Single Parenting

‘Tis the Season for Turmoil

By:

Kari West

My husband slammed his fists onto the kitchen counter. “You know, this is all your fault,” he said. “I hate my life.”

Stumbling backward out of reach, I asked, “How can you say that? What more do you want?” “I don’t know,” Ed said, “but not you.”

As his hands sliced the air in heated emotion, my dreams of a lifetime were shred to bits. His icy stare froze my heart. I was stunned.

Days later, just 14 days before Christmas, I sorted the mail and found myself holding in one hand a stack of season’s greetings and in the other a divorce summons. That moment slashed 22 years of family traditions and memories. My daughter and I joined the ranks of wives and children discarded like last year’s Christmas tree.

Although I trusted in a God who could turn evil into good, I wondered how He’d do it this time.

ACKNOWLEDGING THE PAIN

 My husband continued to live in our family home until it sold and closed escrow. He often left for the “office” at 3 a.m. or worked late. His lifestyle confused our daughter. One night I taped a note to his lounge chair suggesting he move out. He stormed into my bedroom after midnight cursing, “Just try to kick me out!”

I cringed every time his car pulled into the driveway, then longed for his arms around me and his words assuring me he still cared. I was tumbling off balance into the terror of his love’s end.

“Is there another woman?” I asked once, searching for a reason for his actions. “No, but there will be,” Ed laughed. “You have your desertion.”

My mind swirled with disbelief as I mentally packed for a journey I never imagined I would start. I spent that holiday season nine years ago in a fog.

Following my familiar routine as a court reporter, housekeeper, mother and tutor to my learning-disabled daughter, humiliation and shame dogged my steps. Out of love for my daughter, I planned Christmas Eve as usual. But when her father unexpectedly arrived home, slammed the bedroom door and refused to converse, I hurried her to the closest coffee shop. Later, she and I huddled together in the back pew of the church. No one knew my anguish or the horror of that most holy night.

Like a cast immobilizes a broken bone, God immobilizes me. In the blackness, my eyes focused on Him alone. That night with a legal pad and a Bible, I started a journal. Full of anger, fear and disappointment, I scribbled letters to God. With shaking hands, I randomly flipped through God’s Word, writing in its margins and recording each promise I found. I chose a verse for the new year: “And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast” (1 Peter 5:10)

Each evening before bedtime I read those words aloud and prayed for truth. Each day I lived believing that promise. And I waited.

ACCEPTING THE PAST

I’ll never forget the day my soon-to-be ex-husband carried the last box tools to his car. “I’ve never been happier,” he said. “We should have done this a long time ago.” The cocky way he tossed his head told me more than I wanted to know.

Weeks later I learned the name of the “friend” Ed had traveled with and discovered he’d given her a necklace identical to one he’d given me. I found out that during the Christmas Eve service he’d called a neighbor with whom he’d had a five-year affair.

I uncovered infidelities that had undermined our marriage for over a decade, ascertained that group counseling was one of many cover-ups, and learned about his secret post office box.

My anger spun inwardly with each revelation of deceit. I berated myself for holding onto a commitment that had ceased to exist in Ed’s mind long before his affairs surfaced. He’d broken sacred covenant by withdrawing emotionally, physically and mentally, committing what theologian and author Dwight Small calls spiritual infidelity.

But Ed had blamed me. I remembered a certain Sunday afternoon. I had walked into the family room and was greeted by obscene images from a pornographic video.

“What are you doing?” I asked. “Our little girl is napping upstairs. What if she walks in here and sees that on the TV?”

As always, in his view I had provoked another fight.

When I’d asked about the infrequency of our intimacy, he replied, “Get your calendar out, and we’ll schedule it …” Intimidated and embarrassed, I had hidden my pain.

My daughter, however, hid nothing. She labeled me the liar, accusing, “You said you and Daddy would never get a divorce.”

“But I didn’t lie,” I said, gazing through my tears to hers. “This was never my dream for you or me. When I married your father, I promised ‘forever.’ But I’m learning not everyone keeps a promise.”

