'Jackie O said it takes 3 years to recover from a marriage ending. I didn't believe her until now.'

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I heard radio presenter Jackie O describe the recovery from a marriage ending, in her 2023 No Filter interview, as a "three-year process".

She was talking about the time needed to move past the initial trauma, fully heal, and finally adjust to a new life.

I didn't understand it at the time. I was over a year into my separation, and I thought, "But I'm fine now." Three years felt like an eternity to me back then.

I didn't realise how true her words were until I finally got there.

Because after a while, it isn't the marriage you're grieving for; it's the "adjusting to a new life" part that is the last, most elusive piece of the puzzle.

"Moving on is one thing, but finding your new normal takes a lot longer," Jackie said.

Watch: Chloe Fisher on love and loss on No Filter. Post continues below.

There is something no one prepares you for: the slow, deliberate disentangling of your existence.

For a long time, my identity wasn't mine alone. It was shared, adjusted, softened, and negotiated. Decisions were made with another person in mind, even the ones that felt too small to name.

When that ended, it wasn't that I didn't know who I was, I just didn't know where I began.

In the early stages, you're in survival mode. You stay busy to outrun the silence. You socialise too much, work too hard, and party just enough to keep the quiet at bay. Or a lot.

You're functioning, but you aren't reflecting. You don't stop to ask the bigger question: "What do I actually want my life to look like now?"

Someone asked me that a while ago, and I couldn't answer. Not because I was broken, but because I'd never given myself the space to imagine it.

The adrenaline of the initial 'break' wears off, and you enter the "messy middle".

This is the most uncomfortable phase because your support system has, understandably, moved on with their own lives. The check-in texts stop coming; the crisis has become "old news" to everyone else.

This is where you have to sit with yourself alone on a Tuesday night with no distractions.

It's where you realise that "finding yourself" isn't a grand epiphany on a mountain top; it's a series of small, sometimes boring, choices.

It's the realisation that your time is no longer a shared commodity; it is a private inheritance.

And it's so easy to fill this void with unhealthy distractions. I know, because I did.

I remember my best friend early on telling me to "get a hobby", and I said, "No way."

It reminded me of that scene in Sex and the City when Charlotte goes to a dance class after her marriage ended and leaves in tears because she was dancing by herself.

I've started seeing a new psychologist to manage my ADHD and my relationship with alcohol. She said, "You need to get a hobby." I cried. It's been years since my friend said it. But they were both right. I did.

While I was partying, distracting, and numbing myself with alcohol, I was never going to be able to learn to truly be comfortable on my own and ultimately, land my North Star.

I needed that distraction for a while. We all do, just to cope, but there comes a point where it no longer serves you. And when and what that looks like is different for everyone.

In many marriages where there are children involved, women subconsciously adopt the role of managing the moods, schedules, and needs of the household.

When that structure disappears, a strange paralysis sets in. There is a frantic restlessness, a phantom energy that used to be poured into something else, now looking for a place to land.

Finding your path isn't a linear upward climb. It's okay to feel empowered on a Wednesday and completely lost on Thursday.

And it isn't a quest for constant happiness; it's a commitment to curiosity. It's about the active, messy, and wonderful process of discovering what you're capable of when you're the one holding the compass.

Listen: Jackie O on What She Wishes She Knew About Divorce on No Filter. Post continues below.

The end of a marriage is often described as a "death", something you need to "recover from". But eventually, it reveals itself as a renaissance.

A shedding of old skin to make room for a version of yourself that may have been sidelined for years, or even a self that you never had the space to explore.

Because your wants, needs and goals when you're in your twenties are vastly different from those in your forties and beyond.

I see the wisdom now in what Jackie O was saying and how important it is to be single for a good while.

When we enter into a new relationship too quickly, we subconsciously abandon the quest to reclaim that sense of "self".

I now see how important it is to define that for ourselves before we open the door to sharing a life with someone else.

Otherwise, you can quickly fall into the trap of bleeding your own needs into someone else's.

I used to think the unknown was a dark room I was being forced into. Now, I see it as a vast, open field. There are no fences. There are no 'shoulds', just 'coulds'.

Now, more than three years on, I'm finally in the unfamiliar position of not rebuilding, not reacting, and not proving anything, just figuring it out.

And it's exciting, more than it is terrifying. Liberating, more than daunting.

When life delivers you a redo you didn't expect, or ask for, you grab it. You take it. And you build your own brilliant, beautiful version.

For you, on your terms. We only get one shot at this thing called life, and we don't know how long we get to live it.

So go forth, my fellow divorcees. And go live it. Not 'for the sake of the children', but for you.

Feature image: Supplied.