Leaning On Her Faith Through Divorce And Into Self-Authenticity

Many women grow up believing their worth is tied to sacrifice and fulfilling traditional roles. But what happens when your inner voice whispers otherwise-and you choose to listen?' Kay Ciarrone Pavicic's journey from a rigid, sacrificial marriage to embracing authentic self-love and balance reveals a powerful truth: your deepest fulfillment begins when you trust yourself enough to break free.

In this episode, Kay opens up about her struggles navigating a high-stakes marriage rooted in faith and obligation, questioning long-held beliefs, and finding the courage to prioritize her happiness.

You'll discover how her resilience transformed her understanding of love, faith, and identity- especially after a divorce that many saw as failure, but she saw as liberation.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello, and welcome to Fire in Her Eyes. This is a podcast about women who persevered through pain to find peace and purpose. So if you're looking for a little inspiration and motivation to sustain you through difficult times, join us as we share stories of women who were empowered through pain and transformed struggles into sweet success. I'm your host, Tanya Skaronsky. On the last episode of Fire in Her Eyes, I had the great pleasure of engaging in a discussion with Dr. Laura Gilliam. She talked about identity, shifts in identity, disruptions in identity. So to follow up on that conversation, I asked Kay Therone Pavisek to join me today. She embodies quiet strength, perseverance that's rooted in faith, and the courage it takes to live in alignment with who you truly are, even when that alignment takes years to reach. Kay's story is one of growth, grace, and evolution. This conversation is about endurance, self-trust, and the courage to become, no matter how long it takes. Kay, I'm so honored to have you here today.

SPEAKER_02 1:27

Thank you for having me. That was a wonderful introduction. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:32

So I know that you grew up the youngest of six children and the only girl in a traditional Italian Catholic family. How do you believe that that upbringing shaped your understanding of womanhood, of obedience, and of faith?

SPEAKER_02 1:51

Yes, I did grow up in a very traditional Italian Catholic family. Grew up during the early 70s, which I think was pivotal in forming my ideas of obedience to marriage, obedience to your spouse, and with faith being the cornerstone of my family, that was had a large influence on me in terms of what my marriage was going to be like. Divorce was not an option in this setting, in this atmosphere. We never talked about divorce with my parents. My parents were married 54 years.

SPEAKER_00 2:32

So what message did you internalize early on about marriage and sacrifice and, you know, staying committed, especially as a woman?

SPEAKER_02 2:44

Yes. Again, being from the early 70s, you know, back then women really had very little voice in their marriage. That's what I saw with my mom. She had very little voice. She never questioned. She just did what her husband told her to do. And it wasn't until much later that I started to wonder whether or not she was really fulfilled and what that fulfillment looked like for her. But I can tell you, it was a difficult marriage, even though they were married 54 years. I don't think it was a very fulfilling marriage for her.

SPEAKER_00 3:21

I don't think back in those days that was something that women spoke about, talked about openly, right? It was more you honor a commitment and you know you roll with it. And there was no other option. It's for life, and that's that. That's correct. Yeah, that's right. It was. I think it was much more about duty rather than fulfillment.

SPEAKER_01 3:48

It was obedience.

SPEAKER_00 3:50

It was about doing the right thing. It was about self-sacrifice for the good of everybody else in the family. You shared with us that early in your marriage, you sensed that something wasn't quite right. What did knowing feel like? And how did you reconcile that with your faith? That's so difficult when you know it, but you know, it puts you in a place of conflict. That's great that you know, but how do you reconcile that with your faith that tells you otherwise?

SPEAKER_02 4:22

Yeah, you're right. I did know something was not right. And I questioned God for a very long time. Is this really what marriage is about? Um, is this really what is going to be best for me? And that was very hard to reconcile that with my faith because you just didn't faith, faith is all about faith. You don't question, you go on faith. And I had a hard time with that. And I believe once I came to the decision that this marriage was not going to work, then I spent a lot of time asking God, do I stay or do I go? And I just always had this nagging feeling that this is not what He wants from me in my life. And I can tell you, I didn't really get a clear answer from God during those 10 years that I prayed every Sunday, fix my marriage, help me to be a better wife, help us to fix this. I never got a clear answer from God. Do I stay or do I go? That clear answer came to me much later, and it was very clear once it did come to me. But it was hard to reconcile that with my faith, to stay in that marriage, knowing that this is not what's best for me.

