I’m Blaming the Aliens

Posted on by stilllearning2b

 

I woke up this morning, on my last official day of spring break, to more cold rain and an empty Kindle battery. I was feeling lazy and wanted to enjoy my coffee, so I clicked on the TV. Surprisingly, there is a dearth of programming at 5:00 a.m. on a Friday morning. As I scrolled through my options, I found myself drawn to Super Nanny, a show where struggling parents call on a professional nanny for help and advice.

In this particular episode, a newly divorced mom was having a very difficult time with her six (!!!) children. Her face radiated pain and fear as she revealed the events of the past 18 months: divorce, the death of the family nanny and the loss of the home to foreclosure. I felt tears start to slide down my face as I watched.

I’ve never been much of a crier (well, since I outgrew my temper tantrum stage). I’m not a sucker for sappy movies nor am I drawn to “chick lit.” I’m not hormonal and I don’t have a biological clock ticking (I knew from my late teens that I didn’t want kids and I’ve never wavered in that decision).

So, why the tears? Although I could not relate to the challenges of raising six kids as a single parent (much respect!), I could relate to the series of losses that the family faced. But understanding and empathy is one thing and tears in my coffee is another.

The truth is that, since my divorce, tears come easily. I have become the person that cries from commercials or greeting cards. I am now that woman whose eyes well up when watching a family at the park or a passage in a book.

I’m sure it has something to do with my acceptance of my vulnerability and my willingness to let go of the strong facade I wear so well.

But I’m blaming the aliens.

First Responder Mode

Posted on by stilllearning2b

 

Wounded arriving at triage station, Suippes, F...
Wounded arriving at triage station, Suippes, France from sanitary train. Selected by Scott. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I had dinner last night with a friend who recently experienced a significant break up. This also happened to coincide with her completion of an education program and the start of a new job.

 

She’s in first responder mode as she works to triage her life. The pain and heartbreak have to be pushed aside for the moment as she tends to exams and the demands of a new job.

 

It’s a state I identify with – the adrenaline fueled days and sleepless nights. The pressing demands overriding any fear or emotion. The tunnel vision that develops so that you can attend to one crisis at a time. The weird excitement that courses through the body, even in the face of loss.

 

I went into first responder mode when my husband left. I was facing overwhelming change – loss of a husband, home, dogs and health. Nothing was the same. I had never ending legal obligations between the divorce and the criminal trial. I had the same job, but the start of the school year was fast approaching and that is always a time of increased stress and adjustment.

 

I triaged my life. I set priorities and worked to accomplish them. There wasn’t room to feel sad. I let my focus narrow and I allowed anger to be my fuel. In an emergency, you have to be able to ignore all non-essentials to address the matters of life and death. You need to be able to act rather than feel. You don’t have time to worry about non life threatening issues or to attend to the bigger picture. It’s all about doing what needs to be done so that life continues for another breath.

 

Eventually, the emergencies pass and the first responder mode is not appropriate any longer. I remember my struggle to let go of my first responder and to allow a more holistic self-caregiver to take her place. Here is the advice I gave my friend last night based on my own experiences:

 

– It’s okay to not feel right now. You have to do what needs to be done to make sure your basic needs are met. It doesn’t mean there is anything wrong with you.

 

– Just like the reality of a medical emergency hits after the danger has passed, expect the reality of this to hit you once the initial crisis have been navigated. Don’t be surprised.

 

– Allow yourself to feel; don’t stay too distracted for too long. You’ve compartmentalized for the moment so that you can function. Those walls won’t hold forever. When you are ready, slow down. The fear of the pain is usually worse than the pain itself.

 

– Again, when you are ready, look for what you can learn from the relationship. When those nuggets come up right now, file them away for later when you are better able to analyze them.

 

– I know you want to be okay. But don’t let that desire cause you to pretend to be okay before you really are. There is no timeline, but if you don’t heal, it will eventually fester.

– It’s okay to ask for help. First responders rarely work alone.

 

– Be careful of the adrenaline; it can become addictive. Unless you want to live your life jumping from one emergency to another, you have to learn to let it go when it is no longer needed.

 

I know my friend will be okay. She’s strong and capable. In time, her emergency will resolve and she can leave her first responder mode behind.

 

The Sixth Love Language

Posted on by stilllearning2b

Cover of "The 5 Love Languages: The Secre...

I read Gary Chapman’s The 5 Love Languages about a year after my divorce. Chapman proposes that we each have a primary love language that we are best able to receive: acts of service, words of affirmation, gifts, quality time and physical touch. I read the book with one eye on the past, analyzing patterns in my marriage and one eye on the future, looking for current applications of the book.

