Love, Loss and Restoration

As I stood in the doorway of my five year old daughter's bedroom, wiping tears with the side of my sleeve, I watched her pounding, red face throw everything off her bed across the room. No words, just anger. She stood alone in her grief.
Her world had just been turned upside down.
She had helplessly watched her daddy move out.
Our pride, selfishness, lack of communication, mistrust, and anger towards one another meant nothing to her.
All she knew was her life was being dismantled.
A beautiful life filled with love and affection from her parents, grandparents, relatives, friends, classmates and neighbors.
She enjoyed the security of a daddy who went to work each day and a mommy who stayed home to nurture and train her.
In her world, she was center, a prized possession, prayed for, desired, and most importantly...loved.
What now?
Unfortunately, I could answer that question.
I lived it at one, three, seven, nine, twelve, and sixteen...with each divorce, a different life.
I knew her life would radically change.
Memories of my first experience with divorce flooded my mind. I found myself a broken thirty-three year old woman sobbing as the three year old that cried for her daddy to come home.
I stared at my cell phone seeing his number by this time crying hysterically because he had just died a few months prior and I needed him now more than I ever had as a child. I wanted to tell him that my heart was being ripped out and that I could not stop the pain. I wanted his gentle voice to calm my chaos.
Memories of his little, green truck pulling out of my mom's driveway knowing he would not be coming back for at least two weeks felt like a death each time.
I stood alone in my driveway with a broken heart.
The similarities of my life and my daughter's new life were more than I could bear. She was also left with a broken heart.
That night I was brought to my knees going to the only source of peace I had ever known, my Creator. As I cried and asked a million questions I felt His compassion and love fill the room. He reminded me that He fixes broken hearts. I prayed that He would mend my broken heart and allow me to love unconditionally as I had been made.
In the morning, I awoke to a restored heart. My broken heart and defenses that kept intimacy at such a distance had been mended with love and compassion for my husband and toward myself.
My husband was also receiving a mended heart through the love that we now were able to share. As he moved home, the blessing of this miracle poured out to our daughter who began to get her joy of love and peace back.
Now, a year and half later, we live in gratitude for the restoration of three broken hearts and a family legacy being changed forever.

50% of children who have been through a divorce become divorced themselves....