E230: How to Have Hard Conversations around Heartbreak, Breakups and Divorce with Sallyanne Hartnell

Sallyanne Hartnell is a Relationship & Divorce Coach, blogger & podcaster.

Your divorce wing-woman, Sallyanne helps her clients answer the big questions they’re asking about their relationship, shift unhealthy relationship patterns, decide whether to stay or leave, & divorce with less drama.

She empowers you to see divorce as an opportunity to open your heart & mind to possibility. To reframe your story, reclaim your life & liberate yourself for a future you’re excited about…

[01:10] Valerie LaVigne: Welcome back to The Women's Empowerment Podcast. I am thrilled to introduce you to a brand new guest of the show. Sallyanne. Welcome to the Women's Empowerment Podcast. It is an absolute pleasure to have you here today.

Sallyanne Hartnell: It is great to be excited to share some space with you.

VL: I'm really looking forward to this conversation. Our style of guests we've had on the show we've had a handful of different coaches, but no one such as yourself. So I'd love for you to introduce yourself and share a little bit more about your story. How you got to where you are today?

SH: Thank you.

I am a relationship coach. I started my business four and a half years ago and it took me a while to really accept the nudges that the universe was sending me to step into this work. I have two young adult children. One is 21 and one is 18. And I divorced. Their father and I separated when they were six and eight. thereabouts. It's going outside, finding it difficult to remember And we did that really amicably. We are still friends, my family still treat him as sort of an extended family member. We get along quite well.

And when we divorced, I moved to a different area.

Outlines of Melbourne, Australia when we were based and people did not realize for some time we were divorced because we'd turn up to the primary school we'd turn up to sporting events for our kids seemingly together, talking laughing and the kids to just move comfortably between us. And so once they realized in their community that most people would sort of ask questions. Well, how did you do it? How are you still friends, you know, and I would be having conversations with mostly women, who were Western separating the divorce like yours.

So that was one part of it. and the other part of it was when we did when we're negotiating and navigating our way through our separation and divorce. I was really looking for that next level of support, someone who was not your best friend, someone who was not a lawyer, someone who was not.

And I realized years later of course that what I was really looking for was someone to hold my hand and steam through just the complexities of what separation and divorce bring up for you as a woman as an individual as a human as a family. and that just didn't that service just didn't exist. So those are two components of why I lived experience.

listening to the not just universe I reached life coach and now I specialize, working with humans who are separated.

{04:13} VL: It's so incredible and so unique and the story that you've just shared makes complete sense to how you got into what you're doing. And I think what makes you so great at what you do is that you have had that lived experience and again, people are looking to you as whether that's proof or evidence or what it could be for them. I have not personally been married or separated. for that matter. However, I have seen a lot of relationships.

Some of those relationships are amicable. I have an aunt and an uncle who come to events together, they still go for dinner together and go to the movies together and their children are adults with their own children. And so it's nice to have them both at family functions and I still refer to this woman as my aunt even though you know they're not married anymore and all this but then I also know relationships that don't have that same connection and they don't want the same room together and they don't want to be part of extended families and whatnot and I can imagine with children, there is an even deeper layer to all of the things that come up. And just speaking from what I've been able to see from what I've learned from listening to your podcasts and watching you online, is that you know there's not one right way and there's not one particular path. There are lots of different options and it's really dependent on the family, the situation the people and so on. So it's really incredible to have someone like you in their corner like you said, holding hands with them through this journey because, again, I can only imagine the feelings that would come up and the questions and the uncertainties and, you know, one of the things I've been able to, I guess recognize in these types of situations just as an outsider as a friend of someone going through these things is that there's a lot of unknowns. There seems to be a lot of shame around divorce or separation, especially with families and so I wonder if we can speak a little bit to that today to maybe it's the how to call it the overwhelm the feelings that come up. How would you describe everything?

SH: Everything? Yeah, I often talk about overcoming the overwhelm. Now that and that happens with whether it's an actual dissolution of a marriage or it's just a separation from a long term partnership. So much comes up, even before you make the decision to separate berries that rumination that constant asking of questions over and over and over fixation on the same questions not being able to see your way through that overwhelm. And yeah, that's part of what I help my clients to do.

