Divorce papers were signed at 2 pm in the afternoon and by 5 pm my ex was already crossing state lines to begin a new life; I was left with sole custody of our 4 year old daughter.
What surprised me was that we rarely heard from him. He never called, or sent an e-mail to inquire on the well-being of his daughter. The only calls received would be on her birthday and whatever Thanksgiving or Christmas holiday he didn't have her, and the one week a year he would take her on vacation. Other than that we never heard from him.
It didn't take long for me to gather a resentment toward him since my daughter felt abandoned by her father and I was the one left to handle her emotions. This was during a time when I was learning how to be a Divorced Single Parent. I had all of my own emotional swings I was dealing with and the last thing I wanted was to cope with my daughter's issue as well. But, I had to deal with life on life's terms and I did.
I'm grateful today, that I did make the decision, shortly after the divorce of never talking bad about my Ex to our daughter; to friends, however, was another story. I started to refer to him as 'The Walking Corpse' because he was absent from my daughter's life.
Name calling is demeaning. So often times when we get hurt through the divorce process that we revert to being grade school kids and begin calling each other ugly names. The name calling can be to our face; but often times, these are names said behind our back.
The day came when a woman was referred to me. She was sharing her story of the early stages of her divorce process that her husband suddenly died leaving her with their 5 year old daughter. The next time I was ready to refer to my Ex as 'The Walking Corpse'; the words literally got caught in my throat. I thought of my friend's daughter and then thought of mine; at least my daughter has a father. I never referred to him that way again.
I suddenly realized through my name calling how insensitive I was being to those around me. Not only was my behavior juvenile; I also realized I was not being true to my value of living by The Golden Rule. Even though I was careful not to use this name around my daughter; I was being disrespectful of her father. That was wrong.
http://www.steppingintojoy.com/
About the Author
Debbi Dickinson coaches divorced women to move past their divorce and create a new life for themselves mixing spiritual strategy with time tested proven tools. Debbi invites you to take advantage a Free 5-Day Video Guide that outlines some of these tools. http://www.steppingintojoy.com/
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