knowing you’re going to be ok…
no matter what…
is the single most important factor in achieving a successful divorce.
Your divorce can be a miracle or a nightmare.
The good (bad?) news is you get to choose your own adventure.
Want the miracle option? You’re going to need the following non-negotiables in your back pocket:
A rock-solid will to engage your power, as the fully whole adult human you are
A crystal clear understanding of what’s your responsibility… and what’s not
The skill of feeling safe in your own body
The ability to harness the resources you need and apply them exactly where needed
There’s not a settlement in the world…
that can give you the security you’re after.
(no mediator, attorney, or judge can win this for you)
As if on cue, in my late thirties, the wheels of my marriage started falling off.
I remember thinking: “we’re not going to make it”.
paradoxically, “not making it” didn’t seem like a viable option.
How to make it work (i.e. make my husband or myself change) became my obsession.
Staying married scared me.
Divorce scared me.
I felt desperate for change, powerless to create it, and afraid for the future, either way.
and there I remained, stuck in limbo, for a decade of my life.
That was 14 years ago…
Today, I’m divorced, remarried, and enjoying a beautiful, shared family life with my ex-husband, who’s also remarried.
I remember seeing family Christmas photos of Glennon Doyle, newly married to Abby Wambach, along with her ex-husband and kids following their divorce… and thinking “I WANT THAT!”
Setting my sights on that outcome, I determined to do whatever it took to create it. (Of course not all the factors were in my control… but I took full responsibility for the ones that were, and I know we wouldn’t have what we do today without focusing all my will and power toward this end.
Divorce didn’t break our family.
(Nor did It break me.)
Today, I’m a Certified integrative change worker & SOMATIC life coach, as well as a certified divorce coach.
Before I was professionally trained to help people navigate seismic life change, I lived it.
When the family-centered life I meticulously crafted finally, irreversibly, fell apart at the seams, I met the long-lost version of myself who’s resourceful, resilient, and capable of BEING OK without needing anyone else to change or be different than they are.
In fact, I didn’t just meet her… I redeemed her. I liberated her.
But first… I was disoriented; overwhelmed; reeling with grief, uncertainty and fear.
Having lost all illusions of “doing life right” to prop me up, I discovered what was there all along: a magnificently intelligent, adaptive nervous system, capable of feeling safety, joy, peace and unconditional love.
I worked with a somatic therapist who eventually became my teacher. I learned to feel safe inside, in each moment as it unfolded, rather than getting sucked into the painful vortex of my remembered past or an unknown future. Differentiating between pain from the past, fears of the future and the felt experience of this present moment enabled me to break life-long patterns of fear that governed my life.
My Integrative Change Certification illuminated the duplicatable processes that enabled me to change so drastically and permanently. Anyone can change old, expired behavioral and relational patterns. Isn’t that incredible news? Knowing how to consciously rewire old, dysfunctional settings means I’m not just stuck repeating patterns. I’m the proud initiator of generational change, undoing formerly unconscious patterns and passing on a different legacy.
Now I teach others how to do this, too.
Bottom line, I’ve been thru this dark forest. I know what you’re up against… and I know you can do it.
Skillful relating (to self and others), somatic awareness, and the science of neuroplasticity deeply root the emergence of my new relational template and family structure I create and participate within, on the other side of divorce.