Sat 18 Jul, 2009
It’s been one month to the day since I sat down to write a post for the blog. I remember specifically because at that time, I pre-posted ‘Today’s the Day‘ wanting to have time to prepare the house and be completely ready when Debbie arrived from Virginia. So I wrote that post, walked away and was honestly unsure if I would ever post another message to this blog again. There were several good reasons for giving up the blog, all surrounding the family…the amount of time that it takes away from them, how it normally makes you think about yourself rather than them, and just the general thought processes of the day in which you begin to think about how to lead conversations so that they make good blogging fodder rather than just letting the day flow as it should. But I’ve been considering today’s topic for about 3 weeks now and with the kids asleep and the wife’s permission, I’ve decided to tickle the keyboard once again, perhaps a little more seriously than the hobbit ever has before.
You see, in the midst of this horrid world economy, social degradation, moral decline, and political hypocrisy (each large topics that impact millions of people) we’ve lost track of the family unit and how important that is to our stability and our sanity. I’ve been driven to this conclusion by the fact that 3 close friends; 3 close couples; have all within the last four weeks announced to us that they are in some state of the separation/divorce process. The youngest of these marriages is 13 years! Collectively they have 11 kids…In one of the cases, there is what the world would call a valid reason but in the other two, one of the spouses has just decided that they can do without the other spouse and no longer want to be married. What are you thinking?
Obviously, you think of the children, who will be devastated to learn that they now only get to see daddy every other weekend; only get to have mommy read them to sleep for two weeks during the summer. They didn’t do anything to deserve this but the rest of their lives will be spent not trusting others and wondering how they could have been better kids so that mommy and daddy would have stayed together. What are you thinking?
Then you think of the husband and wife, is divorce really the only solution to whatever is driving the wedge between them? Is there no counseling that could help them to learn to communicate their issues with each other? No amount of prayer, within the family and without, that could begin to heal the rift between them? What could he or she have done that caused the other to be unwilling to reconcile? Do you really feel that living out your life alone (or with some new person) is going to be better than being with someone who has loved you most of your adult life? What are you thinking?
Next you begin to think about yourself. Once you move beyond the ‘can I be friends with both of them’ types of questions, you begin to feel the impact within your own family. You anticipate the questions from your kids as they begin to understand that it could possibly happen to them, even though you do your best to convince them otherwise. You begin to wonder whether or not your spouse is contemplating divorce and instead of being a positive, loving spouse, you become negative. What are you thinking?
Being male, I’m genetically predisposed to attempting to fix these things. It is not in my nature to just listen and nod my head and ask the open-ended question periodically so that you can get this stuff off of your chest. Today, I’ll go against my nature and just tell each of these three couples these few things:
Anonymous says:
I pray these couples reunite. Pray for the 11!
jonni says:
Prayers and lots of support, is what they need. They are judging themselves harder than any of us could. And thank goodness, that kids are resiliant.
Kim says:
It’s so hard to know what to say to people who have decided, for whatever reasons, to separate. I do subscribe to Dr Laura’s viewpoint that addiction and adultery are the only valid reasons for divorce. And even those don’t necessarily need to lead to that life altering event.
Anonymous says:
We’ve just heard that June Cleaver is leaving her husband for another man. We feel so sad for him after serving a year overseas for our country.
Please pray for him and his children.
Anonymous says:
This must be hard on him. Please offer up prayers for the entire family.
Anonymous says:
There is still hope, there has to be!!!
Anonymous says:
I know he loves her more than she cares to realize.
a husband says:
My wife also wants a divorce after many years. Even so, she is still the love of my life, a great person, a wonderful mom, my hero and my greatest blessing in life. I just want a chance to work it out.
a wife says:
The thing that hurts the most in these situations is when people spread untrue rumors-