| Dec 8, 2006 @ 5:16 PM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond
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Ron9
Posts: 386
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The 5th Stage
I got dumped (right out of the blue) on Mother’s Day ‘03. I had been married 17 years - I loved her. I went right into stage 1 - denial.
Within a few weeks I had found the 5 stages (of a severe loss) on the net. Right after I read them I pretty much forgot about it.
1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Blame
4. Depression
5. Acceptance
At some point a few months back I passed into the 5th stage and did not even realize it until 15 minutes ago. I had passed into the acceptance stage and ..... within a week had moved pass acceptance to ........... ACTION.
I’ve worked from a home office for about 18 years - no one to actually talk to. My best buddy - my mom had died in Feb‘05.
With no one to talk to and doing a lousy job of consulting with myself - I acquired lots and lots of self help files.
I’ve been working and listing to Brian Tracy today - The Science of Self Confidence. It hit a point where he started talking about the 5 stages of a loss.
I’ve lived with the first four stages in my guts for over three years - but ...... when he started talking about the fifth stage my entire body started to shake with joy - it was only then I realized I had passed beyond the fifth stage - I’ve been in the Action stage for about two months now.
Everything he was saying was ringing true ... it was ME he was talking about - oh man - what a feeling.
Here is what he was talking about.
When you enter into the 5th stage - the lights begin to come back on. You accept full responsibility for what has happened - or at the very least you accept responsibility for your responses. You begin to exert a bit of self control - self mastery (when I stopped picking up the phone when she called - I told myself - cutting off contact with her is in ***MY*** control). You accept the disappointment as a fact and realize there is no use in crying over spilled milk. You say to yourself - “what can not be cured must be endured”.
Then ......... you move past (past acceptance) into the final final stage - the stage of ACTION.
You consciously choose the future over the past. You become solution orientated over problem orientated. This was exactly what I did and did not even realize it. I killed the contact (accepted it) and went to work on myself (took action).
I did not realize it then - but the faster you can move yourself through the stages the faster you can get on with your life.
I was in denial for about nine months - the anger and denial coexisted for several months - the blame stage (it is her fault) came and went - the depression stage was the hardest one to shake off. In my case it was worse due to being a recluse (by accident) and not really liking the casual dating stuff.
Did you go thru stages?
What stage are you in?
Did you recognize the stages as you passed thru them? (I did not)
What are you going to do about what ever stage you are in.
When I first read about (and forgot about) the stages it said it takes 1 year for each 4 years you were with the person. I told myself “BS - total BS there is no way it will take me over four years to get over this” - it took 3.5 years lol.
Do you think it takes 1 year for each 4 years?
Yack it up - this is good stuff. It is good to realize that no matter the type of loss (it could be a big customer in your business even) a death a dump any sever loss. The stages are pretty much identical. It is not me saying that it is the people that have studied it.
I’ve been feeling darn good about myself for the past few months but ...... hearing the reason why - oh man what a feeling.
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| Dec 8, 2006 @ 5:42 PM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond |
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Heaveninawildflower
Posts: 18,611
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Hey, good for you Ron!!! You know, it's funny but I was just thinking the other day that the tone of your posts had changed considerably in the time I've 'known' you here...now I see why! 
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| Dec 8, 2006 @ 9:09 PM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond
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LSU79
Posts: 323
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Isn't the third stage "Bargaining"?
Regardless, I like the concept of the 6th stage.
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| Dec 9, 2006 @ 11:57 AM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond |
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wiccked
Posts: 12,300
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i am in the depression stage and for the life of me, i can see no way out!!!! if it werent for this forum letting me be a total idiot (joking relieves stress, at least for me) i dont know what i would have done-i dont know whether to start taking drugs(for depression) or try to beat it myself- so far, nothing really matters to me like it used to- just dont seem to care
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| Dec 9, 2006 @ 1:36 PM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond
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nightrider3281
Posts: 752
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wicked , you dont need drugs, just believe in yourself and you will be fine. I have read many of your posts and you are a very strong woman
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| Dec 9, 2006 @ 4:09 PM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond |
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Ron9
Posts: 386
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Wiccked - I don’t know if this could apply to you (or anyone else) but .......
I buried myself in work. That was a natural for me as I am self employed and work from home. I am a Macintosh computer nerd - my “business” is all on computer files. I just put my head down and worked on my business files 18 hours a day 7 days a week. The days/nights were just blurs. That went on for over two years. I very seldom left the house (still don’t).
When I started getting close to my computer file objectives (information on 74,000 companies) I was getting a tad of self pride from all the work I had done. That ounce of self pride was begging for more. It dawned on me that there are professionals out there regarding self esteem and self confidence. I latched on to lots and lots and lots of self improvement e-book info and turned off CNN and started pushing the crap out of my head and making room for all the positive information .......... it is working very good.
I too sat around and did the ............. what is the use - “stuff”. I am getting older 90% of the females I could be interested in are looking for guys younger than they are - I don’t really have any family - never had any of my own kids - I get trumped on all important events (with my two step daughters) by my ex wife and yadda yadda yadda.
At one time I was very successful in my business - I’ve told myself - I am going to do it again - JUST FOR ME and I am going to.
My two step daughters are getting together and (just for me) cooking me a holiday dinner tomorrow - that is pretty dang cool that even in their busy lives - even after their natural mother dumped me - they STILL consider me dad.
Over simplified - we need to (as said above) “consciously choose the future over the past. You become solution orientated over problem orientated”
It works. I was very very depressed but melted the hours away trying to at least “pretend” I had some purpose. In my case I used the purpose of collecting all that information vs just wallowing around day after day in self pity. It was nothing huge but it was something.
