Ep #54: A Good Divorce with Sarah Armstrong

Mikki: I'm Mikki Gardner, and this is the Co-Parenting with Confidence Podcast, Episode Number 54, A Good Divorce with Sarah Armstrong. [music] Mikki: Welcome to Co-Parenting with Confidence. A podcast for those courageous moms out there who wanna move past the conflict and frustration of divorce and show up as the mom they truly wanna be. My name's Mikki Gardner. I'm a certified life and conscious parenting coach with my own personal dose of co-parenting experience. Throughout my co-parenting journey, I have learned to become confident in who I am as a woman and a mother, and I'm here to help you do the same. If you're ready to learn what it takes to become a great co-parent and an amazing example to your children, well get ready, and let's dive into today's episode. Mikki: Welcome back, friend. I'm so excited that you're joining me here today. I know that there are so many things you could be doing and so many amazing podcasts that you have available to listen to, and I'm super grateful that you're here with me today. If you're new here, I wanna say welcome, and I'm so glad that you found me. So have you ever had one of those conversations with a friend and later you wish that you'd recorded it so you could share it with someone else. Well, that's what happened in this episode today. I had the opportunity to talk with Sarah Armstrong. She is a proponent of good divorces and the author of The Mom's Guide to a Good Divorce. She's also Vice President in Global Marketing Operations at Google. Right? Amazing. And she's the proud mom of Grace, who was seven when Sarah got divorced, and Grace is now a sophomore in college. Mikki: Sarah is a mentor to women in business, but also in personal life. And so I really wanted to have her on so that we could have a conversation around what is a good divorce. Because often times we don't even think that those two words go together. And so I love this conversation and how passionate Sarah is about offering another way, offering another opportunity to look at divorce. Sarah and I have so many things in common, and we were really, I think, just drawn together. And so I love that we were able to have this conversation and I wanna share it with you. So without further ado, let's take a listen. Well, hello, I am so excited for today. I get to have a conversation about something that I love the idea of and with an amazing woman, Sarah Armstrong. So Sarah, welcome, and thank you for coming today. Sarah: Mikki, thank you so much for having me. Mikki: Yeah, so I told everyone a little bit about you at the beginning, but I would love for you to sort of tell us who you are, what you do, and why this book and this mission, why you have it. Sarah: Oh, okay, well, thank you. So I'm a working mom. I have a daughter that I had the pleasure of raising both with my ex-husband and then in a kind of single working mom stage. And we got divorced when she was seven. And at that point, I'll be honest, I didn't think that I was ever gonna get divorced. That, obviously, isn't something that people plan for. Mikki: No. [chuckle] Sarah: And I like to say actually, just for the record, I'm actually not even an advocate for divorce. I actually think in an ideal world, couples that get married, stay happily married for the long term. And unfortunately, sometimes that's not always the case and so these days it's more common than ever. And so when I went through my divorce, I was one of the first of my friends to go through this, so I kind of was going through it on my own. And also the mental model of divorces that I grew up with... And I should also say my parents are happily married. They've been married for 54 going on 55 years. So my picture of marriage was very much long-term. But I had seen some pretty ugly divorces growing up, and so I had that in my head. Sarah: And so at the point when it became clear that this is the path that we were gonna be going down, I really wanted to step back and figure out how to do it differently. And I just thought there had to be a way where it wasn't this negative cloud that follows you through your whole life. And so that was kind of the approach I took as I started talking to my ex-husband, or husband at the time, about how I wanted to go through this divorce together. And with Grace really as the focus and really figuring out what was the best thing for her at every step of the journey. And one of the things I reflect on, Mikki, is no one gets married to get divorced. Right? Mikki: Nope. Sarah: And no one gets divorced for positive reasons, unfortunately, there's always something that's driven you to that decision. But the children don't get to make a decision that their parents are getting a divorce. And their lives are the most significantly impacted. And so that was the reflection for me is like, what can we do so Grace's life... It's gonna be impacted by this divorce, but I didn't want it to be so significantly impacted that it was the defining kind of aspect of her life. Mikki: Yeah, I love that. Well, I don't love it for your daughter, but I love that you had that sort of awareness. Sarah: Yeah. Mikki: How did you... If you look back... Hindsight being 20/20. How do you think you had that awareness to... That there was a way to do this differently? Sarah: I just felt there had to be a way to do it differently. I