Life After Divorce

I’ve heard it said that people going through divorce act like God is their best friend.  It is the most lonely time.  Nobody wants to say anything, I guess for fear of saying the wrong thing!  Jesus may be the only friend who loves at all times.  (Proverbs 17:17)  Divorce can actually be a great opportunity to make new friends.  Personally, I thought divorce represented the end of my blessings.  I thought I had disappointed God to the point He would turn His attention away from me and I would become a restless wanderer (Genesis 4:12) for my remaining days.  I’ve found that I’m probably able to hear his voice more clearly now because I’m not preoccupied with the issues of a failing marriage.   

My ex- and I separated in May of the 2011-12 school year.  My friend Sue, had been inviting me to start the boys on the Country Club Swim Team.  I thought maybe having to keep a schedule all summer, lots of sunshine, meeting new friends would be good for us.  Zach’s practice was at 8 every morning and Nick’s was at 10.  The sunshine, the people, the schedule for the month of June - I truly do believe that is what prevented me from sinking into depression - that and having to help my nephew prepare for his first semester at the Citadel.

As August began, I took my nephew to the Citadel, and dropped the boys off with my parents because I had to work that week and I didn’t want them home alone all day.  That was the BEST week!!!  I cooked nothing, but I ate well!  During that week, I took down and threw away our king bed and finally moved myself back into the Master bedroom!  I went Back-to-School shopping for me because I had lost some weight and needed some smaller clothes.  What a week!

I don’t recall much about that school year except that I was asked to teach Chemistry, which was not a strong suit for me, but I learned it and began to love it!  During that school year, I was man-hating hard.  I didn’t want a man, I didn’t want to see a man, and I did not want a man to look at me.  I was through with their species.  I was concentrating on myself and my children.  

When the school year ended, June 2013, we were at my parents’ church for revival.  I was criticizing the minister (in my mind) as he explained that he was about to preach from the 23 Psalm.  I was perturbed about driving 2 hours to hear him preach from Scriptures I already knew.  I wanted to hear something profound, something I had never heard!  As I was having this complaint session in my mind, yet writing the date in my sermon notebook, a voice said to me from my right side, “Your husband is a minister.”  It startled me, I looked to my right and there were like 3-feet between me and the next person.  Then my man-hating started up again, husband, I don’t have any husband and wont have one either!  After all I’ve been through with a husband, huh, not me!  That man preached the 23 Psalm like nobody’s business.  I had well-outlined notes that I kept paper-clipped to the lampshade next to my bed for several years!   

It wasn’t long after this that I began to ask the Lord to send me a male friend, not a boyfriend and certainly not a husband!  I just wanted a male friend to maybe come over and play board games with us on Friday nights, and maybe he would drive us to church on Sundays.  Maybe I would start cooking Sunday dinners again if I had someone to cook for.  The boys were fine stopping to pick up a pizza on the way home from church, and I was fine not to having to clean up the kitchen on Sunday.  

I had completed the application for the boys to change schools, to the School of Accelerated Studies.  They didn’t want to leave their school, but I thought it was best for them to change.  They protested for weeks!  Finally, I told them that if they would stop complaining, I would let Zach play football, something both of them had been begging me to do - Nick had been begging on Zach’s behalf!  They agreed.  

My mom had been encouraging me to join Bible Study Fellowship, but it was always in Charlotte.  In 2013, they started a class in Rock Hill.  The boys and I enrolled, but I was only planning to attend for a couple of weeks.  I was going to lose interest fast!  We began to study the Life of Moses.  How Moses mother could put her 3-month-old son in the tall grasses next to the Nile, then a girl could find him, ask her dad Pharaoh, if she could keep him and he said yes!  Then she needed someone to nurse him so she sent her slave to find a lactating Hebrew woman and she returned with Moses mother (Exodus 1-2) - I was so hooked!  There was no way any of that was coincidental, that was God's plan!  I'm still in BSF today and have made many Godly friends through the organization.  

