Speaker 1:
Welcome to How to Split a Toaster, a divorce podcast about saving your relationships from TruStory FM. Today on the show, the sneaky, dark emotional damage of divorce.
Seth Nelson:
Welcome to this show everybody, I'm Seth Nelson and I'm here with my good friend, Pete Wright. Divorce by definition is damaging. Taking apart a relationship impacts us far beyond the law. Today on the show, clinical psychologist, Dr. Margaret Rutherford, joins us to talk about how the stresses of divorce can sneak up on us in ways we might not expect. In addition to her practice, she's the author of Perfectly Hidden Depression, How to Break Free from the Perfectionism That Masks Your Depression and the host of SelfWork podcast. Margaret, welcome to the Toaster.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, thank you. Margaret is just fine. I've worked really hard for that doctor part, but I don't particularly like being called that. Margaret is just dandy.
Seth Nelson:
Okay. Well, I mean, I tell people do not replace my law degree 20 years of practice, federal clerkship with your Google search. You're the boss though, if you want us to call you Margaret, we've got it.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, sometimes I thought if somebody calls me Dr. Rutherford, I look over my shoulder like, "Who are you talking to?" We're pretty cashed down here in Arkansas.
Pete Wright:
Well, I love it. I'm very excited to have this conversation because, I mean, we're a legal podcast, right? So, it's a show about the legal process of divorce and where humanity runs headlong into the law. But there's obviously this other side that we don't touch during legal separation and frankly, I think, both of you can catch me when I start lying, frankly might get in the way of the legal process of divorce.
Seth Nelson:
And by the way, on your lying part Pete, you got a lawyer and a doctor here, so.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Watch it.
Pete Wright:
I think that this is a hell of a safety net, is what I've got. I'm really excited about that. What we don't talk about is, I read in a recent post that you wrote, Margaret, about emotional divorce. What does it mean to get emotionally divorced?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, it's a heck of a lot harder than getting legally divorced, as hard as getting legally divorced can be. I'm sure everyone else who uses the term emotional divorce as well, but to me, you can be divorced for years. And in fact, you probably had the experience of talking with someone, just meeting them and they say they're divorced. And they launch into this diatribe about their ex, and you think, "Oh, they must have gotten divorced maybe a few months ago." and you find out it was like six years ago and they still got this incredible intensity about the divorce, or they are suffering because their kids are suffering and it can take so many forms, but I really do think that it's a separate concept. I've been divorced, I've put up with a lot of people who are getting divorced, and I know attorneys do try to keep the emotion out of it. If you're handling a divorce with integrity, that means you're facing the fact that you've made some mistakes and that it's a failure of a kind.
Now, if you've been abused and that thing, then obviously there's really good reason to leave. But so many of us either chose poorly or we ourselves did damage to the relationship. So there are a lot of things to work through. And then of course you add children to the mix and I've often said divorce with kids is not the same as divorce without kids. So don't see your good friend's divorce and they don't have any children. "Oh, well that won't be too hard." Because it's very difficult, complex.
Seth Nelson:
In all of our conversations with all of our guests, divorce is hard. It's just a matter of degree of how difficult your divorce is going to be, and what I mean by that is I think exactly what your point is, is sometimes I can get them through the legal process very quickly, no children, they agree on the division of assets. They'd agree on whether or not there'll be any support paid afterwards and they're done. But emotionally, that's the case that I'll never think of again, it came in, it came out. I help someone go through the legal process and they're like, "Oh yeah, I'm good. We've been separated for three years, for many years, and we just need to finalize the paperwork." But there's something about that paperwork being finalized.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Oh, seeing it in black and white is just often very shocking for people. And they'll say to me, it's as if all of this, whether it's two years, five years, 17 years of trying to make this relationship work or putting in my own effort toward making it work, you're not just grieving the other person not being in your life anymore. You're grieving all the things you did, said, promised, fouled, tried hard, whatever, to create and you're grieving all of that energy. Actually that has to be reinterpreted. Let's say you go every day and put a dollar in a savings account in a bank, do they still exist? Savings accounts? I'm not sure. Anyway, so you spend a dollar, so you spend 15 years putting a dollar every day and then that accrues 1% or something, whatever savings accounts do.
