What You've Lost - What Still Remains

How can you be both authentic and feel your true feelings while, at the same time, work on cultivating the awareness that although you have lost so much, you still have so much left?

We had such an interesting discussion last night at one of the meetings of my online divorce recovery group, Hearts & Minds. One of the women was talking about all she has lost since her husband left. Her son just had his high school prom and, before the event, all the parents were invited to a pre-prom party. When she arrived, all dressed up, she did a quick scan of the room and her heart sank when she realized that she was the only single parent present. All the other women were there with their husbands.

I don’t need to tell you what that feels like. I know you’ve been there. I know I have. That empty feeling, lonely, a bit embarrassed - all the fun drained from the party while you have to keep up a brave face, counting the minutes till you can leave.

At the meeting last night, the other women in the group were empathizing with a communal groan. But I was looking at it a bit differently. Knowing the prom boy’s mom, I thought about what she has lost, but also, everything she has; a secure job, a big support network and three beautiful kids - things that many women in the world would kill to have. So, I brought up that aspect - that in spite of all we lose, we have to keep an eye on all we have.

Earlier in the session, one of the women was talking about gratitude and how what Oprah used to call the Gratitude Attitude is so important to happiness and I talked a bit about that. It’s been a frame of mind that I’ve tried to cultivate in my own life. When I’m miserable about something, I try to fly over it to get a different perspective and remind myself that so many other women have it so much worse. I find that helps me stop feeling so miserable.

But then, a different woman in the group challenged my approach. She said how important it is to really feel your feelings, not to deny or suppress them. It’s okay to let yourself feel the hurt because . . .  it hurts! It hurts to be the single woman in the room when last year, you would have been sharing the fun with your husband. It hurts to not have someone to unpack the evening’s events with later in the privacy of your home - to talk about everything that happened and how great your son looked in his suit. That’s a reality too!

Seesaw. Seesaw. How can you be both authentic and feel your true feelings while, at the same time, work on cultivating the awareness that although you have lost so much, you still have so much left? I remember having seen Tony Robbins at a conference a few years back talk about his 90-second rule. He said that when something upsets him, he allows himself only 90 seconds of suffering and then he turns it around and I thought - how do you do that? (Disclaimer: don’t try this at home! LOL)

Perhaps the answer is that it’s a matter of degree. Of course, in the beginning, right after your husband leaves, there’s not much you can do other than to survive. There are only small things that help to lessen the suffering, like disciplining yourself to not check the other woman’s Facebook page if you can, but you’re certainly unable to see anything past the intensity of the pain.

Later on, the work of recovery is to explore ways of managing the suffering so you are not totally helpless in the face of it. One of those ways is to practice that gratitude attitude and develop an awareness of what is left after so much is lost. That doesn’t mean sugar coating the painful times. It means letting yourself feel them but, at the same time, recognizing that blessings remain. 

Some women keep a gratitude journal and write down three good things that happened that day each night before bed. No matter how difficult life can be, there’s always something to feel grateful for and by writing it down, even if it’s a struggle to locate anything positive, you’re training yourself to scan your day for little particles of joy. And that’s a good thing!


 

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How long does it take to recover from Wife Abandonment?

If your happiness is dependent on you living the life you had in the past, then you will never be happy again because that life is over. But perhaps, you need to make a new definition of what constitutes your future life and potential happiness. Rather than focusing on all you have lost, can you tally up all you still have? . . .


What’s the normal recovery time from wife abandonment? One year? Two years? Five years? Eight years? The answer is . . . yes. The normal recovery time is the time that it takes for you to recover. Women who are still dealing with painful thoughts of their ex on a daily basis and anxiety around holidays and events years after the marriage has ended are often ashamed. But they shouldn’t be.

They feel that they should be over it already. Their friends and family insist that they should be over it already. It feels like the whole universe is shouting that they should be over it already! But they’re not. And there are good reasons for that.

There are a lot of complex factors at play but the one that has the largest impact on how long it will take for you to click into a new normal is your belief about your own future. If you’re telling yourself that you will never be happy again and that there is nothing to look forward to, it will be much harder for you to stop ruminating about the past.

I can hear what you might be saying right now: “Vikki! All that is true! I will never be happy again. I have nothing to look forward to!” I think part of the problem is that you are still defining your life in the terms you used when you were with your husband. If your happiness is dependent on you living the life you had in the past, then yes. You will never be happy again because that life is over.

But perhaps, you need to make a new definition of what constitutes your future life and potential happiness. Rather than focusing on all you have lost, can you tally up all you still have? Can you work on becoming agile and pivot to a new vision of your future? One that you define on your own terms.

Really true profound happiness comes from an appreciation of the very simple things in life. The other day, my client told me that she went for a walk by herself on the mountain (the city of Montreal was built around a beautiful “mountain” park). She said she was walking up the trail and drinking in the experience. She thought to herself, “I could be lying in a hospital bed somewhere but I’m here now, walking on the mountain”. She was able to feel how special it was. That felt good to her.

It takes practice to learn to really feel appreciation for the moment, for the simple things. You have to work on it. Practice trying to feel appreciation when you’re sitting at the breakfast table in your warm house with food on your plate. You won’t feel it right away, but with practice, you can get there. Practice communing with the trees outside your window. Feel their quiet energy. Tune into the small beautiful things that surround you. Construct a secret chamber in your heart where you can retreat in peace, just feeling good to be alive.

I believe life itself is a gift that we have to cherish whether things are hard or good.

When you can turn your vision from the past to your own future, whenever that is, the real healing will start. Your future may be small and quiet and different from what you expected but hey, it’s all yours. Make it beautiful.

What do you think about how long it’s taking you to recover? Add your voice below!


 

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Want to Stop Feeling Like a Failure? Flip it!

You know who you are. You know your value. He doesn’t get to define you - no more, no way! Instead, flip it!

Tonight we had our second meeting of Hearts & Minds (my eight session online therapy group) and we talked about so many amazing things, I wanted to share some of them with you. The focus was on how to stop letting your ex-husband control you. He can say whatever he wants but if you can recognize that it is coming from a destructive place, you can turn it around and say, “I get to define myself - I’m not letting him define me any more!”

