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Author: Robert Reeves

Offering Divorce Support

You may be a pro at giving friends advice. For instance, movie suggestions, sports bets, haircut and wardrobe advice may all be a piece of cake. However, when it comes to offering divorce support? You might want to adjust your methods. It’s a difficult time for them and as uncomfortable as it may be, it’s important to offer divorce support. 

Tips for Offering Divorce Support

Don’t Interrogate

When offering divorce support to a friend, it’s important to avoid interrogating them. While you may want to ask questions and figure out where things went wrong, asking too many can become offensive. During a divorce, people will experience a lot of emotions and probably have a few questions of their own.

Answering questions they may not have the answer to is the last thing they want to do. In order to avoid this, they may begin to isolate themselves, which can be damaging. Therefore, it’s best to allow them to talk and give a listening ear. 

Don’t Judge

While they are going through this time, it’s important for your friend to know you aren’t judging. A divorce is a big decision and coming to that conclusion can be a difficult process. So, adding comments about why the marriage didn’t work or how they could have tried harder may just be a discouragement to your friend. Therefore, when you are trying to give divorce support, you want to avoid these types of statements and attitudes. 

Validate

Instead of questioning or judging your friend, it’s important to offer divorce support by validating them. This time can be confusing and your friend may have moments of questioning their own decisions. When this happens, you want to be there to offer validation. In some cases, it may be a good idea to give them details and remind them how they came to this decision. In addition, try to offer divorce support by validating their feelings. Remind them that their feelings are normal and understandable.
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In short, giving a friend divorce support can be hard. It’s a difficult time for them and while you want to help, it’s hard to gauge how. However, the most important thing you can do is to listen and be present.

The Weapon of the Emotional Abuser: Gaslighting

A phrase that has gained popularity in recent years is “Gaslighting.” Gaslighting is a form of emotional abuse because it skews the balance of power in a relationship and makes the victim question their reality. There are many different ways that an abuser can gaslight their partner, and the effects can be huge. Often, victims have a hard time overcoming their emotional abuse, and it takes a long time to trust again. The best way to respond to gaslighting is to keep a record of everything so that you can view the events later with clear eyes. Gaslighting can have a huge impact on emotional and mental well-being, so it’s important to address it.

The Weapon of the Emotional Abuser: What is Gaslighting?

What is Gaslighting?

Gaslighting is a form of emotional abuse where a person makes the victim question their perception of reality. A victim of gaslighting will feel confused and question their own reality. They may also question their own feelings about events and wonder if they are over-reacting in situations. This can cause significant anxiety and eventually hurt a person’s mental health. The term comes from a 1938 play called Gas Light where a husband keeps dimming the gas-powered lights in a home and disagrees with his wife when she points it out. Gaslighting can make a victim unable to trust their own instincts and feelings. It is a classic weapon of emotional abusers.

Effects of Gaslighting?

The main effect of gaslighting is that the victim begins to mistrust their own feelings. They question their reality, and ultimately this gives the abuser more power. If a victim feels unable to trust their own instincts, they’re more likely to stay in a relationship with their emotional abuser. They’ll also be afraid to reach out to others for help because they wonder if they’re being too sensitive. If a victim doesn’t reach out to friends or family, then it’s less likely that somebody will spot the other red flags in their relationship.

How to Respond to Gaslighting

The first thing to do if you suspect your partner is gaslighting you is to keep a record of things. Start a journal or diary of your day to day conversations and when you feel like your feelings are being dismissed or questioned. Hopefully, you’ll be able to gain some perspective by viewing the conversations later on. Collect evidence that supports the version of events that you remember, even if your partner insists that you are incorrect. You can also speak with a friend or somebody you trust to see if they notice red flags. This is another way to collect evidence that you can refer back to later. It’s important to address gaslighting because it can have such a harmful effect on your mental health.

