Hey there! I made this video for you! When you’re feeling overwhelmed and stressed out, do you know the steps to take to get you back on your path to a more vibrant life? Are you a little more “snippy,” unhappy, or wake up not very excited to start your day? When you’re caught up […]
Category Archives: Divorce or Break Up
How I Met My Soul Mate, Part 3: My Happy Ending
This is part 3 of my journey of meeting and marrying my soul mate. In this series of articles, I share how I found authentic and conscious love and how you can, too. In part 1, I wrote about how my childhood set me up for disaster. In part 2, I wrote about how my […]
How I Met My Soul Mate, Part 2: How My Childhood Affected My Choice for a Husband
This is the part 2 of my journey of meeting and marrying my soul mate. In this series of articles, I share how I found authentic and conscious love and how you can, too. In part 1, I wrote about how my childhood set me up for disaster. Entering Adulthood I flunked out of Syracuse […]
How I Met My Soul Mate, Part 1: My Childhood Set Me Up for Disaster
This is the part 1 of my journey of meeting and marrying my soul mate. In this series of articles, I share how I found authentic and lasting love, and how you can, too. I remember meeting the love of my life like it was yesterday. I saw him standing in the parking lot of […]
Couples in Conflict Often Do This
[et_pb_section bb_built=”1″][et_pb_row][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text] In this vlog, I share with you some of my thoughts on couples in conflict. I shot this video on the beach near my home, soon after a storm. The storm wiped out a lot of the old debris kind of leaving us with a new canvas. It also left in its […]
Why You Might Be Headed Down the Road to Divorce and What You Can Do About It
Ah love…First you meet each other, then you fall in love, and then if it reaches this point, you decide to get married. It’s wonderful, those first months and years of being in a serious relationship. It’s at that stage in your relationship that maybe you laugh more together. You do more fun things. You […]
The Two Months of the Year When Most People Divorce
When do most people file for divorce? According to recent research, the two months of the year when most people divorce are March and August. Well, at least for the state of Washington. Brian Serafini and Julie Brines from the University of Washington researched the divorce records for the state of Washington. Their study found […]
What’s One of the Best Ways to Get Through Divorce?
What’s one of the best ways to get through divorce? According to researchers Gabriele Prati and Luca Pietrantoni (2009), posttraumatic growth following a major life crisis like divorce is fostered by having social support. Finding a support system for yourself was mentioned in my book Transforming Divorce as one of the first and most important […]
Under Construction: 3 Tips for When You’re Going Through Big Change
It’s inevitable. At some point, if you haven’t already gone through a major life change, you will. Maybe it’s when your kids grow up and move out, you get a divorce, there’s a job loss, the loss of a loved one, alienation of a child, an illness…things happen that can turn your world upside down. […]
If You Could Give Your Divorce a Song Title What Would It Be?
Okay, so this post, “If You Could Give Your Divorce a Song Title What Would It Be?” is not my usual kind of post. It is not necessarily enlightening and it’s not informative, but hey–sometimes you gotta lighten things up especially when it comes to divorce! Divorce is a major life challenge–at least for most […]
How Triangles Mess Up Your Relationships
Triangles (not the shape but the relationship dynamic) can mess up relationships especially if you aren’t aware of what they are and what they can do. Everyone, to some extent, has relationships that are triangles. Triangles, according to Murray Bowen*, a psychiatrist and one of the early marriage and family therapists, are “the smallest stable […]
When the Holiday Season Isn’t So Happy
“Happy holidays!” someone shouted to me. “Mmm hmmm, ” I mumbled. Gosh, I felt miserable then. About ten years ago I faced my first Christmas as an almost-single woman. We decided we would split up in early December but he’d move out of the house after our youngest daughter’s birthday in January. So, we kept […]
How to Screw Up Your Kids After Divorce
Divorce can be tough. My own divorce process took almost three years and it was extremely hard trying to keep the kids out of the fray. It’s hard for most people to handle the break-up of relationships (I say “most,” but Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin seem to be doing okay with their divorce). The […]
You Need an Attitude of Gratitude
It’s that time of year again in the United States–Thanksgiving time! I love this time of year: creating great memories of culinary feats, satiety, and wonderful company. In other words: Thanksgiving is a time where good company and lots of good food combine to create wonderful memories. Thanksgiving is a day that many associate with […]
One Little Thing They Didn’t Tell You About Co-Parenting
One of the hardest things about divorce if you’re a parent is having to now split custody of your kids with your ex. I used to be a stay-at-home mother–a conscious decision that was made by both of us for the well-being of our children. Then, with the break-up of our marriage, I found myself forced to […]
5 Habits that Help You to be Happier After Divorce
I remember it like yesterday–the day I found out my marriage was ending. Seventeen years down the drain. Kaput. It was the day it felt like the very floor, not just the rug, was pulled out from under me and everything in my world was turned upside down. The timing sucked. It was the holidays. […]
How to Ruin a Relationship
If there were a course called Relationships 101, what would it cover? There’s probably a course out there somewhere that’s called this, but let’s see if we can come up with some of the topics: How to communicate well How to honor your commitment How to honor each other’s dreams How to learn and grow […]
Why Complaining About Your Ex Can Actually be Bad for You
When I first separated from my ex, it was hard to refrain from stating what I was going through to a selective audience who would listen. Most of my inner circle knew what was going on and they knew about my painful break-up after 17 years of being married. It’s hard to shift into making […]
How not to allow divorce to suck the life out of you
Divorce. It is one of the most stressful things you can go through, up there on the list with the death of a loved one and a major job loss. If you’ve been through one–especially if it was acrimonious–you’ll know that while it wasn’t easy, chances are it provided you with incredible learning opportunities (whether […]
This Judge Did WHAT to these Alienated Kids?
