The Courage To Be a Single Mother: Becoming Whole Again After Divorce

269 Pages·2001·0.67 MB·English

by  Sheila Ellison

The Courage
to Be a
Single Mother
Becoming Whole Again
After Divorce
SHEILA ELLISON
To my children,
Wesley, Brooke, Rhett, and Troy,
for bringing light into the darkness
Contents
Introduction v
1 • Knowing It’s Over 1
2 • Stripping Away the Old 16
3 • Telling the World 39
4 • Too Many Decisions 55
5 • Finding Support 70
6 • The Divorce Process 86
7 • What Is Best for the Children? 106
8 • Grieving the End 130
9 • Who Am I Now? 145
10 • On Your Own 161
11 • Feeling Good 176
12 • New Romance 192
13 • From Survival to Living Again 211
14 • Time to Dream 226
15 • Passion Discovered 236
Epilogue 247
Acknowledgments 251
About the Author
Praise
Other Books by Sheila Ellison
Cover
Copyright
About the Publisher
Introduction
I’m picking up the towel from the floor in the boys’ bathroom, put-
ting it over the shower door and holding on to the edges of the
towel as tears run down my face. Harvey, our black lab, rubs my
legs. He hears all my cries. Nobody is here, the kids have all left for
school, but all the lights are on, stereos are still playing, breakfast
dishes line the sink, and a huge pile of laundry sits on the couch and
reminds me of all the things that need to be done. I’m sick. I should
probably be in bed resting, trying to get well, but there is no one but
me to make the lunches, to give a hug and say, “Have a great day!”
and I have a writing assignment due today that isn’t finished. I’m
still holding on to that towel, wondering how many more mornings
like this I will have, how much longer I can carry the weight of it
all. I make myself let go of the towel, tell myself in my most author-
itative voice, “Pull yourself together. It isn’t so bad.”
I remember just a few days ago when I was in a different space.
Why is it that I can fall apart in a single instant for what seems like
no reason? I somehow make it out to my office with a thermos of
tea in hand, and here I sit writing. I don’t feel well, I don’t feel in-
spired, I’m still crying, but I’m sitting here and willing my fingers
v
vi / The Courage to Be a Single Mother
to type. I know I have to. My kids don’t have anyone else they can
count on.
There are many reasons marriages don’t work. I can’t begin to
define or even understand all the reasons mine didn’t. I got divorced
because I could no longer survive without love. It was the hardest
decision I’ve ever made. Ron* and I had grown up together; we
married in 1982, a year before I graduated from college. I had just
turned twenty-two. Two years later we had our first child. By the
time I was thirty I had four children under the age of six. My hus-
band Ron worked for ten years as a professional athlete, and I wrote
part-time and took care of the kids. When his career was over, we
decided to take a year off to have some time together as a family.
The marriage wasn’t going so well, and we both agreed that our re-
lationship needed attention. In September 1993 we decided to rent
out our house in California and take the kids to New Zealand, where
we rented a house for one year. Ron was born in New Zealand, so
it was a natural choice.
The marriage was falling apart. It wasn’t helped when Ron’s agent
fraudulently signed our names on a bad business deal, losing most
of our savings, so in June 1994 we were forced to sell our house in
California. Ron hadn’t decided what his next career move would
be, and I still was trying to make the marriage work, so in July 1994
we bought a house in Christchurch, New Zealand, with the hope
that we could start over with a new and simpler lifestyle.
Six months later, in December 1994, my youngest son, Troy, who
had just turned four, was diagnosed with autism. After months of
researching treatment facilities in New Zealand, I discovered that
our only option was to go back to California. Ron and I had grown
further and further apart. When I told him I had to take the kids
back to the United States so Troy could get help, he told me that he
would only allow me to take Troy. But I wasn’t about to leave three
children behind with a man who rarely attended to their needs. In
April 1995, when Ron was in the United States on business, I packed
up our house in New Zealand and took my children home. It wasn’t
as sudden as it
*
For privacy reasons, all the names in this book have been changed.
Introduction / vii
sounds—we’d been talking about divorce and I’d been living in the
guest room for six months.
Ron was furious and in June 1995 charged me with abducting the
kids. That suit stopped me from being able to get divorced, have
child support, or provide for the family. (The suit was eventually
dropped. Even Ron knew it wasn’t true.)
When the California courts decided not to take our case, Ron was
free to take all of our money and move it to New Zealand, which
meant that I had no access to our joint assets for the next two years.
I ran out of money in June 1996, so the children and I moved into a
rented studio apartment. Desperate for guidance and companionship,
I joined a single mother support group. For fifteen months we lived
in that studio while I waited for a trial date in New Zealand. Finally,
in June 1997 I appeared in a New Zealand court and was awarded
half of our assets. I immediately sold the house in Christchurch and
in November 1997 bought a one-bedroom cottage down the street
from the studio we had been living in. Since then we have added
an addition to the cottage and begun to rebuild our lives.
If someone had outlined for me what I would have to face over
that two-year period, I would have thought myself incapable of
