How to manage overwhelm during your divorce (and beyond!)
Overwhelm is often the result of feeling many strong emotions at the same time. Fear. Sadness. Anger. Confusion.
Overwhelm is common in divorce because there is so much uncertainty and change. You are probably spinning with such questions as
Where are you going to live?
How are you going to support yourself?
How will your kids cope with the split?
That’s why I want to share a four step process with you to help manage all the overwhelm during your divorce.
1. Step back from your day and separate your emotions into buckets, such as
- fear
- anger
- hurt.
This distinction can significantly simplify handling these emotions one by one.
2. Explain your emotions, such as
- fear of what
- anger at whom
- hurt by whom, specifically what hurt.
As you do this, it might not feel like writing it down because your feelings are so obvious to you.
But I encourage you to trust that it will really will serve you down the road.
For example, ‘My ex brought his new girlfriend to an event at my child’s elementary school and I felt angry and afraid. I was angry that my child had to deal with seeing a stranger with their father in ‘public’. I felt fear that this new woman was going to replace me as ‘mom’ and that my child would prefer her to me.’
3. Define the percentage of your overwhelm associated with each emotion bucket and create an action plan for the highest % emotions.
If overwhelm = 100%, then what percentage of your overwhelm is hurt, anger, fear?
Start by defining the one with the highest percentage and work from there. Yes, this is subjective but it is a pragmatic way to distinguish between between emotions. If you find you are 70% angry, 20% hurt and 10% afraid then your time is far better spent working through the anger than the fear.
4. Dig into your highest percentage emotions and create an action plan.
Your plan could be to ask for something specific from your ex.
It could be to handle your concern within your home (using the example above, you might talk with your child about how they felt and work through it).
Or you might find comfort in knowing more about what you were feeling and decide not to take any action.
This is still progress because it is a conscious choice not stuffing the feelings down or ignoring them.
You will be able to see your progress much more clearly if you write down what you feel, what’s underneath your feeling and how strong one feeling is versus another.
I know many of my clients are surprised to find that this process uncovers more fear than than hurt and that the fear is often projected vs. literal.
Fear of the unknown is one of the strongest fears so bringing the fear into the light of day can be enough to take away its power. (And they then feel empowered as to how to deal with it.)
Imagine Day 1 of your divorce vs Day 60. Even in that short time you notice and feel different things.
Give yourself the gift of documenting your forward progress by defining your feelings along the way.
Need some more guidance with your newly-single status? Contact me to schedule a time for your complimentary 30-minute Session.