December 22, 2003

• When the Mighty Fall ~

  
  

  Last week, Kyle left me a comment on the blog where I revealed that Tim and I are divorcing that began, "When the mighty are fallen, how can any stand?"  He went on to say that its devastating for someone in his position, contemplating marriage, to hear that a couple has thought it through as calmly as possible (let's be honest, the evaluation of a marriage is never completely calm or objective) and reached the conclusion that the only way through the mess is to separate.  He asked me whether there is any hope for avoiding divorce without avoiding marriage.  I'd like to answer that question, for myself as well as for him.  It goes to the heart of what I believe ~ and what I hope is true about both marriage and might. 

  
  

  Before I try to answer his question,  I feel compelled to offer a couple of disclaimers up front.  It seems paradoxical to ask me for advice and  impossible for me to formulate an answer because if I'm in the process of seeing my own marriage break apart, how could my answer be trusted?  Surely if I knew anything about how to make a marriage strong, I wouldn't be in the position I'm in today.  My second disclaimer is that that I'm not objective.  I want to believe that I'm a good person, I want to believe that I did everything I possibly could to solve our particular problems, and I want to see myself as the hero of my story.  The truth is that it takes two people to make a marriage and it takes two people to break one.  I bear responsibility for the place I'm in today.

  
  

  We expect a lot from our mates, and if we find the struggle difficult, we are bombarded with the ads for no-fault divorce that make it seem as though it's no more traumatic than making an appointment with the dentist.  I hope you understand that this is a lie.  On the charts of life stressors, divorce is at the very top.  A divorce represents the death of your hopes and dreams of a future with your chosen partner.  All kinds of feelings of failure, rejection, guilt, anger, and sorrow are mixed up in a cocktain that no one would ever choose to drink if he or she felt there were any way around it.  In addition the things that go along with divorce are pretty high up on that chart in their own right.  Depending on your pre-divorce situation, you could (like me) find yourself facing a move, coping with the need to know right now how to do things that you've depended on someone else to do for you, and having to find a job.  Divorce tends to be a financial catastrophe which takes years of recovery.  No one wins in a divorce.

  
  

  On top of the difficulty that the divorcing couple experiences personally, all the studies coming in on the effects of divorce on children are in agreement.  Children may be the ones who pay the biggest price of all.  Their lives are disrupted, their sense of security is destroyed, and they become far more likely to get involved in all kinds of things that parents want to see their children avoid like drugs and prison.  Children of divorced parents are more likely to either avoid marriage for themselves, or wind up divorced.  The negative outcomes for children are so severe that they make the cliche that we should "stay together for the sake of the children" seem both reasonable and wise.

  
  

  Last week I talked about the level of pain necessary to bring us to the point of believing that our best hope is to separate.  Maybe it would help if I describe what it is we are hoping to achieve with this move.  Certainly we don't want to scar our children, ruin our financial futures, or create loneliness and pain.  We are already in the place where each of these things is happening.  We are hoping that through separation we can avoid or minimize some of the worst of these possibilities. 

  
  

  Since we agreed to separate, we've actually been able to talk more, to share more of our hopes and to cry more of our tears.  We are trying now to build a friendship and that's a lot harder than you might think.  We've been lovers, we've made each other parents, and we've worked together at the business of family, but we've never been friends.  Does that sound harsh?  I'm afraid as I type this that my husband will read it and feel hurt that I've said it here.  We are talking about it now, but for a long time, we couldn't.  And that may be the key to what it takes to know that you are heading for the rocks, if you can't talk to each other, hope dimishes day by day.

  
  

  Kyle, the institution of marriage is a formidable fortress.  Safely inside these walls there should be communication about everything.  Talk to each other.  Talk about the important things and the unimportant things.  Touch each other and support each other.  Listen to each other.  Teach each other how to communicate so that you can hear each other.  Follow through with your promises both spoken and implied that you will do the things that you need to do in order to meet each other's needs.  Figure out what she needs and then DO it.  And the same goes in reverse, tell her what you need from her.  Don't assume that she knows, that she can figure it out on her own. 

  
  

  We do not have the idea that we will divorce so that we don't have to deal with each other.  We will in many ways be forced to deal with each other more because we have more details to be discussed, more conflicts to negotiate, and more obstacles to overcome in the day to day process of trying to raise our kids.  We are changing our legal status.  We will no longer be tied together for financial burden or benefit.  We will no longer be living in the same place.  But there is no avoidance of the fact that we are in a relationship that will in many ways never end.  No court decision can change that. 

  
  

  I've thought about the people I know who have no children when they divorce.  I've wondered if it's easier for them, if perhaps they can move on and truly end the relationship.  Marriage changes a person.  Becoming one flesh with another human being, even if the bond is imperfect changes you.  You can separate, but you can never undo the influence that person had on you.  So I'm willing to bet that even when there are no children, the divorce is just as devastating as it is for those of us who are parents.

  
  

  I'm not really answering the question am I?  Marriage can be either the best or the worst, heaven or hell, and it depends on the choices you both make, what you do or don't do.  This brings me around to the question of might.  What makes a person strong and how do you know whether you are strong enough for the task?  The short answer is that you won't know until you after the battle whether you have strength to survive it.  But I think that many times we are decieved about just what strength means.  I can tell you that the ability to fight, to stand up to each other, and to win you argument is not strength in a marriage.  These aspects are weaknesses that will tear down and destroy.  In a marriage, strength is seen in your ability to love when the other person deserves it least (that's when they need it most.)  Might comes when you are able to forgive the incident that you cried about only hours ago.  Real strength is revealed when you choose to honor your commitment sometimes minute by minute because you aren't able to see to the next hour or day. 

  
  

  This is the kind of strength that Twila Paris sang about 25 years ago in a song that some of you know. 

  
  

  Lately I've been winning battles left and right
  But even soldiers can get wounded in the fight
  People say that I'm amazing
  Never face defeat
  But they don't see the enemy
  That lays me at his feet
  They don't know, that I go running home when I fall down
  They don't know, who picks me up when no one is around
  
  I drop my sword and cry for just a while
  Cause deep inside this armor
  The warrior is a child.

  
  

   

  • 6:57 am
  • 34 Comments