My journey through life has made some challenging and unique turns. One that I’m most proud of is the relationship I have with Larry’s ex wife, Shannon.
If you have lived through divorce, you know the brokeness and heartache that follows. Often, the people we love the most suffer the most in divorce. It’s the natural consequences of broken promises, broken hearts and sometimes a desire to make someone responsible for all the pain.
When I met Larry, he was going through a divorce and had two very young children. The years ahead were hard, to say the least. I was the new woman in Larry’s life and the step-mom. I was jealous of the connection she had with him and she had plenty of reasons to despise me. The relationship suffered. It was ugly, to say the least. As we both matured things certainly got better. However, it took turning both of our lives upside down to really put things in perspective for both of us.
When Larry and Landon died, Shannon stepped up in a beautiful way. She of course took care of our girls because they are the loves of her life and I simply couldn’t. But more beautiful and gracious was the way she reached out to me. Every single day, she sent words of encouragement and love.
It wasn’t long after we found out that the first grandbaby was on the way. We decided we no longer wanted to live life with regrets and bitterness. We no longer wanted these lives of separate family gatherings. Life had dealt us some pretty hard blows and we knew that every moment was absolutely precious. We decided to tackle loving these girls together instead of as adversaries. Since, we’ve hosted baby showers together, we do family Christmas together, we celebrate birthdays and holidays together but most importantly we love our daughters and gradbabies together. People are amazed when I tell them I’m spending time with Larry’s daughters and their mom and I simply couldn’t be more proud. I now call her mom and sister family. It’s simply beautiful and nothing I ever deserved.
It wasn’t easy. We both had to put our hurt and pride aside and make some conscious decisions to be better. It took a tremendous amount of forgiveness, grace, empathy and ultimately love to get where we are today. We could have simply continued to live lives grounded in hate, but we choose love instead. We could have spent years harboring hurt and bad feelings at the cost of hardening our own hearts and hurting those we love, but instead we chose forgiveness. We both extended grace when the other may not have always deserved it. My only regret is that we didn’t get here earlier in life.
We all have those relationships that need mending. Forgiveness is never about who is right or wrong, it’s about healing. Grace is not about something someone has earned, it’s about mercy and showing true love. Saying I’m sorry is never about the guilt or blame, it is always about the mending of the heart. Who do you need to forgive? Whom do you need to extend grace? Whom do you need to say, “I’m sorry”.
If the holidays are truly about love, now is the perfect time. Start the new year with new bonds, new found love and newly mended hearts.
