Grieving Our Losses

In The Secret of Loving, Josh McDowell wrote that resolving a conflict is more rewarding than dissolving a relationship. This is especially true when it comes to making peace with our parents and the impact of divorce on our life. Making peace doesn’t mean that we like the impact of the divorce or that we condone or accept it as good. It does mean that we acknowledge it, grieve it and choose our response to it. We make peace with our pasts when we decided not to react to the present based on the past experiences and hurts, but rather choose to respond in ways that enhance the future we desire.

Making peace means we choose to accept our parents for who they are today, with all of their imperfections and the consequences of their choices. While we’re quick to acknowledge that our own emotions and moods fluctuate, we tend to forget that our relationships ebb and flow as well. Making peace in our relationships does not mean we’ll live perpetual bliss. It does mean we choose to forgive and accept forgiveness, release resentment and commit to the continuation of a relationship--in whatever form it may need to take--rather than walk away from a burned bridge.

Our parents may have made some wrong or hurtful choices. In the midst of taking care of themselves, they may have forgotten to take care of us, Without their protective cover, we were hurt, perhaps even abused. In reality, our parents did wrong us, and we will pay the consequences of their actions for the rest of our lives. However, regardless of our pasts we each have a choice: Will I allow my pain to make me bitter toward my parents, or will I take responsibility for my own choices and choose to make peace instead?

There is not such thing as a perfect family. Each family will falls short of the perfect ideal God intended and thus be dysfunctional.

As children of divorce, we experience incredible loss: the loss of stability, the loss of financial security, the loss of continuity, the loss of shared history, and the loss of deep intimacy with both parents. Sometimes we lose even the freedom to express this feeling of loss.
~From Generation Ex by Jen Abbas