Seth Nelson:
Well that's good in this market.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yeah, exactly. But anyway, you're counting on there being a big wad of money there, and that's what people who try really hard in relationships, they are giving every day, well, the ones with integrity are, they're trying to make this relationship work. They're doing stuff they don't want to do. They're going to see their in-laws and they're not wild about them. Your partner is doing the same. And so, you get to the end of that time and you see in black and white, "This is over." And then you go to the bank, you say, "Well, at least I have all that, that I committed, all that energy I gave." And it's gone, it's gone.
And so you have to reinterpret. And that's what part of the emotional working through is all about. Re-interpreting your own commitment, your own energy, the meaning of what you did and who you were and who you became in that relationship. And it can take a while. As far as transparency is concerned, I've actually been divorced twice. I've now been married and happily married as my husband has saved about half that time, the 31 years. So I finally did something right and picked better, but I remember my first husband saying to me, because he'd been divorced before. And he said, "You're not going to understand how this affects you". And I brushed him off like, "Whatever." And he was right. He was absolutely right. I had no idea how it was going to affect my life.
Seth Nelson:
And by going through that process of divorce and going through the emotional divorce.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
By going through the process, I don't regret that I got divorced, but I didn't realize, personally, I was a jingle singer back then. I was a professional vocalist back then, it was way before I was a psychologist. So I had a lot to learn. But yeah, I thought I could just get divorced and leave that behind, and that's not the way it worked out.
Seth Nelson:
That's an interesting point you make about that, about getting divorced and leaving that behind, because if you're out in the dating world, the question will come up. "Have you ever been married or divorced?" No one ever asked, "Have you been in a long-term relationship that you're no longer in?" Right? It just sounds funny, right? Talking about taking the vows, getting a marriage certificate and then going through the legal process of divorce. That question is very common to all of us.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Exactly. It's one of the facts that you recite for someone. I grew up in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, blah, blah, blah. I've been divorced, that kind of thing. And in fact I will tell you all that when I was in graduate school, after my second divorce, this guy asked me out, he was a PhD and had already gotten his degree and he was asking me about my life. And I said, "Well, I've got my second divorce about six months ago." And he literally looked at me and said, "If I'd known that I wouldn't have asked you out."
Seth Nelson:
Wow. What kind of stuff is he throwing at you there? Like, what's going on internally there?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, I'll tell you what I did. I ordered the most expensive thing on the menu and I did not go home with him. He wouldn't ask me out again, but he did want to have another relationship with me that was brief. We didn't do that either.
Pete Wright:
That is fascinating to me, it's a weird sort of a Scarlet D that you carry around. And I think it's so fascinating what you're talking about here, because well, I guess on two fronts, one, that you're both talking about the legal process and I think the vows maybe mean more, even if you don't carry around a specific spiritual backing that would say, "I want to have a particular religious ceremony." But the fact that you've taken the vows and you've signed your name on the line which is dotted, that means something different than just another long-term relationship and the process of becoming legally unmarried and emotionally unmarried requires you to have resilience between those two experiences, to be able to balance between those experiences.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
I think that's exactly-
Pete Wright:
Is that a common thing that you find with people you're working with and they come into you and they say, "Okay, I'm starting this process, where do I start?"
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yes. Generally I ask about, "Tell me why you got married, what you were looking for, what you thought you were getting." There's a great book called Coming Apart. It's an old book, but it's been revised a whole lot by Daphne Kingma, and she talks about how when you really look back at failed relationships, be they marriages or just those long-term relationships that didn't... that you will find the one thing that you ignored, that your gut told you to pay attention to, but you did not. And we all have that thing that we thought, "Oh, well, this will not be a part of our relationship that my love for him will fix this." And then that doesn't happen.
Seth Nelson:
I find that interesting about the first question you asked, basically at the beginning of your relationship, or why did you get married or what were you... It all sounded to me about what were your expectations. All those questions are about expectations and I try to really focus on my own life, about being clear about expectations, because I think if a lot of people get upset when their expectations aren't met, even if those expectations should not be the expectation. So for example, clients will be very upset about what their former spouse is doing. And I'll ask you, that's been the behavior for how long?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Exactly.