Both perspectives proved to be interesting.

With my ex, I had to learn how to give and receive physical affection, as that love language was important to him. It’s strange that he was my teacher in that language: I came from an affectionate family and he came from a “hands off” environment. I guess that goes to show that nature can override nurture! Apart from physical touch, we were pretty balanced on love languages. I don’t think either one of us had one stand out more than another and I don’t think either of us ever felt like we couldn’t understand the language of the other. Our issue was that he didn’t reveal the truth. His love languages said one thing while concealing his actions, which said something quite different.

The book had more to say about my developing relationship with Brock. He didn’t do so well with physical touch and I had trouble at times reading his other gestures. The book helped to give me perspective and to look for his expressions of love in other ways. They were there all along, I just didn’t always see them. His love languages may have been a whisper to me, but mine were an overwhelming shout to him. I had to learn to tone it down while he had to learn to dial it up.  We have found a balance and it has had more to do with the recognition of how the other expresses love and the understanding of how it is received than of trying to change the languages we each speak.

I like using the concept of love languages like I use other labels: as sticky notes, temporary shorthand used until I have gained full understanding. The love languages are simplistic by design, reducing our complexities into rather small categories. Although you probably identify more strongly with one or two of the languages, you can most likely relate to all of them at times. They can be useful, especially in newer relationships, as you try to understand how your partner communicates and receives love.

ASL short for "I love you"

But eventually, the sticky notes should be removed so that you can see your partner for all of who he/she is and not just as a love language. And that’s when the sixth love language develops – the one that is unique to your relationship. That language is formed from the shared history, the private words, the successes and even the pitfalls. Its vocabulary is built from experiences; its syntax comes from understanding and compromise. As it is a new language, there will be errors in grammar or diction. It’s okay. Keep trying; the language will continue to develop and grow along with the relationship. It is a language that no one else can speak. If the relationship dies, the dialect dies with it.

As you move into a new relationship, one of the challenges is forgetting your former love language and clearing the slate for a new tongue. Be patient. It takes time to get to know someone and even more time to create a language together (there is no Rosetta Stone for love languages!).

Be sure to listen. Don’t be afraid to try. And remember to laugh when you make mistakes. It takes time to learn a new language but it’s always worth it:)

Read the Rest of the Story

Posted on by stilllearning2b

Available on Amazon (print and Kindle) or on Nook.

5.0 out of 5 stars Gut-wrenching, humbling, empowering page turner August 5, 2012
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
From the very first page you feel what the author is feeling, you are with her as she is delivered the shock of her life. Her husband is gone, but he didn’t die, he simply up and decides one day to leave her, their pets, and their home behind. You feel her shock, her disorientation, her paralyzing fear and disbelief and sadness from the very fist paragraph. You are there with her on the floor, as she shuts down, trying to process the news, completely immobilized by the sudden, debilitating trauma of her husband making the decision to abruptly end their longtime marriage.

I’m a news junkie, I like to read blogs. I was driven to read this particular story, at first out of sheer curiosity. It started with reading a brief synopsis of her story on her Huffington Post blog. Her story immediately caught my attention, perhaps because I’ve known people like her former husband. People that posses a unique and bewildering talent for weaving elaborate webs of deception. I think what caused me to fixate on this particular story was at first my own desire to understand why some people develop a taste for manipulation, for living in and perpetuating lives based on lies.

From the first sentence, this book is a page turner and quite difficult to put down; as you learn one piece of the story you immediately begin to thirst for the next. In this case, Lisa has truly lived what has often been said, a reality stranger than fiction. I can’t imagine what it must feel like to be manipulated and lied to so succinctly and completely by the one person you’re supposed to be able to rely on and put your trust in the most, /after/ a marriage of ten years and a relationship of sixteen years! It simply boggles the mind and for me, calls me to question my faith in humanity itself. How is it that some people come to be so self-centered, so diluted that they can perpetuate acts of complete and utter treason against not just another person, but their /spouse/?

How could a man be caring and loving and intimate one moment, and for all the many years leading up to that moment, and then decide abruptly, coldly and without any feeling at all to simply vanish from her life, from /their/ life together, with nothing more than a text message and a very cold and unsettlingly impersonal “Dear John” letter? Without ever having a conversation with her, without ever expressing any disinterest or dissatisfaction in or with their marriage? How does a man then also marry another woman while still married to his first wife? How is it that she never saw any signs or clues of his pending blitzkrieg of complete emotional and financial ruin? What could make a man so distorted and narcissistic to consciously make these choices? Well, friends, this book does not disappoint. This true story of betrayal, of infidelity, of bigamy, of a woman’s story of how she picked up the broken pieces of her life and mended her soul and confronted and laughed and cried and began anew will haunt you, will move you, will humble you. And yes, will cause you to question many, many times the sanity of the man she married. I found myself completely captivated by her story.