Gaslighting is a common form of emotional abuse. If your partner is gaslighting you, they may argue with your memory of events, or make you question your feelings. They may even make you feel guilty for questioning their motives. Eventually, all this confusion can deteriorate your self-confidence and hurt your mental health. The situation just helps your abusive partner gain more control over you. If you are a victim of this form of abuse, start keeping a record of events to refer to later. And reach out for help. You can always ask for help at the Domestic Violence Support Hotline.

Healing After Emotional Abuse: Focus on Yourself

If you’ve been in an emotionally abusive relationship, you are probably feeling confused and hurt. Healing after emotional abuse requires you to focus on yourself. Keeping a journal can help you separate fact from fiction. Don’t engage with your abuser any longer. Asking for help from a friend or person you trust is important as well. And finally, take time for yourself and do something that makes you happy. Hopefully, you’ll be able to find your self-worth and move on to a happier relationship.

Healing After Emotional Abuse: Focus on Yourself and Move On

Journal

One of the main goals of emotional abusers is to try and distort your view of reality. Healing from emotional abuse requires you to sort out fact and fiction. It also means that you’ll need to gain some perspective on the situation. Write down your experiences in a journal or diary. Later, you can read the entries when you are doubting yourself. Hopefully seeing things written down can help you get some distance from the situation. Therefore, you’ll be able to see the whole situation more clearly.

Don’t Engage

Healing from emotional abuse is easier if you can sever ties completely with the person hurting you. However, if you are in a situation where you must see them, try not to engage. If they begin using hurtful language or trying to belittle you, stop them in their tracks. Simply say that if they say anything unkind, you’ll walk away. Then stick to your word. Don’t argue, just leave the situation.

Ask For Help

Ask for help if you are healing from emotional abuse. Go to a close friend or somebody that you trust. Explain the situation to them and ask for help. For example, if you need to coordinate things with your ex, they can help. You can also get help from a professional. Therapy can help you find your self-confidence again. It can also help you gain some perspective on the situation. Some therapists are offering virtual sessions.

Take Time for Yourself

The single most rewarding thing you can do for yourself when healing from emotional abuse is to take some “me” time. Find a hobby or new passion that makes you feel happy. Or explore a talent that makes you feel proud of yourself. Taking time for yourself doesn’t have to be expensive. For example, it might just mean a long bath. Or a few minutes of focused yoga. However you choose to do it, just take a few minutes to do something that makes you feel happy.

Emotional abuse can be very hard to overcome. This is because it distorts your perception of reality and can cause distress even years later. Healing from emotional abuse requires focus and self-reflection. Take time to journal your feelings and experience. Refuse to engage any longer with your abuser. Ask for help either from a friend or professional. And finally, take time to focus on yourself. Hopefully, you can use these suggestions to move forward with your life. That way, you’ll be able to move on to a relationship that lets you know your self-worth.

Steps to Becoming a Foster Parent


If you are becoming a foster parent, you’re making an amazing decision that will improve your life and the life of the child you foster. There are so many children needing supportive foster families out there. However, the process of fostering does require some up-front work. Fostering agencies have to make sure that the parents they place children with are able to give them proper care. This requires training on the part of the foster parents. In some states, a license is actually required. Next, you’ll have an in-home visit where the agency makes sure that you’re prepared for a child. And finally, you’ll have to pass a background check. After you’ve completed all of these steps, you’ll be ready to take in a foster child and begin a relationship that will change your life.

Steps to Becoming a Foster Parent: Getting Prepared

Training

The first step to becoming a foster parent is taking a training course. This will probably cover an overview of the child welfare system and how the process of fostering works. It will help families decide whether or not this is a course that is right for them. It will also provide you with some understanding of what types of behaviors you might experience from foster children as a result of them being in the welfare system. Many children have been through the trauma of one sort or another, and the training program can help you be better prepared to help them.

Licensing

In some states becoming a foster parent requires a specific license. For example, in North Carolina, parents must complete a 30-hour course and then apply for a fostering license. Fostering and adopting are two very different things, although sometimes people get them mixed up. In states where you have to get a license, you often need a separate license if you are applying to adopt a child.