Pete Wright:
It's why you got divorced.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Some people seem to think that everybody's going to rise and be their best self during a divorce. And I have rarely, if ever, seen that. Maybe in a very amicable divorce where there are kids and there's just been a lot of love and it's just, "Oh, we were best friends and we should never have gotten married." Something like that. And they are both parting ways, even though that can be hard, but it is at least amicable and I have seen those people be their best selves.
Seth Nelson:
I'm going to ask you a leading question that is going to tell you what my answer is. And hopefully you'll agree with me, but if not, that's fine.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
I'll allow it.
Pete Wright:
But watch yourself counselor.
Seth Nelson:
Thank you. I appreciate that.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
I am a doctor you know?
Seth Nelson:
Yes, that's what I've heard, I'm a little nervous about this conversation looking into my soul. I feel that whatever your personality traits are, the overwhelming ones are heightened in a divorce. If you're anxious, you're super anxious. If you watch every dime, you watch every penny or every nickel or nickel than the penny, right? Do you find that to be the case as well?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
I say to everyone, when they're trying to make the decision whether to divorce or not, "Look me straight in the eyes and let me say divorce mimics the marriage it comes from." So if there's greed, if there's jealousy, if there's deceit, if there's control issues, if family is intrusive, all of that's going to be, as you said, heightened.
Seth Nelson:
That is powerful. I've never heard it said that way. That really struck a chord with me.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yeah. And people have this fairy land idea of what it's going to be like and like you say, Seth, they'll come to me and say, "I just don't understand why she, or I don't understand why he's doing it." And I said, "Because that's exactly what you chose." So, you have to figure out when you're doing this emotional healing, what was important in you choosing this person? What were you trying to learn? What did you learn? I'll also tell you that number one piece of advice that I give people, that they never follow or rarely follow, and that is wait. Get your divorce and then wait a good year before you start another relationship.
Seth Nelson:
You know what? I've heard that where it's a year from the actual final judgment from the divorce they did, right? Before you get into another serious relationship.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Because you haven't changed. You are going to choose for... You could think, "Oh, he's taller or she's a lawyer, or she's got her own career like my first wife."
Seth Nelson:
Don't do it.
Pete Wright:
Don't do it.
Seth Nelson:
Mine is a counsel, don't marry a lawyer.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
No, in fact I don't particularly like lawyers as patients because they argue with me all the time. But anyway, that's a little good arguing. My brother's is a lawyer and we argue, so that's good. But, we get lonely. I mean loneliness, it's hard. And then if you're a single parent, that's hard or if you're trying to get used to having the kids for a week and then not having the kids for a week, that is just tough. And especially if you don't trust the other person very much, if you're wondering what's going on, or if they brought a girlfriend or a boyfriend in, way before you thought they would. I mean, there's so many complexities here. So what I try to do when someone is saying, "Well, I'm thinking about getting divorced." I run through, this is likely to happen. Have you thought about this? What's it going to be like when you put your couple of kids in the car and wave and say goodbye for two weeks in the summer. I mean-
Seth Nelson:
What's the goal of that? It doesn't sound to me like you're trying to persuade them to stay married.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
No, I'm not. I want them to know, to look ahead and say, "What skills do I have or what skills do I need to learn in order to handle that?" I would never tell somebody unless they're literally getting the, you know what, beat out of them every day. And even then it would have to be careful, this relationship needs to end. That's not my role, my role is to help someone look at everything they need to look at, that they can think of and that I can think of with my experience, and then we'll mell those experiences so that they can think of, "What are the blessings going to be? What am I going to enjoy? And how's my life going to be?"