So often women feel like failures that the marriage ended and part of the reason you feel that way is because your ex had told you that you were a failure. Sometimes he even presents his wife with a list of all her deficits and being nice girls, we believe the garbage he’s saying. We let him remain in the position he was in throughout the marriage - the arbiter of what’s right or wrong. So when he outlines for you all the ways he thinks you’ve failed, It makes you second guess yourself - maybe he’s right!

One of the participants in Hearts & Minds tonight told us what to do when we feel like a failure - flip it! Rather than saying, “I must be a failure because I couldn’t keep my marriage together”, say, “I’m amazing because I kept a marriage going with such a deeply flawed person! If I didn’t take such good care of him, this marriage would have fallen apart years ago!”

Another participant came up with another way to flip it. Rather than to say, “I feel so badly that he sees me as such a controlling bitch”, say, “I don’t want to be with someone who doesn’t appreciate who I am after all these years and instead sees me  as a controlling bitch!”

Another participant suggested that we put his message to the test. Rather than swallow whole whatever he says about you, ask yourself, “Is it true?” Just because he says it doesn’t make it true. You know who you are. You know your value. He doesn’t get to define you - no more, no way! Instead, flip it and say, “He’s a broken man that makes him behave in this disrespectful, cold and selfish way and I don’t want that in my life.” You don’t have to be subject to his distorted assessment of you. So the next time he puts you down, flip it and remember that you don’t want to be with someone who is so blind that he doesn’t know you by now.

One way that I’ve suggested to women to flip it is the following. Instead of feeling so sad that you don’t get to spend your future together with your aging ex, just realize, “I had the best years of his life. It’s fine with me if she (the other woman) takes over as nursemaid in his dotage!” 

Alice Sommer, who was the oldest Holocaust survivor before her death at the age of 110 said about her approach to life, “There’s good and bad in everything. I choose to look at the good.” So when you’re focusing too much on the bad, just flip it! There’s some good tucked away in there somewhere!

Hey, what are your thoughts on this? Let us know below in the comments.


 

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The One Word that's Keeping You Stuck - Why

The whys are buzzing around your head like a swarm of angry bees and you can’t get away from them. If only you could break free . . .

Why didn’t he tell me he was unhappy?

Why didn’t he want to work on it?

Why did he become so mean?

Why can’t he see that he’s hurting the kids?

Why is he so mad at me when he’s the one who left?

Why is he so unreasonable in the divorce process?

Why do I still miss him after all he’s done?

Why do husbands who are LOVED do THIS?

The whys are buzzing around your head like a swarm of angry bees and you can’t get away from them. If only you could break free but it feels like you can only break free when you can answer all the whys and that’s where you’re stuck because you just can’t. At least, not yet.

We humans are programmed with the need to understand our lives. When life is predictable, we feel safe. We keep an agenda so we’re prepared for what’s coming. When something unexpected happens, we need to identify the cause and might even make up some unscientific reason just so that we have some explanation - the need to understand is so strong.

Over the years, so many women whose husbands have suddenly left have told me that if only they could understand what motivated him, why he turned so mean, why he didn’t want to go to counselling, then they could start to move on. That yearning to understand how a loving husband could morph overnight into an angry stranger is normal and understandable. The problem with it is just that you may never get the answer you desire and deserve.

So how to move on without closure? How to move away from the whys? When I was a kid growing up in New York City, if I’d ask a friend “why?” about something, she might respond, “just because”. What does “just because” mean? It means, “I dunno - there’s just no answer to the why?”

The desperate need to peer into your ex’s mind and fully understand his motivation is keeping you stuck. My recommendation is to take a giant scissor and just snip off the why at the beginning of all those sentences and see what you get:

  • Why //// didn’t he tell me he was unhappy? becomes - He didn’t tell me he was unhappy.

  • Why //// didn’t he want to work on it? becomes -  He didn’t want to work on it.

  • Why //// did he become so mean? becomes - He became so mean!

  • Why //// do husbands who are LOVED do THIS? becomes - Husbands who are LOVED do THIS!

When you eliminate the why, you can breathe. You start to accept that this happened, that he did what he did just because, and you can come to a place of acceptance.

Of course you continue to need to know why and over time, you will unravel the mystery little by little - I can help you with that. But it’s the relentless drive to know why right now that keeps you up at night, tormented by the swarm of bees. If you can accept that over time, the information that answers your questions will come to you naturally and that, over time, your mind and heart will evolve to be able to absorb what you’re learning, then the bees will slowly fly away so you can rest and continue on your journey of healing.

So the next time you’re struggling with a sentence that starts with why, take a big scissor and snip off the why and accept the declarative statement that’s left, or maybe just answer it to yourself with just because.

Take a sec and let me know your thoughts about this post down below in the comments!


 

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Some People are Painting Rainbows

Let’s not miss the good in the bad. Let’s use our own creativity and make a souvenir to remember this wild trip by. All the things that seemed unthinkable that have become everyday. We need to write it all down . . .

Do you feel like a pioneer yet? Are you doing things you never thought you would do? Cutting your own hair, home schooling your kids, baking your own bread, making do with whatever you have in the larder? This time is going to go down in history. Let’s not miss the hidden gift.

Alice Sommers, the oldest living Holocaust survivor who died at 106 said, “Even the bad is good if you know where to look for it.” Let’s not be so focused on the bad that we miss the opportunity to experience the good. The universe has pressed the reset button. Mother Nature has sent us all to our rooms to think about what we are doing to this planet. Let’s not skip that lesson.

This is a time of creativity bursting out everywhere. Some talking dog YouTube videos are so funny that people are laughing till they cry. I was invited to an international dance party. People are writing songs. Balconies are the new concert halls. Here in Montreal, we stood on our balconies and sang Leonard Cohen songs. In Italy, they’re singing the national anthem and playing accordion for the neighbors. People are cooking. My friend heard of a woman who is drawing a flower every day. I heard that kids are painting rainbows and sticking them in the front windows.

People are resilient, self-reliant, resourceful. We’re not bothering our doctors with small issues, our dentists’ offices are closed except for emergencies. We’re figuring work-arounds to make things happen. The organic grocer is taking orders, bagging your things and passing the bags to you through the front door. You pay online.

Let’s not miss the good in the bad. Let’s use our own creativity and make a souvenir to remember this wild trip by. All the things that seemed unthinkable that have become everyday. We need to write it all down. The schools are closed, restaurants are closed, we don’t meet our friends, we don’t go into work, Stephen Colbert did the Late Show from his bathtub. We couldn’t have imagined this!

