The Naked Truth About Midlife Romance

New Year's gets a lot of us thinking about the changes we need to make: losing weight, giving up cigarettes, getting more exercise. But if you're a woman resurfacing after a divorce or death of a spouse or the breakup of a long-term relationship, your resolutions may include a plan to restart your love life. It's time, you've decided, to force yourself off the couch, away from the TV and the ice cream, and out looking for love again.

If it's been a long time since you've put yourself out in "single space," and particularly if you're older than 46, this prospect can be both enticing and paralyzing, says clinical psychologist Judith Sills. Her new book, Getting Naked Again, aims to be a guide to women looking for advice on how to navigate this transition.

"The issues that concern a woman of 42 or 62 are not the same as a woman divorced at 22," Sills says. And too often, the only advice such women get is from married friends "who haven't dated in 200 years." Having been through the experience herself, Sills knows firsthand that there are things she wished she had known before she decided to tango again. In addition to her own hard-won lessons, she interviewed other women who were "just at the point of reentering"—or just past that point, women who had fresh experience with the anxiety, the fears, the trepidation, and yes, the thrill of reentering the dating world. "I think your memories of this time of your life are like childbirth," Sills says, "A couple of years later, you don't remember what it was like."

The trick to making a successful transition involves a lot more than meeting someone new, Sills says. Women need to start by determining if they've moved past the overwhelming sense of grief or loss or anger that follows a breakup or death. Are you eating and sleeping normally? Are you still drinking too much, binge eating, or obsessing over your ex's new girlfriend? "A divorce or death can be staggering blows, and require healing," Sills says. "You can't get into a marathon when you're still in a cast." You'll know you're ready, she says, "when you're more emotionally invested in the present and future than in the past."

It's smart to take stock of who you are and what you want from life, before beginning again. Don't automatically assume you want the same kind of guy—or the same kind of life—you wanted 20 years ago. "A huge mistake is to act like you're going right back to being 25. It takes a while to realize this is not a re-do," Sills says.

You also need to figure out "how the injuries and frustrations of your previous relationship shape your next one," she says. "Women coming back after a loss, who experienced numbness or injury, have to recognize the filter through which they see the world. If you've reduced your ex, mentally, to two lines: 'cold, withholding guy who never was there to provide emotional support,' the next guy you're attracted to could be the exact opposite, a highly emotional guy who wants to talk about the relationship for hours. Where you come from shapes what you're seeking."

While you're at it, she says, figure out if you've bought into a couple of common fantasies and fears that can make reentry bumpier than it needs to be. "One common fantasy is, 'My family and friends will find someone new for me. They'll take care of me'," Sills says. "And then when they don't, you feel rejected." The other, she says, is the expectation that your grown children "just want you to be happy." It's rarely that simple.

Others don't acknowledge, even to themselves, that their decision to start dating again is motivated primarily by the fear of being alone. "These women can be careless about who they bring home, and can end up in an exploitative relationship, sexually and financially." Sills says. "They make connections too fast and too impulsively, and end up needier and more dependent than they otherwise would be." At the other extreme, she says, are the women who have a "profound fear of making a mistake. These women tend to be highly critical and shut down quickly, concluding that there are no good men out there. They're looking for what's wrong with every available man, and not realizing that it's their own fears that are creating this pattern of behavior."

Instead, she advises, approach every new acquaintance with an open mind. "Take the attitude of, 'Let me see what you've got.' Men have a lot to offer, just rarely the 22 things you have on your list. You may be at a time in your life where you don't need someone to make a whole life for you. The man you enjoy going out dancing with may not be the man you need to fix things around the house, but they don't need to be the same man." It's also important to realize that you'll likely go through several transitional relationships with Mr. Half-Right, and even Mr. Wrong, before you figure out what you want. But if you're paying attention, you'll learn a lot in the process.

"There are a lot of people who think that dating again must be awful and that they'd hate to have to do it. But what does not get mentioned is that it can also be exciting and thrilling and fabulous," Sills says. "It can be like the fountain of youth. Your heart can skip a beat again, you can fall back in love again." And for most of us, the hope of that is worth the risk.