In Home Visit

After you’ve completed your training, the next step to becoming a foster parent is the in-home visit. This is when somebody from a foster agency comes to your house to check out how you live. They’ll ask you tons of questions about your lifestyle. They’ll also make sure that you have the essentials for bringing home a child. If you’re fostering a baby, you’ll need to show that you have a crib and have babyproofed. They aren’t trying to find fault with your home, but instead just getting a feel for how you live your life.

Background Check

Finally, the last piece of the puzzle to becoming a foster parent is passing a background check. Foster agencies must make sure that the children they place with foster parents are in a safe environment. Once you choose a foster agency you’d like to work with, they’ll likely order the background check. All in all, a background check keeps the children safer.

Becoming a foster parent is an amazing life-changing decision to make. It’s one that will probably be very difficult but even more rewarding. However, there is prep work to do upfront. You’ll decide which agency you’d like to work with and then begin training. Next, if you live in a state where it’s necessary, you’ll need to apply for a license. You’ll have an agent come to your house for a home visit after that. And finally, you’ll need to pass a background check. Once you’ve completed all these steps, you’ll be ready to take in a foster child and start providing some much needed support to a child in need.

Kid-Related Mistakes: What To Avoid

Trying to navigate divorce and not make mistakes can feel like an uphill battle. However, one type of mistake you want to avoid are kid-related mistakes. After all, it’s important to do your best to protect your kids from the potentially troublesome impacts of divorce…

Kid-Related Mistakes: What To Avoid

Bad-mouthing the other parent

Divorce isn’t easy for any couple. Often times, it involves a lot of buildup which eventually boils over into a divorce. During this process, many negative emotions might come to the surface. When or if this happens, then you need to watch what you say, especially around your kids.

One of the biggest kid-related mistakes is bad-mouthing your ex in front of your kids. Your kids don’t understand what has happened which caused you to divorce. To them, you’re still just their parents. As a result, you need to think of their feelings at all times before you speak.

Drag TheM In The Middle

Another of the kid-related mistakes to avoid is getting your children involved in the divorce. A lot of parents try to use their kids to help them and their goals. For instance, they might use them as messengers, or try and make them “pick a side” between them or their ex.

Again, it’s important to realize that your kids don’t see divorce like you and your ex do. Using them in this way just confuses them and causes them a lot of unwarranted psychological stress. It’s much better for both them and yourself to keep them out of these kind of positions.

Trying to spoil them

Not all kid-related mistakes are about getting your kids involved in the divorce. In fact, some of them tend to occur when trying to keep them out of things. For example, some parents like to try and spoil their kids with gifts to try and keep them happy, or because they feel guilty for stressing them.

However, this doesn’t actually tackle the real problems your kids may be experiencing. Plus, you could accidentally be encouraging spoiled behavior in the future. A better alternative is to talk to them one-on-one about how they feel, and possibly have them talk to someone like a family therapist.

Divorcing Child: What to Do as a Parent

These days, Millennials are more patient about marriage than Baby Boomers, leading to marriages that last longer than they used too. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean divorce no longer happens. If you’re the parent of a divorcing child, you might be unsure of what you should be doing. Thankfully, you can find the right balance to help support your child during this difficult time…

Divorcing Child: What to Do as a Parent

Give yourself time to accept it 

Parents of a divorcing child also need time to process and accept the divorce. They may have formed their own connections with their child’s spouse, or are worried about their grandchildren’s feelings. Sometimes, they may feel like they should’ve done more to help things work out for their child. 

It’s important to be honest with yourself about the situation. If your child is able to forgive and move on, then so should you. Try not to hold onto bad feelings, especially if it was a mutual decision and they remain friends. Follow your child’s example and accept what has happened.

Be supportive

Your divorcing child is going to need support to get through this difficult time. Try and remain out of the legal aspects and keep a neutral stance. Offer financial help if you think it’s needed, but the biggest thing is being their for them emotionally. 

Your child might also need some extra help if they have children. It might be a good idea to offer to watch them for a few nights so they’re away from the divorce. Even the most mutual divorces can be stressful on children, so it helps for them to be at a place they know they’re welcomed. 