As much as we’re avoiding each other, we’re reaching out to each other. Checking in. We have more time now that we’re not commuting, now that some of us are not working. We can contact our cousin in Tucson. We can have dinner parties with all of the guests eating at home connected by Zoom. Young people are distributing flyers offering to go grocery shopping for old people. We sign our emails to our friends with “Be well and stay safe.”

I honor the check-out workers at the supermarket. I send love to my mailman. I bow down to the nurses, doctors, ICU staff, respiratory therapists. I pay reverence to the hospital cleaners and kitchen staff. I appreciate the public officials who are working hard. The doormen, bus drivers. I don’t forget the garbage men and those that work in the recycling plant. We see you. We honor you. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Namaste.

Families are coming together or exploding apart. People are out strolling in household clusters. Husbands and wives are fighting. The stakes are high. Beautiful moments are experienced with kids. Vicious fights taking place at 4am with everyone listening. When this is all over, the landscape will have changed.

We have more time. The world has become a village. Every day is Shabbat. The skies are fresh and pollution is clearing because people aren’t driving. We’re cleaning our closets. Taking the dog for long walks. Doing Yoga with Adriene. Meditating. Taking up running.

How about keeping a journal on paper so you can remember it all? You can make one if you don’t have an old one in the back of the closet. Keep notes on events and thoughts. How are you feeling today? How did you sleep? Any bizarre dreams? Suffering? What’s the latest unthinkable thing that is happening? What are people saying?

Write it all down and then use your creativity. Put color in it, paste something into it, a quote, make a drawing, insert a photo that you can print on your printer. Make it beautiful, or raw, or painful, or full of fear but express it.  And then express it again later in the day or tomorrow.

This is one for the books. Let’s not let it pass us by in a haze of anxiety, selfishness and fear. As Ryan Holiday said, the obstacle is the way. We can use this crisis as a springboard for growth and change, love and kindness, courage and grace. Embrace it. Breathe.


 

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Four Practices to Help You Feel Better: reflections from my week at a yoga retreat

A couple of weeks ago, I took myself off to spend a week at a yoga retreat in the Bahamas. The retreat was at an ashram and along with lots of yoga, I did daily meditation and attended workshops on a bunch of topics, from mindfulness to forgiveness. I so often thought about you, always looking for things to bring back, like a mother bird flying around looking for worms to take back to the nest . . .

A couple of weeks ago, I took myself off to spend a week at a yoga retreat in the Bahamas. The retreat was at an ashram and along with lots of yoga, I did daily meditation and attended workshops on a bunch of topics, from mindfulness to forgiveness. I so often thought about you, always looking for things to bring back, like a mother bird flying around looking for worms to take back to the nest. The retreat was great for me and I feel changed by it - calmer, more steady and optimistic about the future.

So I’m bringing back to you some thoughts that originated at the retreat and also in discussion with the women in the current Hearts & Minds online divorce recovery group. Here are four practices for your reflection:

Detachment 

Aren’t we all suffering because we can’t detach from our ex-husbands? Hasn’t thoughts of him colonized your mind, maybe tormenting you day and night if you’re in the early phases of recovery? Aren’t there hooks that keep you connected to him, ruminating about everything? Are you ready to untie those bonds?

There’s always a lot of ambivalence about detaching from him; it’s loaded with significance. It means that you fully accept that it’s over - and that’s huge. It may feel like you’re letting him off the hook. As long as you’re still grieving, in some cosmic way, you’re holding his feet to the fire, keep him responsible. And there’s a feeling of emptiness that you can avoid as long as he is firmly in your mind.

Detachment is a big task and cannot be accomplished in the early phases, but at some point, you’ll need to accept that it is over, release your grip and let it all drift back into your past. When you’re able to detach, you’ll free your mind and heal your heart. It means turning your vision from the past to your future. You can do that!

Resilience

We all have a natural bouyancy. When we sink to the bottom of the pool, we’ll naturally float back up. The body is programmed to heal - your cut finger will eventually be as good as new - it knows how to repair even without you doing anything about it.

Resilience means you have the capacity to recover, to bounce back. It doesn’t mean that you’ll bounce back right away as if nothing awful had happened, but it means that, in your heart, you know that you will. Eventually. It’s the expectation that this too shall pass - that you may not know what shape your life will take but you believe that whatever it is, you’ll be okay. You know you have the capacity to heal.

Rewiring

Rewiring means that you will need to challenge the thoughts that keep you stuck. This is where you shape some new neural pathways and fight against negativity. Science has shown that you can lift your mood just by changing your expression. When you smile even if you don’t feel pleased about anything, the body doesn’t know that the gesture is not genuine - the smile just naturally lifts your mood.

Another experiment showed that if you lift your arms in the air in a triumphant pose as if you’d just won a race, even if you don’t feel triumphant at all, you’ll be more likely to do well on a job interview than if you’d not. What you do and say, even if it’s not heartfelt, will bring you closer to those positive emotions. They rewire new neural pathways - it’s the “fake it till you make it” theory and it holds water. What you practice grows stronger.

So if an acquaintance at work asks how you are and rather than say, “miserable”, you say, “I’m okay” (even when you’re not), you’re making a cause to be one step closer to actually being okay at some point in the future. Just save the truth for those close to you who want to help.

Self-care

There’s a lot you can do to grow from this trauma but it means that you work on it in a consistent way and that requires self-care. I’d love to see you adopt some daily practices that will strengthen your spirit inch by inch. The effects of trauma get lodged in the body so you need to do healthy body practices to release it.

An example would be to do ten minutes of meditation every morning. If it’s too hard to sit quietly and focus on your breath, you can easily use an app that offers guided meditations of any length. If just sitting at all is too hard, how about a meditative walk around the block, where you notice the light, colors, trees, snow, whatever?

Other self care practices include yoga, t’ai chi, stretching exercises, singing, playing the piano, running - anything you do for yourself (you moms of young kids may need to get up 15 minutes earlier to carve out that time for yourself). It means putting some thought into doing something that you know is healthy for you, even if you don’t feel like it. The more you do it, the easier it becomes. Recovery comes in tiny increments and sometimes, you can’t see that it’s happening, but if you do something positive for yourself, it will add up and you’ll be headed in the right direction.

