How Long Does It Take To Get Over A Divorce?
When you get married, you do so with the promise and intention that it will be forever. Therefore, if separation comes, it is difficult to assume it, it does not matter if it is desired or takes you by surprise. Getting over a divorce is never easy and can take some time.
How difficult it is to let go of a relationship depends, to a large extent, on the depth of the ties that form it. From factors such as how long you have been together, the quality of the relationship and commitment, to material connections, such as children, property and common assets.
How to get over a divorce
Even the age, position, and social relationship of the couple affect recovery. The more turns a knot has, the more difficult it is to untangle. The same goes for a marriage and any relationship. There is no magic bullet to get over a divorce.
What does science say?
Although it is difficult to measure human feelings, science has tried to understand the divorce process and the time it takes to overcome it.
Studies such as the one carried out by a team from the University of Binghampton, in New York, indicate that a divorce can be overcome between 6 months and 2 years. According to this research, women feel a more severe emotional shock but recover faster than men. In fact, men have a harder time getting over the breakup altogether.
This study reveals that there are 6 phases in the process of getting over a divorce.
- Depression and rage. There is a mixture of anger at the partner and moments of separation anxiety.
- Disorientation, caused by change and uncertainty.
- Pain and sadness when understanding that a feeling has been lost.
- Reflection. It is about looking for explanations and understanding what happened.
- Assimilation. At this point you begin to accept the divorce and break the ties with the past.
- Opening. It comes when the divorce has been overcome and the person acquires the ability to meet new people and face a new life without resentment or ties with the past.
Tips to get over a divorce
The relationship has a great impact on the way you believe in yourself and act. When living as a couple, one interacts, plans and decides together. There is a direct influence of the other person on oneself. The couple is also a support and someone to whom one trusts a large part of their intimacy.
By divorcing, you lose that partnership. As self-sufficient as you may feel, divorce is like losing part of yourself, experts say.
To recover from a divorce there are several steps that can be taken:
- Talk to someone about your feelings.
- Seek help from someone who can understand you. Do not hide your feelings or your sadness, or try to make up for them. If you speak in a sincere and objective way, you will find answers that will help you.
- Find a positive story. If you constantly talk about the breakup, rejection and loss of happiness, the recovery will be slower. However, if you seek a positive approach to your personal story, the healing process will go faster. Look for learnings from relationship and separation, personal lessons, and lessons for the future.
- Find yourself. Do not focus on that part of yourself that you think you have lost by separating. Redefine yourself and establish who you are outside of a relationship. Take back those parts of yourself that you sacrificed for the relationship. You start to see yourself as a whole person and not as the half that needed another person.
- Find your own way. Search and get closer to the things that interest you. Set goals and paths to achieve them and follow that path. On that path, connect with yourself and with new people.
What not to do
Therapist Susan Pease also recommends situations and actions to avoid.
- Do not isolate yourself and keep your feelings in your thoughts. Seek help and share.
- Don’t wait for others to tell you what to do. Talk to others but the solution is in you.
- Do not shut yourself up and wait for everything to pass by itself. Take action to overcome the divorce.
- Don’t pretend you’re okay when you don’t feel that way.
- Don’t feel bad about feeling bad. It is normal to feel angry and sad. Accept it as part of the process.
- Don’t be a perfectionist or think that you don’t make mistakes. Usually in separations there is blame on both sides. Accept yours but don’t focus on blaming yourself. Take it as an apprenticeship.
Dr. Pease believes that people who take more than two years to get over a divorce, surely, do one or more of these things that should be avoided. Keep in mind all of the above and take your time to overcome the duel.