Seth Nelson:
I call that the silver lining of the voice of children, is you get every other weekend off.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
That's right. That's right
Seth Nelson:
Now, people, when I first told them that are like, "You're going to cry your eyes out the first weekend you don't have your kids, if you're very involved and you're used to having them." And then there will be a time when you're like, "Alright, you're going to the other parents. Let's go, come on, get your stuff ready, got to go." Because you're going to recharge your batteries in whatever way you do that on that weekend. And I believe that being a single mom is the hardest job in the world because of all the societal pressures, harder than being a single dad. When I was first divorced, I would say I was a single dad in people would say, "Oh my God, did your wife pass away?" No one thinks about that for a single mom, right? Because it's not the term people typically use. And I think language is really important and I'd be like, "No, my son's mom is my former spouse, she's amazing. Every other weekend I have them. And I have them a couple of days during the week, depending on the week." It just would hit people's ear much differently.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
That's very interesting.
Seth Nelson:
But then, I mean, I miss my son greatly on the weekends, I didn't have them and then I started thinking, "Hey, this is okay." But he's having fun at mom's. And we went down that path, and he was two and a half when we decided no longer to be married. And he's 16 now. And we have a great relationship. I have one with him, I have a great relationship with my former spouse. Her and her husband came over for super bowl. I have to give a little shout out to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers who won the super bowl and their home stadium, but, shake your head Pete, all you want.
Pete Wright:
The truth is the truth.
Seth Nelson:
All right, all right. These type of conversations about figuring out who you are and looking yourself in the mirror and say, "Have I done everything I can to just stay in this relationship and on this path in life with this person?" Or do I want to take a different path, or if they're taking a different path and I don't want to, I have to wrestle with that because now my past changed, because it might not be your choice.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Part of that emotional work is also, obviously, whatever conflicts there were in the marriage. There may be some resolution to those with the ending of the marriage, but a lot of marriages don't have that kind of emotional closure. I mean, if you were able to get that, you might not be getting divorced in the first place as I think Pete said that a few minutes ago. And so, you have to live with this sense of there's this raw wound that you're walking around with and I know I did, I had this longing to sit down with both these men that I had hurt and had hurt me and to say, "Hey, listen, this is what I did and I take responsibility for it. It was not wise on my part. I know it was hurtful to you and I'm very sorry." And then they have their part, and we have this wonderful, again, closure and then we could all walk away, but you know what? That didn't happen.
Pete Wright:
I was just going to ask, wait, are you telling me you did that because that's amazing. That's like a unicorn just happened on the show right now.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
No, I wish I could sit here and tell you that I had but unfortunately, I wanted to, but it was not reciprocated. And maybe I never even got it across that I wanted to, who knows?
Seth Nelson:
We had a guest on the show who actually did that with her husband over a period of time because they're raising a child together. They would go on trips or the child's sporting events, and they had some really Frank conversations in the car after they were divorced.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
I think that can happen.
Seth Nelson:
Which can help them co-parent.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). It depends on really, so much about, do the two of you go on and you create more chaos? I mean, do you bring the new girlfriend in or the new boyfriend or do you... let's say you married someone with children and then you don't see those kids after you leave, I mean, you're creating chaos, and both people can. If you're married to someone who can be really narcissistic or dramatic or whatever, then you've often got kids listening to that diatribe about how you're such a terrible person. And so one thing that parents often forget is that kids will want to please you, they'll want to please both of you. And so if they're in the middle of somehow another, then that's creating more chaos. So you working on your own sense of peace about what has happened and trying to disempower your partner from triggering you, then will help your kids as well as you. It's tough. I'm not saying it's easy.
Pete Wright:
One of our favorite pop culture tropes is that of the rebound relationship, right. Stella has to get her groove back, there's always that trope of, "Oh my gosh, you got a divorce, now you got to go do something frivolous." Is there any rational support for the emotional health that comes from the rebound relationship? Post divorce?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
That's a big fat no, Pete.
Pete Wright:
That's a big fat no, with Dr. Rutherford, is the title of our show right now.
Seth Nelson:
That's right. If that answer would have been yes, Pete might have been like, "I'm getting a divorce. I want to see what this rebound relationship is about."
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Now I will say to you that obviously, if you been told you're ugly or you're not worthy or that I can't believe I ever married you and then someone gets interested in you that can certainly be healing. But if you haven't done that all important thing about waiting or you sleep with somebody and then you decide they're the love of your life and boom create chaos. I'm not saying that there can't be healing and some positivity coming your way, of course there can be. But again, you have to do the inner healing. My second husband used to say to me, "You better stay with me, because nobody would stay with you if they knew the kind of person you were." And there was a part of me that absorbed that and believed it. So when I, well, not the guy who took me out, then told me he wouldn't have taken me out. That guy was not helpful in my healing.