I hope these four concepts offer you food for thought (that mother bird again!) and that they help you access the hidden opportunity in what you are going through. You are being forced to work on yourself and develop self-healing and self-care practices that will serve you well no matter what you have to face in life in the future.

And, as always, let me know your reactions to all this below in the comments.


 

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Natural Healing

Forest Bathing, in Japanese, Shinrin Yoku, is a therapeutic practice that was developed in Japan and is now being taught around the world. It’s not just a walk in the woods. It’s about going out in nature and really connecting . . .

The heart of Montreal is the mountain. It’s not really a mountain, it’s more like a hill, but it’s the center point of the soul of the city. The mountain is really a park, designed in the 1880s by Frederick Law Olmsted, the same architect who designed New York’s Central Park. There is a wide paved path that circles around the mountain, as well as rustic trails that may trick you into thinking you’re out in the woods. On a beautiful weekend day, you might run into two or three friends on the path as the whole city is drawn to the vibrancy and tranquility of Mont Royal park.

The year my husband left, I turned to the mountain for solace. The weekends were long and quiet and I developed a practice of walking on the mountain every Sunday morning. My heart was aching but being in nature was a balm and I always felt better after my walk. Even though it was winter, he left in November and remember, this is Canada, I would dress up warmly and take to the path. It helped.

This past fall, I turned to nature again to connect with tranquility. I was able to hike in the woods (the real woods) every weekend for six weeks in a row. At some point on each trail, I would stop and stand still for a while, listening to all the sounds, watching all the life around me, breathing deeply and feeling like the breath was healing. This practice of arriving in a place of stillness in the woods would nurture me all week long.

I didn’t know that what I was doing had a name. It’s called Forest Bathing - in Japanese, Shinrin Yoku. It’s a therapeutic practice that was developed in Japan and is now being taught around the world. It’s not just a walk in the woods. It’s about going out in nature and really connecting - moving slowly with no destination and taking it all in. You can learn about it here: Forest Bathing.

Let me suggest that you try it. If you can’t get to the actual woods, find the most rustic park in your town and let the trees heal you. The trees, grasses, birds, water are all alive - see if you can feel part of it; if you can connect, even a little bit. It’s a practice so the more you do it, the easier it gets to relax into the arms of nature. And it will put your soul to rest.

Please share your thoughts and experiences below. We love to hear how nature has healed you.


 

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Don't Let These Men Define Us Incredible Women!

Don't let these terrible men define us incredible women. We are so much better than them and we should be thankful to be free of someone who doesn't value all that we have to offer. I used to obsess over the fabulous life these young women were having with my husband, and then I realized he's not that great and he's not smart enough to keep up his fake charade of being amazing for very long.

Okay. Kick off your shoes. Get a cup of tea. Get comfortable. This is a long one but oh, so amazing. Here’s a heartfelt letter I received from Michelle from Atlanta and I so very much wanted to share it with you. It’s full of great advice to you from someone who has been there and gotten through it. Thank you so much, Michelle, for giving me permission to publish it! I know it will help so many women!

When my husband essentially abandoned me I was so distraught, but in my case he strung me along with false facts for many painful months. By him telling me how awful I was, that I wasn’t a supportive wife, that he didn’t deserve to be treated so poorly, and that I should have seen this coming, he kept me in a state of panic and desperation. It also shifted the power dynamic completely to his favor, despite my knowing none of what he was saying was true. I started the long “pick me dance”, and so began my many months of complete humiliation trying to convince my husband that he should come back to the life he claimed I forced him to leave. 

When I think back now on all the completely degrading ways I kept trying to get him to acknowledge me (and the children), I feel sick. Through very expensive lawyers and years of waiting for discovery, I finally found out a lot of the truth. My husband was not only cheating, but with multiple women and spending money like he was a billionaire when he wasn’t. It was only first class travel, expensive hotels, lavish meals, etc. I am too embarrassed to write how much money was spent in a typical month, and what's even worse is that he had nothing tangible to show for it except an expanding waist line. 

I can't believe he was able to get away with this for so long. I truly believed he was spending all of his time working on our growing business. I mean I did see him on TV as he was interviewed on CNN and Fox News, so it wasn't that I was completely delusional! The depths of the lies and deception were incredible and eventually it did lead to his downfall at work, but that just too impacted me financially.

Now with time, I realize that a man who cared about me would never leave us for himself and blame me fully for it. That he was a coward and a covert narcissist. That I kept trying to convince him he had it all wrong and that our relationship was worth saving, probably just made him feel great, but didn’t change a thing. It also didn’t stop him from syphoning our money secretly to new accounts, setting up new credit cards or sleeping with age inappropriate women. 

There were lots of red flags during the time he left before I found out the truth, but I had made it my mission to convince him to come back and stupidly overlooked all of that. Also, with the perspective of time, I can see that even if all my convincing had worked, or if the younger women had dumped him, that I never would have had the same relationship again with my husband. What I mean is that I was on such a campaign to have my old life back I never really stopped to realize that what I was fighting for wasn’t worth it anymore and that I deserved much, much better. 

The only comfort I have in this nightmare is that one day I can tell my children that I did absolutely everything to try and save our marriage. Something my ex-husband will never be able to say. 

Here are some things that I would recommend to anyone else going through abandonment::

1) Watch videos and read self-help articles but don’t share them with him.  I scoured articles and videos online that seemed similar to our situation and sent them to him often. I was obsessed and there is a lot out there to find. I doubt he ever read or watched them. 

2) Don’t send him messages late at night. I sent him repeated texts very late at night, or in the early am, when I couldn’t sleep. Sometimes they were loving and sometimes pleading and begging for him to respond and return to us. Sometimes I was upset and lashed out. He rarely responded, but that didn’t stop me from sending. I now know he was in bed with other women at the same time. This probably made him feel even better about himself since he was getting away with cheating and I was still begging for him. So degrading and disgusting!

3) It’s ok to be stunned and hope he will come back, but don’t wait too long. I told lies to our children and friends that he was busy working and out of town to cover for him and keep his spot open in our life in case he decided to acknowledge me and our kids one day and come home. Looking back I should have probably only done this for a month or two, not almost a year.

4) If it looks like a duck, it’s a duck.  I found a lift pass for a 20 something year old female for Machu Picchu in our home and believed his story when he said he had no idea what it was and that he had never even been there. Later I found out that he had in fact gone there with this girl, paying for two first class plane tickets, expensive hotels and a private tour guide, all while he claimed he was working in a different state. 

