So, you firmly decided that you’ve had enough of this and it’s time to get a divorce. Or is it still not? And your decision is not so clear-cut? And if so, how to do it? Sometimes marital relationships present a real dilemma - a real sword of Damocles that can hang over your head for years. Sometimes a divorce turns into a real melting pot in which all the values of life are burned: health, finances, good social connections. How to get a divorce with minimal losses? This is what our conversation will be about today.
Why do you want to break up with your husband?
Family relationships are influenced by many factors, both political and personal or social. These include the characteristics of upbringing, religion, traditions, the character of each partner, as well as their personal goals.
READ The main reasons for divorce in Russia: what psychologists say
The following reasons push you to want to break up with your husband:
- rash marriage;
- betrayal;
- search for new sensations;
- sexual dissatisfaction;
- birth of a child;
- incompatibility of characters;
- household troubles;
- bad habits.
Many young people rush to get married without thinking about what awaits them in their family life. Time passes, the euphoria fades, and everyday married life begins, which does not meet the expectations of the partners. Bored with each other, or experiencing sexual dissatisfaction, spouses sometimes look for new sensations, and this can lead to betrayal. It is considered one of the common causes of divorce.
READ How parents can tell their child about divorce without harming them
The appearance of a child in a family changes the way of life of the family. We need to adapt again to the new regime and circumstances. Those who find it difficult to adapt to new conditions are stressed, often give up and want to get a divorce.
The different interests of spouses, as well as the inability to respect them, lead to scandals. For example, it is difficult for a wife to understand her husband’s desire to go fishing, and the husband rejects the TV series that his wife watches. Scattered socks or missing dinner can also lead to thoughts of divorce.
The bad habits of one of the spouses make life unbearable. Living with a husband who is an alcoholic, a brawler, or a drug addict is unpleasant, even dangerous. If other problems can be solved, then these are simply useless, because people with such habits almost never change.
The negative impact of scandals on children
The family environment always affects the development of a child. The relationship between a child and his parents influences his entire subsequent life, as well as mental health.
The child always remembers how parents communicate with each other and builds his own relationships in the future on the basis of this. Swearing and quarrels at home affect school performance, because it is quite difficult to concentrate in such conditions and the child cannot isolate himself from his parents emotionally.
Worrying about parents who get angry, scream or don’t talk at all, the child is in a constant state of stress, which cannot but affect his state of mind.
Not only the psychological, but also the physical health of children can deteriorate due to conflicts and scandals at home. Research by scientists in different countries has shown that already at the age of six months, a child who hears his parents quarreling produces the stress hormone cortisol and his heartbeat increases. It's worth thinking about this before you start arguing.
When family conflicts become persistent, children at any age may experience sleep disturbances, anxiety, depression, and even signs of abnormal brain development, not to mention social and academic problems.
When parents seem to live amicably, but sometimes allow themselves outbursts of mutual anger and scandals, children may encounter similar problems, but for children growing up in families where everything is fine, this does not happen or happens, but extremely rarely.
Previously, it was believed that children reacted extremely poorly to divorce, so some parents tried with all their might to maintain the appearance of a family and did not leave, even despite constant conflicts and mutual hostility.
Now the situation has changed: psychologists are sure that it is not so much the separation of mom and dad as their quarrels that harm children.
It was also previously believed that a genetic factor has a great influence on the psychological health of a child.
Indeed, heredity largely determines whether a person will be susceptible to anxiety, depression, even psychosis in the future. However, the importance of home environment and upbringing cannot be underestimated.
An unhealthy family environment can aggravate the tendency to mental illness, but a good, peaceful relationship between parents can do the opposite. At the same time, it does not matter at all whether mom and dad live under the same roof or separately, whether they are relatives of the child or adopted. The main thing is not this, but how they communicate with each other.
The problem cannot always be solved by breaking up
Family relationships cannot be ideal.
There will always be some trait in a partner that will irritate and cause dissatisfaction. For example, a husband helps cook, but does not give flowers, or is good in bed, but does not know how to support his wife psychologically. Having broken off one such relationship, you are likely to encounter problems in others. Let's say another man helps around the house, gives flowers and supports his wife, but she is bored with him in bed. That is, care alone will not solve the essence of the problem. Before you leave, you need to decide what you want to come to.
What is a green breakup?
The concept of “painlessness” in the case of termination of a relationship can include two elements:
- Lack of traumatic experience during a breakup.