Pete Wright:
No, he wasn't the right guy.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
No, he wasn't the right guy, the lobster was good. But anyway, I had to do that inner healing, I had to figure it out again, why I have been attracted to someone who could be verbally abusive like that and controlling, and what was that about for me so that I would choose differently. And if I chose to be in a relationship again, which there was a year or so I didn't think I would be but... The other thing, let's talk a little bit about second divorces, because there are a lot of people who've been divorced at least twice. And what I have found is that what surprises people is that they think a second divorce will actually be easier because they've been through a divorce. I find that it's harder because you have less faith in-
Seth Nelson:
I've got a question on that before you go for it. When you're saying harder, are you saying emotionally?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yes.
Seth Nelson:
Because in the legal sense, it depends on the case. Some people are like, "I've been through this before. I know what it's like."
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yeah, yeah. I know the rig and roll you have to go through. I know that the interrogatories are meant to incite violence.
Seth Nelson:
Pete, that is not the definition of [inaudible 00:24:52].
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, they do, I had to-
Seth Nelson:
Questions asked by a lawyer to incite violence, is not... I've got to defend my profession a little bit here.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, they're pretty rough, I know that. Maybe not violence, but at least some bad behavior on the other person's part. I'm saying what's just common sense, when you get divorced a second time, you are the common thread. There's no way you can say, "Oh, I picked the wrong person or, Oh... " I mean, I guess, when I say no way, if you have absolutely no integrity, yes, you could still be in denial and just think that all women are terrible or all men are terrible.
Pete Wright:
But there is this notion, I think again, we're talking about busting pop culture bubbles, that once you've been divorced that second time, you've broken the seal and now you're a person who divorces. Many of my friends who have been divorced, that is a fear they still talk about now, 10, 15 years into their second marriage. When they have trouble, when they're facing conflict with their spouse that they have demonstrated over the years they can resolve and have great healthy marriages, they still carry that fear in their back pocket that they don't want to be the person who divorces, that, that's really resonant to them.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, when I moved, I got my training in Dallas at UT Southwestern Medical School and my husband got an offer of a job here in Northwest Arkansas. And I had grown up in Southern Arkansas and I was bound and determined that no one in Fayetteville, Arkansas would know that I've been divorced twice. I was just going to pretend that my husband was my only husband. If asked I would just change the subject because of that very sense of stigma and labeling and fear of being judged, overly harshly.
Seth Nelson:
What I find interesting about that is, we're then caring what other people think.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, yes, but it's also your own shame. I mean, your shame makes it where you would absorb. I mean there are people who go to certain conservative churches and that kind of thing that would judge someone who'd been divorced twice, so, that is a reality.
Seth Nelson:
But you have to absorb it is my point, right? Like I appreciate that, and my son actually just did this in school. They were doing a thing on how people treat each other based on their rank in life, their station in life. And the way they did that is they all held up cards to their foreheads, but they couldn't see their own card. An ace was the lowest and king was the highest, and you had to treat the person based on their rank. Very powerful thing about just by this social rank that we've all given each other. And he said, "Oh yeah, I knew I was two or three. I watched what the other behaviors were and there was some people being treated worse than me, that's why I thought it was an acer two, for them. And then other people, people dropping on their knees and bowing." But that was people were absorbing what they thought of them, by how they were being treated. But we don't necessarily have to do that. There's that feeling you do in that year after divorce, that you can't just say, "Hey, Margaret said wait one year, it's been a year. I'm going to go get a serious relationship."
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
It's a little more work than that. I had a supervisor when I was in graduate school in Texas and I didn't like him very much. He was a big, tall, lanky Texan and he swaggered and that kind of thing, and I thought he had drunk his own Kool-Aid too much. But he said something to me and to a group of us that were in training with him, that I've never forgotten. I didn't agree with it at the time but now I know he was right and this is what he said. "Shame is helpful for 10 seconds. It's a helpful emotion if it lasts for 10 seconds and it leads to a change of behavior." I'll say that again, shame is a helpful emotion if it lasts for 10 seconds and it leads to a change of behavior. That's what you have to do with whatever shame you have about divorce. Whatever you feel shame about, having an affair, whatever it was that might've been a part of the divorce rubric.