5) Don’t be afraid to snoop. I didn’t check the cell phone bills. I think I was afraid for what I would find, but boy how I wish I would have done so much earlier than I did. I would have known the depths of how much he was cheating and with how many random women. This from a man I could barely get to respond to a text from me or the kids, I found hundreds, if not thousands of text messages with random women. That stung.

6) If you see something unbelievable, don't convince yourself it's not possible.  I saw my husband in his SUV on the road in front of me with what appeared to be a young woman in the passenger seat and started to follow him. I then called him while following him and he said I was crazy and just seeing things. I proceeded to follow him for miles and miles and he wouldn’t pull over. I think this may have been one of my lowest points. I later found out that I was right. There was a female in there the whole time who had climbed into the back to hide. Did I mention I had his own mother in my car with me while all this was going on? I still feel so sick about that experience when I think back on it now. 

7) Don’t sign anything! I signed what I thought were refinancing documents for our new home that turned out to really be a way for him to pull out extra cash to spend on his secret life with women. I wish I had not “trusted in my husband” and sought outside counsel before signing anything. I was more concerned with being a loving, supportive and welcoming wife, that I went against all of my better judgement. I can see now that the time around the signing of these documents that he was charming and manipulating me and it worked. Don't fall for it!

8) If he moves out, change the locks. If you can change the locks or set up surveillance cameras to keep him out, do it! In my case leaving the door "open" for his return majorly backfired. I found out in court while on the witness stand when my ex's lawyers put papers in front of me that were in my handwriting, that my husband had invaded my privacy and stolen from me. Apparently he knew when I was out of the house with the kids and took his time going through everything, and I mean everything. He even stole some of my things and my favorite jewelry, though I could never prove it. But the worst of it is he managed to find my personal therapy journals and took photos of everything and then attempted to use them against me in court! I was beyond mortified and humiliated.

Here is some advice for someone who is in the worst part of their nightmare:

1) Enjoy the divorce diet weight loss!  Seriously, I actually got down to my college size jeans and was amazed. It also helped with my low self esteem after being rejected by my husband. 

2) Don’t avoid going to gatherings or events where it will be mostly couples. I always ended up having so much needed fun and it is rare that the couples stick together the entire evening. Feeling normal from time to time was so nice.

3) Keep appointments that you don’t think you can handle. This includes hair cuts, mani-pedis, doctor's appointments, book clubs, school meetings, family gatherings, etc. I always thought of cancelling, but every time I went, I came home grateful for the distraction. There is nothing worse than time alone to keep you from being able to move forward. Know that you will go there and people will ask about your husband and or talk about their amazing husbands/lives, but don't let it affect you. 

4) It's ok to not want to take your wedding rings off.  I found it very hard to remove my wedding rings, so I rarely did. One thing I would recommend is maybe going to a grocery store or to an event well outside of your normal living area without them on as a first step. I found a grocery store two towns over and actually had single men interact with me which was a nice and welcomed feeling. People might say something to you about still wearing your rings, but it's not their business, and only you can decide when you feel comfortable removing them, if at all.

5) Take up a new hobby that your husband would have thought was stupid or a waste of time. Mine used to make fun of me when I made jewelry. I enjoyed making it (therapeutic) and giving it as gifts to friends. Now I am trying to make a real business out of it! I know it isn't probably healthy, but I dream of my jewelry line becoming successful not just for me and my kids, but so my ex can be frustrated.

6) Try and find a local divorce recovery workshop. They usually are not expensive and typically they have a speaker first and then break into smaller groups. I met some incredible people who I still talk to today. It’s tough to even show up and a bit humiliating, but don't leave! The one I went to actually had volunteers in the parking lot to help convince you to come in because they said so many people would turn around and leave. I’m so glad I didn’t!

7) Be prepared for the people you thought would be there for you not to be. I’m not sure why, but divorce to some people is almost like you have an infectious disease. They want to be supportive but not get too close. It’s upsetting, but if you know that it might happen, you won’t take it too personally. Sadly, this also applies to close family members.  There were some get togethers that I wasn't invited to when normally I would have been. It hurt a lot, but just know that it will happen. I was also told once by a friend that I wasn't invited to something because the hostess was afraid her husband might talk and flirt with me. Strange but true!

8) It’s ok to let go of the commitment you made in front of your Rabbi/Minister/God. It is ok to let go of the dreams and all those plans for your future. This really is the hardest part, especially if you have children together. When I would think about being an empty nester all alone it made me feel physically sick. I held on thinking that one day that my husband would have an epiphany and remember our vows, our life, our plans... but that day never came. A man who would cheat and lie doesn't care about those commitments and only cares about himself. Plus who wants to be with a man who doesn't honor something so sacred? Would you have married him the first time if he had done this in his previous relationship with another woman? Probably not.

9) I feel it's ok to contact the other woman, but don't say anything incriminating that can be used against you! I never did this and regret it. The main young woman my husband cheated with is still hanging on to this day. I wish more than anything I would have reached out to her once I saw evidence years ago. Of course I don't know what would have happened, and chances are she still would have stuck with my husband because she is fully supported by him, but at least I would have gotten my truth out. 

10) It’s ok to put yourself out there to date even if you still believe the horrible things your husband said about you.  There are several women I am in touch with from our Sedona trip who say they have just given up and don’t even attempt to look for a relationship anymore. I say that is so wrong! That means their ex wins! The ex is still hurting you despite being long gone and living their fake new life with their pre-pubescent girlfriend. It’s like taking poison and hoping they get sick. 

Final thoughts - That I was willing to do anything to get my dream back was, and still is, so humiliating. It’s also tough to come to terms that my not so great ex chose someone not so great over me. I’ve heard all the sayings like, “your better off without him”, or “one day he will realize what he gave up”, but the problem is that doesn’t make you feel any better. It still really hurts that my husband gave me up, our children, our fabulous life, all for a 20-something year old art school drop out who is not particularly attractive or smart. 

Yes, I may be in my 40’s, but I am highly educated, told I am fairly attractive, am a very compassionate, friendly person, who is well liked and respected. Did I mention I have two Emmy awards? None of this was enough to keep my husband committed and it still hurts to this day. Sadly, I still fight daily with bitterness, which I hate. I dream of karma but it hasn’t come. Or at least not the way I want it.  