Respect boundaries

Your divorcing child will need support during this time. However, they’ll also need some time to themselves to process things on their own. It’s good to be respectful of that and not try to push past the boundaries. 

If your child comes back into your home after the divorce, don’t overstep the line into their independence. You can certainly offer to help with say child care and financials, but you shouldn’t make them dependent on you again. Moving on again is an important part of post-divorce life. 

Advanced Co-Parenting: Stepping Up Your Game and Collaboration 

Co-parenting can be made simple if both parents are being collaborative. However, as you, your former spouse, and your children grow as people and get older, you might find that the plan you’ve started with, needs a little bit of adjustment. Now that you’ve become pro’s at co-parenting, it’s time to kick it up a notch. We’ll call this time of reevaluation advanced co-parenting. After all, the things you’re dealing with now that you have older children, can be much more difficult, and require a more hands-on approach from both of you…

Advanced Co-Parenting: Stepping Up Your Game and Collaboration 

When you and your spouse divorced and made a plan for co-parenting, your children likely had a little bit less going on then than they do now. Especially if your children were toddlers, the introduction of new activities, commitments, and wants can being about necessary changes to how you and your former spouse are doing things… If you and your spouse were already successful at co-parenting before, making necessary changes doesn’t have to be a big production. Instead, it can be a natural progression. Not to mention, it should be easier to cooperate after years of doing the same song and dance.

Financial decisions will increase 

As your children get older, the financial requirements can become a bit more intense. For instance, buying a car, prom expenses, cell phones, college funds, interests, develop specific needs, and so forth. In short, when kids get older— the expenses can become tenfold. Therefore, making adjustments due to their needs, as well as current financials, is a pretty necessary step to helping both parents, and the child/children prosper. 

Relationship changes and growth 

As your children become young adults, they’ll start to make their own decisions. Those decisions might affect the current custody agreement that you’ve been following. Maybe your son has started playing football, and the games are every Friday night when they typically stay at Mom’s. On the flip side, maybe your daughter wants to spend Spring Break at the beach, instead of at Dad’s house. Letting your children make decisions, and also learn how to compromise, is a key part of becoming a successful adult. Tell your children to find ways to make up for their breaking a commitment. For example, since daughter wants to spend Spring Break at the beach with friends, offer Dad an extra week in the summer. 

Parenting will never be easy, or stay the same 

As your children grow, you can expect changes. Changes in opinion, habits, activities, interests, and preference. These things are to be expected, and it often means making adjustments and having conversations that you’d rather not have. However, after taking so much time as co-parents, these methods in advanced co-parenting should be a breeze…

Divorce Truths: What You Should Know

Divorce is a difficult situation to be in. After all, divorce isn’t something that couples imagine happening when they get married. However, if you do, there are some divorce truths you need to keep in mind. Doing so can help make the process a bit more manageable…

Divorce Truths: What You Should Know

It’s rarely one person’s fault

One common issue which pops up during divorce is the blame game. Each spouse likes to place the blame for the divorce solely on the shoulders of their ex. What this leads to is a lot of hostility and tension throughout the entire divorce, making things much more difficult.

However, one divorce truth you need to keep in mind is that divorce is rarely one person’s fault. Divorce can happen for many reasons. However, the majority of them are due to actions performed by both partners. If you can understand this truth, then you can better accept your divorce, and learn some lessons from it.

Divorce takes time

Another divorce truth to understand is just how long divorcing can take. For starters, there’s the actual process itself. You’ll have to get documents together, handle court dates and negotiations with your ex, and many other similar things. This will take some time to get through, even for the most amicable divorces.

Plus, with how important divorce is, you don’t want to just rush through it. Like anything in life, rushing through divorce increases the chances of you making mistakes. With how important these decisions are, the last thing you want to do is make a mistake which could’ve been avoided.

You need to take care of yourself

One divorce truth that people don’t remember enough is how necessary it is to take care of one’s self. Divorce can be a time of great stress in a person’s life. This stress, along with other divorce emotions like depression, can take a serious toll on your health.

