 years in the ladies room.

I’ve been musing about the thousands of women I’ve met since I first published my book, Runaway Husbands, on February 1, 2010. The book is about Wife Abandonment Syndrome - when a husband leaves out-of-the-blue from what his wife believed to be a secure marriage. The woman left behind is devastated, traumatized. I’ve had the privilege of helping women recover.

The women in the Runaway Husbands community are in a club they never wanted to be a member of - one where the members have experienced a wife’s worst nightmare. I offer support in the form of therapy groups, workshops and retreats so I’ve met with groups of women on a weekly basis. Sometimes, like during a Sedona Retreat, we spend days and nights together, working on recovery but also, having fun, eating, laughing, talking and connecting.

Through all this, I’ve really gotten to know the women in our world and so often have been dazzled by them. In the early years, I started to notice that the women who participate in my activities are smart, deep, warm, special. Maybe it goes with the runaway husbands paradigm - abandoned wives tend to be empaths - caring and self-sacrificing. Whenever I start a new group, I’m tickled to see how quickly the group gels. Right from the get-go, women are offering support, suggestions and help to the others, even if they’re suffering themselves. Being together is quickly comfortable and women open up, sharing their tears, fears and laughter.

Women are programmed to connect with others going through the same thing. We get pleasure out of talking. I once read that pleasure center of the brain lights up when women talk but when men talk? Crickets. Just being together is healing for women. We learn from each other and feel soothed. Women tend to want to help.

This quote from the blog, TheUnleasedHeart.com, talks about the healing power of a community of women. “It takes a village to heal, too. We start within ourselves, yes, but we can’t do it alone either. We need support, guidance, and a heart with ears. We need to be able to feel heard without judgment, criticism and analyzing.” I’ve often felt that the effectiveness of the workshops and retreats that I run is 50% what I say and 50% what the women get from being together with the others.

So, today on International Women’s Day, I’m sending love to all the women in the world! You just keep being you!

Are you a woman whose husband suddenly left? Click here for more resources to start your healing process.

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When You Can't See the Mountain for the Trees

Have you ever been to Sedona, Arizona? If you have, you’ll know that it’s one of the most beautiful, magical places you’ve ever seen and that’s because of the vortex energy and the spectacular red rock mountain formations that encircle the city in an embrace everywhere you look. I don’t even know how to describe it to you if you haven’t been there but take it from me, the mountains that surround the tiny town of Sedona are literally breathtaking.

I’m lucky enough to lead an annual women’s divorce recovery retreat in Sedona and this year, we booked into a new hotel that boasted of mountain views from every room. I was delighted! The thought of sitting on my balcony with my coffee in the morning gazing at that view - perfection! So when I arrived and pulled open the curtains to my room and saw this big bushy tree right in front of me, between me and the mountains, I was thrown off. “Hey, where’s my view?”

Do I go to the front desk and try to change my room? I made myself a cup of tea and sat on the balcony to think it through when I heard a quiet sound. I looked up and the cedar tree in front of me was whispering. She said, “What about me? Can you see me? I’m here, I’m green, I’m fresh, I’m actually very lovely. What about me? You’re going to tour around all day long, looking at the red rock mountains, hiking on red rocky trails. They’re beautiful, yes, but maybe you’ll need me at the end of the day.” 

Of course! I had so anticipated gazing at the mountains in the distance that I couldn’t see the beauty right in front of my eyes. So I said “thank you” to the cedar tree for the lesson learned - in striving for something you think you want, you might miss the magic right in front of your eyes. 

So think about it for a moment. In the intensity of longing for something you have lost, have you lost sight of the precious gifts you still have? Take a breath, take a minute and let yourself appreciate that beauty that lights up your life, in spite of it all.

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Are you a woman whose husband suddenly left? Click here for more resources to start your healing process.

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Does How It Ended Negate the Marriage that Went Before?

We had such a profound discussion at the last session of the Hearts & Minds Divorce Recovery Group about how much the women devoted to their marriages during all those years and the fact that their husband, in the end, walked away from it all as if it had no value to him. They were questioning, how do I think about all those years of being together? Was it real? Does how he left mean that it was all meaningless?

Members of the group talked about how much they’d invested, fully expecting to be together with their husband till death do them part. They gave wholeheartedly - was it under false pretenses?

One woman said that she felt she’d been robbed. She can’t “cash in” to take advantage of everything she’d contributed. Cashing in means enjoying later years together, travelling, spending time with family together, creating a home, feeling that life’s value grew and grew and that it reached a comfortable point at which she could sit back with him and enjoy the glow.

Another woman said that she felt that all those years of her life with her husband had been tainted. She wants to wipe it all out - it’s too painful to think about.

Another, an engineer, gave a metaphorical explanation of covert narcissism. She suggested that it’s like a bridge that has a latent defect. Let’s say that the bridge can support the daily traffic but it has a weak joint that no one knows about. One day, an extra car is on the bridge and that weak joint gives out.

Our husbands are like that bridge. They’re fine to a point, but there’s a weak joint in their makeup that means that once they feel it’s all too much, they just give up. You don’t know there’s a problem because it only becomes visible after the whole thing cracks.

I was thinking about how, in all the years I’ve worked in this field, most women in the Runaway Husbands community describe their marriages in very positive terms. It’s very rare for someone to say, “Aw, it wasn’t that good”. After the husband leaves, we tend to highlight the good things that happened. It’s called a Positivity Bias. Here’s the definition: Positivity bias may denote three phenomena: a tendency for people to report positive views of reality; a tendency to hold positive expectations, views, and memories; and a tendency to favor positive information in reasoning.

Does our perception require us to view the marriage in glowing terms? A lot of women blame themselves. Yes, you weren’t perfect, but he wasn’t perfect, either. I’m sure he was annoying and selfish lots of times.

That evening at the group, as everyone was talking, I was thinking, how can I encourage them to find value in every precious day of our lives? He wasn’t perfect and in the end, his weakness became visible. But I believe that during all those years, when the bridge was holding up, it was real. He loved you and it was genuine. It was your real life.

Don’t let the fact that it ended in betrayal make you harden your heart to those years of your life. You had good times, but you also had bad times. And it all adds up to experience.

If your husband leaving can contribute to you struggling to become a more positive person, to strengthen your appreciation of your life just as it is, so you can love life, no matter what is happening, then you can chalk it up to experience. 

Don’t think of it like an investment you make in the bank that you can lose when the market tanks. That’s the wrong metaphor. Think of it rather like an investment you made in yourself and in your own life that no one can ever take away from you and learn to love life again.

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Are you a woman whose husband suddenly left? Click here for more resources to start your healing process.

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