I’m Completely Over My Ex-husband but Some Women Aren’t

Ringing in the Divorce New Year properly and letting go

“He’s still a handsome man,” says my friend.

“Really?” I say. “I don’t see that at all anymore. I don’t see any of what once attracted me to him.”

Not long after I enter a local restaurant.

My ex-husband is there with his new girlfriend who will later become his wife.

He has his arm around her.

I don’t feel a thing. I mean nada, zippo, not one emotion. I meet her for the first time and that doesn’t bother me either. I’m not sure how I thought I was going to feel.

But I thought I would feel something.

“I ran into ‘Ralph’ and his girlfriend,” I say to my high school guy bestie.

“How was it?” he asks.

“I didn’t feel a thing,” I say. “I didn’t feel sad, remorseful, nostalgic, angry, or any other expected or unexpected emotion.”

“Really?” he says.

“Yes,” I say. “The only thing I could say is that it was kind of weird to see him with his arm around another woman. That’s it. Weird.”

It’s a massive relief to be over my ex-husband.

To have zero feelings…

For a man I once believed was the love of my life.

Especially since that emotion is what kept me tied to a man for far too long. Those feelings kept me trapped in an unhappy and unhealthy relationship, unable to mobilize, to properly and immediately end it.

Recently I was talking to a man I know.

His wife is not over him.

She is filled, no she is consumed with anger. I get it. Anger is a part of the failing marriage and divorce process. It’s a part of the emotional price we pay.

It’s a step on the way to grief and healing.

But they’ve been divorced for years now.

And it wasn’t ugly.

They committed to a decade of marriage counseling. These were two people who both tried to save their relationship. When the marriage did end, the divorce was completely equitable and had an appropriate duration.

Neither of them dragged out the process.

Neither of them screwed each other financially.

They both have great jobs and new loves.

But she’s not over the marriage ending.

She can’t help herself.

She texts him nasty messages.

It’s a mystery to me that someone who had as much counseling and is supposedly spiritual, has not figured out a way to get over her anger. Again, I get the anger.

I write about divorce and relationships because it’s messy.

And it’s fueled by anger and emotion.

But at some point, if you want to be happy and heal, it has to diminish.

People often get confused since I write about the severe abuse in my divorce. I do it to help others avoid what my family endured. I don’t do it because I live an angry life in my day-to-day.

Don’t get me wrong.

I still have moments of anger.

I think everyone can if there’s cheating, abuse, injustice, etc. in marriage and divorce. Or if our kids are still on the receiving end of the divorce aftermath. It can bring out the worst in any of us.

But it’s a moment. It’s not consuming. It’s not blinding. It doesn’t make you want to text nasty comments about your ex or their new love.

It’s more of a moment you might confide that frustration in a friend.

Especially if you are years out of your divorce.

To completely clarify what I am saying…there’s a tremendous amount of baggage in marriage and divorce. The emotion may still be there. Our ex can still get a rise out of us.

It’s natural.

It’s to be expected.

But there’s a difference when you are completely over that individual.

They no longer have the same power over you.

I don’t love my ex-husband anymore.

Not remotely. Not nostalgically. Not even platonically. I don’t miss him either. Not romantically. Not as friends. Not as partners in life.

I don’t miss being married.

I don’t mourn the way my life turned out. I did at one time. I didn’t want to accept this divorce outcome. I didn’t want this path in life. But it was meant to be.

This was meant to be my path.

I accept it.

I embrace it.

And I’m much happier since I have.

Fighting the inevitable demise of my marriage was exhausting and much worse.

Anger and bitterness are ugly.

They make us unattractive.

They diminish who we are. They embarrass us when we hold to them because it shows an inability to mature beyond an unpleasant experience and outcome.

But mostly, it gives our power away.

To the person we already had surrendered it to.

Divorce is meant to take that back.