Disclaimer: The following deals with spousal abuse in absolute truth.
The Absolute Truth is this: I have no idea what I'm doing. I travel through life quickly, telling others my opinion, my story, my views. I tell people what they could do differently and what I think needs to be changed in their lives. But honestly, I have no idea. I'm just a wife/mother/friend/lover/enemy.
When Hillary was born, I had an idea of what being a mother and wife looked like. I would make dinner for my husband, our daughter would be perfect and I would be the best housekeeper ever. Instead, my house was a mess, my husband hit me and our daughter....well, she WAS perfect. She was my reason for living. When he started hitting me, I thought it was my fault. That somehow, I had created his animosity. I thought if I did better/looked better it would all be ok. It wasn't. I lived for 2 years under his rule. Once, I even told him I forgave him. I figured he must not know what he was doing....overtaken by rage, certainly he lost himself and didn't mean to hurt me. He quite nonchalantly informed me that he knew exactly what he was doing. People looked the other way, ignored the lumps and bruises and accepted my excuses of running into doors and cabinets. When his parents found out, they confirmed my worst fears: they said he wouldn't have to hit me if I kept a cleaner house.
Right before his birthday one year, I left. He had been hitting me and I saw our tiny daughter, not quite 2, cowering behind the recliner. All I could think was that I didn't want her to think it was okay. No way was I going to let her believe that was how SHE deserved to be treated. My vision changed of how to be a mother. I was 19, an abused woman and now single mother. I was scared. I had no idea how to do anything.
For years, I wondered why I had to go through that sorrow. The almost dying, the insecurity, the physical pain. And then I met someone. She was abused...her heart ached. I saw her. Recognized her. I had been her. She is still with her husband, but I pray someday she finds the courage to truly leave....or he truly changes. My ex never did. After our divorce, he killed a child. Spent 12 years in prison after pleading no contest. I thank God every day for delivering Hillary and I from that life.
As I had more children, I struggled to be the mother God intended me to be. I had 3 children in 3 years....add to that Hillary and my (ex)step-son. The Absolute Truth is: I was overwhelmed. I wasn't grown up, I was PLAYING grown up. Everything about me was sad. I was heavy, didn't take care of my house. I did take care of the kids...they were my world. I couldn't imagine my life without my children. They were always mine...never my 2nd husbands. My life was only complete as long as the children were in it. I couldn't picture my life after they were grown....couldn't picture my home empty, children gone their own directions. Slowly, things changed. I went through my selfish phase, met Matty and finally grew up.
The Absolute Truth? I can picture our life after the girls are gone. I'm loving being a grandma and I'm excited to watch the girls grow. My heart aches when I think they will be hurt, my heart sorrows when they are sad. I want to protect them, but I know they need to fly away.....and experience the life God has planned for them. My plan seldom is His plan. I always want things to be just so, and they rarely ever are. I can see where sometimes my plan does align up with His...but it's typically AFTER I've given up. I'm stubborn. Looking back over my own life, I see where the road would've been different. I was meant to marry Matty....I just went the hard way around the mountain instead of just waiting for God to unfold the path across it. And that's the way He works. I don't blame Him for the abuse, never did. I questioned Him, but that's okay. Sometimes there were answers, sometimes there was silence. Sometimes it was years before I got the answer I looked for.
The Absolute Truth: He allowed me to travel around the mountain that is my life. He allowed me to stay and wallow in the pit of my own making. Then He took my decisions and fashioned great things out of them. He allowed me to finally look past myself into the great big world and find joy in the things that brought me sorrow. He allows me glimpses of each girls future, reassuring me that He's got them. And no one can snatch them away. He is the King. I am His child, His beloved.
The Absolute Truth: If you are being hurt please know that it is NOT okay. You are worth more than the sum of one person's fist, the sum of what the world overlooks. You may not feel it, but you ARE precious in His sight. He sees the sparrow, believe me my dear one, He sees YOU! In the darkness, He is the light. Tomorrow is Easter. The day He died, took all my sin (and yours) and provided a way to live with Him forever. The story didn't end there...He rose again. He lives today.
The Absolute Truth: I'm feeling somber today. I wait and watch to see how a plan will unfold. For me, that is nerve wracking. Truth....He already knows how it unfolds....across the mountain we go.
So glad that God carried you through. Because of your choices, your kids won't have to suffer like you did. They'll probably never recognize it, but it will be there, and your whole posterity is different because you had courage.
ReplyDeleteThank goodness for courageous friends, too. (You left that part out...)
When Paul and I were first married, I did some respite care for a teenager who was severely disabled, and she often threw violent autistic tantrums. For a few weeks in a row, I showed up at church with bruises and cuts. We were in the same ward with his parents and my parents at the time, and Paul's family had lived there for over 30 years. They were very well known, and a "Pillar in the community". No one for one minute would have believed that he was the source of the injuries.
Except...I'll never forget that one of the women at church had the courage to corner me and seriously ask me if Paul was hurting me. I felt so loved, and knew then that there were people in my life who would protect and help me if I needed them.
If someone as strong and beautiful as you can experience it, it can happen to anyone. I'm so glad that you got out!
Love you!
p.s. I'm pretty sure that if one of your girls ever finds herself in this situation, the question of how clean her house is will only come up AFTER the jerk has been dismembered piece by piece by his mother-in-law. Just sayin'.