The Golden Bachelor Gets Divorced after 3 Months of Marriage. What Can You Learn from It?

In case you haven’t heard, “The Golden Bachelor” is getting a divorce. The couple announced on TV (of course) that they came to the conclusion it was time to “dissolve” their relationship after being married for just 3 months. According to news reports, the decision was linked to the inability of couple to decide how to merge their lives. Apparently, part of it was they could never reach an agreement on where to live. (The wife lives in New Jersey while the GB resides in Indiana.)

While their divorce may come as a sad surprise to many, the truth is if you don’t have big issues resolved—like where to live—before tying the knot your marriage is going to go down in flames. Divorce rates for second marriages but esp. for widows and widowers is extremely high in part because big decisions and dealbreakers aren’t discussed and sorted out before saying “I Do!”. If you’ve ever taken a coaching session from me or read one of my books, you’ll know that I stress knowing your dealbreakers and what you can and can’t live with BEFORE getting serious with someone.

Alas, it’s too late for this couple, but be ye not so stupid. In any case I wish the Golden Bachelor and his soon-to-be ex-wife all the luck and success going forward and may everyone else learn an important lesson as you look for love.

Where Does Starting a New Life End?

A viewer writes: Abel, I agree relationships need to be reevaluated and you shouldn’t expect a new spouse to just plunge into the deceased position socially or family wise. However, when it comes to hobbies and passions, where does requesting to start a new life end? For example, if they enjoy working out or running and that’s something the they shared with their deceased partner, does that mean I’m not allowed to continue with those activities or share them with my new love? If Julie asked you not ot write a book because your late wife, Krista, enjoyed writing, would you do it? Is that part of the price you have to pay for a new life?

A Brief Dating Guide for Widows and Widowers

I’m often asked by widows and widowers who are thinking about dating or starting to date what are some things they should do if they want a successful Chapter 2 with another person. In this video I give 3 tips that make dating again a successful experience.

Transcript of video follows:

Hi, it's Wednesday, and that means it's time for another video edition of Widower Wednesday.

I'm Abel Keogh, author of the book "Dating a Widower" and today I'm giving all the widows and widowers out there three things they can do to make their dating more effective and lead to a long and loving and happy chapter two.

Now, I'm often asked by widows and widowers who are thinking about dating or just starting to date, what are some things they should do?

If they're looking for a chapter two with someone else and they want it to be successful, what are some things they could do?

Now, I have written some in depth dating guides on the subject.

For example, there's the ultimate dating guide for widowers.

Most of the advice in there applies to widows as well, by the way.

But if you want the basics on having a successful chapter two, I'm going to give you three tips.

And for those who don't know me or know my backstory, just so you know, I share these tips as a remarried widower.

And one, by the way, who recently celebrated my 21st wedding anniversary with my chapter two, Juliana.

We're going long and strong after 21 years, and I hope we get at least another 21 out of it.

So okay, here are the tips.

First tip is to know what kind of relationship you want.

So are you looking to get married?

Do you want a long term partnership?

Do you want something more casual?

Knowing what it is that you want helps to be clear about your intentions and to communicate your needs with those who you're dating.

And notice the term communicate your needs in there.

So again, if you're looking to get married, it's important to communicate that to the people that you're actually dating.

And knowing what you want also helps identify potential partners who are a good match.

And avoiding broken hearts that results in falling in love with someone who doesn't want the same kind of relationship as you do.

So know what you want and then find somebody that wants the same thing.

That's the first step.

Tip number two is don't use your new love as a therapist.

Now, this is a big mistake I see widows and widowers make.

They use their relationships as a way to cope with feelings of loss or sadness.

And now I understand that a relationship often provides support, companionship, and it helps distract from those negative and sad feelings, and it also gives you a sense of purpose in life.

But your relationship is not a way to cope with your grief or unresolved emotional issues.

If you need to talk to somebody, if you find yourself that you're using your date as a crutch or an emotional support to help get you through hard times.

You might be using them as a therapist and maybe need to reevaluate that now there are healthy ways to get emotional support.

You can go to grief groups, you can find groups online, you can chat with people, you can go to an actual therapist.

But using your new partner as support, as emotional support as a therapist is not one of them.

I have never seen it in all the years I've doing this where a widow or widower has used their new real love as a therapist, where it's worked out long term, the relationship will crash and burn and the person you're dating will, I promise you, become resentful.

So that's tip number two, do not use them as a therapist.

Number three is don't compromise on your important values or priorities.

So now healthy relationships are built on trust, mutual respect and understanding.

And you need to take your time getting to know the other person.

And you need to communicate openly and honestly about your values and priorities.

So it's not what is important to you.

What kind of values do you want in that other person?