SPEAKER_00 5:44

I know you talked again about praying and asking God to help you fix it, fix whatever was broken. So, how did prayer sustain you? When sometimes it feels heavy and confusing, right? Yeah, very heavy.

SPEAKER_02 6:00

Yeah, it I think without my faith, and my faith is is continually, continually evolving and growing. And I think without my faith, I don't know if I would have been able to hold it all together, to raise my children and to stay sane, really, um, during this difficult time because divorce is so, so difficult. And I just had to really rely on, again, my faith. I go back to my faith, knowing that this can't be what God wants for me. This cannot be all there is to marriage.

SPEAKER_00 6:36

How did you talk to yourself during those years when you can't quite silence your inner voice, but it doesn't align with your external life?

SPEAKER_02 6:50

Yeah, that's a good point. Not aligning with your core beliefs. And I really never sat down and thought about what my core beliefs were. And when I did, I got very clear on what was important to me, which was my faith. And when you're clear on your core beliefs, that nagging feeling that something's not right gets louder and louder. And I think as I was going through this, I just kept moving forward, one foot in front of the other, knowing there's going to be something better. There's it, it's gotta get better because this is not what I was put on this earth for.

SPEAKER_00 7:32

When we've spoken before, you did say that you recognized fairly early on in your marriage that something wasn't quite right. Yet you made the intentional decision to stay with your children, and you didn't make that move until they were in high school. Yes. So, how did motherhood teach you about strength and self-sacrifice? I think of my own daughter. What would I want her to know about self-sacrifice for the greater good of her children one day, but at the same time living in alignment with her authenticity, her truth.

SPEAKER_02 8:16

Yes, yes. Kids have very sharp perception, and they know when you're not living aligned with your truth. They know, they feel it, they see it. They may not talk to you about it. And that became very important to me that I could show my children that I made a mistake and I wanted to step back and make a correction with that and get myself back in alignment with who I truly was. And that became, that became very important to me. And I think that sustained me through the long years where I realized that I am going to have to leave this marriage. But I also put my children first and said, I can't leave when they're small. I didn't want them bouncing back and forth between two houses. My husband at that time was traveling four out of five days a week. And I just it I just didn't see how that could work. So then that's when the sacrifice comes in and you realize this is what you do for your children. And you know, you're a mom. You'll do anything for your children, you'll run through a brick wall for your children. So that was never, that was never in question. I just knew I would stay until they were what I thought old enough to understand why I was making this decision.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

Were there moments when you feared losing yourself completely? And how did you protect the parts of you that still mattered while continuing to go through the motions and doing what is expected?

SPEAKER_02 9:59

I did, I believe I did lose myself. Looking back now, I believe I lost a lot of myself in that marriage. I say that he so altered my perception of reality that I no longer could tell what was true and good. And when you get to that point in your life where you can't decide whether or not something is true and good for yourself, that's a scary place to be. And I knew that I had to step away from that for fear of losing myself completely.

SPEAKER_00 10:36

When you got married, were you working at that point? Did you have a career? And how were you able to balance that with having children? I don't know if you had children fairly quickly after you got married.

SPEAKER_02 10:50

Uh we didn't. We had we were married for five years before we had our first one, and then I had two right in a row. Um, at that time, I was not working. I was a full-time stay-at-home mom. Throughout my marriage, um, I had always been told that I was not smart, I was not capable, I uh would not be able to be independent on my own. And I just knew that that was not my truth. I knew inside of me that was not true. And so when I decided to go back to school, which was my children were in first grade and third grade, I knew it was going to be a long journey to become a teacher. That's what I decided I wanted to do because I felt that aligned with my beliefs of being able to be there for my family. So I decided to go back to get my degree as a teacher. And I can remember sitting with my children, uh studying and us being at the table together and balancing motherhood and taking care of the house. And I remember at that time we were spending a lot of time with my ex-husband's uh clients, and they most of the women that we spent time with had degrees, had higher education, and I always felt intimidated by that. And I remember this so clearly because this is what flipped a switch in me. We were riding in a car with one of the executives, and the two men were up front, and the two women were in the back seat. And my husband asked the man, What does your wife do? And he said, you know, she's the CEO of some other company or blah, blah, blah. And then he asked my husband, What does your wife do? And I remember him, it was quiet in the car, and I remember him saying, My wife doesn't work, she's dead weight. And I remember when he said that, something in me slipped. And that was when I decided I need to go back to school and I need to get my degrees, and I want to become something. When he said that word in front of those people, it really did cut me to the core.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