And so, so many people think shame is the same thing as a good conscience. It's not, it's not. It's very different. It is something you carry around on your shoulders and you can feel its weight every day. And what it makes you do is absorb all that negativity that's coming at you. And if you have worked through the shame, and as Bren� Brown so prolifically writes about, that you realize, "Yes, one of my vulnerabilities is I've been divorced twice. One of my vulnerabilities is X, Y, or Z." Then that's a position of strength because I have admitted to myself and worked through some of my own vulnerabilities. And that actually is empowering.
Seth Nelson:
That's so fascinating to me and I talked to people about this a lot. When you're vulnerable emotionally, that is a sign of strength. When you can say, "Hey, here are my weaknesses." Instead of hiding them and being defensive. Or whatever other emotions are going on. We'll have meetings at the office, and before we start the meeting, we'll just say, "Where is everyone on this meeting?" And sometimes, I don't think I'm leading the meeting and I'll be like, "I'm like a caution yellow." Like my head's somewhere else right now, I'm going to do my best, I'm just not fully here. And people will go around and other people are like, "I've been waiting, I'm ready for this. I've reviewed all the cases I'm really ready to get going. Or maybe it's a procedure we're trying to change. I've worked hard on changing a procedure to be more efficient, to help our clients better."
Then I'll be like, "okay, look, I'm going to let you run this meeting, you're really focused, ready? Go, in." So we'll do that before we start a meeting and that is so powerful because then when someone's like lackadaisical in it or not really focused, it's not the idea. They told you that's where they're showing up today. And we don't believe, "Hey, whatever happens outside of the office stays out of the office." Because that's just not the way life works. It affects you in some way. So, that being vulnerable just really makes sense to me.
Pete Wright:
There's really powerful implication to all of that, which is if you are not aware, if you're not doing at least some of the work, the internal emotional work during your divorce, you're going to be taking on the identity of potentially these negative stereotypes that we've been talking about, of the tropes. And when you are a vulnerable, it's one of the things that I love so much about Bren� Brown's work, is that when you are vulnerable, you're taking on a much more powerful identity, a powerful persona of ownership of the reality of your life and not the stories that we tell ourselves in our heads when we're at our most fragile.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
So true. I will tell you that I did keep that a secret for a couple of years and I can remember the young woman, she was getting her second divorce and she was crying and she was across the table from me. And she looked up at me and she said, "Well, I know you would not know what this feels like, getting a second divorce." And I took a breath and I looked at her and said, "You're about to join a club that I've been a member of for several years, and I know how hard it is." And she looked at me like, "Really?" And it was this powerful moment between her and me. And at that point I just said, "Boom, so what. Let the whatever fall where they may." Whatever that phrase is.
Seth Nelson:
Chips fall where they may.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
There you go, chips. But anyway, Seth, I'm impressed that your law firm does that and good for them.
Seth Nelson:
Well, thank you.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yeah. Yeah. Do you all know people that are divorced and really have not let go of it or are still, you don't have to name their names, but what would you say-
Seth Nelson:
That they're divorced but still married?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm (affirmative). Is it about money? Is it about kids? What is it normally about?
Seth Nelson:
The cases that I see is, they'll be back to my office because it's not like you're now divorced. There's an agreement or there's a final judgment, you went to trial, whatever it is, there's some set of rules of behavior that we're supposed to follow. You're supposed to do X, I'm supposed to do Y. And sometimes even though they're legally divorced, one party might not have wanted it, and the way you stay connected is through conflict.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Exactly.
