So you have decided to split from your partner for the foreseeable future, or you are taking time out to reassess your relationship.
Sometimes couples can really benefit from what I call ‘healing separations’ where each of them takes time to work on themselves and decide what they really want at this stage in their lives and whether or not their relationships still fit or if they have any mileage left in them. For most people this is not an easy time.
If you have moved away from your partner and are unused to being on your own, loneliness will set in fairly quickly and the challenge is to figure out what it is that you are really missing.
To begin with here are some questions to ask yourself:
- Do I miss my partner’s qualities and characteristics?
- Do I miss being part of a couple with my partner, or just being ‘part of a couple’.
- Can I imagine taking time to work on our challenges with a view to spending the foreseeable future with my partner?
Now is the time to reevaluate the relationship and look at it from every angle.
Probably for some time before your separation and during separation you will experience what I call being ‘one foot in and one foot out’. You have not fully stepped out, (even though you may have literally or metaphorically, left the building) but you are certainly not back in and not yet ready to give the relationship your very best shot. Part of the purpose of a ‘healing separation’ is to take the time to ask yourself some serious questions. Questions like:
1) ‘What do I want for myself’? What needs to I have that have been compromised during the relationship? What’s most important for me to live a satisfied and fulfilled life? 2) What do I want from the relationship? 3) Is there the possibility of getting it from my partner? What would your partner have to do differently? 4) What would I have to give my partner to get it? What would my partner need to know and understand? 5) Am I willing to do what it takes to give this my best shot now or in the future? When would that be?
Searching your soul is not easy but it will grow your understanding of yourself and will allow you to see who you are and have been in your relationship and choose what you want and who you want to be going forward.
During this period, some people have moments of clarity and then crash into indecision. Many give up the thinking altogether, become unconscious and spend months in numbness living a limbo like existence, which only delays the decision making process. Others have to really feel the pain of disconnection before they choose to reconnect because the pain gets unbearable. This is not good because no one wants to be with someone just to ease the pain of his or her loneliness. Others put so much time into trying to work themselves out that any chance of rekindling their relationships moves further and further past its ‘sell by date’. There is no easy answer but you certainly do need the right skills and tools to help you decide where you stand. It’s hard to do this work by yourself.
There are also practical considerations to contend with. For example, do you communicate with your partner during this time or do you stay away? How do you agree the terms and conditions of your separation if there are children involved and shared finances, or if you work together?
What exactly are the rules and guidelines to follow when the two of you have decided to separate for at least the short term? This is a question many of my clients ask me and for sure there are plenty of books and online information out there but if you are in this situation yourself and you really want to concentrate on getting the clarity you need to make the right choice for you in the most effective way. The truth is that you’ll need to work with someone who is skilled enough to give you all the tools you’ll need to show you how to make the right choice for you. This is the work I do everyday with men and women in this exact situation, so if all this resonates with you, please do call me for immediate help.
Believing Its Over –v- Knowing its Over
If you have worked hard to rebuild your relationship, but there is simply too much water under the bridge or despite all your best efforts, the two of you want different things from your life; have different values or you manifest behaviours that are simply unacceptable to the other, it may well be that your relationship is now complete.
But there is a difference between knowing its over and actually believing its over and that difference is what makes it so challenging to get over a broken relationship, whether you are the leaver or the levee. ‘Belief’ itself is the powerful six letter word (in fact is probably the most powerful word in our whole vocabulary) that will either keeps us stuck in sadness and non-acceptance of the completion of our relationship.
You see, its one thing ‘knowing’ from a rational point of view that its over. You may have spent many hours, days, weeks and months and even years thinking about the pros and cons of your relationship. You may have had periods of separation, both mentally and physically and then returned to the relationship. You may have experienced times when you withdrew or felt numb or just didn’t give the relationship a great deal of thought while you got on with the distractions of every day life. You may have done the ‘inside’ work you needed to do and came to realise, after much prolonged thought, that there is no way you could imagine spending the rest of your life with this person. And then perhaps you looked even deeper inside yourself and called on your intuition to help you make the decision, which you then declared, to your partner.
Once the words are out; once you have declared your intention to leave the relationship, for whatever reason you give, is that when it’s really over?
Whilst you may ‘know’ from a deep place of knowing that there is no more mileage in your relationship, believing it is an altogether different process.
If you believed it was really over, there would be a feeling of peaceful acceptance perhaps even a liberation that comes partly from the release of the turbulent emotions that you had been feeling for however long. There is also a forgiveness of self and other that washes over you like a refreshing waterfall on a hot summer’s day. Cool and cleansing all at once. To get to that stage; to ‘believe its possible to get to this stage; many people need evidence of varying kinds.
Some people need evidence that they can operate singly, manage their lives, their finances, their families and themselves to the standard and degree they had in partnership before they feel it’s really over. Some people crave love and a sense of belonging and are unable to experience the relationship as truly over before that replacement comes along. Some people think that if they give themselves time, (but no-one is clear how much time) they will heal and they will just ‘know’ when it’s really over. Others remain stuck in numbness for far too long.
If you are struggling right now in a limbo land of knowing its over but not quite believing it, I have some wonderful skills to show you that will help you make sense of where you are now and understand why being in this place is absolutely vital for your future growth and your future relationships. Once you know how to operate your life from this new perspective, you’ll experience a freedom on a daily basis that you simply cannot access right now. Once again this takes a commitment to wanting to have your life back and return to the person you really are when you are not upset and living in angst.
When you work with me, I can guarantee to move you from ‘knowing’ to ‘believing’ so that you can start healing, stop the turmoil and get on with your life. I can show you how you got to this place, how it was inevitable given how you and your partner ‘operated’ together that it would turn out as it did, and I can show you ways to avoid making any of the same mistakes ever again.
I wish that I could wave a magic wand and as one client said to me ‘Francine, can’t you take it all away?” Whilst I cannot take away the circumstances of your life, I can show you how to handle them and how to move forward with your life and that’s a ‘wand’ I wave every day. So do please contact me for a chat on 0208 416 0121, or email me at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or check out my website at www.francinekaye.com . It’s always good to talk.
