10 Ways To Help A Friend Going Through A Divorce

10 Ways To Help a Friend Going Through a Divorce - Janna Kasza

Offer practical blessings.

For the first year or so, your friend probably won’t notice the flower beds are dead and the lawn needed to be mowed last week. Or that the ring around the tub might now have reached “pressure washing” status.

This was me. I had trees down over fences, a gate falling off the hinge, and just a hot mess everywhere. My sister organized a “work day” at my house and gathered volunteers to help me get back on top of home maintenance. It was such an unexpected blessing.

Consider getting a crew together to help with basic maintenance around their house. See if you can help fill those gaps in the short run, or consider taking up a collection between friends to help pay for a handyman or cleaning service if that would be a better fit. This is the literal meaning of the “Hands and Feet of Jesus” and, wow, it will be so meaningful to them.

Understand that holidays hurt.

Holidays have memories and traditions all their own, and now many of them have been erased in the fire of divorce. Family gatherings will be different or nonexistent. Kids might be with their other parent.

The first few holiday seasons while going through a divorce will be exceptionally hard. Start early and help them come up with new traditions or modifications on the old ones. They might want to join your family in the first year, and if you can, let them! Depression is a monster during the holidays. So even if they decline your invitation, make sure you at least drop in to check on them with a peppermint mocha and a hug.

Let them be needy.

Be prepared for your friend to be needy, very needy. Coffee dates and more coffee dates, and did I mention coffee dates? If it’s not coffee, find whatever it is he or she can do to unplug, unwind, and share their heart with you. That might be going for a walk, working out, working in the garden together, or maybe it’s helping them clean their house. But it’s probably mostly coffee.

We’re needy in the beginning—there’s suddenly a giant hole in our lives. Eventually we figure it out, but we’ll probably test the boundaries of friendship in those early days of trying to get our footing in this new life.

“The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit” (Psalm 34:18 ).

Remember their anniversary.

They won’t want you to bring it up by name, and they don’t want to celebrate. But remember the day—you know they sure do. Be there so they don’t get stuck inside their own head. Plan something, keep their mind busy. Don’t you dare let your friend spend that day alone for the first year or two.

This list is really just the beginning of how God showed up through friends and family during my darkest moments. I’m still walking through them in many ways, but I know I’m not alone. And I’m forever grateful to those who chose to walk alongside me and my children.

As you think about your friend going through a divorce, I encourage you to get involved, and above all else, pray. Pray to the God of all comfort who is able to do exceedingly more than all you ask or imagine.

“Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us” (Ephesians 3:20).

This article originally appeared on FamilyLife.com.

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