And, finally, if you are like me, in a happy, loving marriage, it will also give you reason to count your blessings, and be grateful with and humbled by the joy and the tremendous fortune of having a good marriage with a good person. Reading a story like this just makes me love my wife all the more and see how lucky I truly am too. For people like me, this story is a cautionary tale that decrees that at any moment a bomb can fall from the sky and sweep it all away in the blink of an eye.

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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Haunting and Hopeful August 8, 2012
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
I have just finished reading Lisa Arends’ “Lessons From the End of a Marriage” and, although I have turned my Kindle off, the story still haunts me. If this book were presented as fiction, readers would say this is not realistic, that no one could be as cruel and destructive as this man was. Yet it is true. It really happened.

Lisa Arends writes with a style that is honest and engaging. She shares with us her journey to recover from having her world kicked out from under her. Her story is a demonstration of the full gamut of emotions that are experienced when something this heart-wrenching happens. The unexpected occasional humor gives the reader more insight into the author’s personality, and I have to admit that chuckling out loud in the midst of reading this book at first felt so wrong. But I quickly came to realize that Lisa’s ability to realistically ‘tell it like it is’ is one of her many strengths that helped her discover who Lisa Arends really is.

This books shows the worst of humanity, but it also joyously demonstrates the amazing potential resilience of the human race. We have the ability to let go of hurt, let go of anger, and to choose instead peace and gratitude. Thank you, Lisa, for sharing your story with us.

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Powerfully amazing and inspirational! September 25, 2012
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
First, let me say that I know the author and witnessed this story. So, consider me somewhat biased in terms knowing how incredible this story is and how incredible this author is to come out of it happier, better and just plain fabulous. But, keep in mind, no matter what I knew, I never knew her whole story–and now I do. Since I have laid my cards on the table I still feel I can write an honest review of her work. This book is truly an example of how truth is stranger than fiction because no novelist or Hollywood writer could make this up! Lisa’s story is one of overcoming trauma, loss and total deception of a magnitude that those of us who learned of it and those of you who will read her story can only wonder how it would be possible to overcome. She is the living embodiment of grace and as her story unfolds one begins to see that she is a survivor who decides she will not be defeated but will triumph in spite of great wrongs done to destroy her. Her story is gripping from the first paragraph. Its almost impossible to believe this is a true story–if she were not my friend I would think this was a story from Dostoevsky or DH Lawrence. I even told her the first time we spoke after her life imploded it would make an awesome book and it has indeed. Lisa’s writing is masterful in terms of literary device such as metaphors and imagery . She is a brilliant wordsmith who knows how to paint a vivid picture while avoiding bodice ripping melodrama–and believe me, this story unfolds along just those lines. Her strength is how she is so honest and insightful about herself. There is no way you can read this book and not find her vulnerable, heroic, hilarious (the gallows humor is a necessary comic relief to such a truly sad story), and a tower of strength. You cannot fail to be astonished by her story, you cannot fail to learn from her, and you will find this book to be a fast-paced page turner that you cannot put down! So, buy it, read it, share it, promote it–its one of those rare books that cuts across any line you can think of and leave you saying, “WOW!!!”

The Most Important Lessons

Posted on by stilllearning2b

Often, the lessons we need most are the ones we are most resistant to. I never wanted to be divorced. In fact, losing my husband, through any means, was my greatest fear in life. So, when I found myself suddenly single at the age of 32 after being betrayed by my best friend and partner of 16 years, I was lost.

The best lessons can often be found when we are facing unanticipated change and loss. It is a window where we are lost and searching, broken and vulnerable, wanting and open. It is a time when the ego has been forcefully stripped away and we are able to face those challenging lessons that we may usually avoid. In those moments, we learn who we really are and what we are capable of.

The following are some of the lessons I learned on the heels of my divorce:

1) When gratitude is your wrapping paper, everything is a gift.
You cannot always change your circumstances, but you can always change your attitude. I wasted time after the divorce being angry and playing victim. Slowly, ever so slowly, I began to soften and to look at the bigger picture. The divorce and its associated trauma happened; I could not alter that reality. I could, however, choose to change my reaction. I have begun to practice radical gratitude — being thankful for the man who deceived and abandoned me. I began by writing a list of ten reasons I am thankful for him and I continue to write a note of gratitude every time I make a payment on the debt he left behind. The situation hasn’t changed, but I now can view my divorce as a springboard for better things.

2) Happiness is my choice.

Read the rest on The Huffington Post.