- Lack of acute painful experiences after leaving a relationship.
The parting can be called calm if both points were present. Reality proves that such a similar combination of circumstances is rather an exception to the rule.
Continuing communication between ex-partners is not an indicator of a healthy separation. This can often mean that one of the couple is still feeling attached.
In practice, people are often in illusions. Stopping interaction with a person on the factual and physical levels is one thing. Breaking an emotional connection with a person whom you considered close is completely different.
But even in theory, an absolutely peaceful separation is not always possible.
How to leave if you lack determination
It is easier to divorce your husband if he is addicted to alcohol or drugs and raises his hand against his wife and child. It’s more difficult if the spouse is good, but the feelings have passed. But in any case, fear of the future will prevail, and this is quite natural.
READ How a woman can decide to divorce her husband: advice from a psychologist
Indecisiveness can be explained by the following factors:
- no housing;
- lack of work and livelihood;
- emotional attachment;
- fear of condemnation from society.
The most important argument for the lack of determination to get a divorce is financial dependence. Before you go, it's worth preparing. To do this, you should get an education, if you don’t have it and it is necessary. Find a job or change it to one where the salary is higher, and also decide where to live. If the latter is difficult, then you can ask for help and support from loved ones. Having prepared the ground for a new life, it will be easier to leave.
Having lived with your spouse for several years, having experienced many memorable events together, having learned his habits, an emotional attachment arises. It becomes a pity to leave your partner, it’s already scary to change something in life and get used to something new.
READ How to tell your wife about divorce: preparation and advice from a psychologist
If you want to part with your once beloved husband, you need to think carefully and listen to yourself whether this desire actually exists. Perhaps this is what relatives or friends want, but what if it’s fear of what people around them will say and think. You need to decide who needs to do well - yourself or others.
If there are children
It is even more difficult to decide to separate from your spouse when there are children in the family. Many couples believe that for the sake of their happiness they need to sacrifice themselves by maintaining the relationship. Actually this is not true. If the parents are unhappy, the child sees and feels it. He becomes uncomfortable in such a family; he develops an erroneous model of family relationships.
If leaving your spouse is a foregone conclusion, then it should be done not emotionally, but thoughtfully and consciously. Regardless of the child’s age, you need to have a serious conversation with him. This must be done without insulting the father; the child must retain a feeling of respect for him. When he becomes an adult, he will form his own point of view about what happened.
How to talk to your husband about divorce
It is difficult to decide to have a frank conversation when you doubt how you can separate from your husband without a scandal. Doubts and fears overwhelm him about how he will react, whether he will scream or take everything calmly. It is important to do without shouting and not turn the conversation into a scandal. It is much better to conduct it in a tactful manner, without mutual accusations. The tone should be calm, confident and firm, the gaze should be directed into the eyes of the interlocutor.
If you managed to endure a peaceful conversation, you should thank him for accepting his wife’s decision and for the good moments that we had in our life together. He may not have become bad, the partners just went their separate ways.
READ Life after divorce: how to become happy again
It often happens that, not wanting to let his wife go, the husband begins to shout and insult her. A woman should remain calm, wait until he calms down and is ready to continue the conversation, or leave without mutual reproaches, but not shout back.
It is necessary to talk about divorce in the absence of children and strangers. But if there is a risk that the husband may attack his wife in anger, then it is better to talk in a place where there are people.
What not to do when separating from your husband
When the conversation about divorce is behind us, all that remains is to pack your things and leave. Now we need to learn to live differently. It is enough to adhere to the following points in order to properly separate from your husband:
- refrain from sending him letters and calls;
- refuse the offer to remain friends;
- put aside feelings of guilt and shame;
- do not idealize your ex-husband;
- stop hunting other men
- stop crying;
- don't involve children.
After a divorce, many women call their exes to share feelings or emotions, talk about plans or achievements.
Psychologists have concluded that it is easier to recover from a divorce for those people who limit communication with former partners or stop it altogether. The wife's offer to remain friends with her husband after the divorce removes some of the guilt from her, but gives her husband hope for renewing the relationship. Therefore, if one of the partners decides to get a divorce, the idea of remaining friends should be abandoned.
Often, when parting with their husbands, wives begin to delve into themselves, looking for mistakes and shortcomings that caused the breakup. This threatens that the separation will be painful, and the path for new relationships will be closed.
