Let's Talk About Divorce . . .

When I was 25, I married an attractive man who had a few flaws but a great family. Since I was an only child, I really enjoyed being part of that family and they treated me very well. We gathered most winter weekends in Toronto and in summer we went up to Muskoka. In latter years, we would go snowmobiling up north on winter weekends.

Both of our children died in infancy and that did not help the union at all. (I was about 35 years coming to closure. Why? Why me? My current Hubby and I were in a Bible Study of Isaiah when the words jumped off the page at me and I finally – with the help of all my friends in that study – was able to somewhat understand the “why”. )

The marriage went very badly and after ten years, I bravely packed it up. (Yes, I say bravely, because there must be others like me who have a job but not a lot of resources and virtually no family. I had nothing to fall back on. I was selling Real Estate in Toronto and you can bet I worked very long, hard hours!)

After the break, I remember driving up Yonge Street one afternoon and seeing my “former” brother-in-law in his station wagon but not waving. It just felt awkward.

Now, if you have read my book, Bumpy Road To Texas, then you know some of this already.

When I married again and was able to travel to Cape Breton where they now live, I found that my Ex’s family wanted us to visit. We not only visited, we had a fine time and over the years, I have visited them many times. They have been great supporters of mine and have been very kind to Hubby, welcoming him into the family as well.

All these years later – about 43 or so, I know I have family in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia and also in British Columbia. So, these people are family to us. We are family to them.

I wanted to write about this subject because I have been through it and now am very much on the other side of it. That family is a very special; Mother-in-law is ninety now and my two sisters-in-law are still my sisters-in-law.

When I was a kid, hardly anyone got divorced. You just hardly ever heard about it – in Toronto, anyway.

Well, that was then and this is now and the divorce rate is very high and there are many families who try to help their children and their children-in-law. If couples have been married for, say eight or ten years, bonds have formed and perhaps your sweet grandchildren are involved.

Nowadays, there is usually a proviso for joint custody of children and I hear all the time about children not wanting to go to visit their father, for instance, or being obliged to talk to fathers on the telephone at a specific time. (I realize I may offend some in assuming that mother has the children most of the time.I apologize for that.)

Sons and daughters calling mothers for advice on how to handle situations is pretty common and I have friends who are grandmothers caught in the middle of this drama.

You may have your own experiences so I won’t give you any more examples because you know exactly what happens, and especially how much it hurts everyone.

I just want to point out something you might not have thought about. That man or woman your child married was very special. You probably thought so too! It is not your fault it did not work. Now, say five or ten years later, you know it is better that they have separated but you are not too sure what to do.

Probably the first thing to do is nothing in terms of siding with one or the other. We are never inside other people’s relationships and we cannot even imagine what their married life was like.

Parents do not like to think that their children could have done anything that would have contributed to the break-up. That is fair.

Another aside would be to mention that today, many couples are not getting married. Some of them even have homes and all the traditional events – birthdays, Christmas, and so on but they just did not legally marry. They do have children though.

We, as parents and grandparents must mesh in or be out of the loop totally.

I saw a photo the other day that actually made me cry. It was my niece – yes, she is still my niece – and so beautiful and now working to keep what she feels should be hers and her child’s. Her parents and her in-laws are trying to be supportive. I am not close to her but she is a very special person who went out of her way to pick up a card I had sent. (She is a special person from a special family.) She is a great mother and a beautiful woman. I want so badly for her to have a super life. (If I have had a super life, so can she!) I hope she meets fine people with similar interests and moves on.

I also hope her soon-to-be-ex husband moves on and has a great life too. People grow apart; their ideas change; problems interfere. That doesn’t make them bad people.

I have several friends facing this problem and worrying. They worry they might not see their grandchildren. They worry their children (adults though they may be) have made mistakes that they cannot reverse or heal.

The older I get, the more I see that we do not live in our grandparents’ world. My grandparents lived a nice, simple life and certainly never knew if there was a problem in their son’s home life. I see friends all around me trying to cope with their children’s marriage breakdowns. I see them trying to be wise in answering the questions posed to them. I see them going out of their way to make sure their grandchildren especially know they are loved. I see them having Christmas a couple of days late because someone else was “entitled” to celebrate on the actual date.

One of the sweetest encounters I have seen, was a mother whose daughter was invited at the last minute to dinner by a person she had not dated before.

“Oh, I am so sorry – I have no sitter for my son and daughter – can we do dinner another time?

Now here is the kind of man you want your daughter to meet! He said:

“Bring your children along!”

After dinner, the daughter came by cropping (scrapbooking) with her son and daughter who had had a wonderful time at Red Lobster. We all were asking the children if they had fun and clearly they and their mother had indeed!

“Mother – you told all these people?”

Ha! Ha! How happy we all were but not nearly as happy as her mother!

We live in the 21^st Century and we must cope with what it has in store for us. We must adjust but most of all, we must have a loving attitude toward all involved in our lives.