Divorce Stress

I awoke one morning recently with the heaviest heart which is really not my nature. But this day, I couldn’t shake it. I couldn’t pray it away, lying there in my comfy bed desperately trying to fall back asleep after a night of disrupted sleep.

The birds were already chirping outside my window as the sky began to illuminate ever so slightly. Noooo, I want to go back to sleep, I pleaded. No such luck. I felt as if I could break out into tears at any second, right there on my pillows. Again, this is not how I usually greet the day.

But there was no pretending this one away. Heaviness was in the air around me.

I even tried to reason with myself, “What’s going on here? What’s the source of this?”

Sure, I have stressors, and I also have people in my life who are experiencing stressful events, and I walk besides mamas every day who are navigating the most painful upheavals of their lives and I’m an empath and it hasn’t stopped raining for what feels like months...oh and the world events...

But this morning as I write this, my capacity to rebound feels fragile and I want to cry...which I think I will just do. I’ve got to move this energy. So, if it needs to fall from my eyes in the form of healing water, bring it on.

I’m taking a spoonful of my own medicine here. This is precisely the kind of thing I encourage the mamas I work with to do all the time...get it out!

Let me clarify a moment that in doing so, I don’t mean make it go away, bypass or pretend it isn’t happening. To the contrary, the unwanted guest needs to be invited to sit down with you so you can gently ask it....

What are you trying to tell me?

What do I need to see?

What am I missing here?

But back to the source of this unease a moment.

I don’t really feel like it’s about any one particular thing going on — it feels like a buildup. Let’s face it, the world feels very noisy right now.

It doesn’t feel safe to share opinions. People are screaming at each other and being violent in the streets. There is a threat of nuclear war. No wonder we all feel emotional and on guard. The news is disturbing, and I’m supposed to find my Zen place amidst this?

There is a buzz of low-grade stress swirling around us 24/7.

I don’t share this with you today to further trigger you, but instead rather acknowledge that you too may be feeling more stressed than usual. And yes, you are in a divorce which is its own breeding ground of stressors.

First off, take a deep breath and remind yourself that divorce is only a season — it is temporary, and you will move to the other side of it.

Then let’s just acknowledge that we live in a highly stressed-out world that thrives on running on all cylinders with few outlets for relief. Isn’t it interesting how we normalize productivity, achievement and stress but not the antidote for it all?

This world we live in reinforces that we are not enough and need more.

So, what can we do about that?

We can learn a new language.

We can get back into our bodies.

We can connect to our intuition.

We can calm our nervous system.

We can learn to create boundaries.

We can listen to our inner wisdom.

We can nurture ourselves body, mind and spirit.

We can say No.

We can say Yes.

We can walk away.

Turning off the evening news filled with fear-inducing information doesn’t change the reality on the world stage, but it changes the reality within you.

It’s easy to get sucked up in the low energy. Like it or not, fear can be seductive. It can unite us. It can feel familiar. And it can keep us stuck.

Every time I walk through town and casually say hello to people I know on the street or while walking my dog in the woods — and I ask, “how are you?” — the response is quite similar and makes me want to scream when they say: The best I can be given ‘everything’ going on!

Do you see what’s happening there? We’re feeding each other fear.

Again, there is a HUGE distinction to be made here. Of course, we can (and should) share the reality of how we are feeling with people we feel safe with. But we should also be aware of what we are reinforcing in doing so.

I know the world feels unsettled and prickly right not, divorce or no divorce. But the greatest way to make impact is to shut out the noise, get back in your body and nurture what is arising within you.

When you care for yourself, you are caring for your kids, all the people in your life...and even the resonance of the planet.

We’ve got to get back to center.

When stressed, I can default to Netflix, or wine, or mindless scrolling. We all have our places to hide. And sometimes we just need to sit with the discomfort of it all a moment, not trying to make it do anything.

Observe yourself.

If you don’t listen to your body, it will continue to scream out to you and it will only get louder. Your body is divine intelligence that knows when something has to move or shift.

It’s OK to not be ‘fine’. It’s OK to share that truth. It’s also OK to write another story that feels aligned and resonates with your body. Something like... “I’m actually navigating a stressful moment, exploring the source of it within myself and leaning into where I am being directed.” 

If you sit quietly long enough to hear the birds or the rain falling outside your window — you will also hear something else in the stillness — your intuition.

She isn’t working against you, mama. She is guiding you to see something you are ready to see, feel something you are ready to feel, heal something you are ready to heal...even if you don’t think you are ready. Trust her. She knows you ARE ready.

I wanted to share this with you today, not because I have it all tied up in resolution (besides I think I have a good cry to still be had)...but rather to remind you that’s life! I share it because each day will present its own gifts and challenges — especially now as you take bold action towards redefining your life for you and your kids.

Right now, that may mean giving yourself a hall pass to not show up for everything you have in the past, to say NO, to create a filter which everything must flow through — one in which you ask, “does this nurture me or drain me?”

It’s that simple — and then identify how you can support yourself. What will help you reset?

Walking outside

Sipping a cup of tea while daydreaming out a window

Journaling

Drawing

Meditating or praying

Crying

Dancing

Breathing, tapping (EFT), grounding

Napping

What would feel decadent to you? Do that. No excuses.

This is your one beautiful life, as Mary Oliver so poetically reminded us.  And it is beautiful in all chapters. When we look back upon the canvas of our story, we will remember the highlights — yes, the painful ones included.

How do you want to remember navigating those moments?

What do you want to model for your children?

What story do you want to tell down the road?

Start by turning off the news in all forms. Write your own news and please don’t normalize stress. That isn’t your nature or your grounded Best Self.

The way home is through the body. Calm it. Nurture it. Connect to your heart. Feel. And then share it with the world.

This is how we empaths can serve rather than self-sacrifice.

Care to join me? Let’s metabolize some of this stress and put it to work FOR us. Remember, it’s just calling you home to your beautiful self and true essence, mama.

So, we interrupt this regularly scheduled stressful divorce to bring you some fierce mama bear transformative love. I hope you can feel it.

Life, like divorce, can be up, down and all-around. We are walking through this human experience together, but we get to decide how we going to do that and what condition we are going to be in. This is why our work in the Intuitive Divorce is steeped in supporting mamas — not just with prudent strategy, but with radical self-care and healing.