July 18, 2025 • 17 mins
Dating after divorce can be messy and murky as we tend to lightly tread around the core of what it means to trust again . But when we learn to trust our intuition before diving into a new relationship - the dating pool looks as clear as the Maldives.
In today's episode, Anna explains these three essential truths for post-divorce dating:
- Consistency is clarity
- Charm is not character
- Intuition is Information
With wisdom from her personal journey and professional insights, Anna helps listeners avoid repeating old patterns and trust themselves again.
Interested in one-on-one coaching around your dating life? Book a consultation call with Anna here.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Hi everyone and welcome back to she Asked Tools
for Practical Hope.
I'm Anna McBride, therapist,coach and your guide in
rewriting the narrative afterheartache, loss and
transformation.
Today, we're talking aboutsomething tender but vital
(00:23):
dating after divorce, divorceand the red flags that matter
most.
This episode is not about fear.
It's about clarity, empowermentand making sure you're not
rewriting the same chapter witha new title.
Let's dive in.
Here's the first red flag Iwant you to pay attention to
(00:47):
Consistency is clarity.
Inconsistency is not mystery,it's a warning.
We need clarity.
This is how we know what'shappening, and when we don't
know, we get confused.
So inconsistency leads can belike inconsistent communication,
unpredictable affection,showing up hot then cold.
(01:11):
That's not chemistry, that'schaos.
And it's not just annoying,it's destabilizing.
In a 2022 study published bythe Journal of Social and
Personal Relationships, theyfound that emotional
inconsistency in romanticpartners is associated with
(01:31):
increased anxiety, decreasedtrust and lower relationship
satisfaction.
Yikes, I once coached a womanwe'll call her Sarah who dated a
man who would text everymorning for a week, then
disappear for four days with noexplanation.
(01:52):
She'd start to feel secure andthen boom, silence.
She told me it's like he wasgiving me just enough to keep me
hopeful.
Oh my gosh, how many times doesthat happen?
Remember, people show you whothey are all the time.
We need to believe them thefirst time.
(02:14):
I can tell you from my ownexperience that you know, I was
married for a long time tosomeone who had narcissistic
traits, who had narcissistictraits.
So at the beginning we werevery connected, he was very
attentive and I felt reallyloved.
And then, as time went on andlife settled down and we were
beyond that initial phase, thehoneymoon phase, it became very
(02:38):
apparent that we wereincompatible.
Yet, for reasons that I'm stillhealing from, I stayed in it,
even though I experienced fromhim minimizing of my feelings,
gaslighting of any scenariowhere I felt like he was wrong.
He made me feel wrong and thething is, is that reliable
(02:58):
people create calm, notconfusion?
I was confused all the time,much like Sarah.
I saw a pattern, yet I wasn'twilling to look at it.
She wasn't ready to look atthat pattern for her person
either.
But remember, that's not love.
What they're doing, that'semotional baiting.
(03:19):
We want calm, we want clarity.
That's what true love reallylooks like.
Yet if we don't pay attentionto the patterns, we're going to
miss the message.
Humans are patterned creatures.
They actually do the same thingover and over.
Yet some of us will handpickwhat we like about what somebody
(03:41):
does and make a whole storyabout that and make that why the
relationship is meant tocontinue.
I did that for 36 years when,really, if I had really
identified the full pattern, Iwould have possibly been able to
get out sooner.
Here's the thing what somebodyshows you at the beginning isn't
(04:02):
always the extent of theircharacter.
That's what takes us intolesson number two, the other red
flag that we often miss.
Usually at the beginning, charmis not the same as character.
Charm can be practiced,polished and performed, but
character that shows up in howsomeone handles disappointment,
(04:26):
boundaries, honesty andemotional labor.
Again, this is what we seeconsistently in someone.
Character is consistent.
Charm is fleeting in.
Individual.
Differences showed thatindividuals high in narcissistic
traits often score high ininitial likability and charisma
(04:51):
but struggle with empathy andlong-term relational health.
That's what my marriage was allabout.
It was very charming at thebeginning and then, as things
went on, the character wasrevealed.
That's important.
We have to really pay attentionto how we feel, what we're
being shown, because people showyou who they are that it's too
(05:15):
good to be true feeling you gotto trust it.