Seth Nelson:
They know if they do X, Y, and Z, the other side is going to call their lawyer and then we're going to get involved. And now we're going to be back in court and I'm connected. So the clients that have moved on when that happens, they might call and say, "I'm just giving you a heads up that this might be coming down the road, but you know what? I'm not going to make an issue of this because they're just trying to draw me back in and it's not worth it. Even though this isn't right, there's a bigger picture here. Not about the specific behavior or the specific thing that is, or is not happening. It's just not worth my emotional bite in my head. And to take up space when I just want to go sit on the sidelines and watch my kid play a sport, or read a book to them at night and not be distracted." And I'm like, "Okay, legally you would be incited to do X, Y and Z. Nowhere in the law do you get compensated for the amount of emotional time that it takes you to deal with it."
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
That's a great point. It could be almost an addiction to that emotional back and forth that's played out in the courtroom. So yeah, I would agree
Pete Wright:
That leads to, and maybe this is a good opportunity to just... as we lead toward wrapping up, I think there is a hole in the conversation that I think we can fill. And that is around this process of doing the work for the emotional divorce. What are the things you can do, the tools you can employ, that can help you day-to-day, to create more of that healthy space between you and the separation of your marriage? And if it doesn't involve some guidance on social media, we're not doing our jobs.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yes, you're exactly right, in fact I wrote something quite a while ago about how social media makes this kind of emotional divorce so much more difficult because it's so easy to spy on somebody and to get information about their whereabouts and their goings on and all that kind of thing. So you're exactly right. Just like anything or mental problem, emotional problem, you have to see it as a problem first. And there are a lot of people who justify, I'll never get over what he said to me. I'll never get over her having an affair. And so they use this language that sets the stage for them being okay to stay in this hateful, blaming, resentful place. And they don't see it as a problem until they come to someone like me.
I remember this guy that came in and he literally said to me he'd been divorced and his ex wife had had an affair and it had hurt him a lot. It was interesting he came to a female therapist because he said, "I don't think I can trust any women." So I started asking him, what was going on? And that's the way he was living his life. And he was having bad relationship after bad relationship because he was picking women that actually were a self-fulfilling prophecy to that. They really didn't know how to-
Seth Nelson:
Right, that are not trustworthy but it doesn't mean all of them are not trustworthy.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Exactly. And so I finally said, "Don't you realize you haven't let go of your grief or your anger about, 'Oh, I'm over her. I'm over that." I said, "Well, I don't think you are." And so we began going through that grief that he had and he also had terrible road rage, which by the way, also got better. So, you have to understand what's buried underneath some of those old issues that you run into. I had a woman, a couple of years ago for example, who just refused to believe she was divorced and she was very blatantly divorced a year or two. And she kept acting like, "Well, he shouldn't do that. We're married." I said, "No," and this woman was not psychotic, she knew exactly to wrap around the idea, she had not wanted the divorce. So you have to understand what is the emotional problem that you are weighed down by.
Seth Nelson:
One way to say that Margaret, I'm just trying to... so Pete's question is how do you start this healing process? And I'm not trying to turn your degree into a bumper sticker, but accept where you are. You have to get to acceptance like, "I'm divorced. Or my former spouse had a longterm affair or short term affair and it crushed me." Now that I've said those words out loud, how can I start dealing with it? And then go seek some professional help to start this emotional healing.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
I do think that divorce groups can be very helpful because you see people needing to do the same thing you're doing. I think journaling can be extremely helpful. I think obviously going into therapy can be also something that's eyeopening because a good therapist is not only going to... they're not going to vilify your ex. They may say things like, "Well, it sounds like he or she had this problem or that problem." but they're also going to lead you to look at what your part was in whatever the dysfunction was.
Seth Nelson:
I know we're closing up, but now that you've talked about going to see a therapist, is there just one or two things you can give our listeners to look for in finding a good therapist? Because there's good therapists and bad therapists, good lawyers, bad lawyers. And in therapy is great, but just one or two quick things that you can say, this is what the therapist should be doing. If they're not doing it, or if they're doing something bad, like yellow flag, red flag, be aware.
Pete Wright:
And when to look for one, right? Like when's a good time to engage a-
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Sooner rather than later, would be my response to that. And people will go, "I can't afford it or whatever" But there are all kinds of options out there, even better help and talk therapy and some of these online therapies are doing some really good, and they're much less expensive than. I think to answer your question, Seth, that people don't realize the importance, in fact, all the mega analysis of the research about therapy shows that the relationship with the therapist itself is vital. That you feel understood. That you feel heard. That you feel respected. That you don't walk in the second or third session and hear he can't remember the name of your ex. I mean, they've got those things down about you. They remember that your mother died. They remember whatever this thing is.