didn't know what it was. And honestly, at the time I didn't know what it looked like. I just felt like it was so apparent to me that... What I'd watched growing up, I felt like there had to be a better way. So as I just started thinking about the steps along that journey, I just... It was a very conscious effort. And I go back to it and I talk about... It's a mindset. Your mindset is essential. And if at the end of the day you can take and kind of a... It sounds crazy to say a positive mindset. But a spirit of positive intent. Like what you're trying to do is best for your children, and you start with that. Then as you go through the discussions you need to have and the decisions you need to make about your children during this process then that starts to kind of pave a path that's, quite honestly, different than what I watched growing up. And that's what I was trying to do. Sarah: And the concept of a "good divorce" which I talk about. First, Grace, my daughter was actually the one that defined it for me. And we were at a CVS right about a year after our divorce. And we're standing at the check out line and there was a People magazine on this news stand, and there was a celebrity couple getting divorced. And she looks at me and she goes, "Mommy, is that a good divorce or a bad divorce?" And I stopped and I said, "Grace, I don't know. What's the difference between a good divorce and a bad divorce?" She goes, "Well, a good divorce is when the mommy and daddy are nice to each other like you and daddy, and a bad divorce is when they scream and yell at each other." Mikki: And I said, I reflected for a minute, I go, "Grace, it's hard to tell what type of divorce that is from the magazine cover," but as I walked out of that CVS that day, Mikki, I thought, whatever my ex-husband and I were doing at that stage, a year post-divorce, we were on that right path. I felt like we were doing things that could have Grace at age eight say that we had a good divorce, and so that was a moment. Mikki: That was a moment, yeah. Sarah: It was basically affirmation that we were taking the right steps for her to feel that way. Mikki: I love that. They give us such wisdom, those [chuckle] little children we're given. Sarah: So much wisdom. [chuckle] So much wisdom. Mikki: And such a simple, profound view for her to be able to recognize that there's a difference in what is working for her and what wouldn't. Sarah: Absolutely. And then going back to your question early about the intent, like it's just something so there's enough conversation in society about the topic about having a good divorce, and so that's one of my goals, quite honestly, is to shift societal perception that it's an attainable outcome, that this is actually possible. And you know, I had a number of girlfriends after I went through my divorce that were contemplating this path, and they would come to me and ask for my help, and they said, "You've had such a good divorce. Could you give me some tips?" Sarah: And so I'd go through the... And I always, again, say I'd want them to work through everything so they could look at their kids and say, "I did everything I could, and this is the only outcome that we could get to." And so I took them each through their respective journeys over a number of years, and about five years post-divorce, I was at a business dinner in Mexico City, and one of my colleagues turned to me and he said, "Sarah," he said, "You're so happy," and I said, "Well, yeah, I'm really happy." He goes, "But you're divorced." And I said, "Solomon, getting divorce is not a death sentence. My ex-husband and I decided to no longer be married to each other." And I said, "I'm happy, Grace is happy, and my ex-husband's happy." I go, "We're all happy. Yes, it is possible." Sarah: And I mentioned to him that a number of my friends that I'd helped through had told me that I should write this guidance down, and I honestly, Mikki, have never considered myself a writer. I'm a business... I'm a bullet point business writer in terms of my day-to-day communications, and so I left that dinner in Mexico City and got on a plane the next morning and I opened my laptop and I actually wrote the first lines that said, "This book is written by a girl who never ever thought she would get a divorce, who got a divorce, and what she learned along the way." Mikki: Oh, it brings tears to my eyes. I love that you did that. And as I said at the beginning of the show, you're a very successful businesswoman. You have an entire career in life and really chose to take the time, because you're passionate about this topic as am I, and I found it interesting when we chatted, we have so many similarities in our sort of background, and I too am not an advocate for divorce. I always say, avoid it. Because we screw up our children... Just in parenting, we... You screw them up. You're just trying to minimize the damage, right? Sarah: Yeah. [chuckle] Mikki: I just am adding to my kid's therapy fund. Every time I make a mistake, $20 bucks in. Like, "Okay, you're gonna need that when you're 30." But divorce, it does. It shatters sort of the norm, the expectation, the level of certainty that children have, and maybe it's not great, but there's this process. It's going to hurt, but there's also what I love about your message in your book is that good can come of it. Happiness is still an