When families are involved with children involved, and as you said, there's a next layer of complexity.

It's really important to have somebody whether it's a coach, whether it's your best friend, whether it's your counselor lawyer who can help you unpack and unravel and come back to what is the one thing I need to get done today. What is the one thing I need to move forward? What's going to move the needle forward? Does that answer your question?

VL: Really overcoming that overwhelm. And I'm curious if you know a little bit more about the shame part of it, because I think that's what I guess I really curious to know is that I don't know what the statistics are now, but I've heard it's over 50% of marriages end in divorce. is that right to have marriages

SH: That is the case in Australia and I know in the states and I'm assuming Canada is similar.

VL: I mean, just based on the people I know I can probably think of half of my community is divorce and yet there's so much of this discomfort. Shame. How, how do we move through that piece of those feelings?

SH: I think the shame comes up because we're also still that happy ever after story that there is one person out there for us there is you know, you go out and you find your person. You commit to a relationship or long term partnership or marriage with them. You create a family and we're we're still sold that that is the story that's the only story. And so if you're if your life doesn't play along the lines of that story, then it's wrong.

And I really want to shift that I really want to shift that credibly story because it's there are so many ways to live a life there are so many ways to be connected and in relationship with other humans. And sometimes those relationships around their cause. And whether that's if that's a marriage, and that involves a divorce. That can be just a completion rather than something that's broken, or wrong or bad. So I think if we can shift the story that there is one person out there for you, that it's a happily ever after. and it's a forever commitment. If we can shift that story, then we can start to release that embedded, embedded shame that I think particularly women tend to feel.

I think there's, you know, Disney and movies and the media still have a lot to answer for in terms of selling us that store that, you know, we need to go out and find the one and create it for ourselves and if it doesn't end up with the happily ever after. It really can embed an audit by that.

[10:14] VL: I've heard you talking about the myths of love Before and how it's so easy to get caught up in those Disney Fantasy, whatever it is stories that we've been told and so to be able to rewrite that. Those were ingrained. When I was a kid, I was watching those movies and listening to those fairy tales.

I definitely mean I've seen some of the newer Disney movies and there definitely seems to be a shift happening in the narrative which is great.

But still rewriting a lot of those scraps for sure. Is there any piece of advice for someone who may be someone such as myself who is going into a more serious partnership where marriage is on the table?

Those “legal commitments.” Is there any advice that you would give someone or even someone who's newly married for that matter? To help them with rewriting the script or to help them create that? you know, more meaningful, more realistic, but a more realistic story.

SH: Have the hard conversations. Don't silence yourself. Don't silence your voice. Don't push down your feelings. Allow all of that to come to the surface and find really healthy ways to communicate your wants, your needs, your desires, and to move through conflict.

I think there's still a lot of silencing of our own voice pushing down on the shutdown, and not being willing to step into hard conversations. Healthy, happy, long term relationships. Let's call them successful. in inverted commas. relationships aren't ones where there is no conflict. They are ones where each person in the relationship, each member of the relationship, is we're willing to stand in that discomfort and to move through conflict to a resolution. They're willing to show up and be vulnerable. They're willing to have the hard conversations. So in terms of shifting that narrative, shifting that story you know, if you think about the classic disaster, there's always a power imbalance about Cinderella and the Prince, you know, there's a power imbalance. So redressing that power imbalance coming in as two equal people committed to the relationship and moving forward.

committed to your own individual growth, but committed to the growth of the relationship that really involves having, having the hard conversations and bringing things to the table so that you can move through the conflict and come out the other.

[13:10] VL: I thought you were going to make it easy! Just kidding.

But in all seriousness, I will say that I definitely have experienced quite the maturity I have in the last several years and specifically with the relationship that I'm in now compared to the relationship that I was last and I remember making a commitment to myself, which was really similar to what you said, anymore. I'm not going to just let this person say and do and act how they want to act, even though it doesn't make me feel good. And so that was really empowering for me to leave that relationship as challenging as that was as heartbreaking as that was and of course it wasn't a divorce, but you know, breakups are hard.