After a divorce, many women begin to miss their ex-husbands and are drawn back to them. Although before that they were no longer satisfied with much in the relationship, they dreamed of breaking up. You need to pull yourself together and open up to a new life and the events in it. If the past relationship had been so good, the breakup would not have happened.
Having separated from her husband, a woman wants to increase her self-esteem and rushes in search of other men. But this method can bring even more negative emotions, because comparisons will begin between the new gentlemen and the ex-husband. It often happens that the latter is a priority.
When discussing a divorce with your husband, you need to restrain yourself from tears: they will make your husband think that his wife doubts her decision. And most importantly, you should not involve children in this unpleasant process. They sense tension between their parents and begin to feel guilty about it. The reason for the separation should be explained to the children so that they understand that it is not their fault.
How to survive a divorce
Going through a divorce is always difficult and scary, and it doesn’t matter whether feelings remain or not. Such a step means the beginning of a new life, changing habits, daily routine, new connections and acquaintances. It takes time to adapt to new conditions. And not everyone knows how to carry it out so that breaking up with your husband is painless.
During this period you can:
- Meet with friends, acquaintances and relatives. It's enough just to walk around the city or sit in a coffee shop. And also increase the time spent with the child.
- Spend time on your hobbies: books, theater, cinema, handicrafts.
- Learn something new. This could be knitting, cutting and sewing courses, or classes at a driving school. Today it is fashionable to make pottery, and courses have appeared to teach this craft.
- Workout. The time spent at the stove has now been reduced, so it is useful to fill your free time with yoga or going to the pool, gym, or just going for a run.
In addition, there are techniques that you can use to ease your psychological and emotional state after a divorce, for example, a letter to your husband. It is necessary to state in it everything that worries, irritates or angers, but under no circumstances should you send it.
Hitting a punching bag or pillow will relieve emotional stress. You can shout loudly or tear up a stack of papers.
And some more advice from psychologists
- To make it easier for your children to cope with your divorce, you need to constantly maintain contact with them. Even if you can't overcome your hatred for your partner, don't stop communicating with your children.
- Many of the problems that children face after their parents divorce are related to money issues. If the mother or father has to solve it alone, the child often suffers from many restrictions. The parent simply does not have enough money to pay for their child’s education in a decent institution, for tutors, music lessons, and so on. Therefore, regardless of who the child is left with, do not forget to provide for him.
- Possible moves will only cause additional stress for the child. Try to keep them to a minimum.
- One last thing: don't forget to take care of yourself. The children will be more comfortable if everything is okay with you. Therefore, try to cope with the stress caused by the divorce process. Chat with friends, go to a psychologist or get a relaxing massage. Getting good sleep and regular exercise can also help.
So can divorce be painless for your children? This question cannot be answered unambiguously. Not everything depends on you. But if you can resolve the conflicts that have arisen and end this war with a peace agreement, if you show compassion and forgive each other, then your child’s chances of successfully surviving difficult times will increase significantly.
About whether to return
There are cases when, after a divorce, former spouses begin to live together again, register their marriage again and give birth to children. But before that, you should think about why the separation from your husband occurred and what is expected from the renewed relationship.
If the ex-spouse was a drug addict or alcoholic, raised his hand against his wife and children, and constantly cheated, then you will not want to return to such a relationship. Yes, and it shouldn’t be, but everyone decides for themselves.
You can try to renew the relationship if the breakup occurred due to misunderstandings or minor conflicts when neither spouse wanted to make concessions. This is all fixable if both are ready for reconciliation, but this must be done gradually, as they say, from scratch.
Thus, a woman’s desire to leave her husband can arise for many reasons. However, divorce will not always solve problems. If, nevertheless, it is inevitable, you should calmly discuss it with your partner, without involving children, and open up to a new life.
Conclusion
Divorce is a very complex, emotionally difficult event; it should be carried out without scandal, with the greatest possible goodwill towards the husband, both in the presence of children and after infidelity. A calm divorce process will allow you to take into account all the nuances, extract maximum benefit, and maintain good relations between people who were recently related to each other. It is quite normal to feel negative emotions towards your ex-spouse, but a wise woman will never show her weakness. The method of “psychological aikido” will help to cope with provocations. The point is to be as indifferent as possible to attacks, which, without mutual reinforcement, morally exhaust the enemy.
How did you cope with your feelings during the breakup? Were you able to maintain friendly communication with your spouse? Share in the comments.
