Therapy Works

BONUS EP: Vanessa Vander on how her divorce made her feel like a failure

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Vanessa describes with great honesty her experience of living with an alcoholic husband. The difficult decision to end her marriage and the resulting challenges she faced. Her loneliness, along with the necessary reframing of her future.


45% of marriages end in divorce which can lead us to treat it as ‘part of life.’ In this conversation we hear how very personal that experience is, and what a loss.


In this episode we discuss: 

  • What led to the end of her 8 year relationship and how painful and hard it was to acknowledge that it was the end.
  • Vanessa describes her loss for the future she imagined, and the fear this new unknown engendered in her.
  • It was the first time she felt she had failed, and how difficult that was.
  • As Vanessa experienced her loss it took her to the point of not wanting to wake up in the morning.
  • Given how labile and emotional the separation was, the actual divorce was mechanical and discombobulating.
  • How over time she managed to create a new version of herself.
  • Vanessa couldn’t control what she felt, but she found that she had agency in building her resilience.
  • Vanessa was helped by her toolkit of resources: exercise, friends, parents and setting goals like the marathon.
  • Through this she did find growth and discovered she could survive difficult challenges.


    • Links mentioned in episode:

    • Sophie mentions the Therapist Uncensored Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/therapist-uncensored-podcast/id1146941306  
    • Julia mentions a paper by Jeffrey Arnett on Emerging Adulthood: http://www.jeffreyarnett.com/ARNETT_Emerging_Adulthood_theory.pdf

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      Therapy WorksBy Julia Samuel
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