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When someone you care about tells you they’re getting divorced, your brain does about forty things at once.
You’re processing the news. You’re scanning your memory for signs you might have missed. You’re trying to figure out what your face is doing. And somewhere in the middle of all of that, you’re expected to say the right thing.
Most of us reach for the same script: “Oh my god, I’m so sorry.”
And here’s the thing… that might be exactly wrong.
Divorce isn’t one feeling. It’s both at once. It’s heartbreak AND relief. Grief AND freedom. Exhaustion AND the first real breath someone has taken in years. When you lead with condolences before you even know how your friend is feeling, you’ve already told them something: that what they’re living is purely a tragedy. And that sets the tone for everything that follows.
Today’s guest is Oona Metz, a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker and Certified Group Psychotherapist with over 30 years of experience supporting women through divorce. She’s also the author of Unhitched: The Essential Divorce Guide for Women (Simon & Schuster), praised by Maria Shriver and Gayle King, and the founder of the Beacon Group Fellowship. Oona has been through divorce herself, twice, and she brings both the clinical framework AND the lived experience to this conversation.
We talked about the five phases of divorce grief and what your friend actually needs from you in each one. We talked about building a divorce support team, the Ring Theory, and why trying to be everything for your friend is a setup for failure. And we talked about what it really means to show up for the hard stuff, including what it costs you as the friend.
This one is worth your full attention. Listen to the complete episode.
The First Conversation Matters More Than You Think
Oona shared a story from her own first divorce. She’d hired a woman to help with her garden, a stranger from a local listserv, and when she explained the situation, the woman looked at her and said: “Oh, congratulations.”
Oona was taken aback. But it became one of the most important moments of her journey.
“Most people would say, ‘Oh my god, I’m so sorry,’ and look at me with kind of goopy eyes. And friends, depending on where they were on the spectrum, might say, ‘I’m so sorry,’ or, ‘Oh my god, what happened?’ And saying it in that way, ‘How are you? How’s your daughter?’ kind of implies that what you’ve gone through is a terrible thing.”
The truth is, divorce is almost always BOTH. Heartbreaking and stressful, yes. But also, for many people, a relief. A new chapter. A long time coming.
So what SHOULD you say?
Oona’s answer: don’t assume. Ask.
Her go-to: “Wow, that’s a lot. How are you doing?”
That’s it. Four words that don’t tell your friend how to feel. Four words that open the door instead of closing it. And then you listen to where they actually are, because that’s going to tell you everything about what they need from you next.
I’ll add my own version here: when I don’t know someone well enough to know what they’re feeling, that phrase has been my default for years. It works because it’s honest. It doesn’t perform sympathy or celebration. It just says: I see that this is big, and I’m here.
One more thing Oona flagged that is SO important: never ask “but have you tried everything?”
Unless your friend specifically asks for your ideas, that question increases shame and stigma. It implies they haven’t thought this through. And almost always, they have… for longer than you know.
“People only do that after they have experienced heartbreak after heartbreak after heartbreak in their marriage. Nobody stands on the altar and says, ‘Oh, I hope one day I get divorced.’”
Keep your doubts to yourself. Your job in that first conversation is to follow their lead, not redirect it.
The Five Phases of Divorce Grief
One of the most useful things in Oona’s book is her model of the five phases of divorce grief. I want to walk through each one from a FRIEND’s perspective, because knowing where your friend is changes everything about how you show up.
Phase 1: Heartbreak
This phase hits whether your friend initiated the divorce or not. Nobody goes through this lightly.
In Heartbreak, your friend is in survival mode. The most basic things, eating, sleeping, getting through the day are genuinely hard. Big decisions are happening simultaneously: lawyers, finances, living situations, logistics. Their brain is at capacity.
What helps: Show up for the basics. Bring food. Check in about sleep. Help with the small, overwhelming tasks that pile up (yes, this includes changing Netflix passwords and magazine subscriptions. I have done both). Offer to read through documents and flag the important parts. You don’t need to solve the divorce. You need to help your friend stay functional while they navigate it.
What doesn’t help: Asking what went wrong. Asking if they tried everything. Making them relive it before they’re ready.
Phase 2: Rollercoaster
This is the LONGEST phase, and the one that requires the most flexibility from you as a friend.
In Rollercoaster, your friend can cycle through anger, sadness, anxiety, relief, and grief, sometimes within the same hour. She might be furious at her ex on Friday and missing him by Monday. She might tell you she’s so relieved and then burst into tears ten minutes later.
“To be the friend that’s able to hold both of those things is a really rare friend.”
Your job here is NOT to fact-check her feelings. Not to say “but wait, I thought you were doing better.” Not to remind her that she was just laughing about this yesterday. You follow her lead. Whatever emotion is present right now, you’re with her in that. The previous emotion doesn’t exist anymore. You hold the nuance.
I’ll tell you what this looks like in real life: I once went with a friend to a gathering where she knew she’d see extended family from her ex. She talked herself up the whole car ride over. Got in the room. Something small was said, nothing obviously terrible, and she was triggered in a way neither of us saw coming. That’s Rollercoaster. One hour to the next. You don’t comment on the shift. You just stay present.
Phase 3: Mending
In Mending, the intensity starts to ease. Your friend is turning back toward herself: what she needs, what she wants, what her life actually looks like now.
