(Written By Co-op Student, Ore Anibaba)
While it’s possible to navigate your divorce journey alone, you should not feel obligated to do so. Opening yourself up to the idea of receiving support can provide much-needed relief, making it easier to process your emotions and work through the divorce. This blog post aims to shed light on the importance and benefits of having a robust support system during your divorce, offering reassurance that you’re not alone in this challenging time.
Maintaining A Good Mental Health
During this time, it’s not unusual to have feelings of confusion, guilt, sadness, or even anger. Due to all these emotions, you may be feeling, your mental health may be compromised during or even after the divorce. This is why empathetic friends and family can help you navigate through your thoughts and emotions to help ensure you maintain a good mental health. Mental health is an essential and significant part of your life that should be taken care of. The divorce process can look or feel different for everyone; for some, it may be a simple process, and for others, it may be a traumatic experience. For any scenario, talking through your feelings to a therapist or close friend is something that would benefit anyone’s mental health, especially during a divorce.
Maintain Relationships
Without the proper support and help from the people around you, all of the mixed emotions and thoughts you may be feeling can influence you to make impulsive or irrational decisions you wouldn’t usually make. It’s crucial to realize you may not feel or act like the same person you were before the divorce. Going through a divorce is a drastic change in your life that may lead to a personality change. This could look like you are sad or angrier than you usually are. It’s essential to have a good and stable support system to help mitigate the risk of you possibly taking out your anger of the divorce on your friends, family, or people close to you. Seeking the help of others to help you register and keep your emotions in check will help ensure you don’t say or do anything that may hinder or ruin your current relationships.
Staying Motivated
In a time when you may have feelings of exhaustion due to a divorce, allowing friends, family, or professional support to comfort and be there for you during this is of utmost importance. Going through a divorce can take up a lot of your time, which can be draining for you to experience all on your own. With a lot of time caught up in dealing with the divorce, you may lose sight of other aspects of your life such as your relationships, work, or commitments. Family and especially true friends wouldn’t just be there to comfort you; they would also ensure you stay
motivated and keep your responsibilities in line. The people close to you want you to be your best self, so making sure you have those friends around you during the divorce will help encourage you to continue being strong and motivated during this challenging time.
Safety of Children
If children are involved in a divorce, having enough support and guidance will benefit you and help ensure the children’s safety. As stated above, going through a divorce can be so consuming that it may blind you from other responsibilities you may also have. This is why going through a divorce alone when you also have children can be a draining experience. Not receiving any help could increase the chances of you neglecting your child, whether it be big or small. Comfort and guidance from friends and professional counselling will help make you more mentally and emotionally fit to continue supporting and raising your children. Remember, you don’t have to do everything independently; it can take a village to raise a child.
Keep in mind that even with the support you receive, it can still take time to recover from and come to terms with the divorce. Having support is a way to alleviate some of the extra stress, anxiety, or depression you may have experienced alone. By letting the people who want to help you in, you’re setting yourself up for a smoother, more peaceful divorce process and recovery.