As a result, it’s important to keep an eye on your well-being. Make sure you’re eating right and getting enough sleep each night. If you need some extra help, make sure to visit a doctor or even a therapist to help you get a handle on things.

Post-Divorce Counselor: Find Your Fit

Seeking out therapy during your divorce can be very beneficial. However, you might also want to consider making use of a post-divorce counselor. Finding the right one for you can seem like a challenge. Still, there are some ways to find one which will work with you the best…

Post-Divorce Counselor: Find Your Fit

Consider their perspectives

The thing about counseling and therapy is that there’s actually many different methods out there. Different counselors might use different styles. Some of these styles might appeal to you more than others. Therefore, consider what methods a post-divorce counselor makes use of.

For instance, some will work on changing your thoughts to help change your actions. Others might ask questions, and help develop a goal for change based on your responses. Depending on which one you feel is best, some counselors might be a better fit than others.

What is their schedule?

You also have to consider accessibility when looking for a post-divorce counselor. Availability can vary from one counselor to the next. Combine this with fitting them around a work schedule, and it’s important to see which ones would work the best for when you’re free.

Still, don’t just factor in the days and hours that they’re open alone. Remember to consider things like distance as well. Having to make long drives can be costly gas-wise, and make you not want to constantly go. A more nearby counselor, on the other hand, is easier to stick with.

Do you feel comfortable

The most important thing about a post-divorce counselor is that you feel comfortable with them. Do you feel like they listen to you, and that you get along well with them? If you don’t, you might not get the kind of help from them that you’re expecting. This can make you feel like you’re wasting your time, and your money.

Don’t be afraid to raise these concerns to your counselor. Odds are they’ll do better to help you feel more comfortable with them. However, if you still don’t, there’s nothing wrong with trying out a new counselor. It can feel a bit tedious, but finally finding one who fits makes it all worth it.

How-to: Choose a Divorce Lawyer

If you want to learn more about how to choose a divorce lawyer, you can learn more from this video.

When you start the divorce process, you will have a lot of things on your plate. From where you are going to live, to figuring out your finances and how this will affect your kids. One of the things you will also need to start working on is looking for legal help. It can be difficult to know who to turn to when you are faced with divorce. Not many people have had experience with this process before, so it can be difficult to know what to do. In a divorce, there is a lot on the line. Learn how to choose a divorce lawyer that is right for you and your situation.

How-to: Choose a Divorce Lawyer: Weighing Your Options

Rethink What You Want

Initially, you may think you want a really aggressive lawyer that is going to start fights and make your ex’s life miserable. Take a step back and evaluate if this is how you really want to proceed. While you do want someone to fight for you, you do not want someone who is going to create mayhem and absolute chaos. This will make everything harder for you in the long run. Having a fair and healthy divorce will be much easier for everyone. This may make you rethink what you want when you choose a divorce lawyer.

Ultimately, the goal of this process is to get divorced. Not only that, but you want to do that without much impact on your life. Do not let your emotions go crazy when it comes down to negotiating over material things that don’t mean much to you in the long run. If you do this, your divorce will become more expensive and longer than you had planned for it to be. Is it worth it? No, it won’t be. Focus on getting divorced as quickly and with as little financial damage, as possible. With this, be realistic about your attorney and what you expect from them. You do not want them to double as your therapist. That is not their job, and this will cost you much more than speaking to an actual therapist.

Looking for a Lawyer

You may feel overwhelmed when you try to choose a divorce lawyer. There are so many options. However, don’t jump to hire the first lawyer you meet. Not all lawyers are equal. Interview at least 3 different divorce attorneys before you decide. One thing to consider is that you should look for a lawyer that specializes in family law. You want a lawyer who is knowledgeable and experienced. Other good traits are good communication and negotiation skills.

You can also ask friends and family for recommendations. Recommendations can go a long way. Get their input on lawyers they had both good and bad experiences with. Also, look at the attorney’s trial record and success in court. This will give you an idea as to how good they are at negotiating. This will help give you an idea about which lawyer to choose to help you through your divorce.