However, I do know how lucky I am. I am recently remarried to the most incredible man. He sees in me all the things my ex-husband discarded and apparently didn’t value. My kids even like him (though that took some time and removal of their father’s brainwash and lies). I feel lucky every day, and I work very hard not to sink back into my bitterness and anger since I still have to deal with my awful ex due to the kids and our business. When my new husband and I tell people our story, we often hear the words “fairytale ending” or “I just got goose bumps”. I NEVER would have imagined that would be me since I was stuck for so long believing what my ex thought of me. I am so glad I opened my heart back up. 

That is the main point of this letter. Don't let these terrible men define us incredible women. We are so much better than them and we should be thankful to be free of someone who doesn't value all that we have to offer. I used to obsess over the fabulous life these young women were having with my husband, and then I realized he's not that great and he's not smart enough to keep up his fake charade of being amazing for very long. This is a guy who managed to misspell my name multiple times on birthday/anniversary cards (not kidding)!  He is destined to disappoint even the dumbest of dingbats. 

This is Vikki again - I’d love to hear your reaction to all the great advice Michelle has shared. Take a minute and tell us what you think below. And, Michelle, thank you so much from all of us!


 

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From Surviving to Thriving

Depending on where you are in your life, opening yourself to growth means pushing yourself to do those things you know are good for you, even if they seem hard or scary. It means starting to say, “yes, sure” instead of “no, I can’t.” And then, one day, you’ll wake up and realize that all that work you did on yourself has made you strong and resilient . . .

My husband’s leaving transformed my life. Initially, in the first year, I would have said that it was only in a bad way. I was buffeted by terrible feelings – emotional pain, hurt, bewilderment, loneliness and, eventually, anger – struggling to stay upright in the face of gale force winds. I had to grapple with an unrecognizable new reality, one in which he not only didn’t love me but somehow, seemed to hate me. I lost thirty pounds and virtually stopped eating because I was forced to swallow something I couldn’t stomach.

I had to work on myself constantly, trying to find a way to stop obsessing, controlling my voracious need to talk about “it” to anyone with a pair of ears, willing myself to stop needing repeated validation that what he did was wrong. I worked hard to accept that life is unpredictable and even if things seem to be a settled, you never really know. I struggled to stop feeling jealous of others and sorry for myself.

His leaving transformed my outer life, but the result of his leaving transformed my inner life. All the emotional work I did those first few years, through my own thought processes, through reading books like When Things Fall Apart and The Dark Night of the Soul, through therapy and talking with friends, all that emotional work changed me and that change was in a good way.

I had to struggle to get up above the churning whirling waters and envision a new and different future. I swam hard against the current of negativity and despair and that hard swimming strengthened me. I fought to love life again.

Over the years since my husband left, I’ve come to recognize what a gift he gave me. I know my circumstance is unique. As a result of his leaving, I wrote Runaway Husbands, which led to the development of the Runaway Husbands website and the privilege of connecting with thousands of amazing women all over the world. I know my work has helped many of them and that gives my life meaning.

But even if your husband’s leaving does not turn into a career path for you, I know you have a choice. Faced with an enormous life struggle, you can choose to turn bitter or be better. Embedded in this challenge is a glimmer of possibility by which you can strengthen your mind and learn, once again, to love life. And following a life and death struggle when you can love your life, in whatever form it’s in, you become different. In a good way.

I just finished reading a best-selling memoir by Samra Zafar called A Good Wife: Escaping the Life I Never Chose. The book is about how she was pushed into an arranged marriage at the age of 17, leading to years of emotional and physical abuse at the hands of her husband and his parents with whom she lived, far from her family and homeland. For many years, she was constantly blamed and criticized, isolated with no one to turn to. After many aborted attempts, she summoned all her smarts and emotional strength to escape from the marriage and the dictates of her culture, which demanded she remain and take it.

She eventually was able to break free, go to university and build a life that inspires women trapped in abusive relationships all over the world. In A Good Wife, she wrote that an interviewer once asked her who was the person most influential in her success. She thought about it and then answered that it was her husband, Ahmed. Had she never had to struggle as a result of his abuse, she would not have grown into the person she has become. She writes:  I’m committed to letting my past make me better, not bitter. I strive to forgive Ahmed, his family and my parents, not because what happened was okay – it can never be okay – but because giving resentment, anger and hatred any place in my heart will only leave less space for love, joy and happiness.

Wherever you’re at in your recovery from Wife Abandonment Syndrome, I hope that you too will strive to turn this crisis into an opportunity for your growth as a person. I know that may seem confusing and vague and you may be wondering what you would need to do to work on yourself.

Depending on where you are in your life, opening yourself to growth means pushing yourself to do those things you know are good for you, even if they seem hard or scary. It may mean taking a drawing class, joining a chorus, volunteering at the animal shelter or going to a party where you don’t know many people. It may mean challenging yourself to learn to balance a checkbook or stopping yourself from projecting bitterness and acrimony.

It means starting to say, “yes, sure” instead of “no, I can’t.” And then, one day, you’ll wake up and realize that all that work you did on yourself has made you strong and resilient.

You can learn more about Samra’s book HERE and please, leave a comment below and tell us what you’ve done to turn this crisis into an opportunity for your personal growth.


 

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Mother, Champion, Queen, Goddess . . . but not Wife

One of the themes that wound through our talks at the Sedona Retreat this year was how many of the women felt ashamed. It was taken for granted that it was more valuable to be married or in a relationship than to be divorced.

Often, when I’m leading a divorce recovery retreat in Sedona, Mexico or Montreal, the participants ask what they should say if a group of us walks into a restaurant and someone asks what our group is about. Over the years, we’ve jokingly decided to say different things – we’re a group of women CEOs or an international quilting club.

We’ve called ourselves circus performers or said that it was a high school reunion (in spite of the fact that our ages ranged from 32 to 70!) One year, we said were a women’s barbershop chorus but then someone asked us to sing – whoops!

But one thing we’ve never said, at least not till this year, is that we’re a divorce recovery retreat. We didn’t want people to know. Why? We were ashamed.

One of the themes that wound through our talks at the Sedona Retreat this year was how many of the women felt ashamed. It was taken for granted that it was more valuable to be married or in a relationship than to be a divorced woman. To be participating in a divorce recovery group, by definition, means that someone rejected them. It means that they are struggling to recover and are not the victor in the equation. It means that they are the vanquished.