Trust is a must when it comesto dating, when it comes to any
relationship.
You know a man I dated shortlyafter my divorce was also very
charismatic, very charming, readme poetry, made me dinner, was
totally attentive.
(05:36):
I was so into that.
But within weeks I realized hecouldn't tolerate discomfort.
If I brought up anythingvulnerable he disappeared.
He wanted a performance, not apartnership.
He wasn't ready to be my guywho could hear how I felt about
anything, particularly about therelationship.
(05:57):
He wanted exciting.
He wanted fun, good times, notthe everyday stuff.
And I think what we have toremember is that when we are
looking for a partner, we'relooking for somebody who is
sturdy, who is stable, who isreliable and has character.
Good character, a realcharacter, is often quiet.
(06:19):
It shows up over time.
It's who someone is when theydon't have anything to gain, and
that is often something that iseasy to miss.
You know it takes time to getto know someone and I'm
embarrassed to say this, butthis is true.
I met and married my husband inless than two years, stayed
(06:40):
married for 36 years, eventhough within the first 10 years
I knew it wasn't working.
So this is why it's importantto take your time in getting to
know someone.
Get to know the character ofthe person and let them get to
know yours, because that's whenyou're going to really
understand that character isn'tcharm, it's a part of who you
(07:01):
are, with consistency, and youhave to pay attention inwardly
in order to understand that.
That's what leads us to lessonnumber three our intuition.
It's a data point.
Your intuition is not yourimagination, it's information.
Intuition is information andthe in part means it comes from
(07:23):
within us.
It's not something we getoutside of us, it's something
that we already have inside us,yet we have to cultivate it.
The payment for the intuition,the information, is time spent
with yourself.
The intuition, the information,is time spent with yourself,
(07:43):
getting to know yourself,feeling your feelings, really
examining your thoughts, yourmotives, your character, maybe
even asking yourself somequestions like who am I?
What do I want?
What kind of partner do I want?
And let it be something moresubstantial than looks, charisma
(08:03):
, fun.
It's got to be more than that.
It's got to go deeper.
You're deeper, so should yourpartner be?
Too often we override ourintuition.
We tell ourselves oh, we'rejust being dramatic, needy or
afraid, but your body knows whatyour mind can't always explain.
(08:26):
So true, in fact.
Research from the University ofIowa found that people's
physical bodies register dangeror unease seconds, even minutes,
minutes, before their brainscan articulate it.
So what that means is yourcentral nervous system is always
(08:47):
talking to you.
The way we experience it isthrough feelings like anxiety,
like tension, like dis-ease orupset, or anger or fear.
Any one of those are possible.
We have to pay attention to thestomach flips, to the tension
in the chest.
It's all data, data points.
(09:10):
It's our inner compass.
We have to pay attention and itcomes from cultivating a
connection with ourselves.
I talk to many women who say Iknew something was off, I just
didn't want to start over again.
And I get it.
You know that was me.
After my marriage ended, whichtook a long time for it to end,
(09:33):
because I didn't want to startover again, I began dating and
as I dated, I kept dating thesame kind of man.
I found that they were.
They were fun, they wereexciting, they wanted to have
fun with me.
They just weren't the type ofguy that had the character to do
the long haul.
(09:54):
And honestly, that's what Iwant.
That's what I want and Iimagine that's what a lot of you
want.
Otherwise you wouldn't be herelistening.
You know.
Some of my listeners have askedme you know what's the
difference between feeling maybeanxious after a date or after a
connection with someone, orfeeling, you know, the calm that
(10:15):
we had suggested would be goodto feel when you're with the
right person.
And I find that that'sinteresting because, depending
upon what's known as ourattachment style, meaning how we
connect with other people andthis goes back to our early
child development and dependingon how healthy of an attachment
we had with our early caregiver,our moms, our fathers, we can
(10:39):
either have a comfortableattachment or we can have an
anxious attachment, where wefeel like we need to have
someone connected with us allthe time, and when we're away
from the people that we'rewanting to have a connection
with, we can feel very anxiousall the time.
