Puppy...it is only because I have seen so much divorce in my own life, plus now seen so many divorces at my work...that I know that it will be much harder than you think it will. It always is. Your emotions will run deeper than you think they will. Yes, even worse (or on par with) the emotions during her affair and afterwards. I know it doesn't make sense intellectually, which is why so many people ignore this advice and try to go through it with no counseling or support group. Because intellectually, it seems like "well this is just the end of the process, we've already gone through the hard parts". But that just isn't true. The hardest parts are yet to come, and no it has nothing to do with your particular sitch.
The attorney I work for has been doing this for over 20 years, and she actually specializes in mediation and collaboraton, she will not do litigation because of the painful situations involved. And she also specializes in uncontested, amicable divorces. And yet STILL, she tells every client who comes in her office door to get a divorce coach or an IC who specializes in divorce. Even if two people are just happy to be done with each other, there are emotions that come into play which they never expected.
When I got divorced, I thought he and I would both be happy to have the details figured out and done so we could both move on. I couldn't have been farther from the truth. It hurt worse than I could have imagined ... for reasons which can't really be described until you are in the middle of the process.
So no Puppy....its not you and your sitch....its EVERYONE and EVERYONE'S sitch.
For clients who refuse to get outside counseling, they end up with literally about twice the size of the bill from my boss as those who get counseling.
Please believe me.
Some people who do get the counseling do so well that they think "oh maybe that was a waste of time and money, I could have gotten through without it"....but they can only say this because they DID get the counseling.
At a minimum, get your kids lined up for their own specialized counseling to help them through the transition.
Divorce is no less painful than death, and people understand that death requires grieving and counseling of some kind to get through.