SH: to break up with this the legal bit of the emotional and practical implications.

VL: When I was first dating my now partner, I, I definitely shied away from some of the conversations that he wanted to have, you know, he is older than I am.

He has more life experience than me in certain areas like buying a house, for example, and all these different parts of that part of his journey. And so, I actually had never lived with my partner before. So a lot of this was really new to me. And so he was bringing up these conversations like whoa, we just, we just started living together. We and it was a hesitancy for sure on my part, but I'm really glad that those conversations were open and even the fact that he wanted to have those conversations. That was a different feeling. So even though I was nervous to have it the fact that I was being met as a partner, and not just as this lesser whatever, like whatever you whatever the case may be, because so when you talk about those dynamics and the power imbalances, I see it a lot in relationships and so I do have a question about that because I can think of a handful of couples come to my mind where maybe one person is making more money, or one person has more quote unquote success in a different way than the other or passion for their job. or whatever it is, like there's always I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, there's always going to be some sort of imbalance in some area of relationship.

So what do you say to help come together in a way that, you know, maybe that one person can make as much money as their partner but is there somewhere else where there's a balance?

[16:11] SH: I'm going to answer it, you know, slightly sideways manner. And that is that I really believe what I know for healthy, happy couples with longevity.

They're each other's biggest cheerleader and champion. So, it's not a competition, makes more money, it's not a competition about who's more successful.

It's that each person is the other’s biggest cheerleader.

VL: Yep. *laughs* you’re coming in with the hard things.

It’s great to hear you say that because really, it's not. It's great to hear you share that because really, it's not just about or just about partnership.

To have your own goals, they can have their own goals, but you come together also as a team, so to me and us. And I really liked this philosophy because part of what I believe in, I'm a very independent person myself, I have lots of goals. I am building my brands and my businesses. You know, I started this podcast. We've talked about this before, but it's not something that I want to bring to my partner.

in terms of investing in my business or being the co-host of my podcast, or whatever that looks like but I want their support with it. So I also want them to have their own goals, their hobbies, their hopes and dreams so that I would love to support the cheerleader type of way as well. So it's nice to have those reminders or to hear that from someone.

Because sometimes it feels like we probably know this from the world and having a podcast. I feel like I'm talking to myself a lot of the time.

I love these guest episodes. But also, I don't know if my partner loves skydiving. I've never been skydiving. I don't know if I will go skydiving. I'm very excited for him to skydive, I will go to the skydiving place. And I will watch him so that's about as close as I'm getting to doing that right now. But the fact that we can support each other in these ways I definitely feel has been key to us coming together and understanding each other and supporting each other. So as much as you know the sideways answer.

SH: I definitely think it's really important to maintain that “You-Me-Us”. And the “Us” actually needs to be the first thing. So there's the Us and then there's Me, particularly when children become particularly when a couple has children, because oftentimes they lose focus on the past and that becomes less of a priority because this is me. There's two kids, there's the dog, there's work, there's the house and there's all the themes. So maintaining that as a priority. While still maintaining your own hopes, dreams, values, goals, whatever, maintaining the Us as a priority is really important in terms of not ending up needing to meet a divorce coach.

[19:39] VL: Yeah, I liked that you said “us” first. I liked what you said first because I know that you've said this on your podcast before you talked about how your relationships suffer. Batum but you talked about how healthy relationships and you don't want to forget about that last unit because our lives can be so busy that we forget about us and then we don't take time to go on those things and to an A relentless honeymoon phases of our relationship because we just get so caught up in all the other things so I'm really glad that you mentioned that as part together. really important. Now, this is great information for healthy relationships or how to maintain those. Well let's go back to divorce and separations because I made that point.

But let's say we are ruminating on the questions. we're leaning towards the decision. And as we are deciding that we are no longer ready to separate. Can you walk us through a little bit about, maybe not like the logistical process that perhaps the feelings and emotional piece of it and how we can grow from there?