On another occasion she sent a verbal dart into my heart. “I don’t want to be anything like you,” she yelled. “I don’t want to talk like you, dress like you, act like you or look like you – because Daddy left you!”

I wrote in my journal, “I am beginning to hate … forgive me, Lord. And help me to forgive, so I may heal.”

AFFIRMING THE PRESENT

 In my despair, God’s Word was clear: “Let go.” Somehow I knew that if I wanted God’s best, I had to relinquish my need to vindicate myself. And if God was my defender, truth needed no defense.

The day I sat in my lawyer’s office reviewing the settlement agreement, his advice confirmed my suspicion. “You’ll spend $15,000 finding $5000,” he told me. “You’re wise to let go.” I signed my name in red ink, waiving all past, present and future interest in Ed’s business.

That night at the foot of an empty bed, I knelt and gave God all I had left; my life, my health, my job, my future, my daughter. I believed if the Lord had brought me this far, He’d stick with me the rest of the journey.

I knew anger turned inward equals depression, turned outward revenge, but lifted upward, it equals a miracle. The Lord wanted me whole again, not confined in the past, controlled by fear of my ex-husband and choked with grief. I didn’t want to remain bitter; I wanted to be free, but my anger meant I was still attached to him.

I recognized that Jesus didn’t justify himself. He didn’t justify himself. He didn’t take revenge, accept or excuse sin. He forgave. I determined with an act of my will to step beyond my feelings, accept the past and allow the Lord to teach me forgiveness toward Ed and myself.

I started praying for my ex-husband. Each night I mechanically read aloud a paraphrase of the Lord’s Prayer. This accomplished what I could not do myself – surrender my will to God’s.

Forgiveness provided a positive response to Ed’s betrayal and shielded me from further physical and emotional harm. I started accepting divorce, not as a failure, but as an opportunity for growth.

When the divorce was final in June, I placed a tombstone on the grave of my marriage by sending this note to Ed: To the memory of a love that began one snowy Christmastime; to a marriage that saw a young man’s dreams of family and college degrees come true; and a beautiful baby daughter born to a young woman who wanted nothing more that to be a loving wife and mother. To the memory of what could have been, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, forsaking all others, until death do us part. May you now find whatever it is (or whoever) makes you happy. I do wish you well.

Then, in life’s emptiest spot I stepped outside onto the front porch of my life and faced my future. Raising my daughter along, I learned that when you can’t go back, you go on.

When painful memories bombarded my thoughts, I repeated a Scripture I’d memorized. I tried to forgive hurts as they happened.

When my daughter was with her father, I invited a house-bound woman to lunch. I attended divorce recovery workshops and volunteered for leadership in a church singles group. I exercised at a health club. Grew pansies in pots. Changed my wardrobe.

APPLAUDING HIS PLAN

 Six months later, when my daughter and I celebrated Christmas in a smaller in a different city, an 18-inch tree perched on a new coffee table. My daughter slouched into the couch and said, “I hate Christmas.”

I told her, “A lot of people get depressed during the holidays. Let’s invite someone who is along to join us for Christmas Day.”

Instead of counting losses, I began to count new faces sitting around our table, filling empty chairs with friends. I started collecting new Christmas ornaments, letting old ones go like the painful memories.

I will always cherish the image of a dad and two children walking away from my garage sale, peering into a huge cardboard box full of ornaments they had just purchased.

“Look at this one!” one squealed. “Wow, this one’s neat!” the other responded. I smile now, remembering their delight over the hand-crafted, sequined balls and patchwork wreaths I’d made during two decades of marriage. I try to remember that each time I let go of an ornament from the past, the Lord hands me a brightly polished possibility.

“Can I wear one of your necklaces tonight, Mom?” my now 21-year-old daughter asked recently. I nodded, recalling the verbal dart that once had pierced my heart and then let go.

My hands are open now to receive and applaud God’s gifts.