I have a friend who is in the middle of a divorce.
Her ex-husband is causing emotional distress. They have a child and she’s unable to completely break from him. He’s not a bad guy but has a number of issues that he hasn’t responsibly addressed.
Anyway, I’ve been through divorce and while mine was amicable, it was still devastating.
I was chatting with her a bit last night. She was very angry as a the ex had said something unkind that rattled her cage. Well, beyond rattled. She was ready to kill. Instead of talking her down, I encouraged her to stay with the anger.
Anger, in my opinion, needs to be processed. Which means it’s useful to express it in a safe environment. Since the ex-husband was probably trying to bait her into a fight, calling him up and screaming, “You scoundrel!” is not a great move.
[note: expression cleaned up for Miss Rojita’s sixth grade class who is studying “Modern Digital American Humor” this week and chose my blog.]
Wow. I can’t lie to you folks. There is no Miss Rojita. Well, there might be, but I don’t know if she teaches, and most likely even if she did, I doubt my blog made her recommended reading list. Her students are probably learning about periods reading Judy Blue.
I like the word “scoundrel.”
I encouraged my friend to imagine that I was her ex-husband and to say to me what was inside of her. She, via instant message, immediately started typing aggressive and intense, angry thoughts. They were rough and cutting. I could tell that he deserved it. She ranted about everything she hated in this guy. It was brutal.
After a few minutes she started to change her tone. Some kindness emerged as she acknowledge his good qualities. She became very sad and her tone was appreciative of the years he was a good partner. I didn’t touch my keyboard throughout the entire process. Not one word. She processed it on her own.
Afterwards she was exhausted and blue. I wanted to cheer her up.
She had started an anonymous blog to discuss some of the pain of divorce. Even though the blog was only days old, she complained that she only had four Twitter followers (I being one). So, I went online and did something fun. I bought her 22k Twitter followers.
About halfway through today she IMd me excitedly. She saw her follower count and knew it was my doing. She’s no moron. But to those of us with four followers, having 22k followers, even fake, is damned exciting. It only cost me five bucks.
I personally have 28k Twitter followers, and I also had purchased my first 3500. I wanted people to think I was a big shot. I outed myself because it was an insecure and embarrassing move and I needed to own it. I’ve earned the rest fair and square, of course.
Even though this was a fake gift to her, it provided a minor distraction from an otherwise unpleasant life event. Sure, she still only has four real followers, but when she sees the large number, she laughs.
Make sure you have one person in your life that can make you laugh when you’re down. Then, treat them real nice.