Episode 28: Transcript

"When we get married, we often don't have an agreement on what love is." - with Kate Anthony

Doug French: So what's the latest?

Magda Pecsenye Zarin: The latest is I'm still sick. I saw my doctor yesterday and I am now on Augmentin and prednisone. I think today I'm at the point at which I feel better enough that I realize how horrible I feel and have been feeling. Like, I've just been sort of in a daze for the last two weeks and not really able to think clearly but just like doing all my regular stuff anyway.

Doug: So, all right, well, we have Kate Anthony for our year-ending episode. We're going to finish off 2023 with a stirring tribute to Divorce Month.

Magda: Well, I mean, I kind of feel like maybe we should have posted this back in November when it was the 15th anniversary of our divorce being final! That was exciting.

Doug: Was it though? I mean, it was two lifetimes ago, but yeah, I think the timing, that's one of the main revelations from this discussion is her new book comes out the day after Christmas, because that's when people start thinking about getting through the holidays and then dropping the bomb.

Magda: Yeah, well, I've been doing Flash Consulting for many years. And for people who don't know, Flash Consulting is my weird little project that I came up with in which I will solve any problem you have for $500. In August, I get a lot of career questions. And then in December and January, I get a lot of people asking me, “Am I allowed to get a divorce or how do I get a divorce or should I get a divorce?”

Doug: “Am I allowed”?

Magda: Yes, the number of people who do not think they're allowed to get a divorce is great. And we talked about this with Kate when we were talking about how her book's coming out on December 26th about how December is a really horrible time if you're in a bad marriage, a bad relationship. Because it's all just everything culturally is about like, you know, “happy family, blah, blah. So in love, in love with you on Christmas Eve,” all this kind of stuff. 

Doug: It's Cuffing Season. And then Uncuffing Season is in January. Got it.

Magda: And it, well, yeah, I mean, cuffing season starts in September. And I think people who are like, yeah, exactly. Well, and the thing is you gotta act fast, right? If you don't make some decisions now, then things kind of drag on and then you're in Valentine's Day territory and all this kind of stuff. But I mean, I think the point is, people feel lonely and unfulfilled if they're in a bad marriage and it only gets worse at Christmas time. And then at the new year, it's like, “wow, I'm going into a new year in this relationship that I really don't want to be in.” “I feel like the small version of myself,” that kind of thing. So yeah, I think this is like a big time for people trying to figure out, Am I allowed to get divorced? Can I logistically get divorced? How do I get divorced? Like, what does it say about me if I'm divorced? Do you remember? I probably didn't tell you this because I was divorcing you. But there was this one point in the middle of our divorce when I just had this crisis and I was like,” I don't want to be a statistic.”

Doug: No, you never told me that.

Magda: Like the point is, you're always a statistic. I was always a statistic, right? Because the number of people who get divorced versus the number of people who don't get divorced, either way I was gonna be a statistic.

Doug: Yeah, and bottom line, it's, you know, it's, it's your life and it's my life and it's our life and we got to do what we got to do, irrespective of how it's calculated. So whatever.

Magda: So anyway, I thought the discussion with Kate was very interesting because a lot of it was about the logistics, things that people worry about. She has been a divorce coach for I don't know how many years. She's been divorced for about as long as we have been. She has a great relationship with her ex-husband also, but she has been coaching women through the process of getting a divorce, giving them permission to get divorced. And some of them just need help navigating the logistics. And some of it is helping them navigate, you know, their emotions. Like, she's not a therapist, but she helps people recognize patterns and just pull things apart and figure things out about the process. And I think there's not a ton of cultural support for what she does. You know, like I think it's very necessary, but I also think there's still this myth that divorce is the worst thing. And I think a lot of times divorce is the best thing.

Doug: Well, it can be. I mean, I'm actually interacting with a bunch of people online right now who are in that place we were in, because it is Divorce Month, and people are thinking that way or the procedures have already started and it's getting ugly. You know, the lawyers are bleeding their clients dry because there's an incentive there. The more anguish you sow, the richer it is for you. One of the things I've always been grateful to June Jacobson for was that she didn't let our cauldron overflow. She had an incentive to make us as angry at each other as possible, and she didn't do that.

Magda: I think that's one of the things that is interesting about Kate's work. You know, like there's the emotional side of divorce and what people did to each other in the marriage and that kind of stuff. But then there's the logistics of the actual divorce and the settlement that you're having and how you deal with money and property and schedules and kids and all that kind of stuff. And we sort of want to think that they're related, but they're really not. Like, people aren't making decisions about money and custody based on emotions and the emotional patterns you had in your marriage. And I think a lot of times people come into it thinking that they're gonna get satisfaction about that emotional process or abuse or however they felt by creating this settlement and this agreement and having it be legally codified, right? Like I think sometimes people go into mediation, we did mediation, or they go into litigation and think that they're going to get some sort of satisfaction for whatever they feel like they were owed emotionally. And that's not how it works. And I think Kate is a place for people to go to sort through that emotional stuff and be able to separate out like, “this is how it felt emotionally,” and then also say, “this is what is happening logistically with the settlement,” and those two things aren't related.

Doug: Editing this thing has been an interesting revisitation of our divorce for me, just because, I mean, she made it clear she works with women and, you know, you know me, you know the work I've been doing for 15 years and the whole idea of how you want benefit of the doubt where it's deserved.

Magda: Mm-hmm.

Doug: I'm not saying it always is, but it sometimes is. And whenever you have a dispute, it's really important to have as much of an idea of both sides of an issue at once. And that's another thing too. I think June was really even-handed with the both of us in a way that, you know, there's a reason why a lot of couples, um, steer away from couples counseling because one of them feels like the therapist is on the other one side or whatever, you know, it can be.

If you feel ganged up on in a situation, you're going to react. You're going to get defensive and you're going to dig in where you might not necessarily have to. I really think the important thing to try and figure out throughout all of this is to find that equilibrium. And I think that's the responsibility of anyone who calls themself a coach, needs to recognize that first and foremost, act as dispassionately as possible so that you can be the fire extinguisher when you need to be.

Magda: There's this idea that you don't want the emotions to have anything to do with your agreement. But it's more than that. It's that a lot of times they literally don't have anything to do with the agreement, even if you think they should. Right? An example of that is: I have heard many, many people say, and this wasn't part of our divorce, there was no infidelity in our marriage or divorce, but I've heard a lot of people say, “the other person cheated on me, therefore they shouldn't get as much of the property or they shouldn't get as much time with the kids or anything like that.” And in states in which you have to have a reason for divorce, right? Because no fault divorce is not the law everywhere. No fault divorce just means that you can say “we want to get divorced.” You don't have to come up with a reason. And when the two of us had divorced in New York State, there wasn't no-fault divorce.

Doug: We had to establish grounds, yeah.