In the news recently you probably couldn’t help but hear of the story of the three kids sent to juvenile detention center for refusing to see their father. A little background here: A Michigan judge ordered the children, ages 9 to 15, to be sent to a juvenile detention center after failing to follow her […]
How to Get Through Life’s Toughest Challenges
I have had several challenges during my child- and adulthood that have helped define the person I am today. And what has gotten me through them is knowing this: This too will pass. When I was seven years old, I lost my adoptive mother. Pregnant at the time, she passed away suddenly from a pulmonary […]
Holding on to Anger and Resentment
Recently, I published the following quote on Twitter: “Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.”- The Buddha One of the things I teach my coaching clients is to keep an inspiration file–something that allows them to […]
5 Ways to Know You’ve Lost Yourself
A while back, I wrote a post on the local AOL outlet Patch called “5 Ways to Know You’ve Lost Yourself” and although it was published over 2 years ago, it continues to be a popular article on their site. I think that’s because a lot of people can relate to the feeling of being lost. […]
5 Powerful Tips to Help You Get Over a Painful Divorce
Going through a painful divorce? Are you already divorced but having a hard time moving on? With more than half of marriages ending up in divorce, wouldn’t you think there would be a heck of a lot more material out there on how to get over a major relationship break-up like this? Some people remain […]
An Update: Current Work on Parental Alienation
Many of you know by now my experience of being a rejected parent (I have written before on my experience of Parental Alienation) of two of our kids: one biological, one a stepchild. These instances began during their middle school years (an age ripe for this) and shortly after my remarriage. Since then, I’ve received […]
It’s Electrifrying! How Some Couple’s Arguments Lead Right to Divorce
You’re in a fight with your partner. Your heart is racing, your body feels rooted to the floor, and yet you feel like you want to run. Or, maybe you feel incredibly irritated and you just want to lash out. When you’re feeling adrenalized, and your fight or flight system is activated, it’s all you […]
How Dr. John Gottman Predicts Divorce
John Gottman and Nan Silver share their research-backed principles for successful marriages in the book The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work (1999). In the book, Gottman and Silver describe the signs they look for that can predict divorce. Their research found the following signs, signs they say predict that couples will ultimately divorce: 1. a harsh startup […]
The Top 3 Reasons Why Couples Divorce
No one gets married with the intention of eventually getting a divorce. We all want to buy into that optimistic dream of living happily ever after. After all, who wants a divorce? Divorce can be traumatic, expensive, it can tear apart a home, affect children for the rest of their lives, and send some people into poverty (usually […]
This Type of Thinking Is Terrible for Relationships
Watching the “Guardians of the Galaxy” movie with my stepson and husband recently (hey–good movie, by the way!), I found myself thinking about the classic Good Guy/Bad Guy scenario where you know who the villain is and who the heroes are. It can be pretty black and white in the movies. In real life, it’s not […]
Brene Brown’s “Are You the Adult that You Want Your Child to Grow Up to Be?”
I love this quote from Brene Brown that I found in an interview with her for the Washington Post: “Are you the adult that you want your child to grow up to be?” Isn’t that a great question? It makes you think about how you want to be in the world as a role […]
When Good Things Fall Apart
“Sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.” ~Jessica Howell I absolutely love this quote! I’ve relied on it in the past to get me through some really tough times. When I am going through a particularly challenging time, I remind myself to let go and let life handle the details. When […]
Why You Shouldn’t Let Your Challenges Get the Best of You
If I had to list the two worst times of my life they would be when my mother passed away suddenly when I was seven years old and my divorce which occurred when I was thirty-nine (experiencing parental alienation comes in a close third as does losing my brother on the day of his first-born […]
This is Why it’s Bad to Ignore Your Childhood Crap
I love learning about relationships and psychology. In part it is because I have spent my life working on my own personal psychology and relationships. I know firsthand that if you don’t address your own childhood crap, you’re going to eke out your issues all over the place. I didn’t want that for my life. […]
Suffering is a Choice–Just Like Being Happy Is
I love quotes. I can sit for hours reading various quotes in books or on the Internet. I collect quotes that resonate with me and keep a Word doc on the ones I like. I think the right quote at the right time can be quite powerful. This quote is one of my favorites (and […]
Your Life is a Masterpiece
Your life is a masterpiece. This work of art, your life, is perfect just as it is; you are already a masterpiece. You don’t need to do anything, say anything, or be anything–you are already enough. Since you are the artist of your life and if you choose, you can create something even more wonderful. […]
