One of the best pieces of advice I was given, shortly after I left my ex, was to ask for some professional counselling. I was given this advice by a colleague who is also a divorcee, who had benefitted from this himself during the time of his marriage break-up. I'm lucky that I have health insurance through work so I thought I would take advantage and make an appointment with my GP.

To make this as succinct as possible - I cried all over my GP whilst explaining the situation and asking for a referral. He couldn't have been nicer, gave me the details of a psychiatrist and said he would be faxing a referral within the hour so I must telephone to make an appointment that afternoon.

By complete coincidence I had my second medical encounter later that day with my ex's psychiatrist (my ex having recently been released from 4 weeks of in-patient treatment in a psychiatric unit). His doctor wanted to explain the situation to me. I cried, and 30 minutes later my husband's doctor kindly said to me that he thought I needed help and would guess that I was suffering from some sort of post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of the way my husband had been treating me.

A week later I went to see my own "shrink" for the first time - as is standard for a first appointment I had to undergo a psychiatric analysis - 90 minutes of probing questions about my history, little of which seemed relevant to my relationship. 90 minutes later the doctor told me that I was fine - how he thought this having a near hysterical 30 year old woman in his office I don't know, but so it was. He said he thought I could benefit from life & relationship coaching - not specific to my ex, but it would help me understand a number of things that had happened, and would be helpful in the future.

Session One was all about relationships and how to keep them happy and healthy (easier said than done - and yes, it still takes 2). I was asked to tell him what was the most important thing to keep a relationship happy - (1) the good things or (2) the bad things. I gave an answer almost immediately - figured it was obvious really. And to anyone reading this before you read on for the answer below please think to yourself what you feel is right.

I answered the good things. I was wrong. To explain (and I'm not a doctor, I don't have any medical training, I am just repeating here something someone told me that helped me, in the hope that it will help others) - in order for a relationship to exist there have to be good things in the first place, otherwise the relationship would never have happened. A simplistic view, but right I think. And you can apply this to any relationship - with your partner / husband / wife; your employer; your local pub etc etc. I haven't yet found anyone who would disagree.

So we accept that there are good things there - at least at the outset. It is only human that there are also bad things - however minor - no one has a perfect relationship, always in agreement, always in harmony. But however many good things are there there will always be some little things that need addressing - even as minor as not drinking straight out of the bottle, but using a glass. It is the bad things and how we handle them that are important.

It takes only one bad thing to become so bad that one person cannot handle it any longer to destroy a relationship. The sad fact is that if you get to this state it's rarely only one bad thing, and most people on here will know that first hand.

He went on to explain, in very simplistic terms, that relationships are all about the A, B & C. - Acceptance; Balance & Compromise.

Both people have to accept there is this bad thing - if one partner doesn't agree then at least they have to accept it's real to the other one and acknowledge accordingly. Both partners have to then work to find a balance, together, to either incorporate this bad thing into their life together, or to remove it; and, if necessary, to find a compromise path so both end up happy.

In my case I went away thinking that there is no way that my relationship could have survived what happened. My ex refused to accept he had done anything wrong. I realised that however hard I might have tried to salvage what we had he would never have accepted he needed to make any changes for me, he felt the way he had behaved was reasonable and I should have accepted it. This helped me see that I should not feel guilty for having left him - yes, he was ill, but I didn't make him ill and if I had stayed things would have got so much worse.

for the record, 15 months later, my ex still thinks he is the victim because I walked away.

Everyone has to apply this to themselves - my story is mine and I think that the simple good / bad - ABC rule can work for almost anything. I've told a lot of people this and it's been interesting seeing what they come back with a few days later having had the chance to consider their own personal situation.

one thing to note - even though my life coach didn't aim this specifically at my past what he said to me was aimed at helping me in the future as a result of what I had been through. Not being a qualified coach myself I'm not able to relay this in any way other than what I was told. I'm writing this last paragraph to explain to anyone who I might offend (which I hope I haven't done) that this is only one perspective and I'm sure there are many many others. I hope this helps some of you on here.