Magda: One of those reasons is always infidelity. Or adultery as they call it.

Doug: That's a dumb name. Why are they...adultery is...come on. Adultery should have adulthood, it should be combined somehow. Just like sleeping together is a misnomer too, because there's not a lot of sleeping going on.

Magda: But at any rate, like adultery/infidelity might be a precipitating factor of the divorce. Although I would argue that it's a symptom of the bad relationship and the relationship is going to end anyway.

Doug: And then Harry Burns says, “Yep, and that symptom is fucking my wife.”

Magda: Exactly. “Mr. Zero knew you were getting a divorce before you did?” “Mr. Zero knew.”

Doug: “Mr. Zero knew.”

Magda: Yes. Anyway, so infidelity might be a cause of the divorce, but infidelity is not taken into account at all in terms of child support or visitation. It is not taken into account at all in terms of division of property either. And so, like, that's kind of what I mean about like, getting the emotional aspects straight in a different way than the actual physical or logistical part of the agreement, the settlement, that kind of thing. Because a lot of times it just doesn't cross even if you want it to.

Doug: Well, at least now, I guess the bottom line is we should recognize that you have permission to ask for a divorce. I would hope that the first thing you do would to ask permission to talk about it, or at least to broach the issue in a way that makes the marriage salvageable if it's not too toxic, if it's not too beyond repair. And that's how discussions work. That's how marriages stay together. I know several marriages that have survived infidelity. You know, there's just, you acknowledge a symptom, you acknowledge a mistake, and you work on forgiveness that works for some people and not for others. But, um, you know, if you are out there thinking about getting divorced, I mean, I can say, you know, it's, it's a situation that no one wants, but it can be better than the alternative to staying together.

Magda: Well, I mean, nobody gets a divorce who's in a good marriage, right?

Doug: Right, but I hope you've talked through everything else before it's time to pull the plug.

Magda: Well, okay, sometimes you can't talk to the other person or you've been trying to talk to the other person and they don't understand what you're saying, they can't connect, that kind of thing, right? So.

Doug: Well, yeah, you've exhausted that. And that's what was a frustrating thing for me, too, because, you know, Kate said most of the time it's the guys who don't want to do the work. Uh, and that's what makes them in the more, um, not predatory or, but puts them in the, in the more antagonistic position, because they're not socialized to process what they're going through.

Magda: Yeah: I would like to point out that I have never charged anyone $500 to say to them, “yes, you have permission to get divorced.” I give that away as a freebie and I give that away to everyone. Also, if you are tempted to pay a stranger $500 to find out if you can get a divorce, the answer is yes, you can get a divorce. Also, I can't tell anybody if they should get a divorce. What I end up doing for some people who want it is help them make a decision tree because it's just not as easy for a lot of people to say, hey, I'm miserable, let me get a divorce. Like that's not, a lot of people feel like they need, need to feel like they've exhausted all avenues. And so I can help people make decision trees, but I've never charged anyone any money to say, yes, you can get a divorce. If anyone is listening to this and you're like, “wow, I've been thinking about it,” this is your sign. You are allowed to get a divorce.

Doug: And if you have a male client and you, then that man signs up for Flash Consulting, you should make it clear. It does not involve a trench coat.

Magda: No, it does not involve a trenchcoat.

[music]

Kate Anthony: I was literally just putting the pieces of our lives together. Realizing that Magda, you're the one that Randi just introduced us to. Okay, I'm sorry. I literally was like, yeah, I just saw someone just posted about that. I was like, Oh my god, it was you. Yeah, the pieces are together. My brain is back online. And I'm so happy to be here.

Doug: Well, frankly, I am really eager to learn more about your origin story. Clearly, no one grows up and says, “one day I'll be a divorce expert.” You know, circumstances in your own life probably guided you in the direction, but you reach a point where you either get divorced and then move on with your life. And there's another path whereby you say, I learned a lot and I can help a lot of other people out of this. And you took that path. So what was that like? And what motivated you to be this, to be who you are now?

Kate: I really started this journey because when I got divorced, I had been in a very, very, very volatile–to put it sort of kindly–marriage. And then when we got divorced, we got divorced really well. Like my ex-husband was very emotionally abusive during our marriage, but he was not the kind of person that was going to translate that into post separation abuse. Right? Like once we called it, once I called it, he was then like, okay, let's do the best thing, best we can possibly do for our son. And frankly, I feel like that's luck of the draw, right? Because you're either going to divorce someone who's going to be a really great co-parent and ex-spouse, or you're going to divorce someone who's going to make your life a living hell. And I don't think you can predict that. I have a very good friend right now, who is divorcing someone that I would have said would have been a great person to divorce. And he's making her life a living hell. So I'm, “What? How did that happen?” And then I had been an actor for 30 years and I was done with that. I was certainly not going to continue that as a single mom, just was not, or a divorced mom. It just wasn't going to work. And I was like, what's next for my life? And people were like, “You should be a therapist.” And I was like, I would rather put glass in my nose. No, thank you.

Magda: Yeah, I get that. I mean, I remember during, during our divorce, I was talking to my therapist and he said to me, you know, you're really good at this process. Have you ever thought about being a therapist? And I said to him, “Bill, what do you do when someone comes in with the same problem that they're causing every week for like 10 years? How do you not look at them and say, “You are a dumbass.”?” And he was like, “Oh.” And I was like, see, I wouldn't not be able to say that, right?

Kate: Exactly. And so that's why I became a coach.

Magda: Yes, because people pay you. I mean, I've been a coach in different genres, too. People do actually pay you to say “you're a dumbass, stop being a dumbass let's make a plan for you to stop being a dumbass.”

Kate: That's right, exactly. And i'm known as being a truth talker and saying what there is to say and saying it very kindly but also, you know. Look, I have clients who have been in therapy for years and they're telling me the same story that they're telling the therapist, and the therapist is not saying to them “you are being emotionally abused,” because they're not allowed to be directive. And I can't not be directive, like I just can't. You know, people want a coach. They want someone who's going to tell them the truth and give quote “advice.” You know, that's always like a sticky thing with coaches, but like, I'm sorry. I'm pretty sure that's what people really actually want. You know, I am highly trained. I've got certifications in a bazillion things. And so I'm qualified to give the advice that I give. If you don't follow it, that's okay. We're still going to work with that. So anyway, so, you know, someone was like, “be a therapist.” And I was like, no, I don't want to be a therapist. And then someone was like,

How about coaching? I was like, Oh, that sounds interesting. And then I went to school for it. Randi and I went through the same program. Yeah, coaching processes, right? That's right. And look, you know, there are a lot of people out there. Unfortunately, the coaching industry is not regulated, and anyone can call them a coach. And a lot of people are coaching out there with no training or information. So you know, that's a problem. But I'm not one of those. And I was never gonna be. And then what happened was I got into the industry and I got into coaching and I started recognizing that there were things, you know, that people were struggling with over and over and over again. A lot of it was about emotional abuse and various forms of domestic violence. And I was like, I actually can't continue to do this for a living without becoming trained as a certified domestic violence victims advocate. Like I'm endangering people's lives if I do that. And so I did that. And then the other thing was that people were constantly coming to me trying to decide whether to stay or go. And so it took me some time to sort of develop a process about that. And that was something that I desperately needed when I was trying to decide. I mean, I don't know about you guys, but like it was years. It was years of me feeling like there's something wrong. This isn't working. I don't know what to do. I've tried everything. And, you know, I wanted a burning bush. I wanted clarity. And there was no access to that back then, you know, 2007, eight, like I'm, there's the internet, Facebook, there was an Instagram, right?