option. Sarah: It is. Mikki: And so that's why I really wanted to have this conversation is to help see that it is a choice, 100%, each and every day. Sarah: Absolutely. Mikki: On how we move through this, and so, as you said, you... I love how concise and just bite-size all of the advice in here is. It's just really so good, and so I'd be curious, if you had two or three things that you feel maybe starting out or on the journey, what would you want people to know? Sarah: Yeah, well, first of all, thank you, and just going back to the book for a moment, I did write it in those bite-size pieces because I think when you're going through a divorce, the... Actually, I was given books at the beginning of my divorce, and they were thick and they were dense and I opened them and I closed them. I never read them. I literally never read them. I was like, "I can't even handle that right now." So when I went to design the book, I did design it just where there's a topic per page. And with that, if you just wanna read one topic and process that one topic, great. You don't have to... It's not meant to be read cover to cover. Sarah: But a couple of pieces of guidance. One that I think really struck home for me, and it was a moment, probably one of the most poignant moments early on in our divorce process, is we were about to tell Grace that we were getting a divorce, and we went through actually what's called a collaborative divorce, and we went to see a child specialist that was gonna help... Was gonna see Grace once we told her that we were getting divorced. And we sat down, my ex-husband and I sat down with him and he looked at me and goes, "So Sarah, do you travel?" And I said, "Yes, I travel internationally for my job," and he looks at my ex-husband and he goes, "Do you travel?" And he said, "Yes, I travel domestically." He said, "Well, Grace is about to become a professional traveler. She's gonna travel for the next 11 years, back and forth every week between your two homes." Sarah: And I just burst into tears, Mikki. I literally had this pit in my stomach and I thought, "That is not what I want for her. That is not what I want for her." So we walked out of that session and I looked at my ex-husband and said, "We have got to do whatever we can to minimize the feeling that Grace is packing a bag every week." And so now some of this has some socio-economic considerations I pre-shape as I go into this, but what we try to do is make sure that at both homes that the basics were there. So we had extra jeans and extra socks and two pairs of running shoes, the things that would allow Grace to literally walk out of one house with her backpack for school and show up at another house and not feel like she had to carry an extra bag to school and be... [0:13:34.4] ____. Sarah: Which a lot of kids have to do. They're going to mom's house or they're going to dad's house and take my overnight bag. And so I just, you know, the special things... Grace played golf, so we didn't get two sets of golf clubs, we had one, but there's... Wherever we could have the basics there and covered, we did. And sometimes I called them rebalancing days, where things would get out of balance. Somehow all the socks ended up at one house. Mikki: Of course. Sarah: I don't know how that happens, but so on a Sunday, I would say to my ex-husband, "We need to re-balance." But then a key part to that is it wasn't for Grace to go and figure out what needed to be taken to both homes, and it wasn't for Grace to actually carry it into the other person's home. That is not her job. She's a child. She should be able to get out of the car and go in and do whatever she has to do. So my ex-husband and I would do that, and we would bring whatever stack of clothes or items and say, "Hey, here's the rebalancing pile." And these are small things, Mikki, to your point, but they all add up for attempts. They all cumulatively add up, and so that was an example of something we were very conscious about, and it took extra effort. It did take some extra investment in the basics, but I will tell you to this day, I look back and think we did do all we could to minimize Grace feeling like she was a professional traveler. Mikki: Yeah, I really appreciate that because I think it's the child-center approach. Sarah: Yes. Mikki: The constant question to be asking is, "How can I minimize the impact here? What is best for my child?" And then figuring out how to do that. There is nothing more infuriating when the favorite pair of jeans ends up at the other house, and I watch people get so angry and so upset, and, "He didn't give me back the jeans, and I can't believe it, and that jeans. And the jeans. And the jeans." [laughter] Sarah: No, it is. It's true. Mikki: And it becomes this huge emotional thing where can we... And you talk a little bit about this, but it's like, "Can I take myself out of this picture and would I still have the same argument for Grace or my son, Leland?" And I think the ability to separate that, to stay focused helps tremendously. Sarah: Tremendously. And I'll give you my own. Yes, so there was a morning where Grace came down, and she's like, "My dress-up shoes are at dad's house." Now we only had one pair of dress-up shoes, and I said... And I had to stop for a minute and breathe, 'cause I'm thinking, "I don't really have time to go get the dress-up shoes," 'cause