5 Ways to Steady Your Emotions During Divorce

If you are used to being the person who handles crises with a cool head, divorce can feel like a shock to the system.

You might be a competent professional who runs a team or manages a household, yet you find yourself staring at an email for hours, second-guessing every word. You might feel like a "puddle on the floor" even though you have handled difficult things before.

If this is how you feel, please hear me: you aren’t failing. You are having a normal physiological response to an abnormal amount of stress.

But trying to "decide" your way into calmness usually backfires. You cannot willpower your way out of a nervous system response. Instead of willpower, you need steadiness.

That’s why I put together these 5 tools to help you regulate your nervous system so you can protect your peace, your kids, and your future.

1. Stop Trying to "Decide" Your Way to Calm

It’s understandable that high-functioning people often try to think their way out of stress. We often believe that if we just find the right answer or the perfect strategy, the anxiety will go away.

But when your nervous system is overloaded, your brain prioritizes safety over nuance. Everything feels urgent. Everything feels like a threat.

If you try to make big decisions from that place, you are often acting out of fear rather than clarity.

The Shift: Don't ask, "What should I do?" Instead, try, "Am I steady enough to decide this right now?".

The Tool: If the answer is no, buy yourself time. Unless it is a true emergency involving physical safety, very few divorce decisions need to be made in ten minutes. Practice saying something like this: "I’ll think about this and get back to you".

How To > Find the Calm in the Chaos

2. Count the Cost of Your Panic

We often think that staying in a state of overwhelm is "neutral." We think it is just how things are right now.

But unfortunately, dysregulation has a price that isn’t just financial. Staying in a state of dysregulation actively erodes your confidence. It also has a literal financial cost. If you call your attorney while you are hyperventilating or spiraling, you are paying their hourly rate for them to calm you down. You aren't paying for legal strategy in those moments. You are paying for expensive emotional regulation.

The Shift: Recognize that your emotional state is a financial and strategic factor in your divorce.

The Tool: When you feel the spiral starting, ask yourself: "If I stay in this state, what is it likely to cost me?".

Sometimes putting a dollar figure on your panic is enough to interrupt the pattern and help you step away from the phone.

3. Mind the Gap Between Lawyer and Therapist

You might have a great lawyer and a great therapist, but still feel unsupported.

That is because so much of the divorce stress happens in the "in-between" moments. It happens when you get a hostile email at 10 PM. It happens during awkward drop-offs. It happens when you are worrying on a Sunday afternoon.

The Shift: Avoid taking emotional urgency to a legal meeting. You may walk away frustrated because you were too dysregulated to actually process the strategy your lawyer gave you.

The Tool: Identify the moment you are in. Before you reach out for help, ask what you actually need. Do you need legal clarity? That is for your lawyer. Do you need to process deep emotional history? That is for your therapist. Do you just need to lower your heart rate so you can function? That is a regulation tool.

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4. Don't Hit Send When You’re Shaking

There is a saying: "You can’t out-communicate a dysregulated internal state".

You can spend hours crafting the "perfect" email. You can edit it ten times. But if you send it with frantic, urgent, or angry energy, it often escalates the conflict anyway. The other person feels the energy behind the words.

The Shift: Communication isn't just about the words you use. It is about timing and regulation.

The Tool: Before you respond to a text or email, run this 3-question filter:

1. Am I regulated enough to send this?
2. Is now the right time?
3. What is my true intention (to solve a problem or to strike back)?

Remember, silence is also a valid option. You do not always have to pick up the phone.

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5. Choose Steadiness Over Perfection for Your Kids

Parents often burn out trying to compensate for the divorce. We fear that if we say "no" or set boundaries, our kids will prefer the other parent or feel less loved.

So we over-function. We try to be the "fun" parent and the "responsible" parent all at once.

But a depleted parent will also struggle to provide safety.

The Shift: Your kids don't need you to be perfect. They don't need you to say yes to everything. They need you to be the steady, safe adult in the room.

The Tool: When you are feeling pressured to do more, ask yourself: "What supports steadiness for me and safety for my kids right now?"

Sometimes, doing less is actually doing more for their stability. A calm parent eating pizza on the floor is better for a child than a stressed parent cooking a three-course meal.

You Don't Have to Do This Perfectly

You do not have to master all of this overnight. Trying to be perfectly collected all the time is just another form of pressure you do not need right now. Instead, just aim for "steady enough." When you can lower the volume on the panic, even just a little bit, you give yourself the chance to make choices that actually serve you and your children. You are building a new life, and that deserves a steady foundation, not a perfect one.

If you want a step-by-step guide to help you build this kind of steadiness, take a look at my Better Than Before Divorce Coping and Growth Toolkit. It is designed to close the gap between legal advice and emotional support so you do not have to white-knuckle through the process alone.

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