Or we can have an avoidantattachment, where we actually
(11:03):
are anxious when we're aroundsomeone because we don't know if
we really can stay connected orthey'll stay connected.
So it's almost like we havethis inner desire to push them
away because we feel like we'regoing to be abandoned anyway,
and so it's important tounderstand what your attachment
style is If you experienceanxiety during a connection with
(11:29):
someone that you're dating, orafter the date, or if you feel
the sense of like, oh, this isgoing to end anyway.
Let me end it now.
You might want to explore thatwith the help of a therapist or
a coach, because that issomething outside of what I'm
talking about.
That's not necessarilyintuition.
That is an attachment stylethat can be healed, which is
(11:54):
good news.
Yet your intuition is a part ofyou also, and it is something
that you'll need to connect withand cultivate a connection with
so that you get the informationabout the person that you're
considering and you're dating.
I can tell you from my ownexperience that my biggest
(12:15):
karmic lesson was I wasn'tlistening to how I felt.
I denied the way I felt in mymarriage, which really came out
of the way I was brought up.
I was raised in a family wherehaving feelings wasn't safe.
We weren't allowed to expressthem, so of course, I carried
that into my marriage, which Imarried very young, hadn't
(12:38):
healed from that yet.
So, because that wasn't ahealed situation, I was acting
out this negative feeling, thisnegative sense of self in
relationship to my husband, andso I was anxious all the time,
yet I denied my anxiety, I saidthat was nothing to pay
(13:00):
attention to.
Instead, I kept looking outsideof myself.
I looked at the lifestyle wehad.
I looked at the fact that hehad a job.
I looked at the fact that hedid his best to be a good father
to our children, that he hadgreat friends, he had a great
career, that he wasn't analcoholic all of these things.
(13:21):
The boxes were checking, yet Iwasn't paying attention to how I
felt when I was with him.
This was my intuition talking tome all the time, and what I've
come to appreciate is that, youknow, intuition speaks quietly.
At the first it's like a littlewhisper, it's a nudge, it's
(13:42):
like that stomach flip, thatchest tug or that little knowing
that comes to you.
Yet if you don't pay attentionto it, it gets louder and louder
and louder and eventually it'slike the proverbial brick that's
whacked upside your head.
Ouch.
(14:02):
And my marriage ended verydramatically because I wasn't
paying attention to theinformation, the intuition that
was always being shared with meby my central nervous system, by
my body, by my spirit.
And when you don't payattention inwardly, you pay the
(14:26):
cost outwardly.
That's called karma.
Cost outwardly.
That's called karma, and if youhaven't listened to the karma
episode, I highly recommend it.
It will help fill in the blanksabout the way karma works.
And so I had to pay the karmicprice because I wasn't paying
attention to the intuition thatI now know was truly talking to
(14:48):
me all the time.
So here's your post-divorcedating mantra right?
Learn please from my experienceConsistency is clarity.
Right?
People show you who they areall the time.
We have to pay attention towhat they are showing, how
they're showing up consistently,not what they say, it's what
(15:11):
they do that matters.
And charm is not character.
So Prince Charming can say lotsof things.
He can love, bomb you.
He can pour on the attention atthe beginning, but his
character is revealed slowlyover time.
Get to know your man.
If he's the right man, he hasgood character, and you will get
(15:35):
to know that.
No rush, and your intuition is asacred tool.
Pay attention to it.
Pay attention inwardly now.
That is my definition of whatpain means P-A-I-N.
Pay attention inwardly now.
Love is not meant to be painful, it's meant to be intuitive,
(16:00):
it's meant to be calm, it'smeant to be clear and it's meant
to be not rushed, not forced,not swayed.
Narcissists are really great atconvincing us that they're the
right person for us and then,from that point on, once they've
(16:21):
won that game, they go aboutconfusing us and convincing us
that we are wrong abouteverything else.
Dating again isn't about provingyou're lovable.
You already are.
You don't have anything toprove to anyone else.
Just show up for yourself.
It's about protecting you, thepeace you fought so hard to
(16:44):
reclaim.
Don't give away your peace,don't give away your serenity,
don't abandon yourself and don'tbe afraid.
You just have to stay awake,stay aware, stay conscious of
what you're doing, what you'rechoosing to do.
