Divorce Happens

No one hands you a roadmap when your marriage ends. You're expected to make some of the biggest legal, financial, and emotional decisions of your life at the exact moment you have the least capacity to make them — and most of us walk in completely unprepared. That's the gap Ron Platt set out to close. In this practical, reassuring episode of Divorce Happens, we hear from Ron Platt, co-founder and CEO of NASDF — the National Association for Single and Divorced Families — for five fresh, foundational tips to help you prepare for divorce and walk out the other side standing on ste...

You already know. You just aren't ready to say it out loud yet. If you're living in that quiet, heavy, terrifying place — the one where the knowledge sits in your chest and doesn't go away — this solo episode of Divorce Happens was made for you. Olivia Howell names one of the most common and least talked-about experiences in the entire divorce process: the in-between space before anything is official, before anyone else knows, before you've even fully admitted it to yourself. It's Googling at midnight and clearing your history. It's crying in the car and then walking inside to make...

There’s a strange, in-between place that almost no one warns you about when your marriage ends. You’re no longer who you were — but you’re not yet who you’re becoming. As one therapist put it to this week’s guest during her own divorce, you’re “somewhere in between.” In this episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia Howell sits down with Fresh Starts expert Bridget Borel, CFP®, CDFA® — a Certified Financial Planner, Certified Divorce Financial Analyst, and founder of Clairwell Financial Planning — to talk about the identity shift at the heart of divorce, and how to rebuild not just your bank accou...

The divorce process is one of the most life-changing things a person can go through — and somehow it’s still one of the most chaotic, confusing, and expensive. That’s exactly the problem that pulled tech founder Ryan Carson off the sidelines. A serial entrepreneur with 25 years in the tech world and three companies behind him, Ryan watched two of his three sisters — the people he calls his best friends — walk into brutal, costly divorces with almost no guidance except an attorney and a stack of baffling forms. Having grown up a child of divorce himself, he found it shocking h...

If you’re standing at the edge of a divorce right now, convinced the life waiting on the other side looks bleak and empty — this is the episode that turns the lights back on. Olivia Howell welcomes back author Betsy Cornwell, a New York Times bestselling novelist, memoirist, and divorced single mom who left an abusive marriage and rebuilt her entire life on the wild western coast of Ireland. Betsy has written six novels and the luminous new memoir Ring of Salt, which traces her journey from fleeing home with her infant son to crowdfunding and restoring a derelict knit...

There is a particular kind of gaslighting that is almost impossible to name while you’re inside it — the kind where someone spends years convincing you that you can’t survive without them, and you believe it so completely that leaving feels less like freedom and more like stepping off a ledge. That was Kelly Sundberg’s reality before her divorce. Her ex-husband had her convinced she was incompetent — that she couldn’t parent alone, that she couldn’t care for herself, that without him, she would fall apart. What happened instead was that she left, earned a PhD, raised her son...

What questions should you actually ask at your first divorce attorney consultation? In this solo episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia answers a listener letter from someone terrified she'll sit through her first consult, nod along, and walk out without asking a single thing that mattered — then spend three days replaying everything she wishes she'd said.

If that fear sounds familiar, you're not failing. That blank-brain overwhelm is what shock does to all of us in that room. So Olivia hands you the cheat sheet: the exact questions to ask a divorce lawyer, the ones too many people on...

What do you do in the first 24 hours after your spouse says they're leaving? In this solo "Hey Olivia" episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia Howell answers a letter from a woman who was standing at the stove making dinner when her husband walked in, told her he wants "a new life," and said she could keep the kids and the house. She hasn't cried yet. She thinks she's in shock. And she just needs someone to tell her what to do first. If you've been blindsided by divorce and can't think straight, this episode is for you.

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How do you heal from a divorce when there's no villain — when you both still love each other and simply grew apart? In this solo "Hey Olivia" episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia Howell answers a letter from a listener ending a marriage with no betrayal, no blowup, and real care still between them. They share a child, they can still show up for each other, and she wants to know: how do you stay connected as co-parents while creating enough distance to actually heal? If you're grieving an amicable divorce that looks "good" on paper but still aches, this ep...

Nobody warns you that the divorce itself might be the easy part. For Courtney Gilmartin, a New Jersey mom who started her divorce journey nearly a decade ago, the 13-month dissolution of her marriage was just the opening chapter of a much longer, harder story — one that wound through post-judgment litigation, forensic custody evaluations, parenting coordinators, and years of fighting a family court system that moves nothing like the urgent, life-disrupting pace of the people trapped inside it. In this raw and remarkably practical episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Courtney to talk about what hi...

