June 9, 2011- Imperfect Lives, Imperfect Wives

     As I look forward to getting married to the love of my life next summer, I can’t help at times but worry about how I will do as a wife.  If I am completely, unabashedly honest with you, my readers, I would have to say at this moment in my life, my greatest failure (in my eyes) is the fact that I was not able to raise my boys in one household their entire lives.  I grew up from 12 on as a child of divorced parents, and it still pains me (years after my own divorce), that I failed my boys in this way. You read about it all the time (that divorce is never what’s best for the kids-duh, right!), but there are marriages you cannot live in happily and provide a healthy role model for your children, and for their dad and I, we simply weren’t meant to live as one, and we never really did.   We had very separate lives and always will, except for our sons. 

      During my first marriage, I was a naïve, inexperienced, and imperfect wife and mother and I failed those I loved, including my two beautiful babies, and I have spent the last few years trying to make up for my failures with the boys.  Unfortunately, I am still imperfect, and I live an imperfect life, so I don’t always handle every situation between their dad and me in regards to the care of the boys completely rationally or in a manner that is best for all involved or at least for my boys. I say things in frustration I shouldn’t say. I make decisions based on emotions and how I feel rather than what makes the most sense.  I allow myself to become “the victim,” blaming my inability to deal with certain issues on him because that’s “easier” than having to confront the situation and resolve it, but the bottom line is, divorce has forever altered not just my reality, but my two incredible sons, my ex-husband’s new wife and child, and my fiancé’s life. And it makes me sad….I never wanted to be a part of the cause of such pain in anyone’s life, but I suppose that’s the way of an imperfect and sinful world and the imperfect and sinful humans who live in it. 

      I will always be saddened by the reality of the world my children now have to grow up in, going back and forth between their dad’s and mom’s house, adjusting to having two “moms,” and two “dads,” and their varying styles of discipline and expectations for the boys. I will most likely always be jealous of any time their “step mom” spends with them and overly critical of any discipline dished out to them by her or activities engaged in that I might not fully approve of while spending time with their dad and step mom. That’s my possessive mom bone sticking out. I am their mom, their only mom, and I want to be there for every moment of their lives, not just when it’s my time with them.  I can never take back my failures in the past. I can never relive my rough days as a mom to them when they were young, and I was not at the most stable point in my life, but I can continue to reflect upon my abilities and decisions now and continue to grow as a dedicated and passionate role model for them in the future.

      What I am most thankful for tonight, even as I grieve over the challenges my boys face living in two very different homes, is a second chance to be a good wife.  I never would have believed there would be anyone willing to take me on again. I truly feel that I have never been loved by anyone as my fiancé loves me, except maybe by God. J  And I have never loved anyone as I love him, except maybe for God. J I am so very grateful for this chance to learn from my past mistakes, to grow in my knowledge of what it takes to make marriage work for a lifetime as it is meant to be (currently, my cousin the minister, has asked us to work our way through 4 books on relationships, money, communication, meeting each other’s needs, etc…). I am grateful for the chance to love my fiancé in all the ways he deserves and needs to be loved. I am only sorry that I have come to him with such baggage already, and that will always be hard for me to accept. It’s not fair for him, and he has been so supportive through all my trials, but the good news for me is, he’s soon to be “stuck” with me forever, so I have plenty of time to be there for him through thick and thin as well and make up for all he’s been through for me and my boys. The world may be imperfect, and I am certainly imperfect, but I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, my upcoming marriage is ordained by God, and so that makes it as “perfect “ as it possibly can be in His eyes. Thank you, God, for forgiveness of our mistakes and for the blessing of second chances.