A Day at the Beach

So many lessons to be learned from the ocean. The waves crash unreservedly; unrestrained. Wild and unabashedly they roar.

Divorce is like that. It is wild, it is crazy. I want to roar like an angry wave crashing over itself into the sea below. I want to cry out at the injustice of being left behind. I was deceived and blindsided. I've been abandoned and alienated from the one person I trusted to be by my side forever - until death separated us.

I didn't sign up for this. I didn't pledge my soul to another, to become one, only to be ripped apart from stem to stern. One half of me is missing, violently torn away. The agony is felt along every torn part. My heart is crushed and I hurt so badly. I never knew a person could be in so much pain and not be dying. Sometimes I wonder why, when people see me, they don't see the anguish I feel. How does that not show on my face, in the way I walk, in my eyes? How does that not come screaming forth when I'm screaming on the inside?

This is a death. A death of a marriage and a death of the dream I had of growing old together, of enjoying our growing family together. It's the death of our family unit. A fracture that cannot grow back together. It will heal, I suppose, like a wound heals, but there will always be a scar, a mark, a permanent reminder that the wholeness of this family will never be restored.

I thought I was choosing someone who would never let me down, never give up. I thought God brought us together in the most magical way. How could this happen? How could all of these years of living and loving and creating a family be reduced to this broken state? Like the ocean, I want to ROAR "It's not fair! I will never get over this! You did this to me.  You let me go! How could you? How COULD you? HOW COULD YOU????"

People who have been through this devastation tell me it gets better. God has promised it will get better. 

For now, I will do my best to be part of the human race, smile when I don't feel like it, say "I'm fine" when someone asks and pretend I'm not dying a tiny bit on the inside.

And one more thought about those waves. As the tops of the waves crest, they are illuminated as they rush over their base, by the sun setting in the west. It's as if God is saying: "Look, even as the day wanes, there is still glory to behold. There is still wonder in the darkening skies. Look. Watch. Behold - I am mighty. I am in charge. I am holding you up to the light, my light. I am with you. I feel your anguish, I am holding you aloft. As the waves are illuminated, so you are illuminated by my Son - your Christ, your loving Father, your partner in this grief. I am with you."