How do you answer your kids' questions about divorce when you're barely holding yourself together? In this solo "Hey Olivia" episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia Howell answers a letter from a parent whose kids seemed "fine" when they first heard about the divorce — and are now flooding her with questions. Where will I sleep? Will I still see my friends? Do you still love each other? Is it my fault? If you've already told your kids about the divorce and the questions won't stop, this episode is the steadying guide you've been looking for.

Olivia explains why th...

How do you tell your kids you're getting divorced when your co-parent wants to blame you for it? In this solo "Hey Olivia" episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia Howell answers a letter from a mom whose ex plans to tell their five- and seven-year-old that Mommy broke up the family — and who yells every time she tries to talk about doing it differently. If you're terrified of how the other parent might frame your divorce in front of the kids, this one is for you.

Olivia explains why telling young children that one parent "broke up the fa...

What happens when you get married at 22, divorced by 27, and have to figure out who you actually are for the very first time — as a fully formed adult? That’s the question at the heart of this week’s episode of Divorce Happens, and it’s one that Sarah Vacchiano has spent the last decade not just living, but writing. Sarah is a Los Angeles-based entertainment lawyer, a first-time author, and the mother of a four-year-old — and her debut novel, Soft Launch: A Coming of Adulthood Story, is the kind of book the divorce recovery space has been quietly waiting fo...

Nobody warns you, when you're in the thick of a divorce, that the financial fallout doesn't end with the settlement. There are tuition bills on the horizon, FAFSA forms with your ex's name on them, and a whole new layer of negotiation you never saw coming. In this episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Vicki Vollweiler — founder of College Financial Prep, divorced mom, and former divorce coach turned college financial strategist — to talk about the conversation no one is having in the mediator's office: how to plan for your child's college education when you're navigating co-p...

She was lying on the ground in Thailand, her husband having just shoved her in public, not knowing if her neck was broken, her arm was broken — knowing only that her heart was. In that moment, journalist, traveler, and diver Lisa Niver could not have imagined that the next chapter of her life would take her skydiving, mountain biking down a ski run in Lake Tahoe, and scuba diving with bull sharks in Mexico. She could not have imagined that she would turn 50 on the other side of all that pain — freer, braver, and more herself than she had ever...

There is a moment — quiet, uncomfortable, impossible to unhear — when you realize the marriage you’re in isn’t the marriage you thought you were building. For D’Ionna Washington, that moment came just one year into her first marriage. Instead of suppressing it, she eventually did what so few women feel permitted to do: she left. And then she wrote the book about it. In this candid, fire-lit conversation on Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with D’Ionna — relationship coach, author, and the woman behind the powerfully named brand The Kept Wife Strategist — to talk about her debut book B...

If you’ve ever sat with the thought of leaving an emotionally abusive relationship and felt, instead of relief, a wave of guilt — this episode is for you. Not the guilt of someone who is doing something wrong. The guilt of someone who has been so thoroughly conditioned to put themselves last that the simple act of imagining their own freedom feels like a betrayal. In this deeply compassionate and psychologically grounded solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell names that specific, gut-wrenching feeling and does something more valuable than tell you to push past it: she explains exac...

What if the end of your marriage deserved a party? Not in spite of how hard it was — but because of it. In this joyful, irreverent, and unexpectedly moving solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell makes the full-throated, unapologetic case for divorce parties — and why throwing one might be one of the most psychologically meaningful things you can do for yourself after divorce. This is the episode that will make you laugh, maybe tear up a little, and then immediately start texting your best friend about a date. It’s fun. It’s real. And it makes a genuin...

There is a particular kind of loneliness that lives inside a marriage that has gone quiet — where you’ve been having the conversation about separating entirely in your own head for weeks or months, but haven’t said a single word of it out loud. Not because you don’t know what you feel. But because you genuinely don’t know how to start — especially when real communication between you and your spouse has all but disappeared. In this solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits with that exact moment and offers something rare: not a to-do list, but a...

There is a question that lives in the bodies of thousands of people right now — not just in their minds, but in the tightness of their chests and the sleepless hours of 3 a.m. It’s not “should I get divorced.” It’s the harder, more specific thing: how do I actually say the words? In this intimate solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell steps into that question with the steady, grounded warmth of someone who has been there — and who has spent years sitting with women who have been there too. Whether you’ve been rehearsing this conversat...