Zach's football season commenced and the team struggled!  Everyday, Coach Troy gave the boys a speech about hard work, and he told them how proud he was of them, and he advised them to put God first in everything they did.  I, along with the other parents, would stand back and listen until the boys were released to go home.  Somehow, by the end of the season I had become the team mom.  I had planned the end of season banquet (at CiCi’s pizza) and the team would go watch a Northwestern HS football game after pizza.  One evening, I was texting with the 3 coaches in a group chat about the trophies I needed to order and which player’s names should be inscribed on each one.  Once that was settled, another text came from “Coach Troy” (that’s how his name was saved in my phone). “I don’t know what I’m going to do when the season ends and I don’t get to see you everyday.”   

I panicked!  I was extremely upset about that text.  I didn’t know what to do!  I didn’t know how to reply or what to say!  (Today, I’m sure I replied, but I have no idea what I said.)  After CiCi’s the following week, I sat next to Coach Troy during the high school football game.  It was October 25, 2013 - the same day I was offered the job of K-12 Science Specialist.  Troy and I continued to text one another - as friends!  Some time later, I asked him if he knew someone who could install a ceiling fan for me.  He said he would do it - no problem.  A few days later, he came to our house and the boys were playing football with their friends in the front yard (their usual) and he joined them in the game.  They totally thought he had come over to play football with them! 

He and I went for a long time just texting.  It was like December before we spoke by phone.  I texted to ask if I could call him, he replied yes.  As soon as he answered, he said, “I don’t know where this is going, but there’s something I need to tell you.  I don’t want us to get too far and then you find out, don’t like it, and break my heart.”  I was like…”What in the world?”  He said, “I’m a minister.  I don’t know how you feel about that, but a lot of women can’t get with that, so I want to tell you now so you can make a decision.” 

I don’t believe in coincidences, so you can’t tell me this was a coincidence.  He didn’t say, “preacher,” or “pastor” or “man of the cloth,” or “man of God,” he used the same word, “minister,” that was used when I was sitting in revival when Great I Am, spoke to me.  I was speechless for a minute.  I DID NOT tell him what the Lord spoke to me months before.  I did, however, make a serious note of that, because it seemed to be some type of assurance from the Lord - an answer to my prayer.  

Time went on, and on Christmas Day 2014, a year later, the boys and I were at my parents’ home in Sumter when Troy pulled up and came into the house with a Jared bag.  My sisters were all in a tizzy over that bag.  It was a silver, heart-shaped locket with a diamond cut cross on the front - beautiful!  We all ate Christmas dinner and Troy slipped outside to his car.  He came inside with another Jared bag!  He took my hand and led me to the living room.  Everyone followed.  He proposed marriage and slipped a diamond ring on my finger.  
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I said yes, but it was going to be YEARS before I married that man!  It was fine with me to be his fiancé til death do us part!  I wore the ring, but I did not post about it on Facebook.  That bothered him a bit, but I just was not ready.  He had been single for the past nine years, so he was ready, I wasn’t.  I wanted us to attend marriage counseling before we announced anything, so we did.  On Valentine’s Day 2015, I posted.   I still didn’t want to get married, necessarily, but I also didn’t want to be celibate for the rest of my life.  I wanted my children to experience their mother in a happy marriage, too, so after MUCH prayer, I figured we had to do it!  We decided to plan a small wedding for Labor Day weekend.  His mother was ill, so that was a stressor for him.  I was stressed out with trying to learn a new job, Bible Study Fellowship was starting to seem long, the boys were playing football and swimming, and there just was no downtime!  Troy would stop by our house after work, wash our dishes, kiss my forehead and leave.  We would come home from school and work and he would be loading up his lawn mower after cutting our yard, then he would just leave.  Absence makes the heart grow fonder.  At Spring Break, we decided to move our wedding up to June.  

On Saturday, June 13, 2015 we were married!  Our family has grown!  Together we have 7 children, 2 of whom are married, and they range from 17 to 38 years of age!  We have four grandchildren ages 3 months, 16 months,  8-years and 13-years old.  All is very, very well!   It hasn’t been the best marriage everyday, for sure, but we are friends and lovers!  We respect one another’s differences and celebrate them.  We are faithful to one another and enjoy each other’s company.   
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There is most certainly life after divorce.  The Lord does not turn His back on the faithful.  There is room for great friendships after divorce.  We must be sure we do not harden our hearts to the possibilities.  "Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”  Deuteronomy 13:6

​Amen!