Doug: So do you meet with couples at all? Or is it all individuals?

Kate: I don't work with couples. You know, I started out wanting to work with couples. And then I quickly learned that usually one person in the couple was more willing to do work than the other. And I worked with a couple of couples and I didn't like it.

Magda: Who's your client, right? If both people came in and wanted to split up, then the split would be your client, but that almost never happens, right? I mean, I'm assuming you've read the Diane Vaughn Uncoupling book where she has the narrative and her whole theory is that one person gets the idea that something's wrong first and moves along mentally in it and it takes a while for the other person to catch up. You don't want to be the place where they have to catch up with each other because that's miserable for you.

Kate: Well, yeah, I mean, my training dictates that when you're working with couples, the relationship is the client, right? And so if the relationship's the client and they're wanting to stay together, okay, right? Is the co-parenting relationship the client? Okay, maybe. But like you said, like one person is usually pretty far behind in acceptance and coming to terms with it. And I don't know, all that just sounded really exhausting. And I didn't want to do that. And also, no offense, Doug, but men are often not willing to be doing this work. It's really women who are consuming personal development and therapy work. And so you just got to go where the people are actually doing the work.

Doug: Right. Well, I won't take offense. I mean, I understand that I will spend a bit of time answering for my half of the species and to some extent, and I get it because people go by the experience they've had. There are outliers, of course. And I will, at some point, try to be the voice of that with respect and everything. Because the reason I asked that question is, emotional abuse is a serious thing, and it happens all the time. But anytime you have a conversation, how much do you want to understand both sides of a conversation before you decide what it is?

Kate: That is a great question. So emotional abuse is not a relationship problem. It's actually contraindicated for therapy. And unfortunately, a lot of therapists aren't trained in it. So they don't recognize the signs of it. And they spend, you know, years and years working with couples, which actually exacerbates the abuse. “I'm trying to understand your point of view about why it's necessary for you to abuse me.”

Magda: You know, they tell you like, don't let the assailant take you to the second location. But if you're in a therapist's office every week or every month or whatever, who is essentially blessing and observing the other person abusing you, that's the second location. That's the sunken place.

Kate: That's right, it is. It's the sunken place where they're also learning tools. They're learning the language, they're learning tools, they're learning your vulnerabilities. So I guess to, you know, to answer your question, Doug, for me, it's quite clear, right? I'm not saying that my clients are all, you know, perfect and all of those things. But like, when there's abuse happening, like if a client says to me, you know, he's saying this to me, he's gaslighting me and like, and I say, what does that mean? What did he say to you? And they give me the script. I don't feel like these are things they're going to like make up. I'm pretty clear on what's happening. They'll send me text messages. They'll send me the emails. And to me, it's very, very clear. If they're saying to me, I don't have access to all of our financials. I don't have access to money. He gives me an allowance and yells at me if I go over in the, you know, my grocery allowance or whatever, like that's financial abuse. For the most part, it can be very cut and dry. It is more black and white to a trained eye than a lot of times. And, you know, I'm not really interested in the abuser's point of view on it, to be honest.

Doug: What sort of tack do you take to explain why it's emotional abuse and how your client can be more attuned to it when it happens in the future?

Kate: For the most part, I'm not taking people who think their relationships are great and then being like, Oh no, that's abusive. So like they're coming to me with some, like, I don't understand what's happening, or I think this might be abusive. I'm not like, so, you know, we're already starting from that perspective. You're probably not going to hire me if you think your marriage is great. Or you know if you're not sort of clued in to begin with. If they're like, that doesn't make sense, or I don't understand, can you help? The real test is, is this about power and control? Because you know often they'll say but if he loved me he wouldn't say xyz, if he loved me he wouldn't do x. Well, if he was actually more interested in power and control over you... Sorry, guys, it's because my ex-husband's here.

Doug: Outstanding! Put him on. Bonus guest!

Kate: He came to pick up our kid. Often when we get married, we don't actually have an agreement on what love is or what the expectation of this union really is. I assume that you're in it for the same reason I am.

We assume this union and unity in our expectations that is actually rarely the same. Like how could you and why would you?

Magda: Exactly. And I think people who come from really different cultures sometimes end up talking about it. But if you assume that you're from the same culture, like why would you ever, you know, why would you ever talk about it?

Kate: Also, it's not like an abuser is going to be like, you're right, I will actually I'm here for power and control. That's not, that's not how that works, right? You know, you need to look to their actions. And when you say, Hey, I have a problem. And I feel I feel exhausted by the amount of domestic labor I'm expected to do when I get home from work, and you're like, you know, sitting on the couch playing video games for three hours, and your partner goes, if you have a problem, it's you, it's you. That's a problem. There's so many women who go to their spouses, and I'm sure men too, who go to their spouses and say, listen, I'm really unhappy and I don't know how to fix it. And their spouse goes, I'm fine. Must be you. Which regardless of where the truth lies, that's just not a way to be in relationship.

Magda: If your spouse was getting up to go to the kitchen and you said, can you bring me a glass of water? And they said, “No!” like, I would see that as an act of aggression, right?

Doug: Well, sure.

Magda: Well, I mean, if the person's like, “well, no, I was gonna bring back things, I don't have enough hands,” or “I was actually going out” or something like that, right. But if they just flat out said no, and refused to do it, that would feel like an act of aggression to me. And so if you said to your partner, I feel horrible, can you help me figure out how to feel better? If they said no, that's an act of aggression.

Kate: Right.

Doug: That's the kind of behavior I can't, you know, Magda will tell you just about how I'm learning about the human race as fast as I can. But because the idea of an outright dismissal of that just seems completely foreign to me, but I'm sure it happens, unfortunately.

Magda: Okay, I don't know. I mean, how many people ever ask directly, right? Like a lot of people don't ask directly because they're afraid to ask directly. It has never occurred to them to ask directly. They know that they're going to be turned down and they don't want to have to confront the fact that the other person just flat out says no to them. I think a lot of people want to just keep limping along in these relationships because they don't want to have to confront what happens if they have to admit that it's not ever going to get better.