We talked about this. We talked about how pervasive the view in society is that if you don’t have a ring on your finger or a partner in your bed, you’ve failed. So many women grow up expecting to be married – it’s the stuff of girlhood fantasy, particularly for those in their 50’s and above. It’s the goal, the expectation – it defines what it means to be an adult woman. It means that you’re valuable, wanted, desirable.

So then we talked about how to start to tinker with the erroneous belief that divorced women are “less than” and for the women to start see themselves as valuable. We called out the names of women we admire who got their fame through what they accomplished and not through husbands or partners: Rosa Parks, Oprah, Amelia Earhart, Beyoncé, Madonna, Mme. Curie, Mother Teresa, Ellen, Lady Gaga, Malala Yousafzai. We talked about what Serena Williams had printed on her shirt at the French Open this year: “Mother, Champion, Queen, Goddess.” You notice, the word “Wife” was nowhere to be found!

We opened up a discussion of how to shift our feelings about ourselves – to love ourselves and stop being ashamed – an emotion that comes so easily to women. Thinking it through and integrating that being single is nothing to be ashamed of is a challenge but it’s where we need to go.

So the next time all twelve of us went into a restaurant and someone asked us what our group was about, we proudly said: “We’re on a divorce recovery retreat!” We thought of Serena and owned it. Champions!

Share your thoughts below about the feeling of shame of being divorce and how you are going to overcome it. And if you are interested in attending a divorce recovery retreat, check out the Jump Up! happening in Montreal this September.


 

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When His Eyes Turn Cold

Although there are many aspects to wife abandonment, the primary one which every woman struggles with is understanding how someone who cared for her so profoundly could just stop loving. How could that light go out of his eye? . . .

My husband left me the day I returned from twenty-three days on the road for a book tour for my first book. I had driven all alone from Boston to Atlanta, across the midwest and then from San Francisco to San Diego, giving readings at bookstores in towns along the way, on the move, day after day after day. It was rough.

When it was over, I took the red eye back from San Diego. My husband picked me up at the airport and I fell in his arms in relief. I remember the softness of his brown leather jacket caressing my cheek as I hugged him tight; secure in his love, I was so happy to see him.

He dropped me off at home and went to work. When he walked in the door that evening, my world as I knew it shattered. He had an odd expression on his face and muttered, “It’s over”. I was mystified. He repeated, “It’s over and I’m leaving you right now for another woman.”

I stared at his face and was shocked to realize that I didn’t recognize it. It was as if his familiar features had rearranged themselves and hardened. The light had gone out of his eyes and instead, they had turned cold. Later, I sat on the bed crying hysterically as he threw his stuff from the closet into plastic bags. He seemed unfazed. He really seemed not to care.

Where had the man I had known gone? The one who grabbed my hand whenever we were walking down the street. The one who showered me with love and affection. Who had written me a card on our anniversary a few months earlier that read, “You are my rock, you are my life!”

That was more than a decade ago and since then, I have dedicated my life to helping women who are going through the same trauma that I experienced. I guide them from ground zero through their painful obsessing, numbness and grief, till they can reach the other side of this nightmare and rebuild their lives.

Although there are many aspects to wife abandonment, the primary one which every woman struggles with is understanding how someone who cared for her so profoundly could just stop loving. How could that light go out of his eye? How could he disconnect so completely? It is very troubling and scary because if someone you felt so close to can turn against you so categorically, how can you trust anyone? It redefines the nature of all relationships and leaves you alone, not only in the physical sense, but also existentially. And that is why Wife Abandonment Syndrome is so devastating.

When I was studying psychology, I learned of an experiment by psychologist Dr. Edward Tronick, director of UMass Boston's Infant-Parent Mental Health Program, called the Still Face Experiment. In the experiment, a mother warmly interacts with her one-year-old baby girl and the baby responds delightedly. Then the mother assumes a still face and no matter what the baby does to engage her, the mother doesn’t respond. The baby becomes more and more agitated, screeching, arching her back and reaching for her mother wildly.

Watching it now moves me profoundly because that baby is us. Our loss of our sense of safety and the security of knowing what to expect from a person we depend on completely who then stops responding and gives us a still face stirs a panic inside. The world temporarily stops making sense.

During those early months post-abandonment, women obsess endlessly about how this could have happened. How could he change and not care? The primary task of recovery is to answer that question for herself. She needs to understand the flaw in the personality of her particular husband that permitted him to have been attached for so long and then so cavalierly detach from her and typically jump to another as if she and the affair partner were interchangeable. He focuses on getting his needs of the moment met without regard for the damage done.

I understand that sometimes marriages fall apart for all sorts of reasons and can accept that men or women feel the need to leave. The unique aspect of Wife Abandonment Syndrome however is that in leaving, the husband turns against his wife with disregard for her distress. His eyes turn cold.

The task then for the wife in recovery is for her to be able to detach eventually but because she doesn’t possess that same internal flaw, for her it is not so easy. Moving on, she will need to find the courage to accept that many other people are capable of making secure lasting attachments even if her husband was not.

Click here to watch the Still Face Experiment and please share with us your own experience of your husband’s eyes turning cold below.


 

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Better, Not Bitter: How being abandoned changes you

The trick is to allow yourself to feel the injustice and anger - to feel the bitterness - but to pass through it eventually and develop that zen acceptance at what life has sent your way. So that, in time, you’ll heal and end up better, not bitter . . .


We had a great session of the Hearts & Minds Recovery Group (an online therapy group) and the conversation shifted to a discussion of how what happened to us has changed us. Penny and Lilly were talking about how they packed up all their husband’s belongings so carefully and thoroughly and then Marianne questioned why we all had to be such good girls in our marriages even as it was dissolving. Lilly said that all the sacrifices make sense if the marriage is ongoing but once it falls apart, they lose their meaning.

Marianne talked about zen acceptance - should we just move on with what life offers us, but Suzanne said that she’s bewildered and anxious. She worked her whole life to get to this stage where she’s retired and has put aside a certain amount of money, and now, she has to split it in half and is looking at the prospect of perhaps needing a mortgage again. It’s just not fair!

I struggled with the conversation because I felt that, of course, everyone needs to air their anger and frustration, but I worry that sometimes women get stuck in bitterness and never again feel happy and free, even in spite of what has happened.

