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GENERAL HOSPITAL

Laura Wright Opens Up About How Her Divorce Changed Her

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When GENERAL HOSPITAL star Laura Wright (Carly) recently sat down with Maurice Benard (Sonny) on his State of Mind YouTube series, one of the many topics of conversation the longtime scene partners covered was her painful divorce several years ago. And while the actress — who is currently dating her GH co-star Wes Ramsey (Peter) — shared that she is now in a good place with her ex-husband, John Wright, it was a long, long journey for her to get there.

Admitting that she was “evil” to her ex during the divorce process, Wright revealed that she struggled greatly with the collapse of what she thought a family was supposed to look like. “I was gonna force it no matter what to where it was gonna kill me,” she confessed. “And it almost did. When I finally let go and stopped running from the pain and witnessed what was happening and accepted it, then it all started to fall into place.”

Once high school sweethearts, the Wrights separated in 2014 before finalizing their divorce two years later, bringing a 21-year marriage that brought them two now-grown children, Lauren and John, an end. But when the couple first split up, the kids were in their early teens, and Wright said that there was no hiding her pain and heartbreak from her daughter and son. “I was a very different person. I wore my feelings,” she admitted. “I was very much in a victim state of mind. And I had to learn to let that go and realize that that didn’t serve me or them, and it was only going to keep me on the hamster wheel of pain. But boy, that took a lot of work.”

As her marriage broke apart their family unit, Wright — here at the 2017 Daytime Emmy Awards with her kids — struggled with being a single mom to son LJ and daughter Lauren.Instagram

Admitting that for a long time she was in denial and hoped that her ex would eventually want to reconcile, “when it all started to crumble, it was like watching a 5-year-old child lose her mind at times. Like, a severe temper tantrum, but as an adult woman. That version of me had to die for me to be reborn as who I am now. Because I really was broken, and it was a death.”

The Emmy winner credits mommy blogger-turned-author Glennon Doyle and her book Love Warrior for ultimately helping her get on the path of healing. Eventually, Wright says, she was able to say to herself, “Okay, I’m not a victim. Every choice I’ve ever made in my life has brought me to this moment. Take responsibility for where you stand, and then let’s move forward.”

Thanks to the lessons she learned by reading Doyle’s book, three years after they first split up, Wright had an “A-ha!” moment where she realized that John was no longer her person — allowing her to finally let go of her ex and the vision she was so tightly clinging to of what a family should look like. About three weeks later, Wright ran into her former GUIDING LIGHT co-star Ramsey (he played Sam and she, Cassie, on the CBS soap) at a Daytime Emmy party, and the rest, as they say, is history.

One big, blended family! A getaway to celebrate Lauren’s graduation weekend included Ramsey, John Sr., Lauren’s boyfriend, and LJ’s girlfriend. Instagram

Today, Wright has wonderfully blended her life with Ramsey with her life with her children, and her ex-husband is still very much a part of their family unit. They may not be a traditional husband-and-wife family, but they are a family, nonetheless. “I’ve never been happier or honest and authentic like this,” she confessed.

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