Kate: People are terrible direct communicators. Communication is a skill that we all need to learn, especially as women. We're standing in the corner, tapping our feet with our leg, with our arms crossed, being like, “when is he going to figure out that I'm exhausted?” or whatever. And we're not communicating directly. That is true. What is also true is that abuse is rarely as overt as, can you bring me a glass of water? No. Yeah. And I think that's one of the things that keeps people not understanding what's happening to them. Because I know when it was happening to me, I was Googling, “What is emotional abuse?” And it was like, when your partner tells you you're a piece of shit, and that you'll be nothing without them. And I'm like, okay, well, he's not doing that. So I guess it's not emotional abuse. Well, it turns out he was far too smart for that. He's not here anymore, by the way. You know, we're very close now. Because he's actually, you know, we've grown a lot together over the 15 years of being divorced, right? This is what happens.

Magda: I also think that there are a lot of men who are abusing their partners and they genuinely don't even know that they're abusing their partners because they are acting the way that they were brought up to act in their family of origin. And it doesn't even occur to them that the way they are speaking that always made them feel so horrible as a little kid, but they were told that they had to toughen up.

Kate: I think you're absolutely right. And also, we are entrenched in a culture that tells us that men's needs and wants and desires are so much more important than women's. And when you're coming from this perspective of entitlement, usually the you know, the other person's needs are being diminished, dismissed. And so yes, I think that I think you're right. I think there are a lot of people that don't understand what's what they're what's happening, what they're doing. And, you know, to Doug's point, get in there and figure out how this all works, right? Because if you're a man, if you're a heterosexual man who wants to be in a loving, connected relationship with a heterosexual woman, then there is work to do to understand all of these dynamics and then how they're just kind of the air we breathe. And we've got to clean the air. And it can't just be us being like, “Hey, can you clean the air? Because it's really toxic for me.” It's a matter of empathy for someone else to say, “Oh, the air is fine for me, but it's toxic for her. I care about that.”

Doug: Well, I understand the point of view in terms of how men don't necessarily receive the training to process their grief because a divorce is a loss. It's a loss of a lot of things, including whatever control they perceive. Control doesn't exist and there should be no control in a relationship. And I worked with a lot of men in that regard just because men can't process this. But at the same time, I'm curious also because you're kind of in a very powerful position working with people in very vulnerable spots. When someone comes to you and says, this is our dynamic right now, there are two very important aspects to establish. One, you need to establish boundaries. Like if you will say, don't take that, that is not appropriate and that's not a thing. And here's how you respond to that. And to what extent will you consider playing a devil's advocate a bit and saying, this is where his head is. He's reacting in a certain way and perhaps acting out in a way that's inappropriate, but it's maybe more benign than you think. I mean, how often do you thread that needle?

Kate: Oh, I mean, very often, right? I will, I will very often say, huh, that's really interesting. It sounds like he has childhood trauma around this. Like, does he have triggers around this thing? He sounds like he's being triggered. What conversations have you guys had around his triggers and stuff? And here's the conversation that you should be bringing to your couples therapy next week. Here's some language to use so that you can set that boundary. Magda and I have the queen of boundaries as a good friend, right? So we learned boundary setting and how and how would the sort of the function of boundaries from some of the best. And those are conversations I have all the time. And the thing about boundaries is that they're for us. They're not for the other person. So people come to me and be like, well, a set of boundaries is always trampling my boundaries. And I said, well, of course he is. That's his job. His job is to trample your boundaries. Your job is to enforce them. And a boundary is only as strong as we are willing to enforce it. And we know that from parenting. I don't play devil's advocate. I'll certainly ask more discerning questions. And also, by the way, my clients will send me emails and stuff, and I will write back to them and be like, okay, so here's where you went off the rails. The answer to that email should have been, “Okay,” right? You don't need to pick up your side of the rope and start waving it around and pulling it down, right? You're not going to win this argument. Or if you want peace in your marriage, right, if actually staying in the marriage is something that is that you want, then like this is how you communicate with someone about your feelings. It's not, “You're screwing up, you're making me feel bad, you're doing this.” It's, “I feel. I am having a problem.” No one is open when they're being blamed and they're being poked at and pushed, right? But if you're coming to someone with your open heart and saying, “Hey, I'm having an issue and I feel really hurt,” you're opening the lines of empathy, if it's safe and appropriate to do so. So that's why I really do want my clients to send me their screenshots and their email communications, because I want to see how they are communicating back. Because often it is, it's like it's triggered, it's explosive.

Magda: People just escalate. Like, I mean, somebody was talking to me about being married to Doug a couple weeks ago. And I said, Oh, I was a horrible wife to Doug. I was a person that I didn't like being when I was with him. Whatever your perception is of the attack or whatever it is, you flex and try to respond in a way that you were trained to as a little kid. And you are with that person because your hurts fit together with each other.

Kate: You know, my ex-husband always said that, you know, your dents match my grooves, right? If you're willing to both say, you know, your triggers are triggering me. And that's a hard conversation. Like because you'll have somebody who has childhood wounding around abandonment, coupled with someone who has childhood wounding around control and domination. And so when I'm like, don't leave me, don't leave me or like, you know, why are you going out with your friends again? I'm getting triggered because you're leaving and not expressing it very well. And you're getting triggered. You're like, “fuck you, I'm out of here.” Because you're getting triggered about feeling controlled. And like, it takes something for both people to show up at the table and go, okay, here's what's actually happening.

Magda: Right, right.

Kate: And it takes something to be the first. It's like the vulnerability of being the first person to go, okay, so listen, I'm this is actually what's really happening for me.

Doug: Well, that's where the blog really helped me. I mean, again, I feel very lucky that this blog even happened because I learned so much more about our interpersonal dynamic after the marriage was over, especially when it comes to her admitting what she said about how she felt she was a bad wife to me. And that really helped me overcome internalizing the failure because I didn't forgive myself for a very long time. Having that conversation and learning that it wasn't anything that I had done, it was just something that is. And again, that's a rare occurrence, but it's something that that kind of communication is the best way to figure out how the two of you are, so you can be the best co-parents for your kids. And so that's what I've always been grateful for. And I will, to my death, I will say to anyone who's getting divorced even now, because we're talking to a lot of people our age who've been married for a long time, and have come to this impasse, perhaps later in life, maybe again, the nest is emptying, new opportunities arising, and you have the chance to look at something that you've always been too busy to look at, but now you have a bit more time to say, wait a minute. And I do hope that anybody who even decides to split up now, if you want to be friends at least, try to establish a paper trail. You have to think about when you're writing, you know, you don't write in as reactionary a way as you do when you speak.

Magda: Don’t write angry.