So I hope this has been helpfuland until next time, I'm Anna
McBride, and this is she Asked.
(17:06):
Where healing meets practicalhope, be well.
Hi everyone and welcome back to she Asked Tools
for Practical Hope.
I'm Anna McBride, therapist,coach and your guide in
rewriting the narrative afterheartache, loss and
transformation.
Today, we're talking aboutsomething tender but vital
(00:23):
dating after divorce, divorceand the red flags that matter
most.
This episode is not about fear.
It's about clarity, empowermentand making sure you're not
rewriting the same chapter witha new title.
Let's dive in.
Here's the first red flag Iwant you to pay attention to
(00:47):
Consistency is clarity.
Inconsistency is not mystery,it's a warning.
We need clarity.
This is how we know what'shappening, and when we don't
know, we get confused.
So inconsistency leads can belike inconsistent communication,
unpredictable affection,showing up hot then cold.
(01:11):
That's not chemistry, that'schaos.
And it's not just annoying,it's destabilizing.
In a 2022 study published bythe Journal of Social and
Personal Relationships, theyfound that emotional
inconsistency in romanticpartners is associated with
(01:31):
increased anxiety, decreasedtrust and lower relationship
satisfaction.
Yikes, I once coached a womanwe'll call her Sarah who dated a
man who would text everymorning for a week, then
disappear for four days with noexplanation.
(01:52):
She'd start to feel secure andthen boom, silence.
She told me it's like he wasgiving me just enough to keep me
hopeful.
Oh my gosh, how many times doesthat happen?
Remember, people show you whothey are all the time.
We need to believe them thefirst time.
(02:14):
I can tell you from my ownexperience that you know, I was
married for a long time tosomeone who had narcissistic
traits, who had narcissistictraits.
So at the beginning we werevery connected, he was very
attentive and I felt reallyloved.
And then, as time went on andlife settled down and we were
beyond that initial phase, thehoneymoon phase, it became very
(02:38):
apparent that we wereincompatible.
Yet, for reasons that I'm stillhealing from, I stayed in it,
even though I experienced fromhim minimizing of my feelings,
gaslighting of any scenariowhere I felt like he was wrong.
He made me feel wrong and thething is, is that reliable
(02:58):
people create calm, notconfusion?
I was confused all the time,much like Sarah.
I saw a pattern, yet I wasn'twilling to look at it.
She wasn't ready to look atthat pattern for her person
either.
But remember, that's not love.
What they're doing, that'semotional baiting.
(03:19):
We want calm, we want clarity.
That's what true love reallylooks like.
Yet if we don't pay attentionto the patterns, we're going to
miss the message.
Humans are patterned creatures.
They actually do the same thingover and over.
Yet some of us will handpickwhat we like about what somebody
(03:41):
does and make a whole storyabout that and make that why the
relationship is meant tocontinue.
I did that for 36 years when,really, if I had really
identified the full pattern, Iwould have possibly been able to
get out sooner.
Here's the thing what somebodyshows you at the beginning isn't
(04:02):
always the extent of theircharacter.
That's what takes us intolesson number two, the other red
flag that we often miss.
Usually at the beginning, charmis not the same as character.
Charm can be practiced,polished and performed, but
character that shows up in howsomeone handles disappointment,
(04:26):
boundaries, honesty andemotional labor.
Again, this is what we seeconsistently in someone.
Character is consistent.
Charm is fleeting in.
Individual.
Differences showed thatindividuals high in narcissistic
traits often score high ininitial likability and charisma
(04:51):
but struggle with empathy andlong-term relational health.
That's what my marriage was allabout.
It was very charming at thebeginning and then, as things
went on, the character wasrevealed.
That's important.
We have to really pay attentionto how we feel, what we're
being shown, because people showyou who they are that it's too
(05:15):
good to be true feeling you gotto trust it.
Trust is a must when it comesto dating, when it comes to any
relationship.
You know a man I dated shortlyafter my divorce was also very
charismatic, very charming, readme poetry, made me dinner, was
totally attentive.
(05:36):
I was so into that.
But within weeks I realized hecouldn't tolerate discomfort.
If I brought up anythingvulnerable he disappeared.
