May 22, 2018

Greetings My Friend,

Saturday I got a phone call from my son, Mike. For the last 6 months to a year our conversations are friendly, easy going, the prior 20 years they were challenging often ending up with one of us hanging up on the other. My divorce was 21 years ago, shortly afterwards I began praying for my children to be healed from the craziness of our family life. Soon after the divorce both of my children became pregnant. My son's wife gave us a daughter, my daughter had a girl as well 2 months later. As soon as I heard about the girls I began praying for them. I wound up marrying Junior the same year the girls were born, he taught me to pray for my ex also. Basically I became a praying woman, God taught me slowly how to let go of pain from the marriage, to love my children, not doing everything to make up for the craziness of our family life. My daughter still is angry, won't talk to me. At this point I accept this, I miss her, God taught me He is all I need, then He taught me how to love Agape fashion as He loves me. I learned buying their love was not going to work, I never was the type to buy love so this was not too hard to learn. I learned when my daughter became pregnant without the father in her life it was not my responsibility to take a turn watching my grandchild every week. I was struggling to learn how to be single, how to be a new wife again, working full time and watching a baby a day or two a week was not something I could do. Eventually God led Junior and I to move from Michigan, a move that did not make our children very happy. My ex kept showing up at the grandchildren's birthday's, the holidays wanting to my best friend. When I saw him, I still had pain, did not have a desire to be best friends with him. I also refused to be goaded into an argument for our children's sake so I hurt a lot but did not know how to make him go away without making a scene. The move allowed me to heal finally. I was able to discover who I was which meant I went from being fearful to being silly, finally settling into a contentment of being a woman who is able to think, to have my own talents. In Virginia, I am accepted loved in ways I have never known. Junior kept encouraging me to have opinions, try new things and most importantly to grow in love with Jesus. As God worked on healing me, He was also working on my son. Mike married his high school sweetheart, had what he thought was a decent marriage, which is much like my life story. I married the only boy I dated, stayed with him 24 years. Mike's marriage broke up, they got together again then broke up again. He had to deal with the same crud I did in many ways so God was working on Mike while He was working on me. We finally are healed, he is now starting a faith journey with his new girlfriend. They are working on Ashley trying to teach her the need forgive what her mother did by leaving. It sounds like Mike's girlfriend Nicole has also had to learn the importance of forgiving, the healing that comes when you learn to let go and let God. God showed me that I can live without my children, that I can enjoy being a mother to fur children, I love being married to Junior, I prayed for him and God gave me Junior who married me within 15 months of my divorce. We knew we were at a higher risk of divorce so God taught us to take relationship classes, associate with other divorced people in a Sunday school class which helped us to be a strong united front. I am not sure if my daughter will ever forgive me, I pray she will. I do know I have her in the best hands though, God's. I will pray for her, Mike, Nichole's relationship and the children until I die. May God bless you and keep you make His face shine on you. Love Janet