
To my friend,
I have been exactly where you are, and I survived this first day.
This day when you wake up legally... alone, when you open your eyes, in a bed that you once shared with your spouse or one you never have, and you start shaking because as you blink up at the ceiling and realise what day it is, it dawns on you that life as you knew it is over.
You may not want to get up because you don’t know how.
How are you going to face your friends? Your children? Your boss? How are you going to navigate life as now a single person when you have been an attached one for however long? What actually will your hands do when they aren’t holding your spouse’s?!?
Maybe it was your choice to end the marriage. Maybe it wasn’t.
It doesn’t matter because this day begins your new life. Either you knew this day was coming because of so many painful moments, or maybe you were so blindsided that your neck should goddamn hurt because it was like a car smashing into your life.
But, sweets, you have been given freedom.
Watch: Mamamia Confessions - Relationship deal breakers. Post continues below.
I know that may sound ridiculous, but please listen.
I know you want to do some things that maybe aren’t in your best interest.
Maybe you want to stay in your bed sobbing all day, or maybe it’s been tooooo long since someone had their fingers on you, so you want to go out and get you some.
Maybe you want to set some things on fire or get f**ked up, or pretend like nothing is going on at all, so you’re just going to dress for work and put your game face on and tackle what you need to because you got no time for this feelings bullshit.
But, listen to me, really.
Please take a moment. Just one. It doesn’t even have to be long, but consider that this is the first day of the rest of your life, and you've been offered the gift of a crisis:
Glennon Doyle Melton writes it best:
“…the Greek root of the word crisis is ‘to sift,’ as in to shake out the excesses and leave only what’s important. That’s what crises do. They shake things up until we are forced to hold on to only what matters most. The rest falls away.”
That’s right. Here you are. Right in the muddle.
Your life as a divorcee has begun.
You get to decide, here and from now on, what needs to fall away and what you need to hold onto dearly.
Listen to Mamamia's award-winning podcast on surviving separation, The Split. In this episode, Mandy Nolan shares her story and talks to women about how they started their new life post-divorce.
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