Have you grieved your previous relationships? Ep 72

Here's a truth most people skip right past: a new love can't find its way in until you've properly grieved the last one. Not just the marriages that ended in loss, but the ones that ended in disappointment, betrayal, or worse.

In this episode, Diane makes the case for grief you may not even realize you're carrying. Because if the relationship you had wasn't the one you wanted, there's something real to mourn, and the leftover ache of it quietly keeps the next person at arm's length.

Inside, she gets into:

Why unfinished grief blocks new love from reaching you, even when you think you're ready.

The specific reason so many people rush into something new, and why using a new person to distract from old pain isn't fair to anyone.

A hard truth about relationships you can't save on your own, drawn from a woman Diane once watched wrestle with a decision she didn't choose.

A separate, tender word for the widows, including how long to give yourself, and what "side by side" means when you're ready to love again.

This one is gentle, honest, and a little bracing, the way real talk about grief should be.

Then join Diane live: Same Guy, Different Outfit, a free class on Thursday, July 9 at 7 p.m. Central. If you keep ending up with the same kind of man no matter how hard you try not to, this class is for you. Sign up at dianebrandonmoody.com.

The 7 Dating Patterns Smart Women Don't Realize They're Running - And Why Recognizing Yours Changes Everything. 

Transcript

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Diane Brandon Moody: Hi, there, Diane Brandon Moody here again with another episode of 50 something love.

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Diane Brandon Moody: I'm doing my mini-marathon of 12 episodes, one daily, until we close the new Simply Irresistible timeframe.

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Diane Brandon Moody: So, today's topic is, have you grieved your last relationship?

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Diane Brandon Moody: I don't necessarily mean if the person died, although that's included.

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Diane Brandon Moody: But if the relationship ended, In a way that wasn't really what you wanted.

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Diane Brandon Moody: There is undoubtedly some grief hiding around you somehow.

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Diane Brandon Moody: And the other person can't find a way in, a new person can't find a way in, until…

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Diane Brandon Moody: You have properly grieved this one.

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Diane Brandon Moody: I think that is a very reasonable thing to do. I'm not necessarily talking to widows right this minute, I'll get to you in a second. But for those of you who you felt like you were cheated on or screwed over in some way.

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Diane Brandon Moody: There was violence, even if there was violence.

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Diane Brandon Moody: in your previous relationship or marriage. There is every reason to grieve that relationship that it wasn't the relationship that you wanted. It was a very wrong relationship, and

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Diane Brandon Moody: to be able to let that go in some way.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Now, one of the best ways to grieve a relationship

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Diane Brandon Moody: or to grieve anything for that matter is to cry. Did you know this is one of the top

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Diane Brandon Moody: nervous system.

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Diane Brandon Moody: regulating things that you can do.

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Diane Brandon Moody: it will help you get into a more regulated space. And I'll be talking more about that as we go on in other episodes, but crying

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Diane Brandon Moody: It's good for a wine.

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Diane Brandon Moody: It gets rid of toxins and chemicals and kind of resets.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Crying too much probably doesn't help, and I don't know what enough and too much what that boundary is in you, because I think it can be different in everyone.

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Diane Brandon Moody: So grieving might have some parts to it. Journaling. This is a very good thing to do.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Some of the things you might want to write about.

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Diane Brandon Moody: what I really wanted and hoped for in the relationship versus what really happened.

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Diane Brandon Moody: What I wanted in the relationship and what I.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Tried to do but couldn't.

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Diane Brandon Moody: what I wanted in the relationship, but was too large for me to stop.

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Diane Brandon Moody: What I wanted in the relationship and wasn't mine to stop.

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Diane Brandon Moody: all of these things write about them in your journal, and that will help you get some clarity, and will probably bring up some tears. I think it's very good. Excuse me to list

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Diane Brandon Moody: What made you sad about this?

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Diane Brandon Moody: Relationship.

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Diane Brandon Moody: What made you happy?

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Diane Brandon Moody: What made you delighted?

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Diane Brandon Moody: What made you angry? Write all this, write, write, write. If you're writing it in your journal, nobody needs to see it, and if you want to feel extra clear that nobody has seen it, then tear it up and throw it in the fire after you're done.

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Diane Brandon Moody: But, making this… An ending?

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Diane Brandon Moody: A definite ending in your grieving is

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Diane Brandon Moody: Is the best thing that you can do for yourself before you're ready to have a new relationship, in my opinion.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Okay.

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Diane Brandon Moody: After you've done the grieving.

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Diane Brandon Moody: And again, I'll get to widows in a moment. I'm getting to the people who were disappointed or suffered in some way.

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Diane Brandon Moody: The next thing is to let go of the notion that anything else.

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Diane Brandon Moody: can save it.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Especially if there's something like violence involved in this relationship.

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Diane Brandon Moody: there is nothing you should even try to do to save it. It's time. It's time to move on, especially if the other person has no interest in trying to save it.

