I remember where I was when I got the phone call and when I realized the extent of what had happened. I was shopping for shoes; getting ready to return to work from maternity leave. At first I thought, “okay we can do this”, he has a lot of support and it might be a tough recovery, but he’ll be okay. But when I found out the truth……  It felt like someone had put a weight on my chest making it difficult to get in a full breath of air and at the same time a burning sensation developed at the bottom of my throat trying to keep it all in. It did surprise me, but I think that’s because society focuses on divorced couples hating each other, and these feelings weren’t following in line with those theories.

 

     I think the worst thing about being a grieving ex wife is that no one really thinks you’re allowed to be as hurt as you’re feeling. And you have a difficult time finding the right person to talk to about those feelings. Generally, if you are remarried, your husband is your best friend. And how do you openly grieve about your x-husband to that person? You don’t want to. You feel like you can’t. Because how many men want to cry with their wife about her x? And you don’t want him to be confused by your own confusing emotions. It’s tough. I have my mom, my sister and my best friend to talk to, but what about the person who lives with you every day? You can’t hide from him.

 

     For the record, my husband is a rock star. He never gave me any reason to have those thoughts. He never questioned my grief in any way. He never questioned where we had to go or when we had to do it. He never questioned the things I felt I needed to do to help my own grief or my sons grief. He comforted me when I was hurt or confused by someone else’s actions. He reassured me when I was struggling to make decisions or didn’t know what to do. He was always there and supportive in whatever I was doing and I’m so thankful for that. Only a strong man could endure all of that without ever making a remark.

 

     As the ex wife, you grieve the man you once loved and you grieve for your child’s pain. You know from that moment on your child is going to hurt every day. You don’t have the recent memories to talk with him about, just old ones. You can’t reminisce and talk about the last holidays together, because you weren’t there to share them. And since you can’t answer those questions at the drop of a dime, it’s hard to be able to fully support your child. To me, it felt like a second divorce. Like I was going through all the hurt and confusion that I thought I had already put behind me. All the battles of figuring out how to co-parent our child, replaced by the battles of how to co-parent without him and with his wife.

 

     As the ex wife, you grieve for his family. You don’t know if you’re crossing any lines in wanting to support them or talk to them about their feelings as well as you own. You don’t know if you’re allowed to be places they are during the process. And that’s confusing because you want your child involved as much as possible. You need to be able to support your child in every way which is hard to do if you’re not aware of what is going on. And quite frankly, they may not want to talk to you, and you can’t help feeling hurt by that.

 

     As the ex wife, you grieve for his wife. You can’t know exactly what she’s feeling, but you hurt for her. And let’s be honest, if there are any two people that are going to want to and be willing to share their grief with each other, it’s not going to be these two. I’m open to it, but it’s hard to tip toe around topics or feelings that may clash during these conversations. I have loved and appreciated her in ways I don’t think she’ll ever understand. She loved and accepted my ex in ways that I couldn’t, and I was happy to know that he was happy. And she whole heartedly loves my son. She’s known him his whole life, she’s cared for him in every way a mom does, she has had her concerns just like any other mom, she’s encouraged him and signed him up for sports/activities, she’s bandaged booboos and kissed him goodnight and she just plain simply takes wonderful care of him. I have never had to worry about him while he’s been in her care, and I’m not sure if there’s a whole lot of mothers that feel that way about their ex husband’s wife. I didn’t always feel that way. There were a lot of lines crossed between the both of us and I didn’t like her in the beginning for many reasons. But as we all grew and matured, I was able to step back and look at things differently.

 

     As the ex wife, you have to endure your own extended family looking over your grief. They are sad for his wife, his child, his family, but they completely forget about you. They will talk to you and ask how those people are doing, but they don’t ask you how you’re doing. Maybe they assume that since they see you and you look good from the outside, that they don’t need to. I’m not speaking about everyone, just some. But even if it’s just one person, it’s a sting that can’t be soothed. It’s a hard pill to swallow when you feel like you lost the support of your own family to his.

 

     As the ex wife, you are straight up confused about your own grief. Grief is not straight forward to begin with. Even within an immediate family, each person is going to feel differently. So when you combine that with the above mentioned it is like a tidal wave of thoughts and emotions. Not knowing what to say, who to go to, what to do, what’s right, what’s wrong, what could help, what won’t….. it’s very overwhelming. My son and I go to group counseling. It has helped me a lot in that there are some other ex wives there, as well as wives who have step moms in their life. While there, I’m able to talk openly with these adults and I am able to get perspective from both sides. So that helps a lot, but it still doesn’t make things any less confusing. You’re still confused, but at least you have a place to talk about it.