it's dress-up day at school, but I'm like, "Okay, Grace, let's go go to dad's house and get your dress-up shoes." Again, not her fault. I didn't want to make her feel badly. It wasn't her fault. By the way, I'm not even sure it was my ex-husband's fault. He didn't know it was dress-up day, so it's no one's fault. It's just the reality, but it's having the... You just have to press pause for a second, take a really deep breath, and say, "We just have to deal with this. We'll get through this and then move on." Sarah: And it does take... I talk about, in my book, a really important muscle that we have to build, I think of life, by the way, not just if you're going through a divorce, but developing a compartmentalization muscle. So this is something that I've reflected on a lot, and it's basically that there are gonna be times when your emotions are high. If your emotions are high, then you need to decide, "Is this now the time that I even need to be around my children, around anyone, quite honestly?" because if those emotions need to come out, let them come out and they do need to come out. I'm not saying to bury them. But in the moments when you are with your children and you are having emotions, there is a compartmentalization that we need to do of those emotions at that time because your kids do not need to see every emotion you're feeling through this process. It's not helpful for them. Sarah: It's not. It is literally I think one of the most damaging things we can do, is share every one of those emotions with them because they're on that roller coaster with you. And so I talk about the fact that when we become parents, we actually... First of all, the stakes are so high. We're raising little human beings, and we owe it to our children that they're not collateral damage due to this divorce. And I think that even if a couple has decided to no longer be married, they made a commitment to their children to bring them into the... Bring them into the healthiest environment possible, and I joke that we cover the plugs, and we put bike helmets on them, and we have them drink organic milk. Sarah: We do all these things to make sure they're safe and healthy and happy, but then the toxicity that can come with the emotions of what happens during a divorce and even after divorce can have a huge impact on kids, on their view on relationships, their view on marriage, actually their overall happiness in life. And so I literally think it's our responsibility as parents to co-parent and take that so seriously, and also use a compartmentalization muscle when you need to so that your kids are not feeling like they have this literally negative cloud following them throughout their life because they do not deserve that. Mikki: They don't. Sarah: And by the way, neither you as a person, neither should you. It's like you all shouldn't have to live under a negative cloud. It is an action. You get divorced. It's an action. But there is a life after that that can be very healthy and happy if you approach it in a certain... Mikki: Yeah. So there's a couple things that as you were talking, it's... You know, I teach and I talk a lot about on the podcast is that, essentially, our brain just functions the way that it does. But when our emotions go high, literally our primitive brain is taking over, we're being flooded with chemicals and physical reactions and all kinds of things. And when that happens, our logical thinking decreases because the energy can only go to feed one or the other. So it goes all to the emotion. And I think what you'd so beautifully described is hitting the pause button, taking a breath. And being... Really learning those tools to be able to regulate your emotion so that you can come back online and make the choice that you want to. Sarah: Absolutely. Mikki: And because we're never making choices that we absolutely love from a high emotional place. Sarah: No, agreed. Agreed. And those emotional decisions, I mean, again, because emotions run so high during a divorce process, and the decisions you're making are very significant in terms of both the short term of what's gonna happen with your children in your life and the long term. Mikki: Long term. Sarah: And so if you're in that high emotional state and you're having to make some decisions, you do have to step back and say, is now, is right now the right time to do this? Or can I kind of step back, pause, take a breath, take a long walk, do whatever it is to kind of rebalance to your point and kind of create the space for you to think clearly about what is the right decision that you're trying to make, or what reaction you're trying to have in a certain situation. But, by the way, Mikki, I appreciate what you and I are saying right now, it feels very hard to do in the moment. Mikki: So hard. Sarah: Really hard to do in the moment. But if you consciously go in saying, "I'm gonna try to do it that way. I'm gonna try a different way." I do think, you might not do it every time, there's gonna be a day that you're like, "Oh, I do that differently." But I do think if you have the intent of approaching it that way, then you, more often than not, you're going to be in a better place than if you hadn't tried. Mikki: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think too, one of the things is that we do all make mistakes. We're supposed to make mistakes. Right? It's