So you really want to feel attuned and you want to feel that whatever style of therapy they do, be it cognitive behavioral, be it emotionally focused therapy, be it a family systems therapy. And you can ask them, "What is your technique that you use?" That they do that well and they do it consistently. And you might not know what that means, but you can say, "Well, tell me something about cognitive behavioral therapy. What are we going to be doing?" And you set goals. Therapy is no longer for many, many, many people. It's not psychoanalytic anymore where you lie down on the couch and you free associate and the therapist says nothing. I mean, that's just very unusual these days. It happens with psychoanalytic therapy but there's so many other schools of thought. And so you've got this guide, you've got someone who's talked to hundreds of people getting a divorce. I often say to people, I'm a consultant. I'm just like your plumber, you don't know how to fix your plumbing problem, but I've looked at a bunch of sinks that are messed up just like yours are. Yes, I've been divorced, but-
Seth Nelson:
That's such a great point.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yeah. It's because you're consulting.
Pete Wright:
I'll talk to opposing counsel and we'll both know how the case ends.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Right. Oh yeah, oh yeah.
Seth Nelson:
You got it, we can't make it end tomorrow. The clients have to get there and if you're settling a case, cases settle when they're ready to settle, because you lead the client through the process and finally they get to acceptance, like, "Okay, I need to do this to move on." And if they don't, with trial, the judge, basically it's going to be in these parameters. So I think that's a really good point that you've just seen it before.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
Dr. Margaret Rutherford. You're a treasure. Thank you so, so much for your time today. This is terrific. Now, we've talked for a long time, but now it's been a long time since we even mentioned all of the good news about you. Where would you like to send people to learn more about your work?
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Oh gosh. Thanks so much Pete. Well, I'm very proud that I published a book in late 2019 called Perfectly Hidden Depression. I never wanted to write a book. I never had it in mind and this topic really found me, the depression that often mental health professionals are missing and we all are missing in our friends and colleagues. We all know someone who died by suicide, who didn't look depressed. Right? In fact, they looked like they had a great life. Those are the people I'm trying to reach. It's called Perfectly Hidden Depression, it's everywhere. My podcast is called the SelfWork podcast with Dr. Margaret Rutherford obviously. And that's also everywhere. Spotify, iHeart, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Podbean, wherever. And then my website is drmargaretrutherford.com and I'd love to have people come by and see what's there. I do a weekly blog post and a podcast, I still see patients every week. So anyway, it's been a delight to be here. I really, really appreciate it.
Pete Wright:
Well, it really has been terrific. Thank you so much for your time and I feel like you have planted the seed for Seth's new book on emotional health and the law, Check Your Emotional Jurisdiction with Seth Nelson. You see what I did there?
Seth Nelson:
I've been waiting for it Pete, I felt it coming.
Pete Wright:
Seth, it's been boiling up in me. It's 40 minutes. It's been boiling up that jaw.
Seth Nelson:
Margaret, doctor, thank you so much for coming on the Toaster. We really appreciate having you. Great insight and I'm sure most of us are going to be better off for it. Thank you.
Dr. Margaret Rutherford:
Well, I certainly hope so. You all take care.
Seth Nelson:
Thank you all for downloading and listening to the show. We appreciate your time and attention everybody. On behalf of Dr. Margaret Rutherford and Seth Nelson Esquire, I'm Pete Wright Nathan. And we'll catch you next week right here on How to Split a Toaster, a divorce podcast about saving your relationships.
Speaker 5:
Seth Nelson is an attorney with Nelson Koster family law and mediation, with offices in Tampa, Florida. While we may be discussing family law topics, How to Split a Toaster is not intended to, nor is it providing legal advice. Every situation is different. If you have specific questions regarding your situation, please seek your own legal counsel with an attorney licensed to practice law in your jurisdiction. Pete Wright is not an attorney or employee of Nelson Koster. Seth Nelson is licensed to practice law in Florida.
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