And what I've seen over the years is when you compromise on your values or what is important to you, you lose self respect and it makes you resentful towards your partner and the relationship that you have.

So putting your values to the side to smooth things out in the short term works in the short term.

But long term, it's going to blow up your relationship because I guarantee you will feel unfulfilled.

You will feel resentful and that the first chance it's going to come back, you're going to take it out on your partner and you're going to realize this person isn't for me. Because a person you want to spend the rest of your life with, you want to have a successful chapter two with.

You shouldn't have to compromise on your values and priorities.

You want to be with someone where you're united on the important things because that's how, for example, you get married.

21 years.

Julie and my marriage would not have lasted as long as it had.

We had either of us, by the way, compromised on things that were important to us. So we're a good fit that way.

Now, I do want you to know that chapter two can be just as happy and satisfying as your first chapter, as long as you give it the same effort and attention.

And I think that's the important thing here.

Relationships don't just happen.

They don't just grow on trees, you've got to actually nurture them and put some effort into them.

So take some time to think about these three tips and what you've talked about.

And before you embark on that new serious relationship, I'm Abel Keogh, author of the book "Dating Widower", feel free to like this video.

Subscribe to it if you want to schedule a coaching session.

There is a link down in the comments where you can do that as well, and I will see you all next Wednesday.

The couples’ guide to moving in together

Quoted in a Vox article tilted “The couples’ guide to moving in together”

If your late spouse previously lived in the home, make a plan with your current partner for how much of your spouse’s belongings or pictures will be in the house, says relationship coach Abel Keogh. “I have some clients that are okay with maybe a few photos being out,” he says, “but I have some clients that don’t want any photos. They don’t want any traces of the person.” Similarly, be clear with how much of an ex’s belongings or presence you’re comfortable with. Don’t be afraid to bring up how you’re bothered by your partner holding on to some of their ex’s clothing. It shows you’re serious about making the living arrangement comfortable for everyone.

Aside from the physical space, how you spend time within it is worth discussing. If you’ve spent many years living alone or with another partner, moving in with a new person (and potentially their children) — with unique routines and quirks — may take some getting used to, Keogh says. In addition to talking about finances and chores (more on that later), have a conversation about adjusting to one another’s habits, including how much alone time you expect. What does time spent alone look like for you? Is it recharging in a room by yourself for a few hours or are you satisfied by spending time in silence next to your partner? By setting an expectation of how (and how often) you like to be alone, Nasir says, your partner won’t assume you’re mad at them if you don’t want to hang out all the time.

Read the full article here.

Research for my next relationship guide

Good news! All the reading and research for my next relationship guide are done. As you can see from the photo below, I immersed myself in books about famous couples and their relationships. It was fascinating to learn from their successes and failures. Now, the fun part of writing begins. I’m looking forward to sharing the knowledge with you.

I Found Love Letters from the Late to My Widower. What Should I Do?

A viewer wants to know what she should do when she finds a stack of love letters from the late wife to the widower she’s dating. Give them to him? Throw them away? Something else? This video has your answer.

Hi, it's Wednesday, and that means it's time for another video edition of Widower Wednesday.

I'm Abel Keogh, author of the book Dating a Widower, and today we're answering a question from a reader who asks what to do when you find love letters from the late wife to the widower.

So I'm going to read this email, and again, I share this with the person's permission.

It says, abel, I've been dating a widower for three and a half years, engaged for a little over a year.

I stay at his house, but won't move in or get married until I know I can be comfortable there.

He's recently expressed wanting me to move in and set a wedding date, and he's been doing wonderful lately with getting rid of all the excess stuff and decorations in the house, despite pushback from his adult daughter.

So we can combine two households without being overwhelmed with too much crap.

So, so far, so good.

Good for him.

The letter continues.

I've been going through cupboards and drawers getting rid of stuff that that is old and that we don't need or won't use.

The other day I was cleaning out the phone book drawer and underneath all the books and tables I found my notebook.

Or I found a notebook with many personal, detailed love letters that she had written to him each day while he was away on a long hunting trip.

My question is, is when we find stuff like that, should I just throw it away or should I give it to him?

I feel that if he reads all that, it'll just send him back to missing her, but at the same time, I don't feel right throwing it out and I don't want to give it to his daughter because she's having a hard enough time with everything and is keeping most of the stuff we are getting rid of because she can't part with it.

I'm not sure what to do in good conscious and I wonder what others in this situation have done when they find things like that when we are going through Christmas stuff.

I did find a box of their personal ornaments from when they got married and such, and he threw them all away to my surprise.

Thank you for your consideration.

I value your input on this question.

So a great question.

And again, it's something I think most people who at least are serious about living with a widower when they're going through stuff you're always going to.

