The legal freedom that comes from a divorce decree does not necessarily give you an emotional divorce or prepare you for the rest of your life. Resist feelings of hate, resentment, or becoming a camp follower. Any one of these could ruin your happy future, keeping you tied to the man you should leave behind.
Even if the final vote in your breakup was his not yours, you will live to see the day you can thank the man for leaving you -- but only if you can vow now to do what you need to do to recover and heal.
The process of divorcing is almost always painful and filled with anger and grief, but being divorced is an opportunity for an upgrade -- not a sentence to lifelong loneliness.
Are You Ready To Love Again?
Answer these questions to determine whether to start shopping or take time to further heal:
When you think of your ex?
A. Would you happily slaughter or soundly beat him?
B. Do you resent your time together and dwell on the emotional pain and upheaval but are trying to figure out what life by your own definition means?
C. Are you on track to neutrality or forgiveness, proactive in your future and relatively uninvolved in his?
When you think of yourself?
A. Is it with overwhelming self-pity or feeling hopeless?
B. Are you up and down emotionally but feeling OK most of the time?
C. Has self-esteem and self-worth flowed back into your world and have you recently laughed heartily, preferably at yourself?
When you think of the next man in your life?
A. Are you repelled, sickened, or terrified at the very thought?
B. Are you cautious but curious -- you can joke and feel some turn on?
C. Is this an exciting concept that you can feel as well as visualize?
Do you feel an expansion of loving feelings?
A. More like wishing the world would go away and an attack team would nullify your enemies.
B. A happier self seems to be emerging and a few more people seem to actually be drawn to you.
C. Well being and well wishing of your fellow woman and man have returned.
Do you believe you are lovable?
A. Not willing to give anyone the chance -- risk adverse and I'm not crazy about me
B. Feel that way more and more.
C. Definitely a yes, and even easy to love.
What is your attitude toward men in general?
A. Low -- am first to warn friends about the pitfalls and join in every opportunity at bashing.
B. Realize my situation was not reflective of all relationships.
C. Appreciation and trust and believe I could be good at selection.
Tally your answers.
If you chose A's and B's, don't begin dating yet. Take a rest break to heal more first. Moving into a new relationship without emptying your baggage means your new love and eventually your lovingness will be dumped on or worse, you are vulnerable to attracting a man with his own matching set of bags. Don't go there.
B's with some C's means ready to roll. Don't wait for perfect. You are free to have a brand new clean version of who you are now -- re-invent yourself and find the man who suits you best.
But do follow these steps:
Bypass what didn't work in your marriage in choosing the new man but don't over credit his lack of these deficits -- be open to the new pluses and minuses in the company you keep.
Don't compete with your ex's time table -- he or she who is quickest to be in a new relationship is not necessarily the winner.
Don't bring a jury on your dates. Good friends, family, and children may have valuable opinions but no one knows what goes on between two people. You retain the right to choose.
Be constantly expanding your level of acceptance -- you need a shopping list of requirements in the man you will re-marry as a safety net but the man of your dreams may not be like anyone you can currently imagine.
Expect to be treated well from the minute you meet a man -- if you aren't, you aren't his dream girl so move rapidly on to a male with better eye sight.
Lighten up -- finding new love is not funeral attendance. Don't play ball with ineligibles but if you know they are eligible by your decree, don't over think -- have a ball.
Men have started to wise up. Modern marriage has one purpose, and that is to legitimize children, and only 50% of men even care about that. There is absolutely no reason other than children that a man should even consider marrying in this day and age. Most men are agreeing, which is why the marriage rate has plummeted, and will continue to do so.
A. Low -- am first to warn friends about the pitfalls and join in every opportunity at bashing."
Replace "men" with "women" in that question and ask it of divorced men and if the answer is "A" they'll probably agree with you, but most of us don't feel that way. It is scary, especially if we felt really burned in our breakup, but most of us who are past the time of wanting to make more babies (but still wanting to do the thing you do to make babies) aren't that opposed to marriage and most will in fact marriy again. The odds of divorced women finding a another husband are good, if that's what they want. Will they find one as good as the poor guy they dumped? Probably not, but hey, anything can happen! ;) Sorry, had to throw just a tiny bit of women bashing in there.
Divorced women find new husbands everyday. Divorced men are maybe twice as likely to want to remarry than woman, according to another article on HuffPo now. In my experience though there is no shortage of divorced women looking for husbands. A guy in his forties who isn't bad looking and has a decent career has it made. There are more women than men at that age and if you don't mind raising someone else's kids (or making more) there are all sorts of younger women that will go out with you.
Personally, I am happy to be alone. I am capable of doing all things needed to keep my Home running in tip top shape. My daughter has me shuttling her from place to place for school activities. I really have no desire to ever work on "Honey Do" lists and be subjected to the whims of the female Gender. Plus, once you say "I DO' a man will never get laid again. At least never as much as He needs.
Get tied down? Ha Ha Seriously? What is the advantage for me? A woman can cheat on you in marriage and still get 1/2 the assets you worked your entire life to build. I really like the George Clooney plan. You do your thing, I do my thing. If we can do something fun together "Great". If it gets complicated "Frankly because you complicated it", we're done.
Sweet, Simple, to the point......
I dated a lot after spliting up with my ex wife, and I made friends with a lot of women in the dating world. I'd hear many complain that there were a lot of guys out there who wanted to get serious right away, and the rest were never going to get serious and settle down. Most of them left their marriages hoping to find something better. Then when they don't a lot of them become disillusioned. They either have to lower their standards, which were maybe unrealistic to begin with, or just write men off.
Dating sites are really interesting for studying people. You see a lot of women just coming out of marriages and their profiles will show that they want tall dark and handsome who makes $100k a year or more, will take them on fancy trips all the time and so on, and then over time their profiles will change and they'll take a guy whose a little shorter, with an average body or a few extra pounds, who makes less money, etc. They'll think, "I'm not lowering my standards, I'm broadening my horizons." Others will just look for young guys because they've given up and just want to have fun.
Dating? No
Have sex again? Yes.
H
15 years later, I still live alone, and God only knows how many live-in situations he's been in since then.
Unfortunately, at this age, the men who are single tend to be single for a reason -- no one else wants them, either. Employed monogamists are rare enough, without also asking that they be compatible with my interests and personality.
The most important thing for a woman to remember when pursuing her next relationship is to not punish her next man for the deeds of her last.
Have a great day!
Impossible task for the majority -- "The most important thing for a woman to remember when pursuing her next relationship is to not punish her next man for the deeds of her last."
H
My dog's pregnant. The neighbor dog, Buddy, thought he fell in love. He kept digging under the fence. I plugged the holes with bigs rocks but they'd keep digging. Maggie helped. Now that Maggie's not in heat anymore Buddy's not in love anymore. When guys break up we're all like Buddy and women all smell like they're in heat to us and we'll dig under fences and nobody can chase us away. It doesn't matter if the woman isn't right for us. We aren't capable of thinking straight anymore than Buddy.
So when my Westie has puppies with a Sheltie, should I call them Shwesties?