surviving it. I didn’t mean to be courageous. I had to make some
hard decisions because my marriage didn’t work. Over the last years
of my marriage I wrestled with my obligation as a wife, my respons-
ibility as a mother, my own feelings as a woman—what did each
mean? Was I selfish, or was I saving my life and in doing so being
a better mother for my children? Now I stand in the middle of a life
that will never be black and white, with four kids whose homework
won’t get done, a house that refuses to stay clean, and mornings
spent crying into a towel.
I’ve learned that it takes courage to make a decision to do the best
you can in both worlds, as a woman and as a mother. I want to tell
you that if you are a single mother picking up this book, you have
courage. This is what I’ve learned about courage—you have to move
forward, do the difficult things, and make those difficult decisions.
Part of courage is experiencing your fears, facing something even
when you are afraid. Courage is taking reasonable risks for a good
cause, standing up for what you believe,
viii / The Courage to Be a Single Mother
standing up for the rights of others, and being who you are regard-
less of others’ opinions. Courage does not have to be a grand or
heroic feat. It can be as simple as saying no. Taking on the process
of divorce, getting up each day and living life in whatever state of
mind you find yourself, takes courage. Life can become a scary place
very fast when all that you’ve hoped for has changed. Every woman
reading this book got out of bed this morning and has chosen to live
her life today—that is courage.
The set designer on a kids’ show I was filming recently compli-
mented me on the ring I was wearing as she lined up the paint,
markers, and posterboard on the table in front of me. I told her it
was my wedding ring melted down and redesigned—just like my
life. She laughed as the cameramen looked on, wondering if I was
serious. Later she confided in me that the only time she felt lonely
was when her husband of ten years was sharing an evening at home
with her and their son. She said she’d been thinking about getting
a divorce for a year. I wanted to scream, “Don’t do it! Raising chil-
dren as a single mother is the toughest thing in the world, and not
just because of conflicting soccer games, financial instability, and
late-night trips to the emergency room alone. The problem is that
you can’t raise your kids if you aren’t whole yourself. There is no
time to focus on becoming whole, so there you are stuck on a daily
treadmill of survival. It’s like fixing the car when it’s not just running
but moving!”
The goal of this book is to teach you how to fix the car while it is
moving. You see, there is a timeline to all of this. Remember when
you had your first baby and you wondered how a mother could
pick up her three-year-old when you were having problems carrying
an infant? You probably swore that you’d never be able to lift a
heavy child every day. You will grow the muscles to manage your
new role as a single mother just as you grew muscles to lift your
child. You can learn to create a new life full of passion and dreams
of a new future. When I joined a single mothers group, I remember
someone telling me that it would be two years before I felt a shift
toward wholeness. That woman was right, and now I tell every-
one—hold on for the first two years.
Psychologists call divorce a “process.” We start by grieving the
relationship, we work our way toward a different life—changing,
Introduction / ix
growing, and stretching along the way—and then we arrive some-
place. “Arriving” for me has been a place where I stopped feeling
like I was surviving each day and started feeling a little bit like I was
living each moment secure in myself, my direction, my worth, my
purpose, and my abilities. I’ve realized many things through this
process, the most important of which was that it wasn’t just the
mental and physical aspects of myself that needed to grow. I needed
faith to live in a world that wasn’t black and white. When I didn’t
know what the next day would bring, I hoped that there was
something out there bigger than I was. I now have a job and am
earning money, and the future doesn’t scare me so much anymore.
I put time into creating a support system and have close friends and
a growing love relationship. All of this took time. The goal is not to
look backward pointing fingers but instead to point our hands and
hearts forward to new possibilities.
There are some stories in here that my kids aren’t crazy about,
and some stories that they feel make them look too good. But I felt
that, to be of any help, I had to be honest, so I’m going to tell you
the way it is, not the way the psychologists and psychiatrists tell
you it should be. This is what happens in the life of single mothers,
mess and all. I will tell you my stories and other women’s stories.
You’ll find that running through all of them is the idea that a sense
of balance happens as a result of having courage.
This book won’t give you instructions on how to get credit in your
own name, how to get a job after years at home, or how to get the
child support you need. It will, however, let you feel—laugh, cry,
rejoice, and doubt—with the voices of many single mothers around
the country who were willing to share how they grieved the loss of
their marriage, how they struggled to survive, and how they made
the changes necessary to courageously create new lives. Society has
given us beliefs about ourselves as women, our mothers have given
us their views—now it’s time to tell the truth and to teach each other.
One promise—you will not feel alone after reading these pages.