Divorce Wreaks Havoc in Everyone's Life

Whether it’s one’s own divorce or a friend’s or a parent’s or a child’s, divorce creates psychological trauma that may take years to get over.

Dr. Paul Wagner has written two books on divorce which describe in detail a way out of the psychological trauma that it brings. Love Trauma details the emotions and difficulties of divorce and his recommendations for overcoming the furies of that dreadful state. Beyond Love Trauma examines the ways in which divorcees can prepare for either a new single life or the prospect of remarriage.

Both books use over 1000 interviews with individuals to guide the new divorcee through the harsh single life that usually follows even the most amicable divorce. As well as these real-life experiences, Dr. Wagner explains psychological concepts that will help divorcees through the dangers of the newly single life.

Love Trauma focuses on the immediate and long-term effects of divorce

In chapters devoted to who to blame, how to escape the havoc of the Furies, to ways in which to care for one’s self, he looks at the propensity of divorcees to destroy either self or the other and how to overcome these urges. He uses the Greek concept of the Furies to examine the ways in which guilt, fear, anger, hate, and jealousy tear at the psyche of the divorcee.

Wagner also details the way in which divorcees hurt themselves through drug or alcohol addiction, workaholism, and promiscuity. Better than simply explaining and examining, though, Dr. Wagner shows the way beyond these debilitating states.

He suggests physically caring for the self with diet and exercise as well as mentally/emotionally caring for the self by reaching out to others. These are not easy actions to take after divorce, but Wagner details ways to go about them that even the most cynical of divorcees will find reasonable.

In Beyond Love Trauma, Wagner insists on the maxim “Know Thyself”

You can’t become the ultimate “catch” if you don’t know yourself. Wagner has suggestions and questions to ask yourself before you move on to a new relationship.

From a long discussion on places to meet others to attacking the “ideal” that divorcees set up for themselves, the second volume takes a hard look at the ways in which men and women sabotage their efforts to “get back into the game.”

What is the Ideal for men and women?

For example, men and women have been conditioned to think of the opposite sex as needing far different things from love, but his reasoning is that the sexes are still people. And people need trust, respect, and commitment. He asks men and women what they want from new relationships. Even though the popular press has designed an “Ideal Man” and “Ideal Woman,” he suggests these are condensations of what people really want when pushed to examine their own lives. Though men might say they want a young, beautiful twenty-five year old woman to date, they are actually happier and more comfortable with a confident woman closer to their own age.

When women are asked to describe their ideal man, they tend to answer with a list no man could fulfill. But when pushed, many had more nuanced descriptions of the man they wanted in their lives. And most of the time, the individual’s ideal had more to do with respect and trust than money or Armani suits.

Discover the three intimacies and how they work together

Perhaps the most useful part of Beyond Love Trauma is Wagner’s description of the three intimacies: sexual, intellectual, and emotional. As Wagner argues, all three are necessary for a romance to achieve, finally, what he describes as the ultimate relationship, one of “erotic love.”

These three intimacies do not come about in a month or even a year. They take constant commitment, trust, and respect over the years. He sees couples who have experienced erotic love but they tend to be people who have been together for years and years.

Sexual intimacy cannot be achieved in a “two ships passing in the night” relationship. It requires people to be open to rejection and to trust the other with their hopes and desires. Emotional intimacy, you guessed it, requires trust and commitment to not just share one another’s lives but to truly live them, to “walk in another’s shoes.” Intellectual intimacy doesn’t mean you agree with one another on everything, but that people respect one another’s viewpoint and can find ways to talk about and, in fact, rehash topics until the people see themselves as a committed couple.

Learn to take your time

None of this can be achieved quickly. Those who want to marry again after a divorce should take their time easing into another relationship. To be afraid to be alone is not a good reason to marry. And marriage—or any romantic relationship—is not a place to figure “What’s in it for me?” A committed marriage requires an attitude of “How can we pursue a long-term goal?” what Wagner calls a “life commitment.”

And Wagner notes that dating exclusively and living together, are not, in fact, good prerequisites to marriage. These are situations in which people are “trying out” the relationship and may not feel the commitment necessary to experience the commitment necessary for marriage. He urges divorcees to take their time, establish trust and respect, before leaping into marriage.

Two volumes = Divorce Recovery

The two volumes are extremely important to divorce recovery programs of all sorts. As Dr. Wagner notes, “Divorce recovery is important in Alcoholics Anonymous, Al-Anon, Celebrate Recovery, dating sights, running clubs, [and] gyms because when people get divorced, the first thing they do is to try and improve their attractiveness. Churches all have Divorce Recovery groups.”

Wagner, himself, is a victim of Love Trauma but the books are never about him. They take into account a wide group of people and their experiences to demonstrate the need for time, trust, and respect to get to the point of a new relationship.

As Wagner notes, “This book is a way out from most harsh and cruel psychological traumas. The reader has only two choices. One, continue to be tossed hither and thither in the turbulence of past memories. Two, take that first step to walk away from the disaster you cannot assign to an alternative universe. You have only one universe and this is it. Take that step forward with me and before you know it you will have a plan to live well. When you have a plan to re-build and live well, you will live well.”