How I went from hating my ex to getting along better than ever

Six years ago I was in one of the worst places in my life. Not only was my best friend terminally ill with cancer but my marriage was becoming increasingly impossible for me to keep living in.

I kept trying to make it work with my husband, but it was not getting better. I was angry and depressed. I remember a lot of crying and complaining to friends and frequently flipping him off behind his back. I retained an attorney to force a separation if he wouldn't move out on his own.

This is the man that I had waited to marry until I was 38 years old. And we were separated by our fifth anniversary in 2017.

It was BAD.

I was in a dark, dark place.

But the dark place is not what this message is about.

This message is about what happened between our separation in 2017 and our taking a NINE DAY family vacation together this summer.

Whhhhhaaaaat?!?!

(And a family vacation for us means him, me, our son, and my daughter who I conceived via IVF with a sperm donor - i.e. not his daughter).

***
I remember when I was separated and dating a little bit I was telling one of the guys about my soon-to-be ex. I was describing what he was like, what our marriage was like, and then about why I was divorcing him.

His response: "It sounds like you're divorcing the guy that you married."

Mind blown.

What he meant was, Matt (my ex) hadn't changed at all. He was exactly the same guy I had said yes to a few years earlier.

What changed?

Me.

Or me in relation to him.

Or me in relation to him and his two daughters (I became a step-mom by marriage).

What changed was I was no longer willing to accept the way he treated me within our family dynamic. I was different and what I was willing to accept in the container of our relationship was different.

He was the same.

***
Fast forward to this summer. I hadn't taken a real vacation in five or six years due to the loss of my friend, my divorce, the pandemic, my fertility journey, etc.

I decided I was going to take the kids to Colorado for a week.

And I asked Matt to join us.

What changed in the last five years?

A lot.

We stopped fighting about the pick-ups and drop offs. We started having dinner together with our son and occasionally having a family board game night (I think social distancing during the pandemic helped create the space for this). We sent each other updates and pictures of our son instead of inflammatory texts and emails about the divorce.

And I changed in relation to him.

I started dealing with the Matt that was in front of me rather than the Matt I wish he was.

I knew all of the ways he showed up in the world, so I accepted the ones that I liked and let go of judgment (mostly) of the ones I didn't. I didn't make it mean anything about me when he was acting like him. And being divorced, I let go of expectation of how he should show up in our relationship.

And guess what?

We get along better than ever now. Our coparenting is so much easier and he loves my little baby girl.

If you want to have better relationships with the people you find it challenging to get along with sign up for a call with me now. I will show you how to have peace in your own life without even needing the other person to participate. You are worth it!