Setting Healthy Boundaries |
by Nicole Weyant
What is THAT all about, anyway? You know, the weird things that the ex-spouses like to pull that inevitably cause friction in our new relationships? It's like they can't let go or something, right? RIGHT! They have not emotionally divorced themselves from the former spouse. Sad, but true...
The word divorce means much more than just a sheet of paper signed by a magistrate or judge dividing up property, debts and households. It means to completely separate two things that were once joined. Like it or not, your divorce is not complete until you are emotionally detached from your former spouse. If you are still emotionally invested enough in your former marriage to continue old patterns of communication, to continue to allow them to have the power to manipulate your emotions or to grant them anything more than the role of co-parent in your life, then your divorce is not complete.
The only obligations that you left your marriage with are the ones mandated by the court in your decree. They probably include portions of the marital assets, liabilities and paying some nominal amount of child support. I am willing to bet any amount of money that there isn’t a single divorce on the planet that reads, "This court hereby declares that these two former spouses remain fully-available emotional punching bags for each other. The court further orders that the children may be freely used between the parties to inspire guilt, manipulation and revenge, in an effort to perpetuate this emotional tie at any cost."
Read your decree, it just doesn’t say that— so quit behaving as if it does! I have said this before, but it is worth repeating: "People only have as much power over you as you give them." Manipulation is a two-way street. Someone can only manipulate you if you let him or her do so.
Whether it is out of an unhealthy need to be "in control", jealousy over a new relationship or out of just plain old-fashioned insecurity, many former spouses find it extremely difficult to let go of the emotional ties that they once had. It is hard for them to imagine that the other has learned from their mistakes in the relationship and simply moved on. It can be even more difficult for them to even fathom the idea that they were the mistake. This often happens even when they are in new relationships themselves.