How to deal with changes that come with divorce

"I didn't just lose my wife; I feel like I lost all my friends, too."

It's not an uncommon feeling. Most of us who have gone through the trauma of divorce have seen the rest of our relationships affected as a result. We struggle to understand and renegotiate parent/child, in-law, and friendship involvements. We find ourselves wondering just how important we are to these people, and are often confused by their sometimes strained response to our attempts to maintain our relationships.

The reality is that the people who have been part of our lives in the past may or may not want to be part of our new single lives. Most of us must go through a reassessment of our significant relationships and their importance to us as part of the divorce process; our friends and relatives go through a similar reassessment. And there are a number of possible outcome as they do so.

For instance, some of the significant people in our life may realize that they just don't care all that much about us. Their past involvement with us has been more out of habit, or out of their caring for our spouse. They just didn't have the investment in us to do the work to continue a relationship.

Others may say they care because they feel they should, but inside are struggling with the reality that we really aren't all that important to them. It is hard to admit to ourselves that we no longer care for people who once were a part of our lives. It is harder still to say that to them. Yet, over the course of a lifetime there will constantly be adjustments in our significant relationships - growing more distant from some people, closer to others.

There are other times when people care deeply about us, but simply don't know how to say it. Often, these people will do a variety of things to demonstrate their caring - a phone call, an invitation to dinner, a pat on the back, etc. - if we are sensitive enough to notice them.

Sometimes, though, people are not even able to do that. Their caring is real, but unknown to us because they lack the skill or the courage to show it. It does take a certain bit of relational skill to know how to say "I care." And we have to have the courage to share the emotions in our caring, and also accept the emotions expressed by the person we care about.

There are those people, however, who not only care, but who know how to, and are willing to, say it and act on it. Such people are often our lifelines as we struggle with how to relate to others in the midst of divorce.

We need to find a way to walk that fine line between talking about nothing but our divorce and not talking about it at all. It is important that we maintain as much normalcy in our significant relationships as we can and talk about all the things we would normally talk about.

Yet it is also important that we do talk about our divorce with people who care about us. We need to talk to help our own healing, and they need to hear so that they know how to care.

It is often a shock to those of us who have divorced just how many other changes result. Ending our marriage is, in fact, just the beginning. Expecting, and accepting, that many of our relationships will be affected (even though it is a time when we may need them most) can help us to get through this very difficult period.

• Dr. Ken Potts is on the staff of Samaritan Counseling Center in Naperville and Downers Grove. He is the author of "Mix Don't Blend, A Guide to Dating, Engagement and Remarriage With Children."