There’s a question that sits quietly in the minds of thousands of people every single day — and this week, one woman had the courage to send it to Olivia’s Instagram DMs: “How do I push past the fear and file against my narcissistic ex? We have a two-year-old.” In this intimate solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell speaks directly to that listener — and to every person navigating the terrifying intersection of narcissistic abuse, co-parenting fears, and the decision to finally leave. This is the episode for anyone who has sat with a racing heart and asked: am I...

What if divorce didn't have to destroy your family — what if it could actually make it better? That's the radical, deeply human premise at the heart of this week's episode of Divorce Happens, and it's brought to life by someone who's lived it, studied it, and built an entire career helping others do it well. Karen McNenny is a 15-year divorce survivor, certified divorce coach, co-parent specialist, parent team expert, and Crucial Conversations trainer. As founder of the Good Divorce Academy, she helps couples navigate the end of their marriage not as adversaries but as partners in protecting their ch...

There's an emotion that lives in a quiet corner of a lot of divorced women — one they haven't said out loud to their therapist, their best friend, or maybe even themselves. And in this solo episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia is naming it directly: relief.

Relief after divorce — or even during it — is one of the most common and least talked-about emotional experiences of divorce recovery. The exhale that finally comes. The shoulders that finally drop. The quiet that feels like peace instead of loneliness. And then, almost in the same breath, the guilt that crashes in right...

If you're a divorced mom, chances are you're carrying a fear that doesn't have a name but feels like this: Am I ruining my kids?

In this solo episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia gets honest about one of the most universal — and most exhausting — emotional experiences of divorce recovery: mom guilt. Not the logistical kind, but the deep kind. The one that whispers at 2am that your kids are going to end up in therapy because of you. The one that makes you second-guess the hardest decision you've ever made.

Olivia unpacks what the research actu...

Most people walking into a divorce do the same thing: they call a lawyer. It feels like the obvious first move — the responsible one. But according to Jill Kaufman, a licensed therapist, certified divorce coach, certified mediator, and parent educator with decades of experience, hiring an attorney first is one of the most common — and costly — mistakes divorcing people make. Jill is also the founder of Divorce Network Pro; a curated online directory connecting divorcing individuals and the professionals who support them with mission-aligned experts across every discipline: financial specialists, parent educators, mediators, divorce coaches, and more. Every professional in her...

If the first thing you did when your marriage started falling apart was Google the most aggressive divorce attorney in town, you are not alone — and you are not wrong for it. But what if there was a smarter, calmer, more strategic way to get through one of the hardest chapters of your life? In this episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Melissa Murphy Pavone, a Certified Financial Planner (CFP®) and Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA®), and author of the newly released book Divorce by Design: How Building a Divorce Team Can Help You Get Divo...

There is a quiet pressure that follows divorce like a shadow — the pressure to be fine. To be strong. To show everyone, and maybe especially yourself, that you are thriving and not broken and absolutely, definitely over it. In this intimate and deeply moving solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits with that pressure and names it for what it is: a lie that is costing women their healing. Because the truth — the one Olivia speaks directly and without flinching — is that grieving your marriage does not mean you made the wrong decision. Those two things can live i...

Nobody warns you about this part. The divorce attorneys explain the paperwork. The therapists help you process the grief of your marriage. Your family tells you it’s going to be okay. But almost no one prepares you for the moment you realize that some of the friendships you built your entire social world around — the dinner couples, the group text, the women who knew everything about your life — have quietly, without explanation, disappeared. In this tender and deeply honest solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell names one of the most overlooked losses in the divorce recovery experi...

There is a version of this story that gets told over and over again in our culture — the one where leaving a marriage is the failure, and staying is the strength. Where the person who files the papers is the one who gave up. Where divorce is a tragedy, and the one who initiates it is somehow the villain. In this deeply personal solo episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell takes that narrative apart, piece by piece, with the kind of directness and compassion only someone who’s lived it can offer. This isn’t a conversation about whethe...

Spring has a way of being quietly cruel when you're in the middle of a divorce. The world turns bright and blooming and annoyingly beautiful, and you're still just trying to get through the week — maybe the day, maybe the hour. The flowers don't know your timeline. The Instagram farmers market hauls don't know you're rebuilding from the ground up. And somewhere in that gap between what the season looks like and what your life feels like, there's a pressure that settles in: the sense that you're supposed to feel renewed because the calendar says so, and if you do...

