One Important Thing to Know About Divorce
We all know that divorce can bring up a lot of emotions including anger, sadness, hurt, mistrust, confusion, and more. You can’t really ever prepare for what divorce will be like but one thing that is important to know about is the psychodynamics of divorce. The psychodynamics of divorce are complicated and may include victimization, mistrust, resentment, grief, and perfectionism. And, while these are very common occurrences, this is what makes working with a mediator instead of pursuing a court-based divorce so important.
Often, one or both spouse’s behavior may be heavily influenced by the psychodynamics of divorce itself, leading to things like passive-aggressive behavior, acting out, or petulant behavior. While these behaviors would remain unaddressed or possibly even encouraged during a court-based divorce, divorce mediation seeks to foster an atmosphere of mutual respect. Divorce mediators use situations and examples from their own lives to help explain how psychodynamics are influencing the divorce mediation process.
One of the hardest things for anyone to accept in divorce is that an expectation (of marriage in general or of their spouse) did not get met and therefore they now feel resentment. Whether resentment is felt towards themselves, their spouse, or other people and situations, resentment and negative emotions are the bedrock of anger and sadness. Frequently, we find that expectations may be unrealistic to begin with and by working through that and setting more realistic expectations, positive and mutually agreeable solutions can be achieved through divorce mediation.