Kate: Yeah, I mean, and I mean, God, we do. I mean, my ex-husband and I still sometimes like rarely, right? We're very close friends like you guys are, you know, and listen to the point of this podcast, because we're in our 50s. We've done a lot of work. My ex and I have both done it. And that is what has helped us become really good friends and really good co parents. We have flares every once in a while. Not for a while, actually, not for maybe like a year or so, a year and a half or so. There will be flares. And man, the texting. And then one of us will be like, sorry, that was really messed up.

Doug: “I still know your buttons, buddy.” No, no, that's, that's fair. That's, you know, and she and I have done that too.

Magda: And I also think like, you know, that saying like, “Do you want to be right or do you want to be married?” Just don't go there. And I never could internalize that with Doug. And I realized finally, at the end of the day, I would, with him, rather be right than be married to him. And that was like the big revelation for me. But I have all these friends with whom I would rather be friends than be right. And so if we have disagreements or, you know, something like that, I just totally let it pass. But with Doug, if it's anything, like even though we're friends now, I'm just used to being right and wanting to be right about it or calling him out on something I thought he said that was not presenting him in the best light or something like that. And I just will go at him the way I go at no one else except for possibly my brother.

Doug: And that's the great thing because now we're not married anymore and she can feel more comfortable with being wrong all the time.

Magda snickers.

Kate: I don’t work with couples, guys. You have to stop. *laughs*

Doug: And there will be situations, as Magda will tell you, something will come up and my first thought will be, “I’ve got to tell Magda about this.” Because there's a tendril of a mutual appreciation for weird stuff that will always exist.

Magda: My God, we have always been so good about public scandals.

Kate: Listen, my ex and I are the same way. And listen, I think that's what's so wonderful is that we have our inside jokes. He is my person for a lot of things that are funny. And by the way, I will also say that a lot of people maybe listen to this who are at the beginning stages and they want to try and have that now. We've all been divorced for 15 years, right? And so having it right away may not be the healthiest thing because we're at the place that we are.

Magda: I think it's gaslighting yourself, right? Because if you actually could get along with the person so well, why would you need to divorce them?

Kate: I mean, right.

Magda: Exactly. I think you need your anger to propel you through it. And when I was in the middle of it, I decided that I was going to let the story be what it was on that particular day. And then the next day, if the story was the same, or if it was different, it was fine. Essentially, I was just letting myself have whatever story it needed to be and move through that. And then I assumed that at a certain point I would settle into whatever I needed the story to be and I think that was like the best gift I gave myself was not like thinking, Oh, I want to have a specific relationship with him in 15 years. So therefore I need to act this way now. That's foolish.

Kate: I love that. Right. I love the idea of this is how I feel today. And like, I may feel differently tomorrow and that's okay. And especially when you're going through a divorce, my God, your emotional dysregulation is at its peak. My therapist was like, you can consider yourself certifiably insane for the next year and a half. Yeah. And she was talking about my dating decisions and things like that. But I think it's true, even in my relationship with my ex-husband, and we did, we tried to do “best friends” right away, and it was a disaster. And, you know, because people were like, how did you guys do this so well? And what I was doing was completely, like you said, gaslighting myself and, you know, dishonoring myself.

Doug: So when you rushed to be friends with him again, could that have also been with a bit of guilt, as Magda’s told me about, just for the sake of maybe your son? And so to what extent maybe was that willingness to be friends early on a way to help accelerate the healing process to assuage whatever guilt you might have felt?

Kate: You know, I don't know if it was from guilt. I think what it was was that when I first got out, I was so relieved. I was ready to throw a party every day. I was so excited and happy for my new life. And I was thrilled to be out of the misery because it really was, I was miserable every day of my life. It was so toxic. And it was so awful. And I just was, I was really miserable. And so when I got out, I was like, what? And so for me, I think it was a burial of the grieving that is part of, a necessary part of the process. And I didn't get that until I started having these crazy dreams about my ex-husband. And I would wake up and be like, what is that? I don't want to be with him. Like, why am I having these like horrible dreams about being abandoned by him and, and like about his new girlfriend trying to kill me and like just all of this shit. And I was like, Oh, I'm grieving? Why would I be grieving this? People say this to me all the time, right? I wanted this divorce. I'm so happy to be out of this. Why am I suddenly crying all the time? Because nobody wants to get divorced. You don't get married thinking you're going to get divorced. Well, you don't want to do this to your children, right? There's the guilt of that. But really, for me, it was this unprocessed grief that just started kind of knocking at the door in my subconscious like, hello. I had to deal with some shit.

Doug: Every decision to split up and that's, that's right there. You're barely awake. You're like, what, you know, this book is about how to make the decision about your marriage. Like, is this cost benefit analysis going too far negative where we got to end this and figure out what's next? Yeah, but that's great that you were able to find that out about yourself. And I think that's anybody who puts the work in. Clearly, you want to understand your ex-spouse's motivations, but more importantly, you got to understand your own. And you have to understand, even look back and, why was I married to her? Why was I attracted to her? What can I learn from this? That kind of thing. And so, when you meet people for the first time, or when you talk about your book, The D Word, which is interesting too, because like, here we are trying to talk frankly about divorce.

Kate: But it's “the d word” because it's making the ultimate decision about your marriage. It's a play on the two words. 

Doug: One of the things, by the way, you should know, did Magda tell you that when we got divorced, we mediated. She was a lawyer, but she also had an MSW. And so she would take her lawyer hat off every once in a while, put on her therapist cap and say, all right, why are you digging in on this? When it comes to dividing stuff up? What are you hanging on to? Is this a symbol of something else that you don't want to let go of? That kind of thing.

Kate: I just want to interject that. That must be so annoying, Doug.

Doug: That was my constant battle, whether to be just angry for anger's sake and whether to try and understand where my motivations were coming from. And that's just the way my brain has always worked.

Kate: Right. And sometimes we don't want to, right? Sometimes we're like, stop asking me to dig deep. I don't want to dig deep with you, the person I'm divorcing.

Magda: Yeah. Well, the funny thing about the mediation process for me was that she had this list of all this stuff that you had to decide, and she was like, okay, this might take us a while, this might bring up some hurt feelings, this might be a big deal for you guys, but we need to talk about holidays and where the kids are going to be when. And we're culturally Christian, so we both observe Christmas and Thanksgiving, but we had been alternating going to our families, for years since we had been married before we even had kids. And so we just looked at each other and we're like, yeah, we should probably keep the schedule the same, right? And we're like, yeah, and we're like, okay, just ink it. And she was like, Oh, right. And I just thought it was kind of funny.

Kate: That's great. We had the similar thing with deciding who was going to keep the house. Oh, where we had been in Imago Therapy together.

Magda: Okay, so I don't know if you know what that is. But like, we did the book, which absolutely changed my life. Okay, so Imago Therapy is basically figuring out what the other person's triggers are, and sort of trying to help people get through it instead of just needling them the whole time.