how we learn. Marie Forleo has one of my very favorite sort of sayings on this, but she says that fail means in a faithful attempt in learning. Sarah: Oh, I like that. Mikki: And we should fail often. And we should fail big because we're trying and we're learning. And I think to your point, 'cause I'm always thinking about sort of the mom listening to this who probably is saying, "But you don't know how hard it is." Right? Maybe she and her ex don't get along. Maybe it's combative. Maybe there's a lot of conflict. And still you can learn those tools to be able to take a step back. As simple as the the 24-hour rule. When the text comes in, there's a reaction, but often as we just said, that's not where you wanna go. So maybe you just take 24 hours. Unless it's life or death, we can probably take a little bit of time to think it through before so we can choose a response. Sarah: Absolutely. Absolutely. And then there is times, Mikki, where I think you can practice that positive intent and show it to both your child and to others. So another poignant moment in our journey, and it was actually five years after we got divorced, was Grace was in sixth grade and we were going into a parent-teacher conference. And we sat down and in this conference at the school that she was going to, the child attends with the parents, so it was ex-husband and myself and Grace in a room with her teacher. And we're sitting there and we're talking, and it was about an hour long conference. And at the end the teacher stopped. She goes, "Wait a minute. Are you two divorced?" And I stopped and I said, "Yeah, yeah, we are. We've actually been divorced for five years." She goes, "Well, I had no idea." And I said, "You know what? It didn't occur to me to tell you." To walk in, be like, "By the way, we're divorced. Can we now talk about Grace's education?" So she said to me, and this was what really stuck with me, and she said, "You would be surprised how few couples who are divorced can come into this office and sit here with their child and talk about their child's education for one hour." She said it is very, very rare. Mikki: Ugh. Breaks my heart. Sarah: Yeah. And she goes, "It makes me very sad." And I said, "You know what? It makes me very sad too." By the way, Grace is here in this whole discussion. Mikki: Sure. Sarah: Okay. And I said, "It makes me very sad too." And you know, I thought about it after that. I'm reflective of like, what is more important for two parents than going in and hearing how their child is doing in school, regardless. Now there are instances where someone does not wanna be in the physical presence of the other person, and I totally respect that. And then you have separate conferences. But in many instances, I think if you can find those moments where you show that you are this child's parent, and you're there for them, not just for them, but for the people around them that are seeing it, it helps build kind of a belief that they're gonna be okay, right? And that they can have a normal life and go to school and have their parents both at parent-teacher conference or have their parents both show up to their sporting event or their play. And actually maybe if, ideally sitting either next to each other or close in the same area, so when kid looks up to look for mom and dad, they're seeing both of you. They're not having to look at two sides of the field and say, "Oh, mom's over there and dad's over there." So again, these are all choices we make every day of how we show up for our children in these moments, that reinforces an approach and an intent. Mikki: Exactly. And that's... I love the way that you just put that because a lot of people will say, "Well if I do that I'm letting them get away with things." Or they think that everything that happened is water under the bridge. But it's really again, sort of you get to process your healing, all of the things, but keeping it very child-focused. And, like you said, if it's not possible, if there's conflict where there's all that, you can have that honest conversation. And I think to the point of what do I need to share and what do I wanna share with my child? And especially as it relates to our vulnerabilities and our shortcomings. They don't need the details of what happened, but when I make a mistake, which I do often in co-parenting. Sarah: Yes. [chuckle] Mikki: You know, like, what was it the other day I did something and he's like, "Oh, dad didn't want me to do that." And I went, "Oh my God." Oh, cut his hair. [laughter] Mikki: And I was like, "Wait, what?" And it didn't even occur to me to call and ask about this, like it seemed... And I thought, "Oh man." I said, "Leland, did mom make a big mistake here?" I said, "Should we have called?" And I said, you know what? I gotta reach out. And he's like, "Ah, don't worry about it." But I said, "No, it's the right thing to do. I might have mis-stepped here, I need to do it." And I do think, again, not that we're doing things perfectly, but it's saying to our modeling, right? I make mistakes. Sarah: Absolutely. Mikki: And what do I do? Right? Sarah: You reach out and you clarify. Or you make sure that you... Yeah. I do think there's a vulnerability that comes through this process and to your point, it's just a matter of which aspects of the vulnerability we're sharing with our children. And which parts we just