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Diane Brandon Moody: It's time.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Sometimes we just have to realize that even though it's not what we want, we have to move on. I remember I was in a class about ten years ago.

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Diane Brandon Moody: And a woman got very surprised by the fact that her husband, who she loved dearly, had declared that he wanted out of the marriage, he wanted a divorce, and…

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Diane Brandon Moody: This is this is what is going to happen.

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Diane Brandon Moody: He was pretty definitive. He didn't leave room for any other opinions. I suspected at the time he was probably seeing someone else, and that was true.

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Diane Brandon Moody: I don't understand. The woman he was leaving was absolutely beautiful, but sometimes you don't understand that, and sometimes, you know, it's just not understandable.

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Diane Brandon Moody: But after she kind of She was rolling around in the messiness of how she didn't want a divorce.

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Diane Brandon Moody: And we talked about it on several occasions, and I finally said, you know, honey, I think you're going to have to accept that this is a divorce. And she said, but I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't want this to be the end. And I said, I totally understand that.

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Diane Brandon Moody: I understand why you're saying that. It's very clear to me.

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Diane Brandon Moody: where you stand. But here's the thing, my friend. If one person is bound and determined to leave a relationship.

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Diane Brandon Moody: That's pretty much the way it goes.

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Diane Brandon Moody: You can't save something if both people don't want to save it.

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Diane Brandon Moody: It has to be both of you. You have to both be in it. It may be messy. It may be ugly. You may need a third party. You may need help, but you got to work on it together.

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Diane Brandon Moody: That's just that.

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Diane Brandon Moody: the end of that.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Now I'm going to be talking to the widows.

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Diane Brandon Moody: That have lost their husbands.

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Diane Brandon Moody: When they passed away.

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Diane Brandon Moody: This is not an experience I've had, so forgive me for not understanding all the finer points. I do understand that this probably hit you like a ton of bricks. You may or may not have known it was coming, but you were devastated by the loss.

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Diane Brandon Moody: I get that. That's extremely understandable.

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Diane Brandon Moody: And it's going to take you some time to get back to normal. Your world isn't normal right this minute. Your world is topsy-turvy. It's going to take you probably two years before you're even ready to think about having another relationship with another person, and I think that should be the case.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Give yourself at least a couple of years. Men tend to want to reattach rather quickly.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Especially if they're over 50, if they've had a good marriage and they want to attach again, and this isn't always true for women, I'm not against women.

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Diane Brandon Moody: doing it again. But you gotta give yourself some time, and you have to fully understand that even though you can always love the man who died, your husband.

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Diane Brandon Moody: You can always keep a place for them in your heart. In order to have another relationship, they need to exist side by side.

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Diane Brandon Moody: The one you remember fondly.

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Diane Brandon Moody: and the new one.

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Diane Brandon Moody: And you can't keep drawing parallels to the one that's gone.

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Diane Brandon Moody: that…

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Diane Brandon Moody: that just doesn't work, because that was one person, and that one person is now gone, and you can't keep drawing those parallels. It's very reasonable for you to find another person if you want one.

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Diane Brandon Moody: It's very reasonable to want love back in your life. It's very reasonable to have somebody who you can enjoy spending time with.

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Diane Brandon Moody: All of that's reasonable, but you gotta give yourself some time.

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Diane Brandon Moody: and don't even try to fill it with somebody.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Until you can fill it.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Happily.

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Diane Brandon Moody: With the memory of your husband.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Still with you. He'll never leave you. But he can be adjacent.

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Diane Brandon Moody: not instead of.

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Diane Brandon Moody: That's all I've got for today in grieving past relationships before you move on. I'd say it's very common for people who have left one relationship that feels ugly, it feels terrible, it feels painful, and you haven't gone all the way through that. And it's very, very common for people to want to replace something new with something old so you're distracted.

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Diane Brandon Moody: from the pain of losing what you lost. Don't do this.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Please don't distract yourself. It's not fair on anybody else that you do that with. It's not fair.

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Diane Brandon Moody: to kind of be that way with another person that the new person is just kind of filling the hole left by the other person. That's not good. Please make sure you've done your grieving fully and completely. If you need grief counseling, that's a good place to start.

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Diane Brandon Moody: And there are quite a few widowhood

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Diane Brandon Moody: support groups in pretty much any town. I think there are a few options probably at a church.

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Diane Brandon Moody: There are third-party places as well. So please, please, please do what you can to finish before you begin again.

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Diane Brandon Moody: Thank you very much, Diane Brandon Moody. This is 50-something Love. I appreciate your being here. Just as a reminder, on Thursday, July 9th, at 7pm, I'm doing same guy, different outfit.

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Diane Brandon Moody: If you're one of those people who tends to keep ending up with exactly the same sort of guy, even though you're trying not to, this class is for you.

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Diane Brandon Moody: So, it's free. Go to my website, DianeBrandonMoody.com, sign up, and we will see you then. Thank you.