Posted to House Bloggers
by Debbie Nigro on Thu, 12/10/2009 - 8:19pm
Now that we all know what we shouldn't — that there's been a Tiger in just about every tankini — Elin Woods and her kids are off to Sweden. So what now?
Lots of anger and depression and humiliation all around… enough to make a mother-in-law collapse. She did.
Though you wouldn't know it by his golf acumen, Tiger Woods is huMAN. So let me comment on the huMAN angle.
Ask any man who has lost his family to a fling and he'll probably tell you he deeply regrets it. He had few regrets at the time it was happening — when he thought he had figured out the best of both worlds.
For all the negative commentary on marriage being an “institution” that's been likened to prison, most men don't like going life alone.
Women are much better at it.
Married men like having their families to return home to after being MEN all day. They love their children and home cooked meals and their couches and their cozy wives. They need it. It's just that some of these men can't eliminate the excitement of sex with strange women.
So some don't. Others wouldn't dare risk it.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by First Wives World on Mon, 01/30/2012 - 11:04am
Week 1 - Crying. A lot of crying.
Week 2 - More crying and some anger.
Week 3 - Crying intermixed with a lot of anger.
Week 4 - A little crying. A lot of anger. Onset of loneliness.
Rinse. Repeat. That's pretty how much it went down for me. It wasn't fun at all. And it lasted for 6 months.
Part of surviving the loneliness associated with divorce is plain old endurance — realizing that this is a stage which will help. Even in the midst of it all, you need to remember that there will come a day when this overwhelming grief, anger, loneliness, and all the rest will go away.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 01/30/2012 - 7:58am
I’m lonely tonight and I miss him. Well, not him exactly. It’s more like I miss the thought of him. The good him, the man I married with my heart a-flutter. The man who always made me feel safe, until he didn’t and it all went south with us. But still… I am lonely. And tired.
There is so much to do around this 100 year-old house we bought together. We both thought that restoring it would save our floundering marriage, kind of the same impulse people have when they think that having a baby will bring them back to the loving place, but without the diapers and midnight feedings.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Julie Savard on Wed, 01/25/2012 - 8:06am
I've been reading the articles lately that say the beginning of the year is the most common time to file for divorce. That means that more than a few couples are sitting their kids down right about now, telling them that by next year, Mommy and Daddy won't be in the same house for Christmas.
I've had to break the news to my kids that my partner and I are splitting up more than once — it's not an easy conversation, but it's a conversation that not only needs to be had, but one that needs to be handled delicately and with a ton of TLC. So, here are a few things I've learned for all the Mother's out there:
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 01/23/2012 - 8:25am
If you are getting divorced, you may want to plan a party to celebrate. After all, your girlfriends absolutely deserve to have some fun after the enormous amount of time and advice they’ve no doubt invested on your behalf. And besides, you too deserve to have a little fun, when all is said and done. The details of your party — such as whom to invite, where and when to have it, and what to serve — will largely depend on the type of divorce you’re planning.
For instance, if yours is going to be a quickie divorce, taking place in a sunny, foreign locale, there will be logistics to consider i.e.: travel, hotel and ground transportation, and of course knowing the proper legal protocol to follow and the location of a courthouse. If you’re going to stay a few days and work on your tan, you’ll need to pack a bag, making sure to remember the sunscreen, a trashy romance novel and the necessary paperwork.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 8:03am
One of the most poignant songs ever written about divorcees Jimmy Webb’s “Didn’t We”. The plaintive refrain, “Didn’t we almost make it? Didn’t we almost make it, baby? Didn’t we almost make it, this time?” is a pageant of hopes dashed and an anthem to regret. The lyrics indicate that the heave-ho they finally gave their marriage was the last in a long succession of let’s-try-it-one-more-times. That they were right on the verge of staying together and failed despite their best intentions is the saddest thing I can imagine. But imagining it is as far as I can go.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 01/09/2012 - 8:13am
It takes balls to finally make the decision to file for divorce. Big ones. Balls of steel. And it’s an especially brave thing to do when you were born with lady parts that don’t include the aforementioned equipment because, believe me, at a time like this, you could really use them. If you are a people pleaser, like me, ending your marriage will probably go against the grain of everything you were raised to believe in, like pleasing others, and the entire process is bound to give you indigestion on a grand scale so my advice, as simple as it may seem, is to keep a lot of Alka Seltzer on hand and maybe a large bottle or two of vodka in the freezer.
Stick with it, people will tell you. Go the distance. Mavbe it will get better, they will encourage. Sure! That’s easy for them to say but if they were in your shoes, even if they only slipped them on for a minute or two, they wouldn’t be handing you platitudes on a silver platter; they would be truckin’ on out of there faster than you can say “I am so out of here and boy do my feet hurt!”
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Posted to House Bloggers
by First Wives World on Sat, 01/07/2012 - 8:36am
I'm not one to mince words. If you think I'm talking to you, then decide to be offended or decide that there may be merit to the advice — either way, your child's welfare and happiness is my only real goal in writing this.
This isn't a fun time and both of you feel hurt and victimized right now. Whether you are or you aren't is not up to me to decide. Whether you give yourselves the opportunity to move forward in the best way possible is ENTIRELY up to you. Your goal is not to 'get yours' or 'see justice done'. Your goal is to move on, gracefully and with as little damage emotionally and financially as possible.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 01/02/2012 - 8:30am
Why do I continue to try to see my marriage in black and white when life is such a Technicolor affair? I loved him madly, I never really loved him. He made me laugh, he made me miserable. He loved me, he never know what love was. I could second guess my marriage until I’m blue in the face, but really it’s not my best color. And more importantly, I have discovered that second guessing myself and my past is very bad for me. It’s like trying to drive down the road while looking in the rearview mirror; I’m not going to move forward that way.
But then I have to wonder: Do we ever truly move on from the devastating moments that pepper our days like penalty flags on the field of life? Or do they hang on forever, becoming a permanent part of our emotional makeup like waterproof mascara or lipstick that doesn’t rub off? In the end it all comes back to the same old thing: I can’t make sense of any of it. Yet I continue to do the tango with this black and white thinking in a desire to move on and in the end, all I’m left with is tired feet and a worn out groove in the floor.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Sun, 12/25/2011 - 7:36am
I love rituals. Pomp and circumstance are fine by me. So as I head into this New Year, amidst the fireworks, parades and glittering crowds, I am girding my loins for all the possibilities it may bring. New Years resolutions are not really my speed as I truly believe they’re for sissies and fools. Waiting for a calendar date to make important changes in your life and then believing you will follow through seems like the very portal to madness, and I don’t need much of a shove.
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