Posted to House Bloggers
by Debbie Nigro on Thu, 12/10/2009 - 8:19pm
Now that we all know what we shouldn't — that there's been a Tiger in just about every tankini — Elin Woods and her kids are off to Sweden. So what now?
Lots of anger and depression and humiliation all around… enough to make a mother-in-law collapse. She did.
Though you wouldn't know it by his golf acumen, Tiger Woods is huMAN. So let me comment on the huMAN angle.
Ask any man who has lost his family to a fling and he'll probably tell you he deeply regrets it. He had few regrets at the time it was happening — when he thought he had figured out the best of both worlds.
For all the negative commentary on marriage being an “institution” that's been likened to prison, most men don't like going life alone.
Women are much better at it.
Married men like having their families to return home to after being MEN all day. They love their children and home cooked meals and their couches and their cozy wives. They need it. It's just that some of these men can't eliminate the excitement of sex with strange women.
So some don't. Others wouldn't dare risk it.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 02/20/2012 - 8:36am
You’ve seen the signs. Probably while trying to exit a parking garage in a newly rented car. You’ve been driving around in circles, become confused and can’t find your way out. And while trying to backtrack you realize you are going the wrong way when, despite your best intentions, you come face-to-face with a huge sign flexing its muscles atop a big-ass row of nasty-looking spikes which reads: DO NOT ENTER. SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 02/13/2012 - 8:43am
It’s February 14 and the first Valentine’s Day since my husband moved out. I have repeated the mantra, “I don’t care about this stupid holiday, I don’t care about this stupid holiday, I don’t care about this stupid holiday…” for several weeks, ever since the advertising blitz began in earnest, and I really believed what I was chanting. So why do I feel like crap today?
I have done my best to ignore the whole thing, but still, this holiday has seeped into my conscious brain and made me feel like a total loser. And in my mind’s eye, every Valentine’s I have spent alone parades in front of me, marching to the tune of “One is the Loneliest Number” and kicking up their heels as if to say, “You’ll always be alone like this…”
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 02/06/2012 - 8:11am
I watch way too many romantic comedies. But I love them. The boy always gets the girl, the dialogue is deeply heartfelt and letter perfect, and everyone lives in great apartments they obviously can’t afford.
I wish I could stop watching them but I can’t. I think I might have a problem. There is no 12 step program for this, I’ve checked. But if there were, I’d qualify by saying “Hi. My name is Rachel and I’m a romantic comedy addict. I am powerless over the belief that Prince Charming is on his way and probably just got held up in traffic”.
Predictably, I cry at the end of every one of these movies because love has won the day like it’s friggin’ supposed to and that really chokes me up. But as happy and gratified as I am for the fictional characters I have grown to understand and love, in under two hours, the tears I shed are more a product of self pity than altruistic joy. Why, oh why, I ask the universe, isn’t that me falling in love with an irascible yet genuinely adorable man with perpetual five-o’clock shadow and a strong-yet-tender heart? When oh when will my prince come to call?
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Posted to House Bloggers
by First Wives World on Mon, 01/30/2012 - 11:04am
Week 1 - Crying. A lot of crying.
Week 2 - More crying and some anger.
Week 3 - Crying intermixed with a lot of anger.
Week 4 - A little crying. A lot of anger. Onset of loneliness.
Rinse. Repeat. That's pretty how much it went down for me. It wasn't fun at all. And it lasted for 6 months.
Part of surviving the loneliness associated with divorce is plain old endurance — realizing that this is a stage which will help. Even in the midst of it all, you need to remember that there will come a day when this overwhelming grief, anger, loneliness, and all the rest will go away.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 01/30/2012 - 7:58am
I’m lonely tonight and I miss him. Well, not him exactly. It’s more like I miss the thought of him. The good him, the man I married with my heart a-flutter. The man who always made me feel safe, until he didn’t and it all went south with us. But still… I am lonely. And tired.
There is so much to do around this 100 year-old house we bought together. We both thought that restoring it would save our floundering marriage, kind of the same impulse people have when they think that having a baby will bring them back to the loving place, but without the diapers and midnight feedings.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Julie Savard on Wed, 01/25/2012 - 8:06am
I've been reading the articles lately that say the beginning of the year is the most common time to file for divorce. That means that more than a few couples are sitting their kids down right about now, telling them that by next year, Mommy and Daddy won't be in the same house for Christmas.
I've had to break the news to my kids that my partner and I are splitting up more than once — it's not an easy conversation, but it's a conversation that not only needs to be had, but one that needs to be handled delicately and with a ton of TLC. So, here are a few things I've learned for all the Mother's out there:
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 01/23/2012 - 8:25am
If you are getting divorced, you may want to plan a party to celebrate. After all, your girlfriends absolutely deserve to have some fun after the enormous amount of time and advice they’ve no doubt invested on your behalf. And besides, you too deserve to have a little fun, when all is said and done. The details of your party — such as whom to invite, where and when to have it, and what to serve — will largely depend on the type of divorce you’re planning.
For instance, if yours is going to be a quickie divorce, taking place in a sunny, foreign locale, there will be logistics to consider i.e.: travel, hotel and ground transportation, and of course knowing the proper legal protocol to follow and the location of a courthouse. If you’re going to stay a few days and work on your tan, you’ll need to pack a bag, making sure to remember the sunscreen, a trashy romance novel and the necessary paperwork.
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by Rachel Gladstone on Thu, 01/12/2012 - 8:03am
One of the most poignant songs ever written about divorcees Jimmy Webb’s “Didn’t We”. The plaintive refrain, “Didn’t we almost make it? Didn’t we almost make it, baby? Didn’t we almost make it, this time?” is a pageant of hopes dashed and an anthem to regret. The lyrics indicate that the heave-ho they finally gave their marriage was the last in a long succession of let’s-try-it-one-more-times. That they were right on the verge of staying together and failed despite their best intentions is the saddest thing I can imagine. But imagining it is as far as I can go.
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Posted to House Bloggers
by Rachel Gladstone on Mon, 01/09/2012 - 8:13am
It takes balls to finally make the decision to file for divorce. Big ones. Balls of steel. And it’s an especially brave thing to do when you were born with lady parts that don’t include the aforementioned equipment because, believe me, at a time like this, you could really use them. If you are a people pleaser, like me, ending your marriage will probably go against the grain of everything you were raised to believe in, like pleasing others, and the entire process is bound to give you indigestion on a grand scale so my advice, as simple as it may seem, is to keep a lot of Alka Seltzer on hand and maybe a large bottle or two of vodka in the freezer.
Stick with it, people will tell you. Go the distance. Mavbe it will get better, they will encourage. Sure! That’s easy for them to say but if they were in your shoes, even if they only slipped them on for a minute or two, they wouldn’t be handing you platitudes on a silver platter; they would be truckin’ on out of there faster than you can say “I am so out of here and boy do my feet hurt!”
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