Cherie responded that bitterness is a stage that you have to go through, like the grief and anger. She resents it when people say “Get over it” when they haven’t been through it and don’t know what it’s like. Then she said that we are all going to be changed but who is the person who comes out the other side?

Suzanne shared how she’s changed. She said that she used to be a cardboard cut-out who shut down when anything got too emotional. She was agreeable and avoided conflict and was uncomfortable asking for what she wanted. Since her husband left, she’s been in therapy and is learning to express herself and feel things. It’s a new world for her and she’s happy about the change.

So I suppose the trick is to allow yourself to feel the injustice and anger - to feel the bitterness - but to pass through it eventually and develop that zen acceptance at what life has sent your way. So that, in time, you will heal and end up better, not bitter.

Join in the conversation below and tell us what you think!


 

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Finding Your Feet - Moving Towards Recovery One Step at a Time

Wherever you are in your recovery, you need to push yourself past your comfort zone. If it’s early in the process, that may just mean getting out of bed . . . each of those little steps is essential to your recovery . . .

I watched a movie last night called Finding Your Feet. It’s a story about an upper class British woman, Sandra, who discovers at her husband’s retirement party that he’s been having a five year affair with her friend. Devastated, she leaves to go stay with her sister, Bif, with whom she’s been estranged for ten years. The husband quickly moves in with his affair partner.

The movie is about Sandra’s transformation. When she arrives at Bif’s messy working class flat, she’s emotionally shut down, crying and depressed. Bif, a free spirit, pushes her to come to her community dance class which Sandra very reluctantly does. After a few times at the class, she can’t help herself and she starts to be swept along by the fun of dancing and being in the group.

She meets a guy there who she initially can’t stand but eventually comes to love. She changes from being an up-tight repressed lady (literally - she’s Lady Sandra) into an alive fun-loving woman. She remembers that she used to love to dance. She finds her feet!

Okay - cliché. Why am I telling you this? Because the message is essential to you - that life begins at the end of your comfort zone. When Sandra’s husband first left, she couldn’t imagine that she could refashion a life for herself with the help of her kooky older sister. But the turning point came when she agreed to go to the first dance class.

She was miserable at that first class and didn’t want to participate. She struggled with herself and couldn’t raise her arms or move her feet and throw herself into the flow of the class. But just by going, miserable and all, she triumphed. She didn’t know it at the time but it was the first step toward her recovery.

A month after my husband left, some friends invited me to their annual Christmas party. I dragged myself there and, sitting among all the couples in a room that I’d been in with my husband the previous year, I was wretched. I left after twenty minutes. I thought it was a failure, but it was really an important step. I'd pushed myself to do something and the next time, it would be easier.

Wherever you are in your recovery, you need to push yourself past your comfort zone. If it’s early in the process, that may just mean getting out of bed, taking a shower, getting dressed and forcing some food down your throat. Later on, it may mean going to your friend’s birthday party or taking a class by yourself. And if you want to, even later on, it may mean taking a leap of faith and dating again.

Each of those little steps is essential to your recovery. You won’t be able to see it now but you need to push past your impulse to retreat, even in small ways and even if it doesn’t feel good. It’s a struggle, it’s a journey and I know you can get there. So stop and think right now of something that you know would be good for you that feels too hard and make up your mind to do it. Like Sandra, you can find your feet again!

Add your comments below. Tell us what that hard thing is, big or small, and how you plan to accomplish it.


 

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Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – How He Morphs into an Angry Stranger

It's mystifying when our husbands change from being the loving man we knew for so long into a critical angry stranger. Here's an explanation . . . 

We were talking tonight in the Hearts & Minds Recovery Group about how mystifying it is when our husbands change from being the loving man we knew for so long into a critical angry stranger. We were saying that we could all remember those turning point moments right after we learned that our husband was leaving when we were hit with the bizarre terms of our new reality – when he said things and behaved in ways that, in his former incarnation, he would never have done.

For example, my own husband was always very loving, and I was 100% secure that he was protective and wanted the best for me. The night he left, he had told me about his long affair. I referred to his girlfriend in some negative way and he said, “Don’t talk about her like that!” That shocked me. He was protecting her (this stranger) instead of me. It demonstrated that his allegiance had shifted and he was now relating to her like he had related to me for twenty-one years – like a caring, protective husband. That was one of the early moments that indicated to me how radically he’d changed.

In our group tonight, we spent a long time discussing how that happens – how did the old husband (a known quantity) suddenly shape shift into this alien. As we were talking, I had an epiphany that I wanted to share. It focuses on the turning point moment, the rupture, during which he changed. Up until that moment, he was keeping his options open by acting like he had always done. He had not declared that the marriage was over and the potential to remain was still possible.

He had to have had some ambivalence about walking away from his life as he knew it and because runaway husbands by definition are conflict avoiders, he may still have not gotten the courage to take the leap. But once his intention to leave is out in the open, he no longer has to keep up a façade. He has nothing to lose and he is now free to make visible what he had been keeping secret for so long – his rejection of the marriage and the transfer of his loyalty to the other woman, if one is in the picture.

After he has blurted out his intention, he no longer has to keep his options open – that door has closed behind him. It must be a huge relief for him to be able to give up the fiction that he is devoted to you alone. His resentment of the stress that he felt to keep you in the dark erupts (irrationally) in anger towards you. He had all this pressure inside which is now released along with the need to keep acting like he’s someone he’s not.

He resents you for putting him in the position of having to hide and lead a double life (okay – I said it’s not rational!) and that resentment can finally find expression. The guy who loved and protected you is free to morph into an angry stranger when it’s no longer in his interest to keep connected to you just in case he chickens out and doesn’t leave.

He has crossed the bridge from his old life to his new one at that moment of rupture and the landscape is completely different from his point of view. He’s no longer bound by the expectations of his life that existed a few moments earlier.

I hope this helps you understand a little bit more how your husband changed so radically out-of-the-blue. Please add to the conversation by posting your comment below.

 


 

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Vikki Stark - Divorce Recovery Specialist

Hi! I’m Vikki and I'll be your guide in your recovery process from Wife Abandonment Syndrome. I’m a therapist but also an abandoned wife like yourself and I know what it feels like. I want to help you not only bounce back, but to discover a new you in the process.



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