So, what was it like to build something that was yours after years of putting others first?

SPEAKER_02 13:21

No, it's funny because when I look back about building my career and and my education, at first I felt very selfish, you know, because for so long I had been told that, you know, I was not capable and I was not worthy of really having any money spent on me. You know, education, paying for college, you know, that's a lot of money. We can't afford it. I heard it all. But I think that dead weight comment really slipped the switch where I just put it out of my mind and decided I'm going to build something for myself that's going to sustain me throughout all of this.

SPEAKER_00 14:02

How has your faith or your understanding of faith evolved from the rigid endurance, being dutiful, obedience, to something that's far more expansive and compassionate?

SPEAKER_02 14:17

Yeah, I think my faith is still evolving. And I I've always been someone that's been very uh, it's always been a focus in my life, my faith. I may not talk about it in front of people, but it's always what guides me and it's always what brings me back to center. And I believe as my faith grew throughout all of this, which is amazing because when, you know, growing up, divorce was taboo. You wouldn't, you wouldn't want to go through a divorce because it's against your religion. It's so funny because going through this divorce, it has actually increased my faith and has actually increased my relationship with God. Um, I know he wants the best for me. And through this divorce and through meeting my current husband, I realized that that was not what was a healthy marriage. And I realized there was so much more that he, so many more gifts that he was going to give me. And so that has really helped with my faith to evolve it into something that's much more compassionate. I was never judged from him, which was so key in my growth.

SPEAKER_00 15:34

One of the things I thought about when deciding to embark on this journey of creating this podcast was I didn't want to give the false impression of being, oh, a man hater, that this is women empowering each other at the expense of, you know, being against men or hating men. So, as you know very well about me, even though my first marriage didn't work out, I never lost faith in love. I never lost faith in the institution of marriage. And I never gave up on myself and the idea of sharing my life with someone. And I am currently um married to my second husband. It is one of the biggest blessings of my life. Um, there's something wonderful for me, at least, about having a partner and as cliche as it sounds, a best friend that um he's my person. And I know I don't need him, but I want him. Love making decisions together, and I love that this life that we're building together. So I never want to give the impression that this is about bashing men or hating men in any way. Exactly. I know that you're remarried and you're deeply fulfilled in your marriage to Mario. I am how does this version of love, this second phase, differ from the one the young, innocent Kate once knew?

SPEAKER_02 17:10

You know, it's so funny because when I got divorced, uh everyone that knew me knew I walked around and said, I'm never getting remarried again. I'm never going to be remarried again. I just never thought I could find a partner who would allow me to have my voice, who would support me. And so I've I was like you. I always believed in marriage. I have a deep belief in the marriage institution. And I I can just imagine God sitting up there laughing at me, going, Yeah, you're never going to get married again. Okay, we'll see. We'll see. And in comes my current husband who has broken the mold and just has provided me with such support and a voice and true communication. And it's it makes you stronger. It really has empowered me. And I know, you know, empowerment's a big word for women. And I think we we are sometimes pushed to thinking that we have to have empowerment by ourselves. But I tell you, two are stronger than one, truly are stronger than one. And I feel like everything now is in balance in my life, and my core beliefs are being supported and honored through my partner. And it's amazing. It really is just never thought I would be remarried again. First of all, I never thought I would be divorced, and now I never thought I'd be remarried. So never say never. Somebody said that to me.

SPEAKER_00 18:55

To me, it sounds like uh as I'm listening to you, uh, the juxtaposition, the irony here is it sounds like your commitment to marriage to Mario has liberated you.