Self esteem is the key and confidence are intermingled. We have to first stop the downward loss of esteem/confidence - level off for a bit and start the rebuild. My esteem/confidence is coming back at a surprising speed and it is a very good feeling.
I can do it (I am at least 75% back already) you can do it - we all can do it.
I plan to become a better person. I was always considered a good person by all that knew me including my ex wife and step daughters and myself but .............. I am going to be a better person for not only myself but for others.
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| Dec 11, 2006 @ 9:52 PM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond
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Monsterboy
Posts: 287
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On September 6, my wife of six years told me -- in a very tactful and round about manner -- that she was afraid she was a lesbian.
For me, denial lasted about 1/2 hour, while I tried to assure her that she could be bi 9as I had thought, and she had, it turned out, hoped) and be primarily attracted t women, after all, she loved me, right?
Like I said, 1/2 hour. Talking with her, and reading some things she'd written to herself of late, and that was that.
I never really went through anger or blame. I didn't see anyone to be angry at, or to blame. She was nothing but concerned about my feelings, even with all she knew she was about to go through, questioning her identity, meta-questioning her faculties in figuring it out after all the years of fooling herself. And she was nothing but supportive in helping me get things together and try to make a new life for myself.
Depression and acceptance have been mixed together. I accepted pretty early, by the next morning, in fact. And it turns out I'd been suffering depression for years (due in part, apparently, to a B vitamin deficiency). I had a rough day after, then periodically would get sad, once or twice cried, but it didn't last long. That seemed more an attempt to get emotions out of my system than anything. I stopped being attracted to her sexually within a few days.
I had some denial as to the extreme to which our life would change -- saw no reason to move apart, for one. But that didn't last long. The other day clearing out the closets, deciding what to sent up to her place what to throw away, I got depressed. Today, going though files (including things we wrote one another, cartoons we drew of one another, etc.) was worse than the closets. But now the closets are empty, and the files are in piles awaiting folders. So that would seem to be that.
I still get a little down when I think about the two of us in the past, as if we were other people. I feel bad for them, thinking how sad they'd be if they knew, how their plans of eight kids and a farmhouse, of going back to where they'd spent their honeymoon or other places so important to them in their courtship and early marriage, were never going to happen.
She lives two floors up now. Takes the kids at night, after she gets back from work. Still my best friend, still the only person that gets a lot of my jokes and vice-versa. We laughed together watching a wonderful grade-Z movie last night after the kids were asleep. I make fun of her new interest in k.d. lang, and neither of us ever complains when the other wants to rewind the video for another look at a hot chick.
I still don;'t know exactly what I want form my life now, still feel sometimes like I haven't got much of one. Other times, I'm the happiest guy I know, with a wonderful combination of the family and freedom. As she put it yesterday, some days I look at the good side, some days I look at the bad side.
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| Dec 13, 2006 @ 3:42 AM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond |
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Ron9
Posts: 386
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Thanks for your story.
I got another huge set back about 18 months after I got dumped (right out of left field). My only friend in the world (I had always thought of my wife as my best friend) my mom thought she had a small stroke. We took her to the hospital and they said naw she is fine. Three days later they said she was stage 4 with cancer. She died six weeks later.
For a time - I thought my ex wife had gone bi sexual. She started running around with a gal she met at college and that was right before she dumped me. One of her girls (she had two that we raised) was in CA in college - when she came home for the first time and went to her mom's new appartment (she figured she would be staying their for her time back here - like three nights) got a big shock. Her mom had pictures of the gal and pictures of the gal's kids out on display and ZERO pictures of her own two daughters. Not only that - she was not allowed to stay overnight due to that other gal staying overnight .........
I have to say it made me wonder. My ex is now 47 she was 44 then and that gal was 53. The gal ended up getting transfered out of state and my ex stopped talking about her. At one time the gal's name was always coming up.
I stopped picking up the phone when my ex called so I don't know (and it is none of my business) what she is up to these days.
She wants to be friends but - it is not good for me - I tried it. It just keeps eating away at my self esteem/confidence.
I am far better off killing off all contact with her - which is what I have done.
Good luck to us all.
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| Dec 13, 2006 @ 4:05 AM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond
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carpediem48
Posts: 3,312
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Ron...
sorry to hear about your mother....six weeks really isn't much time to say goodbye although you're probably grateful she didn't endure 'extended' sufferring.
What you've just posted about ''contact'' with your ex inclines me to believe that in some aspects...in some cases....divorce can be harder than widowhood.
The widowed don't have the same kind of frustrating experience with accepting that their mate is really gone.
After all...it IS true that sometimes someone leaves you....then does come back later 
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| Dec 13, 2006 @ 8:24 PM |
The 5th Stage ... and beyond |
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Ron9
Posts: 386
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Yes carpdiem - she was more or less ok (she was 80) and her voice started to change (like she had a cold) - that was in Oct. I am pretty sure she was dismissed by her Dr. My ex wife is in health care and she says the industry just don’t pay much attention to older people - they figure “they are old they are going to die anyway”. I am not very impressed with the health care industry. I got a call from a nurse and was so happy to report mom had no cancer ........... two days later we where told she was stage four and would not live very long. We moved her to my sisters house and together gave her 24/7 care.
To do believe getting dumped out of a long time marriage IS as ruff on someone as a loss to death. My sisters husband died in around the same time frame. We were talking about a year ago and I reminded her he did not leave her on purpose. That is something she could hold onto.
There will be no coming back now. For a good while I (and both girls) though she had some kind of a break down and would come back to her senses. She told me she had always been a wife/mom and never had not ever had even so much as her own room (she shared with a sister growing up).
I personally think she pulled off her long term plan. Get her kids raised/educated - get herself educated and split. IF that actually was her plan she pulled it off to a tee. That is actually the only thing that fits all the questions. That puts the entire puzzle together perfect - all the pieces fit.
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