[21:02] SH: I think the first thing that comes up For many once they've made the decision is if let's talk about it being a mutual decision, because if it's if you've been blindsided by your partner, then there's a different, whole different host of emotions and feelings and thoughts that need to be preserved. If this is a mutual decision, one of the first things that comes up Grace Because not only you're grieving, the loss of that partnership, you're grieving the loss of the happiness ever after that you thought you were going to have. So, allowing. Allowing grief to surface, processing, whatever healthy ways you choose to process it is really important.

I think if you want an amicable relationship going forward, particularly if you have children, if you're going to have to make because of the kids or young adults or finding ways to communicate effectively, is really important. You're getting divorced, you're separating your breaking out for really crisis and very often one of those reasons he's that he's struggling to communicate effectively with one another. So finding ways to dial down your nervous system to regulate your nervous system so that you can go into a conversation about logistics is really important to the shame that comes up for you again, process that for many of my clients who are amicably, jointly deciding to separate there's still a real sense of sadness.

Even those and I work predominantly with women, not not only with women, but even those women who they know it's done. I'm out here. It's my decision. He doesn't want to say, right, I'm out. There's still sadness and sometimes that is a surprise that hey, I chose this big now to be really sad and I'm really craving.

So processing, allowing, allowing or allowing all the other women, other clients. They're actually really happy. So if they get a bit upset sometimes when they're explaining to someone else that we've decided to separate, we're divorcing and everyone's like, well, actually, it might not be sad. So if, if you're the, what I call the first responder, if you are being told by a friend, relative colleague, that they've chosen to separate and divorce and don't respond with, oh, that's so sad. That tips people back into that shame back into that narrative of their happiness ever after. So be really open about the way you respond to someone who's sharing that separation or choosing to divorce.

Again, that was a bit of a sideways answer, but I always like to drop that in because that first response when somebody tells you that they're separating divorce, divorcing is really important and can actually inform the way their divorce processes if you whip it into a frenzy of oh my god, I really never liked him. he was always at this or she was always, you know, that can really trigger and activate the person that you're speaking with. and they can get sucked into that narrative. and that can snowball into a high conflict situation when it doesn't need to.

So yeah, if you had the first responder. Choose your words really gently.

[24:20] VL: That's so interesting that you say that because I can remember very vividly a time when the girls were getting together and one of the girlfriends Such and Such happened. Me and him are breaking up. and you could just see I mean, all of us were there, but each person had a very different response in her energy, the one who was sharing changed.

Like a yo yo roller. I was crazy. and I remember that, to me, was a moment where I was really present and I saw her but I felt very deeply for this friend of mine.

I'm not going to respond that way to where people say and so maybe give us definitely freaked out about that guy not working for me. And obviously she was feeling a lot of different ways.

And I just said, “I’m sorry to hear about what you’re going through, I can imagine you are experiencing a lot of feelings, is there anything I can do?”

Even though I totally didn’t like that guy and they were definitely wrong for eachother… *laughs* but what are some things that we could say in these situations?

[26:22] SH: I think what you just shared is almost perfect. That's big news. Because if you say “I'm sorry” that it's a bad thing. That's big news. How are you feeling?

“What do you need from me right now? I'm here for you, Let me know.” Because those kinds of things rather than projecting our own claims or whatever just reflecting back, that it's big money here.

[27:03] VL: Yeah *sigh* Because I’ve been there too, And I don’t want any unsolicited advice, what’s done is done. *laughs*

We are very emotional and excitable friends.

SH: They are reacting like that because they're invested in you and they love you, if you and they don't want you to be hurting, However, just tread really gently.

VL: I'm glad that you mentioned at the beginning of this conversation how you know, you weren't looking for a best friend, you weren't looking for a lawyer. you weren't looking for this and that The other thing just wanted someone to be there And in an unbiased way too, because yeah, you're my best friends are always going to pick my side, lay better.

Your family is probably gonna pick your side – maybe.

[28:46] SH: Exactly. Sometimes families don't. That can be really interesting and challenging when your family actually doesn't pick your side and doesn't have your back. So we've talked about family with dad because I find that breakups and separations. Sometimes it's not the partner.

VL: Sometimes it's a family member, a sibling, a parent, sometimes I have to distance myself from certain family members who love my family.