Kate: Yeah, I mean, and it what it does is it uses a very specific dialogue to get to it. So you're keeping everything in I language, I feel triggered, I feel sad when you X, you know, when we have this conversation, and it's triggering my childhood wounding of Y, and it would really help my healing if you would Z. But the process of the dialogue is what's so incredible because the other person can't say anything other than just mirroring exactly what you're saying and then summarizing. So it really teaches empathic communication. You have to listen actively and intuitively. You know, it's one of those things that didn't save our marriage, but it really aided in our divorce in communicating. And so we sat in our very first mediation session and he said, well, you know, probably one of the first things we're going to have to figure out is, you know, which of you is going to keep the house. And have you guys talked about that? And we sat and we had this Imago Dialogue about the house and he expressed that he felt that I was a stay at home mom at the time as the working parent, he. felt disenfranchised already. And what he said to me, I say this to my clients all the time now, he said, Kate, wherever you go, is home to our son. I don't have that. And I feel like if I were then to go into like some random apartment and some new place that that that would make him feel further, like uncomfortable with me. And I want him to have like at least the house to feel like

for when.

Doug: That's the point I think that a lot of men hopefully in this situation will learn to do because your fortunes are linked to how you communicate your I feel statements and recognize that this is what adults do. Adults ask for what they want. Adults explain what they feel. And yeah, I'm a big fan of that. And again, I suppose I'll have to answer for whatever her perception of my behavior was 15 years ago. I mean, 15 years ago, right?

Magda: Like, I mean, you answered for it by the fact that when we finally did the book, by that point, I figured out what your childhood traumas were. And I just no longer cared. I mean, that's what happened, which was, you know, I mean, people say, Oh, how was how did you like the Harville Hendrix book? And I said, It was amazing. It changed my life, because it really reframed how I think about relationships in general, including friendships and the relationships I have with my kids. Yeah. And with my parents, but it was to me a definite answer of, oh, I am just done. Like, I think that's the problem, especially for people our age. You were talking earlier about talking to people and helping them see that somebody could have triggers and could be responding this way. And, you know, maybe it's not intentional and maybe they're hurting you, but they don't realize they're hurting you and all this kind of stuff. And I think the thing that's happening that I'm seeing with people my age is that they have been doing that kind of work with their partner, whether the partner is engaged in it, fully engaged in it, partially not really engaged with it. They've been doing that work for years, and they are exhausted. And they either need somebody to give them permission to just be done with it, or they need some sort of point of light that it's going to get better, or, and here's the one that I find really interesting, they need somebody's permission to just live with it.

Kate: Yeah, and I think that comes from an idea of, I was talking to, interviewing Dr. Ramani yesterday for her new book, and we were talking about radical acceptance, right? And coming to a place of radical acceptance that like, this is what our marriage is. And if you can radically accept that, that doesn't necessarily mean you have to go, right? If let's say, you know, they're an abuser, and you would think that the immediate thing is, well, then you have to go. Well, you know, not everyone has the privilege of being able to go we don't, we can't all in this housing market in this economy, like we can't afford all afford a separate place to live all of those things, right? But if you have a radical acceptance of this is what this relationship is, I'm no longer trying to change you. I'm no longer trying to morph myself into what I think you want, right? This is just what our dynamic is. Then you can set proper and appropriate boundaries around that that are like, oh, well, this is who this person is. And so I'm going to stop trying to get my needs met from them. And I might be able to stay in the relationship with them. Right? You just have to stop trying to change them. Right.

Magda: It's very difficult to figure out what is going to make you happier in the long term. To be out of this relationship that's causing you pain, but have a different set of struggles, whether they're financial, whether they're finding your identity, whether they're figuring out your relationship with your kids when you're not half of mom and dad or mom and mom or whatever. And I think we haven't been trained to think in decision trees, right? Like we have been trained to trust your gut, you know, and the whole like, throw it out if it doesn't bring you joy. Well, what does “bring me joy” mean? Right? Right. Like, is “bring me joy” a five on a scale of one to 10?

Kate: Yes. And also, like, we're in our 50s. And we're like, well, you know, when we're in our 20s, we're like, like, Mark Manson, if it's not a “fuck, yes,” then it's a no. Like, how much of my life is a “fuck yes,” like, come on. I'm 52 years old. Like, really like not a whole lot.

Magda: Yeah.

Kate: And I think at our age, we get a sense of like, oh, there's like a reality check of like, oh, this is actually what life is. I thought life was good, life and love and all these things were going to be so much more dynamic than they are.

Magda: And like, you know, yeah, people have different needs for excitement, intensity, depth of connection with other people. And, you know, I can't judge anybody for staying in a relationship that I would not be happy in, just as I would not want them to judge me for leaving a relationship that they would have been happy in. Right?

Doug: Magda will probably tell you that true passionate love is possible in your 50s because she's ostensibly found it, which is great.

Magda: Um, and “ostensibly” is doing a lot of work in that sentence there, Doug. I'm teasing you about the fact that you said “ostensibly.”

Doug: Well, who knows what we know or want? You know, I think in our fifties, we are all unreliable narrators.

Magda: Oh, probably.

Doug: So, and that's why I think just in general, I'm fascinated with the idea of how different sides of a conversation perceive that conversation.

Kate: Yeah.

Doug: I'm just fascinated by how unreliable our memories are, how unreliable our wants are. Since when does anybody know what anybody wants? Anyway, but when we talk about your book, I really wanted to get to the book, the D word, making the ultimate decision about your marriage which sounds like you could be in your 20s or in your 50s and thinking, you know, weighing a lot of negatives and positives. I mean, all contexts are different, but to what extent do you think this book is usable for anybody in terms of absolutes about evaluating where your marriage is and whether it's salvageable?

Kate: Well, I mean, I think there are no absolutes, right?

Doug: “So, so there's all the time we have. Thank you.”

Kate: I don't think there are absolutes, but I think that I have a very large Facebook group and there are women in there who are in their 20s and there are women in there who are in their 60s. And they all resonate with different aspects, I guess, of my work. And my book is really written for women as well. By the way, if a dude reads this and is like, oh, okay, that makes sense. I have a chapter called “Why Are Women So Unhappy in Their Marriages? How Marriage Exhausts Women and Benefits Men.” So, you know, if a man wants to read that and understand better, by God, please. But yes, I do think it's relevant for all age groups.

Magda: I don't think there are very many divorce stories. Like, you know, there was a time when people were like, Ooh, what led to the divorce? And I was like, there's like, I don't know how many stories, right? There's one story, which is somebody cheated on somebody. There's another story, which is like, somebody had some sort of addiction and couldn't get out of it. There's another story where there's violence. And then there's another story where you just realized you didn't like each other very much. And that was us. The rest is just details. And you know, sometimes you hear these things that are kind of hair-raising, but they're not the reason people are getting divorced. There are things that happened along the way to the reason that people were getting divorced.

