Another professional frequently involved with Second Saturdays is Alanna Williams, a family law attorney who is based in Fairfax and works with many Loudoun clients. She noted that those considering divorce – especially women who have been stay-at-home moms – require a lot of information about the legal issues involved. “They need to understand what they need to survive. They need to understand child support and how Virginia calculates it. They need to understand how property division, and how the grounds of divorce affect it and spousal support.”
In addition to Second Saturday, Brilliant Exits offers other programs, including a Divorce 101 workshop, a support group, and Banana Splits for Families, which focuses on children whose parents are undergoing divorce.
“Divorce is a transition,” Zarozny explained. “I saw how hard it was on my children.” She added that during the Banana Splits sessions, the children are helped through art therapy to express their feelings. Also, to inject a little fun into the day, they can actually make a banana split for a treat. “People always ask, ‘How can I make this easier on my kids?’’ Zarozny said. “It’s not the divorce, it’s the exposure to conflict – that’s what’s going to hurt them.”
One of the Second Saturday workshop participants is a friend of Zarozny’s who resides in Loudoun County. She spoke to TalkLoudoun on condition of anonymity. “I went through my divorce a number of years ago,” she said. “I wish I had had (Zarozny’s) resources (then).”
For this woman, difficulties have extended beyond the finalization of the divorce. One bone of contention involved family photos that her ex-husband had in his possession. “I was not allowed to have pictures of my children,” she said. “It became huge.”
Zarozny advised her friend to come at the request a little differently. Instead of asking for herself, Zarozny suggested that she should ask for the photos so that she could do a memory book for her daughter’s high school graduation. “I thought, ‘What a great idea,’” the woman remembered. “It came across as less emotional.” The approach worked, and the woman received the photos. “My ex-husband would honor something my children wanted,” she observed, “but not anything I wanted.”
The Loudoun resident added that she had a tough time dealing with her feelings about the breakup of her marriage. “I was completely stymied by my emotions. I couldn’t help myself. You’ve got to take the emotions out – they’ll trip you up again and again.”
“The emotions are big,” Zarozny said. “If you can separate your emotions, (you can) see the divorce like dissolving the business end of a relationship.”
Like her friend, Zarozny also knows the pain of divorce firsthand. A native of New England, she married her college sweetheart and had two daughters with him. The couple was married for 10 years, but eventually divorced. That process turned out to be an ordeal that took nearly five years to finalize, but it also sparked in Zarozny a desire to make the path easier for those who might follow. “I learned the hard way how difficult the process can be,” she said. “I wrote up a business plan for the services and support that I would have liked to have when I was going through a divorce.”
Two years ago, Zarozny received her life coach certification. Around that same time, Brilliant Exits was born – the start of her own crusade to turn a negative experience into a world of good for others in a difficult position. “This is why I do what I do,” she explained. “It’s the only way I can make sense of what I’ve been through. I can make it better if I help others.”
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