Thanks to everyone who entered my giveaway for Susan Piver’s The Wisdom of a Broken Heart. There were lots of great suggestions and tips for healing a broken heart and because I know it’s easy to miss comments on posts, I thought I would capture those comments here.
Write about it – could be blogging, keeping a journal or letter writing. The letters don’t even have to be sent.
Realize the divorce is for the better
Stay friends with your spouse
Prayer and reflection
Online support groups and books, reading about other people’s experiences
Cry, daily if necessary
Keep busy with life’s details
The passage of time
Your children
Do activities that you love that perhaps you haven’t had time for
Understand what it was about your spouse you loved so much
Open your heart to your spouse’s new love
Most of these I can identify with. Two that challenge me are staying friends with your spouse and welcoming your spouse’s new love. I think the first would apply where you and your spouse were good friends even at the end of your marriage. Maybe if you weren’t friends it would be possible to become friends afterward and that might help. I don’t know – I wouldn’t have called my spouse my confidante and that was definitely part of the problem.
As to accepting your spouse’s new love – I could see that happening maybe over time but I can imagine that some serious counseling/therapy would help to get to that place.
I want to add one more and that would be to tell people instead of putting on a brave face or keeping that stiff upper lip. I do believe, if you share your pain, you will be surrounded with love and support.
I love this photo – most of the photos on my blog come from flickr.com and I just happened across this one. It’s by Hayley Bouchard and with the photo she has posted a poem. It starts with:
Do not write love poems.
Forgive yourself for the one morning you didn’t kiss him awake while the alarm clock rang.
Let yourself cry when you realise you don’t remember the last time he said “I love you”.
And again, when you know exactly when you said “I love you” last, and it didn’t matter to him anymore.
I’m not a huge poetry fan but this one grabbed my attention and I read it all the way through. The poem is credited to sweet-lyrical.deviantart.com and I don’t know if that is also Hayley but I couldn’t find the poem itself at this website. Anyway, it’s a beautiful poem and if you have just two more minutes click on the photo credit link to Flickr. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.
Photo Credit:
Great post Mandy.
Yeah, I have a probelm with the same two you do and they are certainly not applicable for everyone. For me, it has a lot to do with the way my marriage ended (my former best friend and husband are now married, which was also her agenda when she befriended me).
Obvioulsy the circumstances as well as the continued efforts to justify their relationship comes at my expense and has in many ways over the last 8 years. There will never be a harmonous co-existence there.
Some things you just have to learn to live with. A broken heart in this case is not one of them but injustice, maliciousness and anti-social behavior sure are! My divorce was the gift that keeps on giving.
Mindy – your situation sounds similar to Carolyn's in my Leap and the Net Will Appear series. I can't imagine a divorce that is more painful that losing your husband to your best friend and then having to continue that relationship because of your children. It would be so hard to put it all behind you.