need to talk to a friend about, or again, have a conversation with yourself in a long walk. But there's things that could and should be shared and there's things that probably should not be shared because of the impact it has on the children and their own emotional wellbeing. Because if we put our children in that toxic environment day in and day out, regardless of how healthy and happy we want them to be, they're going to live with that toxicity. Mikki: Yeah. Sarah: And it has a long term impact. It really does. And so that's the thing I just want us all to kind of again, step back and reflect on is, what do we want our children to be... And I say this, I said I want Grace to say down the road, "My parents got divorced, but they did the best they could." That's all you can ask. Right? And that's why I said to Grace always, I'm like, "Mom's doing the best I can sweetie." [chuckle] And again, just, some days better than others, but I'm doing the best I can and that's something I think children can appreciate that you're doing the best you can. Mikki: Yeah. And I think to do that also it requires, and I know you mentioned this in the book, but support. Right? Getting the support you need, so you do have the outlet to talk to other people about what's going on. Whatever that is. What are the ways that you recommend for people to get that support and when? Sarah: Yeah. There's such a range of support. First obviously there's professional support and I went through many years of therapy to think through things and that's important. There's your friends and family and deciding who do you wanna bring into that inner circle where you're really honest about all that's going on. I would say choose wisely on that because... [chuckle] Well, 'cause you don't wanna be, you don't wanna be the talk of the town on all things. It's not really anyone else's business quite honestly, except for those that are gonna give you the support you need to get through this next phase. And then I also think just, I mean, I walk a lot and I think also just giving yourself the space and the time, and again, a lot of us, we're trying to juggle so much, but giving yourself the own time to just kind of process and be with yourself and your thoughts is also support, but it's a different type of support. And so I do think it comes from the professional, the family, the friends and your own support of yourself of what helps you get through this. Mikki: Yeah. I love that. And I always tell people, 'cause it really stuck with me that typically the sort of range is, it'll take a year or two for the parents to kind of level out from the divorce, from sort of all the emotions. And then at that point is when the child's healing can begin. Sarah: Yes. Oh gosh, Mikki, yes. And I talk about it in my book. I talk about recovering from a divorce hangover while still driving carpool every morning. Mikki: Yes. God, I love that analogy. [chuckle] Sarah: 'Cause you're getting up and you are still struggling with the day-to-day and what this looks like and this new life and you're a single parent and... Mikki: All of it. Sarah: All of it. And so that's how I refer to it. And I talk about it is a real hangover. Your point, it's a year, maybe two in the making, but you will get out of it. Mikki: You will. Sarah: It won't... Hangovers do not last for forever. And so I think that one of the things is recognizing that that first year post-divorce, I talk about the year of first. Mikki: Yeah. I love that. Sarah: There's a lot of year of first, there's first birthdays, there's your wedding anniversary that's no longer your wedding anniversary. There's family vacations. So, there's all of these moments and I think when you go through the year of first, and to your point earlier about making mistakes or wanting to do things differently, at least from my experience, I went through my year of first and some of them I'm like, "Oh, that worked well, that was good. Okay." Right? We started a new tradition, "Ooh, we're gonna do that again next year." And then there were some that were really hard and I'll... I mean really probably the toughest thing I still think to this day, it's the toughest thing about divorce is splitting holidays, and not having your child on a holiday that you normally would. Mikki: Yep. Sarah: And my first holiday without Grace, that first year, I decided I had gone home to be with my family and my nieces and nephews, everyone's running around and I thought, "I'm not doing this. This is hard." And so now when we're alternating, even to this day, the years I don't have Grace, I go away. I have a wonderful person in my life and we go away together and I do not, I don't put myself in that situation 'cause it's just emotionally really hard. And even years later I just think, Grace is supposed to be with me here, she's not, and I'm just not gonna do that. And so it is, those are moments, but you do, you learn in that year of first what you wanna continue and those things that you do wanna change and try some different models. It may be very non-traditional in approach, but they may be what you need to do. And maybe not for forever, but for a period of time until, to your point, things kind of normalize, and you see what works for you. Yeah. But it's, yeah... That year of first is a big one. Mikki: It is. Sarah: It's a big one. Mikki: Well, I would sit