Kate: Yeah, I think that's, I think that's, that's fair. I mean, I think also, there's that one last hair, right? Like, who knows what it is? You know, for me, it was, it was Christmas Eve, by the way, the worst time to end your marriage. Let me just tell you. 

Doug: Ours ended on Thanksgiving. So I hear you.

Kate: See, right? We had to assemble a toy kitchen that night. And emotions were flaring there. Anyway, we went to my friend's Christmas Eve party. I had the best time with all of my friends–these are my best friends from college, and we came home and he said, “You spent the whole time talking and hanging out with your friends, and like you didn't pay attention to me at all.” And I said, “Because my friends like me and you don't, and I'm done.”

Magda: Did you ever read Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God?

Kate: Oh, my God, years ago.

Magda: It's just a delightful book. And the narrator's name is Janie. And it just follows Janie through her life. And there's this moment where she's married to this guy that everybody thinks she's lucky to be married to, but he doesn't understand her. She doesn't understand why she's unhappy all the time. And then they're in public and he says something mean to her. And Zora Neale Hurston says something like, “She stood there and her heart fell off the shelf.”

Kate: Right. Oh, that's, oh my god. That's exactly what it is. You know, your heart falls off the shelf.

Doug: The way that comes in, the rhetorical zing of that, that lands. That's a kind of rhetorical skill that just lands in the moment.

Kate: Yeah.

Magda: I just wanted to talk some more about women our age and a problem I think is kind of specific to women our age who are struggling in relationships in which the other partner, whether it's a man or a woman, is having mental health issues and just refuses to address them.

Kate: Huge problem, right? Huge. One of my more downloaded podcast episodes is called “Not My Fucking Job.” And this is one of those things that it's not our job to be anyone else's therapist. Look, especially if there's real mental health challenges and mental illness and addiction, I feel is very similar. So the question that I ask is, you know, are they aware that they have a problem? Are they willing to get help for that problem? And are they actively seeking help for that problem? If I love somebody and then they're actually taking action on their own, I'm in, right? Because for better or worse, I love you, but there are a lot of people that are aware that they have a problem and say they're willing to get help for their problem, but if the action doesn't follow, we're in the same spiral and it won't ever stop. And the rut that so many people fall into, women in particular, is that they'll find a therapist for their partner. Nobody ever got better in therapy that they didn't choose themselves. And I know it's really hard to feel like you're abandoning someone, who's in their greatest time of need, but we live in a world in which access to healthcare can be difficult. It's expensive, all of those things, but there are a lot of options out there and you can't be somebody's lifeline and last resort, right? ‘Cause that's the emotional labor that is not fair to put on a partner.

Doug: Kind of leads to codependence and stuff, right? When you start thinking I'm less this person's partner and more of their caretaker.

Kate: That's right. In the book, I really talk about this and I really do recommend that people seek out their own treatment for that, right? The sort of spiral into codependence and caretaking of another person is not, it's not like I stepped from perfectly healthy boundaries into this codependence, right? It's this slow seeping thing that happens that you don't even know is happening and all of a sudden you wake up and you're like, where's my life? And some people have stayed in relationship with addicts or people with mental illness who have been able to create their own boundaries and their own recovery and that radical acceptance. There's nothing I can do to help them or fix them. I'm choosing to continue to be in this relationship, but I'm going to have to do it in a way that doesn't constantly nag them to change. And I'm going to do it in a way that supports my own well-being. That's the war, right?

Doug: That's the internal battle of like my own care versus my partner's care and how we balance that because once you're out of balance, it's hard to get it back.

Kate: Absolutely. And that's why your own treatment is so necessary. So for, you know, like Codependents Anonymous, Al-Anon, those types that were your own therapy. You know, you love this person. Of course you want to help them, but you can't do it for them. And you can't want it more than them.

Magda: I think if we looked at it more as any other health issue, you would expect them to be in charge of their own care.

Kate: Well, yeah, I actually use that as an example in my book. It's like if your partner is diagnosed with diabetes, you can cook all the things at home that you want, but you have zero control over the fact that they're going to go out and hit the donut store on the way to work and eat a Big Mac for lunch, right? And you can scream and yell all you want, but nobody ever got sober because their partner was screaming and yelling.

Doug: Well, there's a particular piece of advice for people in your 50s. If you have been married to someone for a long time, what are some typical warning signs, ways you can assess your own being? If you're going to initiate a split, you want to have both feet on the ground.

Kate: Well, I mean, I think what you said, Doug, is really important that you want to have both of your feet on the ground. The first part of this book is about yourself, right? Because we're so used to, but he's doing this and he's doing that. And we've got the magnifying glass on the other person. What I want for people is to very first ground themselves in who they are. And sometimes we lose sight of who we are as parents, we're so all about our kids or you know, we lose sight of us, you know and and in a toxic relationship in particular We lose sight of who we are because we're being gaslit into believing that our experiences are not real, right? And so we want to shift that a little bit We kind of want to clear the deck from all the looking at everybody else and really focus on yourself. And I have guides and ways to do that in the book that are very specific, exercises, all of that, because I think that's the most important thing to do. And then you want to educate yourself on what is emotional abuse? What is financial abuse? What are all of these things look like? Or what does a healthy relationship even look like? Right? Because we forget, right? And I talk a lot in the book about how you might feel in your relationship. And I think, you know, Magda and Doug, I think my ex and I had a very similar dynamic, which was like, while there was all sorts of things wrong with the marriage, also, we brought out the worst in each other. Yeah, first of all, I was not a person that I had ever been before in a relationship. And I nor have I ever been that person in a relationship. And I was not somebody that I enjoyed in that relationship. And if that's the case, like that's something to look at, right? Like this person, does this person just bring out the worst in me? Regardless, whose fault, it doesn't matter, right? Like, that's not who, is that who you want to be? And if not, like, okay, let's address that. For those of us in midlife, like a lot has changed, and we have an empty nest. And now we're sort of looking at each other going, huh? Really? Yeah. Or like, you know, I'll ask my clients who are like, I don't know, I don't know. And I say, okay, well, when the kids are gone, is this the person you want to walk off into the sunset with? Then sometimes they'll have a very strong action of like, oh my god, no. I'm like, well, okay.

Doug: What if she walked into the ocean by herself?

Kate: Right. That sounds good. You know, another thing that I talk about in the book is what to expect on the other side. Get yourself educated on what it might actually mean for you. It doesn't mean you have to do anything about it, but like consult an attorney and find out, like, how much money are you going to have? Right? Can you afford to go? You know, are you going to have to get a job? Okay. Like, where are you going to live? Are you going to be able to afford to move into another place in your neighborhood in this economy? Like, that's a valid question.

