Rebuilding Your Identity (and Your Finances) After Divorce With Bridget Borel, CFP®, CDFA®

There’s a strange, in-between place that almost no one warns you about when your marriage ends. You’re no longer who you were — but you’re not yet who you’re becoming. As one therapist put it to this week’s guest during her own divorce, you’re “somewhere in between.” In this episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia Howell sits down with Fresh Starts expert Bridget Borel, CFP®, CDFA® — a Certified Financial Planner, Certified Divorce Financial Analyst, and founder of Clairwell Financial Planning — to talk about the identity shift at the heart of divorce, and how to rebuild not just your bank account, but your sense of self. Bridget brings a rare double lens to the conversation: she has lived this transition personally and now guides clients through it professionally, which means she speaks about the rattling, disorienting middle of divorce with both clinical clarity and genuine warmth.

What makes this conversation land is Bridget’s refusal to sugarcoat paired with her stubborn hope. She tells new clients the truth — it’s going to hurt, and it’s going to take longer than you think it should — and then she holds the other half just as firmly: it won’t last forever, you will get through this, and you don’t have to do it alone. She describes the “arc of the divorce experience,” watching clients move from the raw, emotional early days to suddenly booking an adventure trip or launching a business once the dust settles. The takeaway for listeners is both a mindset and a method: you are allowed to become a new person, and you can get there in baby steps — one new skill, one small financial win, one healthier conversation at a time. Whether you’re considering divorce, in the thick of it, or rebuilding on the other side, this is a grounding, hopeful listen about financial confidence, rediscovering your identity, and truly starting over after divorce.

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