Separated, Not By Choice

[stadre]

Maybe I shouldn’t enter this thread as I am not familiar with your situations, but the idea of prayer for the ex spouse really hit a chord in me. I have a bad relationship with my sister and sometimes I cannot bring myself to pray for her. At those times, I pray for the grace to pray for her.

Heavenly Father, we ask you to pour out Your blessings on all who have been hurt by their spouses.

 

[Liberanosamalo]

SacredCello, when xh left the first time, my lawyer asked me if I knew what a “mixed blessing” was. Yep. He was right.

Much of that grief was over the loss of dreams, the loss of the image of what I wanted him to be. I was not in love with a real person. I was in love with the person I used to think he was. There is nothing more you can do when someone else doesn’t want a marriage. It takes two to make a marriage, but only one to really foul it up.

Once I mourned the “death” of my spouse, and that’s what it was, but no one made me casseroles and I didn’t get an insurance payout to help me move on, and I can’t keep his picture around and talk fondly of him like a real widow, I was able to see that God was merciful in helping me accept his departure. Because I’d be in a loony bin by now if he had stayed.

Or worse.

Stadre, I know it’s hard to pray for people who have hurt you badly. Sometimes an honest prayer is good too. My mother had trouble praying for xh. The priest told her if all she could come up with was "God bless the bastard, " that was sufficient.

Here is what I pray for: I pray that God will open xh’s eyes to the Truth. And that he will act on that Truth.

And I pray for his conversion.

That’s the best I can come up with. Most of the time I’m praying the Prayer to St. Michael in my head when he’s around.

 

[sacredcello]

Here is what I pray for: I pray that God will open xh’s eyes to the Truth. And that he will act on that Truth.

And I pray for his conversion.

That’s the best I can come up with. Most of the time I’m praying the Prayer to St. Michael in my head when he’s around.

Yes, I will continue to do the same for my xh.

I just received a letter from him this week, out of the clear blue, I hadn’t heard from him in more than 5 years. What a surprise! He left the church after we divorced and mumbled something about his Jewish heritage and wanting to investigate that. In his letter of this week, he tells me that he wants to give me a list of his sins against me in order to prepare for Yom Kippur. How bizarre! I’m not even sure if he means it, or if he is so desperate for attention, that this is his way of getting it. Well, if this confession will bring him closer to God, then I guess it’s ok! But, I’m not giving him my phone number!

 

[Liberanosamalo]

Yeah. Don’t give him your phone number. But remember, the Jews are still God’s chosen people. And if God’s grace can somehow filter in so that he even thinks he might have a list of things he recognizes he did to you to hurt you, that may be the closest thing to an apology you’ll ever get.

And that is more than a lot of us get. It can help you heal.

Keep praying for him. If he finally tells you the truth, the truth will set you free too.

Who knows, he might wander in the desert for several more years like a good Jew, and eventually find his way back to the Church.

Even if he does, still don’t give him your phone number.

 

[dulcissima]

Even if he does, still don’t give him your phone number.

I’ve got to agree with this.

 

[sacredcello]

Yeah. Don’t give him your phone number. But remember, the Jews are still God’s chosen people. And if God’s grace can somehow filter in so that he even thinks he might have a list of things he recognizes he did to you to hurt you, that may be the closest thing to an apology you’ll ever get.

And that is more than a lot of us get. It can help you heal.

Keep praying for him. If he finally tells you the truth, the truth will set you free too.

Who knows, he might wander in the desert for several more years like a good Jew, and eventually find his way back to the Church.

Even if he does, still don’t give him your phone number.

Thanks, I won’t!

Well, I listened to the beginnings of my xh’s confession, in all the torturous detail, and I do believe that he is genuinely sorry for his maniacal behavior. I stopped him before he got too carried away, after the third email. I wasn’t sure of his intentions, as he was peppering his confession with happy memories of us (which weren’t so happy, as I remember). I simply told him that his apology is accepted.

The good news is that his resentment that the Church granted our annulment has softened, and this has me feeling more free. Admittedly, my situation is much easier than yours, as we do not have children.

Who knows, this might be the last time we communicate. And, that would be just fine with me. What a surprise, coming from someone who would have gone to the ends of the earth to save the marriage!

 

[DebChris]

Maybe I am the one with something unresolved?

One of the most important things to remember in any relationship is that you cannot change another person. The only person you can change is yourself. I am responsible for my own decisions, not the reactions or decisions of another.
I have a poem of sorts on my refrigerator. The gist of the poem is that we are made in the image and likeness of God. As such, our playing small does nobody any good. We attract others by the light that shines through us.
Many have written about the signs of abuse. One of the things an abuser does is make the abused feel is worthless. Recognizing first of all that I am a child of God increases the possibility of others seeing me in the same light. We attract what we project. Project confidence and love in order to draw that confidence to yourself. It makes it easier to forgive the hurts of the past and to let go of bitterness and resentment. When I fail to forgive, to release the past, I allow the past to control who I am now.
When I see the good in me, I am better able to see the good in another, even somebody who may have hurt me in the past.