This is often the phase where the friendship starts to feel more mutual again. She may have more capacity to ask about YOUR life. She may be making decisions about her health, her routines, her identity. This is a great time to do things together: yoga class, a new activity, something that’s just about being alive and not about the divorce.
Celebrate the small moves. “I love that you’re doing that for yourself” goes a long way in this phase.
Phase 4: Letting Go
In Letting Go, your friend is shedding her identity as a married person and releasing the resentment that’s been sitting in her chest. She might look lighter. She probably IS lighter.
But here’s something worth knowing: just because she looks fine doesn’t mean she’s done. The feelings of divorce last a long time. She may still want to check in about it occasionally, even if she’s not leading with it. Don’t assume the topic is closed.
This is also the phase where the practical shape of your friendship might need to shift. If you were couple friends before, some of the ways you used to connect are just… different now. That’s not a loss. It’s an opening. This is a great time to help her re-own things that feel complicated. A restaurant. A city. A band. A tradition.
“If you’re feeling like you want to re-own it, let’s go re-own Newport.”
That is such a good line. Help her reclaim the things she loves on her own terms.
Phase 5: Moving On
This is the phase I personally find the most exciting as a friend.
In Moving On, your friend takes all the energy she spent on a difficult marriage and a difficult divorce and reinvests it in something new. She doesn’t forget she’s divorced. That’s always part of her history, but she’s building something forward.
Your job here is to cheer her on. Tell her you’re proud of her. Ask if she wants to celebrate, and let her define what that looks like. (Oona mentioned the Fresh Starts Registry. Yes, a divorce registry is a real thing, and it’s a beautiful idea.)
And if you want to do something that actually matters in this phase: start pushing back on the shame and stigma of divorce in your own conversations. Your friend may not have the energy to do that yet. You can.
You Cannot Be Everything (And You Shouldn’t Try)
Here’s something I think a lot of close friends get wrong: when someone we love is going through a divorce, we feel like we need to be there for ALL of it. Every call. Every crisis. Every phase. And that pressure, the pressure to be everything, is a setup for failure.
Oona talks about building a divorce support team, and the idea is simple: different people are good at different things. The friend who will answer the phone at 2am crying is not the same friend who will come fix your printer. The person you want to sit in silence with is not the same person you want to help you draft a text to your lawyer.
“There may be a friend that’s really good at. You call them in the middle of the night crying and they’re a great listener, but they’re a disaster when it comes to helping you fix your printer.”
Knowing which role you play is an act of honesty AND generosity. You can show up fully in your lane instead of burning out trying to cover everyone else’s.
And if you’re the friend who is in that inner circle, the one doing the heavy lifting, I want to talk to you directly for a second.
The Ring Theory (And Why You Need It)
Showing up for a friend in crisis is one of the most meaningful things you will ever do. It is also HARD. It’s emotionally exhausting. It requires a lot of self-monitoring. And for a stretch of time, it is largely one-directional, you are showing up for someone who cannot fully show up back for you yet.
On top of that, you might be grieving too. Maybe you loved spending time with this couple. Maybe you genuinely liked her spouse. Maybe your whole friend group dynamic is shifting and nobody asked your opinion about it.
That’s real. Your feelings are real. And they need somewhere to go.
This is where the Ring Theory comes in. Developed by psychologists Susan Silk and Barry Goldman, the concept is this: imagine the person in crisis at the center of a circle, with rings radiating outward representing the people in their life, closest in, most distant out. The rule is simple.
Comfort goes IN. Dumping goes OUT.
You do not process your grief about the divorce with the person going through the divorce. You take that to someone in a ring further out than you. A mutual friend. A therapist. Your partner. Someone who is NOT the person at the center.
I have been one ring out at least a dozen times in my life now. I’ve flown across the country to be with a friend who lost her husband. I’ve stayed for weeks with a friend whose son was in the NICU. And I will tell you honestly: I almost have to emotionally prepare before I go. I build in a buffer day after I leave. It takes something out of you, and that is OKAY. That is what it means to really show up.
But you have to take care of yourself in the process. Because if you don’t, you’ll burn out before your friend even hits the Mending phase.
For a deeper look at the Ring Theory, I’ve linked the original article in the show notes.
The Line That Stayed With Me
Near the end of our conversation, Oona said something I keep coming back to:
“Presence is so important. I think we so often think we have to fix things, and we don’t have to fix things. And there are some things that aren’t fixable. Your friend is getting divorced. That’s not something you can fix. But just going and sitting with that person, sitting in the feelings with them, is such a gift.”
You don’t have to have the right words. You don’t have to know what phase they’re in or whether this calls for congratulations or condolences. You just have to show up and stay.
That’s the whole thing.
If you have a friend going through a divorce right now, or if you’re going through one yourself and trying to figure out who to lean on, listen to the full conversation at friendshipirl.com/episode178. Oona goes deep on the shame and stigma of divorce, how to build your support team, and what it looks like to actually use these frameworks in real friendships.
Is there a friend in your life right now who’s navigating a divorce? What’s one thing from this episode you’re going to do differently the next time you talk to them? Send me a voice message at alexalex.chat. I genuinely want to hear.
And if you’re the friend who’s been showing up for someone in crisis and you’re feeling the weight of it, know that what you’re doing matters more than you can see right now. The full episode has more for you.
