The One and Only One Good Thing about Divorce

Therapists generally do not recommend that people divorce.  This is for a variety of reasons.  For one thing, most of us do not consider it our role to make such a recommendation.  In addition, have seen how difficult separation and divorce can be on people.  There are high rates of depression in separation.  Then there are the effects on childen.  And we have seen times where divorce may have seemed to be the solution for a patient's depression or problems, but it wasn't really.  Divorce is not a simple solution for problems.

But what if, despite all that, you are getting a divorce?  What if you didn't choose it, and it was forced upon you?  Or what if you began the divorce process but felt you had no choice?

What is that one thing which is good about divorce?

I believe that it provides a chance for re-inventing oneself.  We have all gone through our lives trying to make the puzzle pieces fit as best we could.  But it is a little like a 12 year trying to build a house or car.  They reach their 20's and would like to make some changes to their house or car, but they would practically have to level the house or take the car totally apart to do it.

Divorce is like a card table with a jigsaw puzzle with a bomb underneath it.  The bomb goes off, and the puzzle is once again thrown into pieces.  Not everything has to be put back together.  But quite a bit has to be reassembled.  And this time there is the opportunity to reassemble one's life in a better way than it was put together before.

Of course, I am speaking somewhat optimistically, pointing out the opportunities for growth.  I often see my patients going through a growth process like this.  Unfortunately, it can also be true that people may simply put the puzzle back together just as it was before.  Maybe a woman keeps looking for her worth in sexual encounters with men.  Or a man continues drinking and looking for his worth in money and status.  But there is the opportunity when relationships break up to stand back and do something new with one's life.  Whether remaining single or getting back into a relationship, routines will be disrupted, and new routines have to be created.  There is a chance also for taking a new look at one's religious and philosophical beliefs.  There is a chance to make new friends.  It can be an opportunity for learning new leisure interests.  Perhaps a new dating partner likes skiing, or opera, and you learn to like them too, even though you thought that you would be interested in them.

As painful as divorce can be, if you find yourself going through it, this one good thing about it needs to be understood and taken advantage of.  Take the chance to do something new and better with your life.  Seek out a therapist if you need to in order to use it as a growth process.  Use your adult perspective to redo old decisions from childhood which were not working for you.  There may never be an opportunity like this again in your life.