Advice For: “I Feel Like My Life is Falling Apart”

The pain you experience when a marriage disintegrates can be stunning. It can come after years of fighting the knowledge that your marriage is over or it can come in a flash, when a spouse tells you they are done.

You feel shock. You feel grief. You may feel anger, guilt, regret, denial, sadness, loss, confusion; the list of emotions goes on.  Some days you don’t even believe it is real. And in the midst of the wreckage, you need to make decisions that will carry you and your children for the rest of your lives. The weight is heavy.

In other instances of loss, we are told not to make major decisions until we have processed the loss and experienced the passage of time. With divorce, we feel we have no time – decisions must be made when we feel most fragile and most angry, and perhaps, when we are farthest away from our best, strongest selves.

This is the exact moment when you need the partnership of a divorce coach.  As your divorce coach, I hold onto your unique experience with compassion and empathy.  I listen to you and hold your heart.  After all, I’ve lived it myself. I know the pain of the beginning, the middle, and what happens after with a difficult ex. I know the loneliness and the fear of not knowing what to do.

I wish I had the help of a coach who could have helped me avoid some of the mistakes I inevitably made.  I needed a soul supporter to stand for me and my soul, when I felt my whole world was falling apart and I had to move forward despite wanting to crawl under the covers.

So how do you move forward when you are saying “I feel like my life is falling apart?”

Here are 3 steps that can be the keys to a positive divorce process.  These steps will save you both time and money by both shortening the time it takes to complete the process, and enabling you to find the clarity, confidence and courage to effectively communicate your wants and needs to your advocates and your “soon to be ex” (STBX) spouse.

1. Hire a divorce coach.

You may be asking yourself why should I do that? Don’t I need a lawyer? Or do I need a mediator? Do I need to sell my house? Where will I live? How will I live? What about custody? How do I even start?

All these questions are swirling in your mind and overwhelming your waking and sleeping moments. Hiring a divorce coach can help you quiet the questions down and begin to understand that you don’t have to do everything all at once.  You have time.  You can breathe.

Once you hire your divorce coach, you will have a listening partner who empathetically pays attention to you without judgment.  She will help you identify what needs to happen first based on what you have shared about the unique needs of you and your family.

2. Ask Questions! Then ask more questions!

You will have plenty of questions for your divorce coach. But even more important than the questions you ask, are the questions she asks you. A divorce coach asks you powerful questions you didn’t even know you needed to ask yourself that get to the heart of what you need to do to create your next chapter, which can be better than you ever imagined.

3. Build your resilience

During the times you say, “I feel like my life is falling apart,” your divorce coach listens to you in your most vulnerable moments, gives you permission to feel your feelings, and reminds you that you have gotten through difficult moments before. You have resources within that you may have forgotten. She helps you re-energize that spirit.  You can take small steps and get great results. That is the recipe for success that will remind you that your new challenges are not insurmountable.

Following these steps can be the essential key that helps you design a blueprint for your future in the shortest amount of time, wasting the least amount of money, and laying the best foundation to launch forward for you, your kids and your future.

Lisa Lisser, Certified Divorce Coach practiced litigation law before choosing to stay home with her young children. While at home with her kids, she became deeply involved in non-profit work. She supported her community as a public speaker and advocate. She designed community wide programs and was an active participant on multiple non-profit boards. A lifelong learner, she went back to school, earned her masters in Jewish education and became a certified spiritual counselor.