The boundaries have been crossed with that. So can we talk a little bit about maybe how do we? I don't know if I'd ever cut a family member out of my life, but I do know people who say I've never talked to my sister for 20 years or whatever the case may be so do you do that involve any of your work?

SH: Sometimes sometimes, but I think there are similarities in how we navigate that whether it's a divorce or sibling relationship.

Or any other kind of breakup relationship.

We break up relationships all the time, in different ways, shape or form doesn't have to be an intimate, intimate partner relationship. And I think the way we do the same, you know, if you feel that your boundaries have been transgressed, repeatedly, and you've communicated that back to the person that hey, this is not okay. And they keep pushing. They keep overstepping and they keep transgressing your boundaries and then it is time to break up. And I think it doesn't matter who it is. It can be a sister, cousin, parent.

Yeah, so I do I work with I work with clients for whom that's happening almost as a part of their divorce. There's a lot of judgment as we as as we have already spoken to in this podcast episode. There's a lot of judgment and sometimes that comes from your sister, your mother, your aunt, if you still females, your father, whoever it is that you were judged when we make big life decisions, and oftentimes if you've chosen to leave a relationship or let's say there's been infidelity and other person involved, there's a lot of judgment and that can really impact on the person when navigating. So oftentimes, I'm dealing with that kind of stuff with my clients as well. So it's not only the separation from their partner, it's separation from other other people be their own family, sort of their mother in law's side.

And I think it does come back to shared values, boundaries, communication and respect. and if somebody, whoever it is, is respecting you and your boundaries, you've communicated that clearly and they keep pushing, then it is time to divorce them, whether you're married to them.

[30:53] VL: Yeah, and those are more difficult conversations to have.

SH: Sometimes when it's a relationship that is a little bit removed from that intimate partner marriage relationship. It can, you can potentially I'm gonna use the word avoid I don't really like it. We can avoid having that real discussion because you don't have to live with them. You don't have to unpack a household or a family. You can just gradually distance yourself from that person.

holding your boundaries as sacred and standing in your power and in your energy. You don't always have that confrontational conversation with the hard conversation with yourself. tell them no. And then just gradually disengage.

VL: And I keep thinking as we're talking about all these different kinds of relationships and reactions and feelings that are coming up, it's there's a lot of it is the self awareness of recognizing where we're coming from because sometimes those communication issues are learned experiences or learned stories from our childhood.

without us having our own self awareness how to recognize when we're projecting when we're losing our temporary, whatever the case may be, when we're not paying attention or effectively. So and then knowing that this feeling is coming up for me I'm feeling XYZ and recognizing it and saying This is going to be happy is the boundary what is the boundary if you didn't make the boundary then you don't have but I, I was having a conversation with my partner and I should have asked her permission for this but that's good. And he said, he doesn't feel like I'm appreciative of something that he does. And so I said, How can I show you my appreciation of what will help you see that I'm appreciated?" And he couldn't answer and I said, okay, well, think about it because if you can't answer, what you think appreciation looks like sounds like feels like whatever smells like then I can't show you my gratitude because you don't know how to recognize it. He didn't like that.

He didn't like that very much but he's going to go off and think about but it's true. How will you know that you reached your success? How will you know that you feel loved? How will you know that you've communicated properly if you don't define? It's for you.

SH: I love that you were brave enough to have that conversation. With him. I love that he was brave enough to say to you, I feel he expressed a need that was being unmatched in the relationship. You asked him, How can I meet that need for you? And so the next bit is of course, resolving that conflict, if you like, and defining for yourselves as a couple What that looks like. and if he can't come back, and if he is unable to say, Oh, this would work for me. then it's an opportunity for the two of you to brainstorm. you can say what if I did X things and so finding that resolution.

A lot of relationships break down, because needs aren't being met.

and a lot of problem is that we're not to express our needs and a lot of the problem is we're not taught to express our needs. We're taught to go silent. We're taught to use passive aggressive tactics. We're taught to get angry, frustrated, Polaris admin to build and then whatever it is that you've been taught. Through your childhood through your family of origin, how, how your needs were met as a child, how they left and met, what you what you saw, demonstrated to you in terms of interpersonal relationships within your family, and your parents behave They're all the stories that we carry. So allowing yourself to feel what you feel being able to name it. I am feeling unappreciated, Not feeling loved.