Nobody warns you that your first Mother's Day after divorce might be the hardest Sunday of your year. You might have your kids — and still feel completely alone. You might be kid-free for the holiday and have absolutely no idea what to do with yourself. You might scroll through social media, watch the flower deliveries and the brunches and the gratitude posts, and feel something you can't quite name — something between grief and relief and guilt all braided together. In this warm, honest, and genuinely helpful episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell opens the conversation with a confession of h...

Nobody tells you that divorce can feel like a second puberty. Suddenly, after years of being someone's partner — someone's spouse — you're standing in your own skin again, sometimes for the first time in decades, asking a question you were never really taught to answer: What actually brings me pleasure? In this illuminating, permission-giving episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Myisha Battle, clinical sexologist, certified dating coach, and author of the brand-new book Sexual Pleasure for Dummies. This isn't just a conversation about sex — it's a conversation about reclamation. About what it means to rediscover your own bo...

There is a dimension of divorce that nobody warned you about — one that has nothing to do with lawyers or custody schedules or dividing furniture. It goes much deeper than any of that. Divorce goes to the heart of your identity. And when the role you built your life around — wife, partner, the person in that marriage — is suddenly gone, the question that surfaces isn't just "what do I do now?" It's "who am I without this?" In one of the most soulful and quietly transformative episodes of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Lisa Lisser — divorce and life...

You've made the decision. Maybe it took months — maybe it took years. But you've finally arrived at it, and now your brain is telling you: move fast, do something, protect yourself. And that instinct, as understandable as it is, might be the very thing that costs you the most. In this indispensable episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Lyerly Spongberg — certified ADR divorce coach, pre-mediation coach, and co-parenting specialist — to walk through the most common and costly mistakes people make in the early stages of the divorce process. Lyerly brings years of front-line coaching experience to a c...

You were so close. The kids were finally sleeping through the night. You'd found a rhythm at work. You were starting to feel like yourself again — like balance was actually possible. And then divorce happened. And the scales didn't just tip — they crashed. If that sentence made you exhale, this episode is for you. In this conversation on Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Amy Pierre-Russo, a work-life harmony coach who has built her entire practice around one radical reframe: stop chasing balance, and start designing for harmony. Because balance, Amy argues, is a trap — a pressure-cooker concep...

Nobody tells you that pregnancy can be the moment everything becomes clear. Not the nursery colors or the baby name — but something far bigger, far more quietly devastating: the realization that the relationship you're in is not the one you want to raise a child inside of. In this profound episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Dr. Gertrude Lyons — author, life coach, podcast host, retreat facilitator, and the powerhouse behind the book Rewrite the Mother Code: From Sacrifice to Stardust — to explore one of the most taboo intersections in modern womanhood: divorce during pregnancy or in the...

When you're going through a divorce, the world doesn't stop spinning — but it can feel like everyone else's resources did. Therapy is expensive. Childcare is exhausting and often unaffordable. And the practical realities of building a new life on one income, while co-parenting, grieving, and showing up for your kids, can feel completely overwhelming. In this episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Joy Read, co-founder of the National Association for Single and Divorced Families (NASDF) — a nonprofit membership organization built from the ground up to close the resource gap for families navigating divorce and single pare...

Nobody hands you a rulebook when your marriage ends and you suddenly have to figure out how to parent from two separate addresses. The paperwork gets signed, the boxes get packed, the kids start splitting their weeks between two homes — and then it's Tuesday night and someone's crying over forgotten homework, and you realize the hardest part was never the divorce itself. It was everything that comes after. In this episode of Divorce Happens, host Olivia Howell sits down with Nora Marcus, a licensed social worker, co-parenting specialist, and divorce mediator who works with families across all 50 states — a prof...

What if you didn’t have to figure out divorce alone?

In this episode of Divorce Happens, we’re talking about one of the most supportive (and most underutilized) resources available to you: a free 15-minute Divorce Resource Consult with Olivia Howell, co-founder of Fresh Starts Registry.

Whether you’re quietly wondering if divorce might be the right next step, actively navigating the process, or rebuilding your life on the other side, this consult is designed to meet you exactly where you are. No pressure. No expectations. Just real support.

During your session, Olivia...

In this final episode of Divorce 101 A to Z from the Divorce Happens podcast, Olivia Howell explores zero-sum thinking, a mindset that frames divorce as a win-lose battle instead of a restructuring of life and family systems. Brought to you by the letter Z and the number 0, this episode explains why divorce does not need a scoreboard — and how releasing zero-sum beliefs can reduce conflict, guilt, and emotional exhaustion.

Listeners learn how zero-sum thinking shows up in negotiations, parenting decisions, and financial discussions, and how shifting away from this mindset supports healthier outcomes for adults and children al...