Us Do Part.

In 4th grade, I was in the checkout line at Kroger with my mom and I spotted a BRIDES magazine on the shelf by the counter.  I picked it up and started scanning through every page and my mom asked me if I wanted to buy it!  I was so excited!  The entire car ride home, I studied every ruffle, frill, and lace pattern!  I loved the colors of the Bridesmaids dresses and dreamed about what color I would choose if I were a Bride and who I would want to be my bridesmaids!  I loved dreaming about weddings!  This continued through my teenage years!  I collected so many Brides magazines that they began to take up too much space in my room.  My mom suggested that I cut out my favorite things from each magazine and put them in a folder!  When my friends would come over to spend the night, I would pull out my Wedding Binder and we would study it and dream of our weddings someday.





Getting married was always my dream! That dream came true August 24, 2002.  I was 21 years old.  My dress was white, my hair was up, my 8 bridesmaids wore navy blue and held lavender roses as their bouquet. It was everything I had dreamed about since I was 9 years old.

My dream came true.

Being married very young, you basically live on love, spaghetti noodles and sauce every night ... because you are poor and can’t afford the fancy meat sauce!  (Who do you think we are!? The Rockefellers!?!?!? )

Our friends from college had all graduated and moved away to their new homes all over the country and there we were- just us.

Something I learned about myself in that first year of marriage was I needed to be constantly entertained. I could not be content just sitting and watching baseball... in fact, I think I discovered I hated sports with a living passion! I wanted to talk about celebrity gossip and be told how stunningly beautiful I was all the time!

I had a lot of unspoken expectations AND spoken expectations!

I complained  a lot.

I nagged.

I cried.

I was 21, far away from my family, my friends, and felt super sorry for myself.

It wasn’t long before baby 1....and then 2...  and then 3 ..came along!

If I was praying for something to do then God answered my prayers! I stayed home with our babies and loved it!

I became the stay at home mom with three  babies under 5 years old and rarely showered, wore make up, and had very little adult interaction. My days were diapers, bottles, sippy  cups, baby spit up, more diapers, chicken nuggets, cutting bananas, did I mention diapers? .... Apple juice, baby formula, laundry, Elmo, toys everywhere and lack of sleep!

If it is possible to feel both complete satisfaction and fulfilled in one area of your life and in the other, like you are invisible and have no meaningful purpose in life outside of raising children-then you would have me.

I craved attention and meaningful conversation! I watched Dr. Phil and took notes about how to spice up my marriage while I cut peanut butter sandwiches in triangles.

It is nearly impossible to feel like a Victoria's Secret model when you smell like baby puke and found a cheerio in your bra.

I began to listen to the voice in my head that I was fat! Ugly! Stupid! Not interesting! Lazy! Invisible! Worthless!  Not capable of much!

Depression, anxiety, and isolation settled into my heart and I was too young to know how to take care of myself!

What I knew for sure was that they did NOT mention any of this in my Brides magazine!

My boss always says you never have to work at becoming misaligned.

Our marriage became misaligned with very little effort on our part.

I think we both found something that gave us purpose- career wise  and dove head first into it! Isn’t it natural for us all to be drawn to where we feel encouraged and are excelling?

Our family became a business transaction- a partnership.

We settled into certain roles we would play in taking care of the kids and at night, when the kids were in bed, we would go our separate ways.

It was comfortable but not at all healthy.

We filed for divorce last year and life as we have all known it has changed forever. It's not easy! It is excruciatingly painful. I hate it.

Nobody puts on their wedding dress and dreams of the day they get divorced. 

What’s worse!?  This is my job!! To help families!  It is quite humbling to fail at something you are supposed to be an “expert” at.  For years I have spent studying the healthy family dynamic! I have trained parents and church leaders on how to do this!  I read the books, listened to the experts and took furious notes!

For the last few years, I have felt like a fake.  How can I do this when I can't save my own marriage!?

Only recently did God reveal a new perspective of this in my heart.  All these years that I studied the benefits of a partnership between church and home and how we are better together-what was actually happening was God's provision in my life.  When my family fell apart... I knew what to do!  I had lots of practice!  I gathered people around our kids.  I asked them to speak in their lives and stand in the gap that felt so wide.  Our church community has shown up and supported us in ways that I can't describe without ugly crying.

I have had people take the kids out for ice cream just to talk, I have had anonymous cards in the mail with money and gift cards for me to take the kids to a movie or dinner.  They have been a shoulder to cry on, to trust, to give solid advice and have actively prayed for us and loved us generously!

God is in the helpers.

 What I do know is that God wants us to tell our stories.  Let me be clear-this isn't even HALF of mine!  This is just the first part.... my intention is not to point fingers or make anyone out to be the bad guy!  Blaming one person for the ending of a marriage is like blaming that poor Bears Kicker that missed the field goal to lose the game last week.  It wasn't the kicker's fault...there was an entire game that was played leading up to that one moment...

(Please do not let the fact that I used a sports analogy here be overlooked. #dab )

Our marriage-and most marriages don't end because of one isolated incident... it ends because of series of many incidents that added up over time.

2019 is new year for a new me!  I am actively working on being a healthy minded, intentional, consistent presence as a mother and as a human.  I am begging God to help me navigate co parenting and blending families with grace. I want to do this well!  I am still learning because I am still new to all of this!  I mess up! I cry! I get mad! Divorce has not brought out the best in me-that's for sure!

And....here I am, getting back up - dusting off, and trying again. 2019 will be a year of being restored after being rescued.

Cheers!