I'm feeling resentful. Why am I feeling resentful? dropped down into having that self awareness, recognized and nice feeling and they'd go next level Next step and say, well, what is the unmet need here?

How can I then express it to my partner? How can he or she meet me? in that conversation without redefining how they can be?

VL: Being vulnerable The theme of today's podcast is hard conversations. I love it. I will say though, like I wasn't brave enough. in a lot of my relationships. this is probably the first relationship that I've had where I feel.

and part of that has been learning about myself and discovering myself and getting to know and taking myself out And being able to love myself, And I think too with my partner. He's also learning about himself because as we get to know each other's families We're both coming back like, Okay, this fix a lot of sense. Both of us are like, Yeah, so my mom does that kind of weird, but it's really interesting because we can come back to you.

Okay, well let's unpack this a little bit together I'm noticing that this comes from that. I didn't get this as a kid. No one ever taught me this, this emotional intelligence and how to express myself so, you know, my partner.

So I am going to advocate for those hard conversations.

[37:49] SH: So the other thing that I often talk about when I'm talking about healthy relationships, and I want to also say you can have a healthy relationship while you're separating while you're divorcing.

And of course, that doesn't involve any sort of abuse within the relationship and substance abuse until about an amicable separation, you can have a healthy relationship with each other while it's difficult, but being able to bring that vulnerability and have those hard conversations is important. And another elegant way to start these.

The other element, happy healthy relationships and use as we discussed, you have each other's back you are each other's biggest cheerleader.

And that's why I say you can have a healthy happy relationship while you unravel and pack and separate or divorce. If you still want what is in the best interest what is best for the other person. So yesterday that she later but you also want good things.

And by committing to doing good things for one another, how can I make my partner's day happier today? How can I make my ex partner my co Parents Day? A little easier today? And that might be as simple as sending them a picture if you keep doing something fun and amazing. you don't even have to send a comment, you send a picture. How can I make their life a little easier as we navigate this storm that is our kids.

[39:33] VL: Yeah, that's a very big thing to do and a lot of couples that are presented as possible and I'm sure people can also attest to having helped them and holding their hand through it!

This conversation has been really incredible! I did not know where we were going to go today but I really liked all of it!

Sallyanne, where can we find you? Where can we follow you, how can we support your business?

Website www.reflectcoaching.com.au

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/reflectcoaching/

LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallyanne-hartnell-5a5b933a/

Podcast https://www.reflectcoaching.com.au/podcast

RAPID FIRE ROUND:

1. What are you currently reading? OR Favourite book?

SH: I think all time favorite ball would be To Kill a Mockingbird.

2. What does “empowerment” mean to you?

SH: Empowerment to me means that I stand really comfortably in my own power, in my own skin and I can speak my wants, needs, desires.. And I can always speak my truth.

3. What is your longest standing habit?

SH: Going to bed early.

4. What are you currently working toward?

SH: flourish is my word for 2023. so I'm working towards growing flourishing in all areas of my life, including my business, but just really stretching. So I'm working towards a flourishing 2023 hearing.

VL: That's so beautiful. I really, really love that word. Sallyanne thank you so much for being part of the Women's Empowerment Podcast. This has really been amazing. I feel like I've learned so much you've given me a lot to think about. I'm excited for the part two of that conversation I'm going to have with my partner.

And I feel like I actually do have a few more tools for myself but also for the people in my life who are going through separation and I definitely have a contact of who I can share Even this episode as an introduction to to you and amazing things you do so Thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you for following the Niger, answering the call to, to do a quick are being so good at it. I'm very excited to see how you flourish.

Podcast Host

Valerie LaVigne

Valerie is the creator and founder of Valerie LaVigne Life and the Women's Empowerment Show. She helps busy and empowered women create healthy habits so that they can become the best version of themselves and transform their lives. Learn more about Valerie here!