After spending all that time with divorce lawyers over a period of months, you and your ex have signed on the dotted line and finally completed your divorce. Life would be simple if your need for human companionship ended with the filing of your divorce papers, but you know better than that. In spite of the pain of divorce, at some point you may want to try to get into another relationship, but might not even know where to start. Here are a few practical ways you can ease yourself back into the world of relationships and dating after divorce.

1. Give yourself plenty of time after the divorce. After your divorce is completed, your feelings toward relationships may go one of three ways: wanting to date immediately to get back at your ex, never wanting to be in a relationship ever again, or somewhere in between, bouncing between the two extremes. Don’t feel pressured to start dating after divorce until you are ready – despite what your friends and family might be telling you. Jumping into a relationship too quickly after divorce could just lead to more heartache, but waiting too long could mean that you’re allowing your divorce to prevent you from ever being happy in a relationship again.
2. Be realistic about your expectations. When you think the time is right for you to try dating, you need to be very honest with yourself about what you hope to get out of a potential relationship. Since your marriage relationship ended badly, you might have very low expectations for any relationship and anyone you might date. But it’s important to make a distinction between the relationship with your ex that ended in divorce, and any new relationship and new person you date. It’s good to be on your guard and not invest yourself too quickly in a new relationship, but you may find that you can expect more out of relationships than you thought.
3. Be honest about what you need out of a relationship. You’re in a very different phase of life than you were when you first starting dating and when you were married, and that’s okay. It’s important to be honest with yourself (and eventually, with whomever you date seriously) about what you really need from a relationship, what your priorities are. You should be honest (and come to terms with the fact) that you might not be looking for a serious, long term relationship. Or, that might be all you’re looking for, only hoping that this time it works out. Either way, honest self evaluation is the key to moving forward confidently when you start to date.
4. If you have children, talk to them about what your dating means for them. Your children may be a big reason why you might not want to date after divorce, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Depending on their age and maturity level, you can decide how you want to address this issue with them, but there are a few important points you should cover with your children. They need to know you aren’t trying to “replace” your ex, and that whatever relationship they have with your former spouse (and with you, for that matter) won’t change with you dating. Do what you can to help your kids understand that your dating won’t change the way you feel about them at all.
5. Give online dating a try. You may be wary of online dating because of a certain stigma, but it can be a great way to enter the world of dating after divorce, especially if you aren’t the type that likes to just hang out at bars and clubs. Do a little research and choose a site you think best matches what you are looking for, and try to only pick “paid” sites. The fee charged by the site acts in some ways like an initial screening process, increasing the likelihood that other people you interact with on the site are actually interested in dating and potentially starting a new relationship.
6. Be gentle with yourself if a relationship doesn’t work out. If you find someone you like and start dating regularly, but it ends for whatever reason, go easy on yourself. This is not your divorce version 2.0. The whole purpose of dating is to experiment and see if a relationship is right for you, and if it isn’t, that’s not a global statement about who you are as a person. It may be difficult, but if you are gentle on yourself, you can take the positive away from a dating relationship that didn’t work out and apply what you’ve learned about yourself to the next relationship.

Dating after divorce may seem daunting, but it doesn’t have to be. Following the steps above and practicing self-awareness can go a long way toward finding a relationship that lasts.

Adam Bowers is a writer living in Atlanta interested in legal issues and relationship advice. He currently writes for Atlanta Divorce Lawyers.

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