Doug: You know, Magda was talking about the different stories. Lately, I've actually read about a number of cases, people my age, perhaps a little younger, whose marriages have ended because one partner has discovered something new about themselves regarding their sexuality. Either they discovered it or it's lain latent for a long time and it's finally blossomed somehow. I'm actually this now and my marriage can't go on as such. Do you discuss that at all in the book or do you talk about that with your clients? And if so, how do those talks go?

Kate: You know, I do not address that in the book, but I have worked with some clients who discovered that their spouse is bisexual and like has been kind of, you know, doing some, some stuff on the side. Well, that's a fidelity issue, right? I mean, that's one thing. Right. Well, so one partner might think it is a fidelity issue while the other one's like, well, this is an itch you can't scratch. Right. How are we defining fidelity in our marriage is an important conversation. I was just talking to someone over Thanksgiving. It was their niece and nephew or something. And she was like 32 and realized she was actually gay. And, you know, we've always asked the question, well, what was her upbringing, right? Fundamentalist Christian. All right. Okay. But it does happen. It happens a lot. And it's tragic. It breaks my heart. It breaks my heart for everybody involved. And, oh my God, I hope you're married to someone who's like, Oh my God, please be free.

Magda: Please. It's not that the sexuality is different than what they thought it was. It's that they were so suppressed or restricted in their life that there was something fundamental about themselves that weren't allowed to know.

Doug: Or we're socialized to deny.

Kate: Right. That's right. That doesn't mean it's not going to be a blow, right? Right. It's a little different, though, if your partner comes to you and says, it's literally not you. Yes. It's me. Yes. Right? Like, literally, this is the definition of it's not you, it's me. So there's less of an ego, like, of course, you've invested time in this person, and you love them. And also, you may feel really betrayed because most people do know this about themselves, they just haven't had the freedom to express it before.

Magda: And so then like, oh, wow, thanks for dragging me along with your, you know, right, right, like, they kind of made them, the other person participate in this self-deception, although clearly, they don't think of it that way.

Kate: No, of course not. And I think a lot for a lot of people, it's also subconscious, right? Like, you know, I know someone who didn't come out till he was 38. And we were all like, honey.

Doug: That's the best. Those are the best stories, right? People who come out, thought about it, agonize about it for weeks, and then they came out and their parents are like, honey, we've known. We're so happy you're there now.

Kate: Right. And you know, right. And his parents were not the ones, but all of his friends were like, no shit, Sherlock. You know, I think there's a lot of grieving to be done on both sides. Right.

Doug: And by all means, find yourself some no shit Sherlock friends.

Kate: Right. Even when you get divorced, too, have your friends that are going to be like, thank God. Exactly.

Doug: I got to say, too, I think the best assets in our divorce, to me anyway, and I try to be this when friends of mine divorce, if there's a friend who loves you both and can kind of be that sounding board who will say, look, you're my friend, but she's my friend, too. And don't come at me with venting about her because she's also the mother of your kids. You know, I'm going to listen dispassionately. I'm in your corner. I'm in her corner. I'm here for both of you to recognize that bottom line, there's a friendship to be found and there are kids to raise. If your friends are getting divorced, if there's a way to be that for them, that's the best gift I think you can give them.

Kate: I think that's so, so, so wise. And also, I think one of the things that you can do if, you know, if you are getting divorced, and it can be at all amicable, or if they're kids, like, tell your friends, they don't have to choose, because people think they have to choose. It's a burden, I think, for a lot of people to carry. And if you can say to them, you know what, like, I'm not asking you to choose. There's no sides here. You know, I'll deal with my feelings about it.

Doug: And that's a good indicator of where your own head is. If you can be in that place to receive that, you know, that's a good sign that you're turning the corner. It's a fraternity, sorority. It's a group of people. You want to pay it forward. When I was in the weeds, I got help. And when you're out of the weeds, there's probably somebody in the weeds who you could be that for somebody else who's farther behind in the cycle.

Kate: Absolutely.

Doug: Kate, I'm really glad you came on to talk to us today. The book again is The D Word: Making the Ultimate Decision About Your Marriage. It is available for pre-order now and will be available on December 26th. Is that right?

Kate: That is correct.

Magda: Eight gazillion women who just had the worst Christmas day of their lives to Google divorce and your book is going to pop up and they're going to be like, Oh my God, when the student is ready, the teacher appears. Is that why your publisher picked that date?

Kate: Yes and no, like so January is divorce month.

Magda: Oh, yeah.

Kate: So I just learned this today that apparently the time that “I want to get a divorce” or “how to get a divorce” is Googled the most is Christmas Day afternoon.

Magda: Oh, I'm sure. I'm positive.

Kate: So it really is terrible. Is that awful? But it really is. I mean, there are people who are like, all right, I just said I was gonna get through the holidays. And here we are. Or there are people who are like, a holiday’s a marker, right? It's like, Oh my god, another year of this. I can't do this anymore. Or they're like, you don't like me. I do have a page on my website, kateanthony.com slash d word, that has some ideas about how people can buy it without letting the cat out of the bag, so to speak.

Magda: I saw that and I was like, that is clever. 

Kate: Yeah, you don't really want to have this showing up in your shared Amazon order history.

Magda: I mean, that's, that's when it's like you've ordered your “how to get a divorce” book and like, a thing of black garbage bags and like a big shovel.

Doug: The D word, dismemberment.

Kate: Awesome. 

Doug: Well, It also makes a wonderful, slightly late Christmas gift.

Kate: That's right. Or an early Valentine's Day gift.

Doug: And where else are you active on social media, just so people can learn more about where you speak. I know you have your own podcast. If people want to learn more about Kate Anthony, where do they go?

Kate: Well, kateanthony.com is sort of the hub for everything. I'm on Instagram at the Divorce Survival Guide, and my podcast is the Divorce Survival Guide podcast.

Doug: How frequently do you publish?

Kate: Every Thursday.

Doug: Thank you so much, Kate, for talking to us. I hope a lot of people get a lot of worth out of this conversation. I really appreciate your help and congratulations on all the success.

Kate: Thank you guys. Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciated it. It was great meeting you both. And I really appreciate this conversation. Thank you.

Doug: And thank you listeners for listening to Episode 28 of the When The Flames Go Up podcast with Magda Pecsenye Zarin and me, Doug French. Our guest has been certified divorce coach, Kate Anthony. When the Flames Go Up is a production of Halfway Noodles LLC and is available on all the usual platforms and also at whentheflamesgoup.substack.com. Please subscribe there for our weekly episode which drops every Wednesday and our Friday Flames newsletter which comes out, wait for it, every Friday. If you listen to us on Apple Podcasts, please leave us a review there. That really helps us out. And that is a wrap on 2023. Thank you for listening all year long. We really appreciate it. We're off next week, but we'll be back on January 3rd. Until then, don't get divorced, hopefully, and we'll see you then. Bye-bye.