SPEAKER_01 19:10

It has. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 19:12

And it has put me back in balance with everything that I know is true and right, and has given me that innate ability that I know we all have inside of us to know what is right and true. I believe we all have that inside of us. And when I was living in something that living in a marriage that was not in balance with that, it was very difficult. It was it was offsetting. I was out of balance a lot.

SPEAKER_00 19:40

So for someone who's listening, who feels stuck between devotion and self-betrayal, someone stuck between doing the right thing by the people that they love while still finding their way to alignment and authenticity you want them to know.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

Yeah, that's that's that's really important.

SPEAKER_02 20:12

I believe you have to take you have to choose yourself. And I know that's for some people that's going to sound so selfish. You have to choose yourself, but God gave you this innate ability to know right from wrong, to have that sense of what is real and what is good and true. And you have to s you have to dig out from where you're at to find that again, because I think you lose it sometimes when you're in such uh disequilibrium. And I think once you find that you're able to choose yourself again and make those good decisions for yourself. Trust yourself. I had to trust myself. I often wonder what my mom would think. She was gone by the time I got divorced, but I often wonder what my mom would have thought of my divorce because I don't know how happy she was in her marriage. And I would have loved to been able to have that conversation um with her about who her true self was, and would she have made different choices? I don't know. I can't answer that for her. I can only answer it for myself.

SPEAKER_00 21:28

So just out of curiosity, what did your dad think about you getting divorced, this traditional Italian man?

SPEAKER_02 21:36

Yeah, I think it was very difficult for him, although he never he never judged me and he never said, never questioned why I was doing that, um, which was a blessing in disguise, really, because I was I was the only girl. Imagine five boys and the only girl, and the one person that gets divorced in your family is the girl, the youngest. And he never did questions. Question me, which I believe was his way of giving me support and saying that I trust you, you're going to make a good decision for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 22:10

Right. I feel like that's such an expression of love. It is just your child doing something that's not necessarily in alignment with your set of values, but respecting them and trusting them enough to just take a step back and let them be and let them figure it out. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:30

That's hard to do. You know, now that you have older children and they're making bigger decisions that's affecting their lives. It's hard to take that step back. But you have you have to remember that you planted a foundation. You planted that seed and you you watered that foundation. And that foundation will always be there. And when they're growing up and life gets unstable, they'll find their footing on that foundation. They'll go back to it. They will. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 22:59

Looking back, what do you feel most proud of, the woman you were becoming, even before you realized it?

SPEAKER_02 23:10

Yeah, I think I'm most proud of the fact that I survived a very difficult situation. And I know the word survive may sound very dramatic for some people, but it was a very difficult situation to decide you're going to walk away from 26 years of marriage, you know, having a lot of nice things and and being able to go wherever I wanted uh in terms of travel. I had a lot of nice things, but to be able to walk away from that and realize that that's not serving me was really important. And I'm really proud of myself for being able to find my center and survive the storm of divorce, which is so difficult. And I believe my faith has grown stronger from this situation, being able to survive that. And I feel more fulfilled more than I've ever been in my entire life. And I look at my kids and they have a wonderful relationship with their stepdad now. And they're okay. They made it through. And I'm proud of that. I'm proud that that they were strong enough to make it through. I wouldn't, I wouldn't wish this on anyone. It is difficult when you walk through a divorce. But there is a reason why it's not serving you. And I you have to listen to your voice. You have to understand that there are better things out there, that there are there is a better way.

SPEAKER_00 24:48

Kay, I'm truly happy for your happiness. You're so very deserving of it. Your story is a beautiful reminder that perseverance doesn't always mean staying the same. It can also mean growing, evolving, and trusting that becoming yourself is not a betrayal of faith, but just the opposite. It's an expression of it. Show us that strength can be quiet, that courage can take years, and that authenticity doesn't always arrive loudly. But when it does, it brings with it much peace. Thank you for your honesty, for your vulnerability, and for sharing a story that will resonate with so many women who are learning that it's never too late to come home to themselves. So thank you for your time and for your story. Thank you for spending time with me today. If you enjoyed this content, please make sure you subscribe to this podcast and leave a quick review to help us share the message.