The ABC's for Single Moms...

Accept where you are in life

Be ready for the hard questions

Challenge yourself..you are stronger then you think

Depend on GOD, he will lead your family

Encourage your children {and yourself} to try new things

Find supportive friends who listen and love you well

Grieve fully what has been lost. Don't move onto another relationship until you do.

Have an idea of where you want to be in a year...five years. It may be hard but it's necessairy.

Identify the good and bad patterns in your marriage...why did it fall apart?

Keep the traditions that are meaningful for your kids...even if they hurt your heart.

Love yourself well.

Monitor your self talk. We are our own biggest critic.

Never stop believing that you can do this alone.

Object to being called broken.

Plan the routine that works best for your family.

Question the feelings that tell you that your responsible for everything.

Release feelings of frear, anger and unforgiveness.

Seek out and connect with other single moms.

Treat yourself with love and kindness, teach your children to do the same.

Uncover and change unhealthy patterns.

Volunteer your time.

Weigh your options, you have a lot of them.

eXpect to feel sad and lonely sometimes. Have a plan for what to do when that happens.

You are beautiful. You are loved. You are enough.

Zealously guard your time with GOD. You need it.

I spent years building a throne for a man who did not deserve to be given the honor and privlidge of my love and loyalty. Even after he betrayed me, and broke my heart I kept praying for GOD to allow him to see what he left behind when he kicked us out of the house. For him to see what he was missing. For him to understand the immense disappointment I felt when I looked next to me in moments of happiness with my Addy girl and he wasn't there. I just wanted for him to see what he was missing and come home. To love US again. For the last ten months I have said the same prayer...

"Lord, bring him back to us. We are a family. We began our life together in your home, to honor you and your will in our lives. We deserve to be together, Adaline deserves both of her parents. Father, surely you can not have planned for me to do this on my own. I trust that you know best and that you will bring him back to me in your own time."

I asked myself the same questions...What did I do wrong? Why all of them, what do those girls have that I do not? What more could I have given? What could I have done different to keep my family together? What did I do to make him not want us? How could it be so easy for him to walk away? How could he not want us? Why doesn't he see his importance in our life? Why isn't he here?!?

I have continued living, holding onto the idea that surely he would come around. That we would wake up one day, hear a knock on the door and he would come back on his hands and knees. That he would apologize, see what a great woman I was, see how perfect our child is. That he would want to be here with us again. Recently I have realized that he didn't see those things in the five years we were a family, and he certainly is not going to see those things now after months away from us. Mostly because he has found a surrogate family, a girl to take my place in his life. A place that is a dark and empty place to be, a place I realize now that I do not want to be.

I have been living to find myself.

To be strong.

To be faithful.

To be loyal.

To be a good mother.

So that maybe he would see that and want to come home.

In changing myself to spite him...I found myself! I found the girl he fell in love with, and she doens't love him. With everything inside of me I wonder if she ever did. The woman she has grown into certainly does not. The most important lesson we can ever learn as humans is to believe with everything in us we need to love and accept ourselves...

You are enough.

You have enough.

You are loved.

You are beautiful.

Most importantly You are STRONG.

 

Yesterday I lived for the first time in a long time. I truly enjoyed myself and my sweet Adaline for the first time, honestly in as long as I can remember. I looked at her on that carousel and instead of seeing what was missing from that perfect picture I saw HER. I saw the joy in her heart, and I finally realized nothing is missing from her life that she needs. I had been living everyday fearing that she would see a father missing from her life, and wonder what she did wrong. Instead of focusing on trying to fill that place that he left empty...yesterday I embraced the place that I fill.

I am her world and she is mine.

There is nothing in this universe that I wouldn't do for my sweet Adaline.

No pain I would not feel to spare her own.

My heart has broken a hundred times over. Loss is something I have felt deep down in the darkest corners of my soul. From that pain I have drawn strength. I have found myself. I have found my sweet baby girl. I have found the power I posess inside myself to purservere through the hard stuff GOD throws my way. Crossfit has shown me my strength, GOD has shown me my power and my worth, Adaline has shown me my love.

The thing that I have learned about myself through my abusive marraige, and now through this divorce is that above all I am a survivor. My heart is still open and full of grace even after the difficult lessons I have learned. This pain has made me into a woman who is more capable now, after the fight, to raise a strong and independent little girl who sees the beauty of the world. She will never know the hurt that I have known, that is a mountain I will live and die on.

Yesterday I fell in love with my sweet girl again.

Instead of looking for what was missing from us, I looked at what we had.

We have so much love, More happiness then we ever had with her father.

I have a stronger faith in trust in GODs path for us.

I am thankful, and we are BLESSED.

Infinitely Blessed.

"Father I want to take a moment to thank you for the family you gave to me. They have been my strength and have helped me raise Adaline when I allowed my pain to cause me to fall short. I have not been the mother I know you inteded for me to be because I thought inorder to be her I needed to have the father you intended for my Adaline to have, standing next to me. I know now that is not the truth. I am thankful for the beautiful day I was blessed to share with Addy, Anna, Ryan, Aunt Dee and Poppa yesterday. I am thankful that through your unconditional love and protection I have found a way to love, dispite my struggle. You always know what is best Lord, I trust in what you give and take away. I trust in your timing. My heart and my life belongs to you Lord, take it and use it to let your will be done."