He wanted a performance, not apartnership.
He wasn't ready to be my guywho could hear how I felt about
anything, particularly about therelationship.
(05:57):
He wanted exciting.
He wanted fun, good times, notthe everyday stuff.
And I think what we have toremember is that when we are
looking for a partner, we'relooking for somebody who is
sturdy, who is stable, who isreliable and has character.
Good character, a realcharacter, is often quiet.
(06:19):
It shows up over time.
It's who someone is when theydon't have anything to gain, and
that is often something that iseasy to miss.
You know it takes time to getto know someone and I'm
embarrassed to say this, butthis is true.
I met and married my husband inless than two years, stayed
(06:40):
married for 36 years, eventhough within the first 10 years
I knew it wasn't working.
So this is why it's importantto take your time in getting to
know someone.
Get to know the character ofthe person and let them get to
know yours, because that's whenyou're going to really
understand that character isn'tcharm, it's a part of who you
(07:01):
are, with consistency, and youhave to pay attention inwardly
in order to understand that.
That's what leads us to lessonnumber three our intuition.
It's a data point.
Your intuition is not yourimagination, it's information.
Intuition is information andthe in part means it comes from
(07:23):
within us.
It's not something we getoutside of us, it's something
that we already have inside us,yet we have to cultivate it.
The payment for the intuition,the information, is time spent
with yourself.
The intuition, the information,is time spent with yourself,
(07:43):
getting to know yourself,feeling your feelings, really
examining your thoughts, yourmotives, your character, maybe
even asking yourself somequestions like who am I?
What do I want?
What kind of partner do I want?
And let it be something moresubstantial than looks, charisma
(08:03):
, fun.
It's got to be more than that.
It's got to go deeper.
You're deeper, so should yourpartner be?
Too often we override ourintuition.
We tell ourselves oh, we'rejust being dramatic, needy or
afraid, but your body knows whatyour mind can't always explain.
(08:26):
So true, in fact.
Research from the University ofIowa found that people's
physical bodies register dangeror unease seconds, even minutes,
minutes, before their brainscan articulate it.
So what that means is yourcentral nervous system is always
(08:47):
talking to you.
The way we experience it isthrough feelings like anxiety,
like tension, like dis-ease orupset, or anger or fear.
Any one of those are possible.
We have to pay attention to thestomach flips, to the tension
in the chest.
It's all data, data points.
(09:10):
It's our inner compass.
We have to pay attention and itcomes from cultivating a
connection with ourselves.
I talk to many women who say Iknew something was off, I just
didn't want to start over again.
And I get it.
You know that was me.
After my marriage ended, whichtook a long time for it to end,
(09:33):
because I didn't want to startover again, I began dating and
as I dated, I kept dating thesame kind of man.
I found that they were.
They were fun, they wereexciting, they wanted to have
fun with me.
They just weren't the type ofguy that had the character to do
the long haul.
(09:54):
And honestly, that's what Iwant.
That's what I want and Iimagine that's what a lot of you
want.
Otherwise you wouldn't be herelistening.
You know.
Some of my listeners have askedme you know what's the
difference between feeling maybeanxious after a date or after a
connection with someone, orfeeling, you know, the calm that
(10:15):
we had suggested would be goodto feel when you're with the
right person.
And I find that that'sinteresting because, depending
upon what's known as ourattachment style, meaning how we
connect with other people andthis goes back to our early
child development and dependingon how healthy of an attachment
we had with our early caregiver,our moms, our fathers, we can
(10:39):
either have a comfortableattachment or we can have an
anxious attachment, where wefeel like we need to have
someone connected with us allthe time, and when we're away
from the people that we'rewanting to have a connection
with, we can feel very anxiousall the time.
Or we can have an avoidantattachment, where we actually
(11:03):
are anxious when we're aroundsomeone because we don't know if
we really can stay connected orthey'll stay connected.
So it's almost like we havethis inner desire to push them
away because we feel like we'regoing to be abandoned anyway,
and so it's important tounderstand what your attachment
style is If you experienceanxiety during a connection with
(11:29):
someone that you're dating, orafter the date, or if you feel
the sense of like, oh, this isgoing to end anyway.
Let me end it now.
