YAKIMA — Your emotions are shattered, your self image in shreds, your children confused — all common occurrences when divorce hits a family.
Yakima DivorceCare is a local support group for anyone going through the pain of marital divorce. First people recover themselves, then they help others recover.
“DivorceCare has been a huge component of my healing,” explains Jenni Elwood, who began attending meetings six years ago and now directs the group’s children’s program.
Christian-based, the group is run by men and women who have gone through divorce and have learned tips for healing. They emphasize that people need not belong to a church to benefit from the meetings. The curriculum comes from the national headquarters in North Carolina.
Free meetings on Wednesday evenings are offered fall through spring, with informal gatherings, such as potlucks, bowling and movie nights, scheduled during the summer and throughout the year.
The group, which began meeting in 2009, is supported by Memorial Bible Church. More than 100 people have gone through the program in two years.
A main objective is to show people experiencing a divorce that their emotions are similar to those of many others.
“You’re feeling like you’re the only one going through this, but we’re all working on the same things,” says Dan Whitney, director of Yakima DivorceCare.
“Forgive and forget are nice, but that’s not reality,” he says. “But you can take the pain and turn it into something nice.”
As Elwood sees it, “You’ve got to replace the sadness with positive things.”
That’s not easy this time of year, they concede. Holidays carry an edge of sadness for many folks from broken homes, so the group makes a special effort to tackle that issue.
During this time, they concentrate weekly themes on “Surviving the Holidays” and give tips, such as finding new friends, doing traditional activities while starting new ones and combating loneliness.
On Thanksgiving, for instance, member Tom Burke opened his home to anyone in the group to enjoy a turkey dinner.
“Holidays can be hard because it brings back memories and losses,” Whitney says.
Themes addressed at other meetings include Dealing with Anger and Reaching Forgiveness. Attendees break into small groups, separated by gender, for discussion.
About 15 people who have gone through the cycle of 14 weekly sessions at least once volunteer as leaders. Typically, about 30 adults attend weekly, along with about a dozen children, ages 5-12, who have their own program in a separate room.
The first meeting is usually the hardest because people are so broken, Whitney says. Volunteers often comb through the parking lot before meetings start, seeking out people who might be too despondent to come through the door without coaxing.
“The first time you come, you’re busted wide open,” says Whitney, 59, who works as a fruit tree grafter. Divorced in 1993, he remarried in 1997.
Tracy Daniels first attended last January when she had been separated for three months and her emotions were “really new and raw.”
“It was a non-threatening place, and it was definitely helpful to know that I wasn’t going nuts,” she says.
The 42-year-old says it was reinforcing to discover that others shared the same experiences.
“I’ve gone from being a total wreck to turning my life around. DivorceCare has been a major part of that,” Daniels says.
For Whitney, “Divorce is the most devastating and most wonderful thing that’s happened in my life. I wouldn’t want to go through it again, but now I’m a better person than before.”
Elwood says the group helped her realize she shouldn’t focus on what was unfair but what she was looking forward to, which helped unravel negative sentiments.
A speech therapist, Elwood, 36, was divorced in 2005 and has since remarried. In fact, she and her husband, Tom, first met when both were serving as DivorceCare volunteers. Generally, dating is discouraged among attendees because the focus is on healing and not starting a new relationship.
“Some people jump back too soon into a relationship,” Whitney says. “The goal of the group is not remarriage. It’s healing and health.”
Whitney says he volunteers with the group because the results are gratifying.
“The reason I do this over and over is I get to see the things that hurt me helping others. I see their joy. I see wholesome, good, loving people giving back to the community in a way they couldn’t before.”
Elwood continues to volunteer because she sees emotional growth in the children who attend.
“It’s good to see the kids doing better in school, making friends and realizing that the divorce is not their fault.”
Her son, Mitchell, a first grader, and Daniel’s 11-year-old son, Jakob, both eagerly attend the children’s program, they say.
“It’s been good for (Jakob) to know that other kids are going through the same thing, and he’s not alone,” explains Daniels.
In the children’s program, they talk about controlling anger, communicating with parents and juggling living in two homes. Games, videos and worksheets are also offered.
Although the program is Christian based, people don’t have to be religious to join. However, Whitney maintains that when a majority of people in a community profess belief in God, it makes sense to include God in the healing process.
“God takes the things that should not have been and, when placed in his hands, uses them for good,” he says.
Because most of the group’s leadership have volunteered for many years, they’ve become deft at dealing with unusual situations, such as when divorced spouses show up, unaware that the other is attending.
During the fall session, Yakima DivorceCare experimented with a program for blended families, talking about how to become successful step families.
They believe it adds to the nurturing atmosphere in the entire group.
“We end up calling these people our family. So many have lost so much, and we’re all there for each other,” Elwood says.
“I just love that.”
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