Life Coach
Lucy Newsum Coaching
It is a human truth: divorce is hard. Within that truth is a depth of feeling that is often so visceral it is difficult to communicate. Divorce is not just hard, it is raw, exposing and messy. The loss of love, the untangling of your life from someone else, the sense of shame – it can feel like hitting rock bottom. It requires all our courage, strength and resilience to move through it and emerge stronger on the other side.
I believe we can move through it, and I believe we can rise stronger. I believe this because I have experienced it. ‘Rising stronger’ was the philosophy I lived by as I healed from my divorce. Today, my mission is to support others to do the same.
Why it’s so damn hard
Grief and emotional turmoil
With any relationship ending there is grief. Grief for the loss of the other person, the loss of the life you built, the future you imagined and your identity as part of that relationship and marriage. For many there is also another loss at play: the loss of ourselves within the relationship. It’s a triple whammy: loss of the other, ourselves and the life we were living.
With grief comes an emotional rollercoaster. You might be familiar with the Kübler-Ross model which outlines the five stages of grief: denial (or numbness), anger, bargaining (can lead to rumination), depression (deep sadness) and acceptance. These stages are not linear; it is likely you will bounce back and forth between them. This emotional whack-a-mole is hard, especially as you start to feel better and have some acceptance to then plummet back into anger or sadness. At other times you might find yourself stuck in the grip of a powerful and painful emotion, unable to move through it. Much of my work is about helping us to navigate and process our emotions, without suppressing or devaluing them.
Loss is also physical
Research shows that the brain’s response to loss and heartbreak activates the same pain centres triggered by physical injury. The heartbreak of a divorce is not just in your head; we feel it at a deep physical level. It can feel like our heart is breaking. Combine this with the physical separation from a person we have spent time with every day and it’s easy to see we are dealing with a lot.
Shame and guilt
And if that’s not enough, we also tend to add a good dollop of guilt or shame on top of it all. Guilt at hurting the feelings of someone we loved, or feelings of rejection and low self-worth, or questions of ‘what did I do wrong?’ or ‘why wasn’t I enough?’.
Our culture contributes to this shame and guilt. The wider narrative around divorce and the opinions of others can leave us feeling like a failure, fuelling the flames of shame
and leaving us lacking in confidence. This all serves to amplify the pain we are experiencing.
The weight of responsibility
Amidst all of this we have choices to make and action to take: the legal process, financial decisions, and maybe childcare challenges too. We are dismantling one life and building a new one. This is scary and often overwhelming. But every ending is also a beginning, and we can rise stronger.
The only way out is through
One of the biggest lessons I’ve learnt in life so far is that you can’t shortcut your way around the hard moments. The only way out is to go through – gently and one step at a time.
It is natural to want to avoid or numb the pain of loss. But avoiding, ignoring, suppressing or resisting our feelings are all actually ways that keep that pain alive. We keep the pain trapped in our body rather than accepting it, feeling it, having compassion for it and moving through it.
Many years ago, I experienced a shattering heartbreak. It was a short relationship, so I judged my pain at its ending to be out of proportion. How could I be so hurt over something that hadn’t lasted long? Grieving it so deeply felt somehow weak, like something was wrong with me. So, I brushed myself off, put the grief into a locked box and got on with my life. Looking back, I can see clearly how that unprocessed and unhealed pain influenced my relationship behaviours and choices, contributed to an internal narrative of shame and limiting beliefs, and gave space to my own very loud and mean inner critic. It shaped how I showed up in my marriage and how I showed up for myself. When I went through my divorce over 10 years later, I finally found myself able to grieve and process that early relationship, which also helped me heal from my divorce, learn from it all and find the road back to myself.
I love Miranda Hart’s description of going through the hard moments. In her recent book, she describes her journey as finding herself somewhere “…dark. Musty.Dank. A cave. With slimy, muddy walls. I walked along the cold, rock floor until another door at the far end of the cave became faintly visible. Somehow, I knew that door was the one that I would eventually, at the right time, be able to step through. And I would be refreshed”
My marriage and my divorce became my teacher. Slowly, gently, with compassion, I navigated that dark, dank cave. It was a journey of getting to know myself (my patterns, beliefs and values), finding the tools to feel more confident and navigate daily ups and downs, and building a brighter, more joyful and fulfilling life. In short, I went on a journey back to my heart. Today I feel freer, move alive, more empowered and more deeply connected to myself and others than ever before.
You can do the same
There is a light at the end of your dark cave. What if this is the start of a journey to truly discovering yourself and building a more empowered, confident and fulfilled you?
If you’re unsure where to start, here are three things you could focus on:
- Seek out your support network: I recommend your network covers three pillars of support – practical support (legal and financial advice, childcare support etc), emotional support (someone to turn to when you are in the grip of emotion or turning in on yourself) and social support (someone who will get you out of the house and sprinkle some joy).
- Daily wins: at the end of each day write down, or say out loud, three wins from the day. It doesn’t matter how big or small these are – a win could be making the bed that day – the power is in the daily recording of your wins. It trains your brain to start to look for the positives.
- Gentle movement: our physiology has one of the biggest impacts on our emotional state. Movement positively influences our emotional state, enabling us to navigate and shift some of those more painful emotions.
“The most difficult seasons of life are often preparing us for the most beautiful times ahead. When life falls apart, don’t rush to put it all back together. Sit in the fire and ash of all that once was. You will rise from this with deeper clarity, more wisdom, and a heart primed for peace. This is what grief does when we make room for it. Grief doesn’t break us, it heals us.” – Sheleana Aiyana
About Lucy Newsum
Lucy Newsum is a life coach and facilitator. She provides coaching for women who want to live and love wholeheartedly.