And this is why, again, I caution about going through a widower's house without him there or having you doing it by yourself because you're bound to find things like this.

I can't think of a time where someone hasn't gone through the house and found something that was kind of private or intimate or something that was very personal anyway to their relationship.

Not always fun to find.

So I guess, first of all, I hope that the widower is okay with you going through and cleaning things up.

You said he was.

But again, generally my advice is to let the widower go through and do it.

Or if you want to stand there holding a trash bag, letting him do it, because again, there may be things he wants to keep, maybe things he's not happy throwing away or that he doesn't want to get rid of.

And the last thing you really want in a relationship is to find out that you've disposed of something or thrown something away that was very meaningful to him or his kids or something like that.

So proceed with caution.

That's kind of my first piece of advice here.

But to your question, what do you do when you find something like love letters?

What do you do with that?

Do you throw it away?

Do you give it to the widower?

And you have to give it to the widower.

You can't throw it away.

You do not dispose of it.

There's a reason that you said in good conscious you don't feel good about throwing it away.

Well, there's a reason you don't feel good about it.

It's because you shouldn't do it.

So you got to trust your gut there.

But it's wrong to actually just throw something like, especially something that personal away.

Now, I know that the concern is, will I give these to the widower?

Is that going to set him back?

Is that going to cause a cry fest or whatever it is? You got to understand that you can't control how the widower is going to react to these letters, but it is a good opportunity to see where he's at in the grieving process and moving on.

And I would say it's okay.

Like, you give him these letters, maybe he has an emotional reaction to them, maybe something that personal, you would have an emotional reaction to that kind of stuff.

But the question isn't whether he has what kind of emotional reaction he has.

The question is it just a temporary emotional reaction or is it something that sends him into a tailspin?

Because, again, something that personal might bring up a lot of memories.

Maybe it causes them just to, maybe he wants to go read them, or maybe it causes a tear or two.

This isn't personal.

You have found something and given him something quite personal as it relates to his late wife.

But in my opinion, it's not his necessarily initial reaction that's important.

It is.

How fast can he rebound from that?

Now, if giving him those letters sends him into a tailspin and he's moody for days and days after or something, or sad for days after, that's kind of a red flag that maybe he's not ready, emotionally ready to move on.

But if he can rebound from it quick and maybe in a matter of minutes or hours or at least less than a day, that he's back to his normal self, don't worry about it.

It just is what it is.

So as long as he can pull himself out of it quickly and things get back to normal, that's a good sign that he's dealing with his grief well and moving forward and ready to open his heart, that's when he goes into that kind of tailspin.

If something like that causes him to go into a tailspin, that's more of a red flag.

So another concern might be, well, what is he going to do with these letters?

Is he going to keep them?

Is he going to give them away?

And if he chooses to, in this case, give them to his daughter, is he going to throw them away?

Again, it's up to the widower if he wants to keep these love letters.

I personally don't have a problem with it.

As I say in my book, dating a widower, he's fine.

If he wants to have a couple of boxes of stuff that it's out in the garage or an attic or the basement or somewhere, somewhere that's stored out of sight, out of mind.

If he wants to add those to the box that he has, I personally don't have a problem with it.

If he wants to give them to his daughter, I don't have a problem with it.

If he wants to throw them away and dispose of them, I don't have a problem with that either.

But what I don't want him to do is put them somewhere, like in a drawer where he's just going to access them all the time or read through them and keep going there.

That's not a healthy or in my way.

If he's in a serious relationship, that's not a healthy way to deal with them.

But if he wants to put him, again, put him in a box in the closet or something like that, where he's kind of had these things, that's fine.

Again, wants to give them to the daughter, don't have a problem with that.

But again, it's what is his reaction to what does he want to do with the letters?

As long as he's not like putting them on the coffee table or maybe on his desk where he can read them all the time, that to me would be a red flag.

But if he wants to again put them in a box, give them to his daughter, even throw them away, it's up to him.

Again, I think you can learn a lot by watching what he does with the letters as opposed and his reaction to them.

But again, it's not your place to dispose of these letters.

You need to give them to the widower because I guarantee if you dispose of them and he finds out you disposed of them, that is going to come back and bite you in the butt extremely hard.

And really, that's the last thing you want.

Again, relationships are built on trust and I hope that if he's trusting you enough to go through his house and clean things up, he's trusting you enough that if you find something that's personal and that's important to him, that you would give it to him and let him decide what to do with it. Thoughts?

Comments?

Go ahead and leave them below.

Feel free to subscribe to this channel and like this video as well.

And if you have like a personal issue like this that you want to discuss, I have coaching sessions.

There's a link down in the description where you can schedule a coaching session with me. I'm Abel Keogh, author of the book Dating a Widower, and I'll see you next Wednesday.