Wellington journalist and regular Listener contributor Sarah Catherall has released a book about her marriage break-up 15 years ago, how she co-parented her children and eventually embraced her next chapter.
Her book, How to Break Up Well: Surviving and Thriving After Separation, includes her story and the break-up stories of other men and women, as well as advice and insights from a range of experts: divorce coaches, family lawyers, parenting experts and relationship experts.
Here she shares five things she wishes she had known when her marriage ended:
That marriages end - and that’s okay
I would never have walked away from my husband. I had married him for life. And when he chose to end our marriage, I felt like I had been in a car crash. The loss I felt was indescribable.
The American science writer Florence Williams discovered that our hearts can literally break when we go through a divorce. Separation shook me to the very core. It was as though the Sarah I knew, the person I had identified with, had been replaced with this weak, anxious, miserable person I didn’t recognise.
But over time, I began to get my old self back. I rediscovered the fun, spirited Sarah – reclaiming the woman I was in the early stages of my marriage – and it struck me that our break-up was for the best.
Some people choose to leave a relationship and it’s – usually - much easier for that person. When I interviewed the Auckland former reality TV star Julia Sloane for my book, she told me her first husband made her bored, her second partner made her angry, and her current partner makes her feel amazing – he brings out the best in her.
I didn’t really understand that concept when I was in my unhappy marriage. My ex and I had wonderful times in the early days but over the years, we got stressed with children, work and life, and we became the worst versions of ourselves when we were together. He took the plunge and ended it. Yes, it was sad, and it was hard, but it was for the best.
That it’s healing to spend time on your own
In our nine-year marriage, I never spent a night on my own, in my house. If my husband travelled for work, there was always at least one child at home.
I wasn’t prepared for the shock when the kids went to their father’s house. Every parent who has to share their kids with the other parent will remember that first night when their child or children aren’t there. I walked along the hallway and opened and closed bedroom doors. I sniffed my youngest daughter’s clothes. I crawled into her bed and sobbed.
It was a cold June night and I packed my overnight bag and drove to a friend’s house. She turned her sofa into a bed and I lay there, hugging pillows. I wondered what my daughters were doing. They were too young to have phones so I couldn’t even text them. I wanted to check they were okay. I sent my ex a text to check on them and he sent me something short back.
That was hell but over time, I adjusted. I was so shattered running a house on my own and holding down a demanding job that I had to get strict with myself. I began to see those nights on my own as a chance for rejuvenation.
Rachel Archer, an Auckland interior designer, refused to miss her kids after her marriage ended. I quote her in my book: “Take that space. Embrace that time away from your children. If you feel like you might miss your children, don’t. Don’t miss them. Go and do something else.’’
That I would meet someone new – my therapist was right
Eight years after my marriage break-up, and after many dating escapades, I was on a man ban after dating one with enough baggage to fill an airliner. Then someone popped up on my Facebook feed as a possible friend I might want to add. His name was Steve. He looked familiar, or was it his blue, sparkling eyes and something about his open face that seemed inviting?
Two weeks later, I walked into a Wellington bar on a cold, June Sunday afternoon. I was early, something Steve laughs about now because I’m often late or running late. He walked in, bought a bottle of wine and we chatted for hours. Our date was natural and relaxed, and we had so many things in common: we had been to the same university with mutual friends and had probably gone to the same parties.
Six months later, I asked my daughters if they were okay with Steve moving in with us and, eight years later, he’s my partner and best friend. My daughters call him “Stevo’' and it is so good to be in a relationship that feels natural and easy.
That my daughters would not be harmed by my break-up – actually, they’d be better off
I worried that my girls would be disadvantaged by being raised by two parents in separate households. My youngest was three when my marriage ended. She only has one memory of my ex and I being together.
It is often said that parents should “stay together for the kids’'. But as Rhonda Pritchard told me when I interviewed the former relationship therapist for my book, that can be toxic if parents are openly at war with one another or in silent conflict under the same roof.
The reality is that one in four New Zealand children don’t live with both parents. Families are diverse and, as long as adults co-parent well, experts tell me the kids will be fine. My ex and I put the girls’ needs first and it was one of the reasons I was motivated to write my book because our daughters are now happy young women in their own healthy relationships.
Too often the kids are used as pawns or messengers, and in the worst case, a parent can be alienated from their child or children by the other parent. Lisa Swinburn, now a Wānaka-based family coach, shared with me what this was like for her when her mother refused to allow her contact with her father: as a teen, Swinburn self-harmed by starving herself when her parents went through a custody court battle. She is divorced and determined not to put her own children through the same trauma. Like me, she has an amicable co-parenting relationship with her ex.
Life is definitely more complicated when you’re raising kids in two homes - or in some cases, just one - but my daughters have been loved and raised by four, happy adults rather than just their biological parents.
That my divorce, more than my marriage, would teach me about love and relationships
I’m quite a different person to the 30-year-old who walked down a grassy aisle in my aunt’s vineyard in a white satin dress and pledged to spend my life with my husband. I’d had boyfriends before him but I didn’t really understand the concept that you can love someone but they might not be right for you, or not forever anyway.
I’m happy I married my now ex for many reasons, mainly my daughters and the relationships I still have with his family. But in my book, I write about the tips from the Australian psychologist, relationship specialist and MAFS Australia expert John Aiken, who suggests you “re-write the past’' after a break-up.
What did you do to contribute to the demise of your relationship? Rather than being a victim, swing it around and accept some responsibility for its end. I can put on my big-girl pants and recognise that I was resentful and a nag at times. He wasn’t perfect either, but part of my journey was accepting the role I played in our relationship breakdown.
I also understand that a relationship can’t thrive and grow if you don’t tend to it. It sounds obvious but you’ve got to give it time and love. In a relationship, we also need space, friends and our own time.
As the global love and sex expert, Esther Perel, declared at a seminar, which I share in my book, we bring unprecedented expectations to modern relationships. Our partner must be our soulmate, our best friend, our lover, our everything, “for the long haul and the long haul keeps getting longer’', she told us. In mid-life, I try not to heap too many expectations on my partner. I know that Steve will not fulfil all my needs. I’m also older so I’ve chilled out.