You might want to explore thatwith the help of a therapist or
a coach, because that issomething outside of what I'm
talking about.
That's not necessarilyintuition.
That is an attachment stylethat can be healed, which is
(11:54):
good news.
Yet your intuition is a part ofyou also, and it is something
that you'll need to connect withand cultivate a connection with
so that you get the informationabout the person that you're
considering and you're dating.
I can tell you from my ownexperience that my biggest
(12:15):
karmic lesson was I wasn'tlistening to how I felt.
I denied the way I felt in mymarriage, which really came out
of the way I was brought up.
I was raised in a family wherehaving feelings wasn't safe.
We weren't allowed to expressthem, so of course, I carried
that into my marriage, which Imarried very young, hadn't
(12:38):
healed from that yet.
So, because that wasn't ahealed situation, I was acting
out this negative feeling, thisnegative sense of self in
relationship to my husband, andso I was anxious all the time,
yet I denied my anxiety, I saidthat was nothing to pay
(13:00):
attention to.
Instead, I kept looking outsideof myself.
I looked at the lifestyle wehad.
I looked at the fact that hehad a job.
I looked at the fact that hedid his best to be a good father
to our children, that he hadgreat friends, he had a great
career, that he wasn't analcoholic all of these things.
(13:21):
The boxes were checking, yet Iwasn't paying attention to how I
felt when I was with him.
This was my intuition talking tome all the time, and what I've
come to appreciate is that, youknow, intuition speaks quietly.
At the first it's like a littlewhisper, it's a nudge, it's
(13:42):
like that stomach flip, thatchest tug or that little knowing
that comes to you.
Yet if you don't pay attentionto it, it gets louder and louder
and louder and eventually it'slike the proverbial brick that's
whacked upside your head.
Ouch.
(14:02):
And my marriage ended verydramatically because I wasn't
paying attention to theinformation, the intuition that
was always being shared with meby my central nervous system, by
my body, by my spirit.
And when you don't payattention inwardly, you pay the
(14:26):
cost outwardly.
That's called karma.
Cost outwardly.
That's called karma, and if youhaven't listened to the karma
episode, I highly recommend it.
It will help fill in the blanksabout the way karma works.
And so I had to pay the karmicprice because I wasn't paying
attention to the intuition thatI now know was truly talking to
(14:48):
me all the time.
So here's your post-divorcedating mantra right?
Learn please from my experienceConsistency is clarity.
Right?
People show you who they areall the time.
We have to pay attention towhat they are showing, how
they're showing up consistently,not what they say, it's what
(15:11):
they do that matters.
And charm is not character.
So Prince Charming can say lotsof things.
He can love, bomb you.
He can pour on the attention atthe beginning, but his
character is revealed slowlyover time.
Get to know your man.
If he's the right man, he hasgood character, and you will get
(15:35):
to know that.
No rush, and your intuition is asacred tool.
Pay attention to it.
Pay attention inwardly now.
That is my definition of whatpain means P-A-I-N.
Pay attention inwardly now.
Love is not meant to be painful, it's meant to be intuitive,
(16:00):
it's meant to be calm, it'smeant to be clear and it's meant
to be not rushed, not forced,not swayed.
Narcissists are really great atconvincing us that they're the
right person for us and then,from that point on, once they've
(16:21):
won that game, they go aboutconfusing us and convincing us
that we are wrong abouteverything else.
Dating again isn't about provingyou're lovable.
You already are.
You don't have anything toprove to anyone else.
Just show up for yourself.
It's about protecting you, thepeace you fought so hard to
(16:44):
reclaim.
Don't give away your peace,don't give away your serenity,
don't abandon yourself and don'tbe afraid.
You just have to stay awake,stay aware, stay conscious of
what you're doing, what you'rechoosing to do.
So I hope this has been helpfuland until next time, I'm Anna
McBride, and this is she Asked.
(17:06):
Where healing meets practicalhope, be well.
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Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show. Clay Travis and Buck Sexton tackle the biggest stories in news, politics and current events with intelligence and humor. From the border crisis, to the madness of cancel culture and far-left missteps, Clay and Buck guide listeners through the latest headlines and hot topics with fun and entertaining conversations and opinions.