There’s a moment in the middle of the night, when the house is quiet and the questions feel loud, that this conversation begins. In this A Fresh Story: Book Talk episode, Olivia Howell sits down with therapist and Fresh Starts Expert Oona Metz, whose new book Unhitched: The Essential Divorce Guide for Women was written for exactly that moment—when you need proof that someone else has been here, survived it, and is willing to sit beside you while you figure out what comes next. Oona doesn’t speak from theory alone. She speaks as a woman who has lived through divorce herself—twice—and spent decades walking alongside hundreds of women as they untangled their lives, identities, and hearts.
Unhitched is not a how-to manual or a checklist. It’s a companion. The book gently guides readers from the earliest whispers of “Should I stay?” through the practical and emotional realities of telling people, supporting children, navigating grief, setting boundaries, and rebuilding a sense of self. Oona weaves clinical insight with deeply human language, making space for the messiness—the simultaneous relief and devastation, the shame that lingers quietly, the identity shift that no one prepares you for. In this conversation, she shares how years of running divorce support groups planted the seeds for the book, and why she felt compelled to write something that centered the emotional journey of divorce—something that didn’t exist when she needed it most.
What makes this episode especially powerful is Oona’s vulnerability. Writing Unhitched required her to confront the shame she still carried as a therapist who had been divorced twice—and to model the very honesty she invites readers into. Together, Olivia and Oona talk about divorce as a life transition we don’t culturally prepare for, the quiet courage it takes to reach for help, and the healing power of knowing you’re not alone. This episode—and this book—are for anyone standing at the edge of a life change, wondering if it’s okay to open the door. You don’t have to walk through it yet. You just have to know there’s someone waiting on the other side.
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