here and talk with you all day, but I wanna be respectful of your time and the listener's time. So I have one final question which I ask everyone because it is co-parenting with confidence. So how do you define confidence and how does it show up in your life? Sarah: Oh, great question. I think for me, I think confidence is a belief that you're trying to do the best you can do every day. And that you're gonna learn from that and you're gonna be better the next time because of what you learned from the experience you just had. And I try to model that both in my life and with Grace from a parenting standpoint. To your point, there's days when I think, "Oh, that I did that well." In other days I'm like, "Oh... " [chuckle] Not so much. And so with that, I get confidence though. I'm like, okay, I'll learn from that and the next time I do that I'm gonna be much more confident. Mikki: Yeah. Sarah: In that moment that I'm supposed to do, whether it's as a parent or it's in the world, so I think that that's how I kind of view confidence, is it's... And also by the way, building and maintaining confidence in who you are is a journey. And it's never over. It's a life journey to figure out how we can be confident in life. But I do appreciate the learning process that comes with building confidence. Mikki: Yes. Well, you... I think when you look up growth mindset, I think your picture might be there. [laughter] Mikki: Angela Duckworth would be so proud. But... Sarah: Thank you. Thank you. Mikki: You really are a beautiful example of a good divorce and that there is another way, and I just am so grateful for you spending time with us today and sort of offering an example of that 'cause I talk about it, but I really love when I'm able to have other people on that really are beautiful examples of just trying it a different way. 'Cause there is. So thank you so much for your time and for connecting with us. Sarah: Thank you so much for having me, Mikki. And I do just want those that are going through this really challenging time to know that a good divorce is an attainable outcome. It really is, and it just, it takes that mindset and I hope everyone can go down that path if they can. Mikki: Yeah. And where can they get your book? Sarah: Great question. So my book is available. It's available on Amazon and in Barnes & Noble, but it's available as a paperback, as an ebook, iBook, Kindle. And also I went into the studio and did an audible version. So there's also an audio version. Mikki: Oh, amazing. Sarah: Yeah. So I feel like those that are going through this process, depending on where you are on the stage, it may be easier to put it in audible and go for a walk, or you wanna look at it on your iPad. So the three options are there and hopefully it helps those that need it. Mikki: Well, thank you. Thank you so much for the book and for your time today. I appreciate it. Sarah: Thank you so much for having me, Mikki. Mikki: I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. I really took so many things away and I wanted to point out a couple of those things here. One of the things that Sarah said is that children of divorce become professional travelers. This is true. And so our main priority is to really start to minimize that traveling, that feeling of being a traveler, in whatever capacity you can do it to make sure that they don't have to be the one bearing the brunt of moving things from place to place is so important. The second takeaway is really keep things very child-centered. This is where we have to use our compartmentalization muscle. And this is a muscle that you build over time, but they don't need to see every emotion. They don't need to hear about every mistake or failure. Mikki: And so if you feel like you are on the roller coaster and you don't want them to have that same experience, we need to compartmentalize, to separate, so that you can be very conscious and keep it very focused on what your child should or shouldn't be experiencing. The third takeaway is really hit that pause button so that you can choose, so that you can make those choices. The fourth takeaway I wanted to point out is when Sarah said, "Divorce is an action, it is not a life sentence," could not be more true. And the fifth is modeling the behavior you want. In the end, she wanted her child to be able to say, "You know what? My mom and dad did everything they could to try to make it work, and when they couldn't, they did everything they could to make it the best for me." Mikki: That's really all that we wanna aim for. And so if we work on modeling that behavior over and over and over each and every day. I'm so grateful for you listening. I'm so grateful for Sarah's time and if you enjoyed this interview as much as I did and found it useful, I'd be so grateful if you would share it with others. I'd love hanging out over on Instagram. And so if you share it there, just tag me. I'd love to connect with you or just take a screenshot and text it or email it to someone who you know could really use some advice on a good divorce. Thank you for spending this time with me. I'll see you next week. And in the meantime, take really, really good care of you friend. Thanks for listening to Co-Parenting with Confidence. If you want more information or resources from this podcast, visit coparentingwithconfidence.com. I'll see you next week. [music]