Forgiveness without the Apology

I started my wide journey to forgiveness a long time ago. I say journey because forgiveness, to me, isn't a one time stamp on a relationship that lasts forever. It's ongoing. You have to exercise forgiveness, stretch it out in the morning before your coffee. Shake it awake in your bones. Make it flex to your soul. Forgiveness is an invisible blanket that becomes your super human cape before you face the roughest moments of your life.

When I learned how my forgiveness shape shifts, I learned the power I could have. I stopped making an apology the prerequisite to my forgiveness. Anticipating and waiting on apologies made my forgiveness conditional and out of my control. And if the forgiveness was mine, shouldn't it have been in my control? What I never expected was an apology.

Last week one came. Out of the blue, in an honest moment of openness and tight window of vulnerability...I received an apology. One from a door I had closed. I wasn't shaken to my core, I didn't cry out of relief. I simply accepted it. It seemed flawless, almost in the way that you allow a stranger to hold the door open for you when your hands are full.

I didn't allow it to let me open the door again, but finally, I could lock it. I didn't have to tend to the monsters behind the door anymore. The pain wouldn't sneak up on me, because now, it could be locked away. I didn't realize that would be an option for me. I was so accustomed to tending to my pain, applying bandages to the wounds and letting them air out with a good cry. Suddenly, the wounds were gone and I felt...light. Like I had an extra pair of wings. Funny how God works.

You never really know how you'll move in life, if it'll be skips over stones or if you'll finally be able to fly. It wasn't the apology that gave me wings, but the active forgiveness that I had been practicing. By the time the apology came, I was already trained to fly.

The apology made the air under my wings more powerful, but without it, I would still be free.
I would still fly.
I will always fly.

Where it All Went: My Open Letter to my Dad

Disclaimer:
This is a personal, yet open letter. If you are afraid to read or don't desire to read, please do not scroll. I also ask that if you feel I should be quiet about abuse, please refrain from in-boxing or texting me to do so, because I will not comply.


Dear Dad,

I'm not really sure where to start. I haven't spoken to you in over three years. I see posts and sometimes see special things you've sent to my little sisters and I land on them for a while and allow my eyes to wander through tears and confusion until I am able to move on with my day. I've been wanting to send you a letter, but the last time I tried to reach out, you never responded. I wonder if you ask about me. Do you know I got a divorce? Do you know I'm married now? Do you know my husband's name? Do you wonder about the little girl you lost?

It's a strange thing really, to have a dad, but NOT have a dad. To feel disowned and confused as an adult. You defined so much in me and molded so much in my life. I don't even think you realize it. Sometimes I don't even want to realize it because I don't want to give you that power. I know you don't like to admit what you did and at this point I would never ask you to. I don't need validation from you, I don't really need anything from you. Not anymore. Maybe I did then. Maybe when I was lost and scared and you were the monster, maybe that's when I needed my dad. Where did he go? Was he ever there? I tend to over think our relationship...or not relationship. I give you credit for who I am today. And honestly, I probably shouldn't, but if you hadn't broken me so intensely I would have never known how strong I was. I wouldn't know that I could recover from anything. I would be weak. In a way, you forced me to be stronger. Stronger than you even.

Sometimes I get scared for my daughter. That maybe one day she'll ask about you. What will I tell her? Will she ever know you? What will I tell my son? Will he resent you? I have so many questions for you that I know will never be answered. A lot of them I've let go for the sake of my own sanity. Do you go a little insane from not knowing about me, the way I go a little insane wondering where it all went?

You'll never not be in my heart and that's a concept I've had to learn to function with. You are my father, but at the same time you're the root of all my brokenness. You planted this small seed of mental manipulation, abuse, and dependence that took me almost thirty years to break.  I have moments sometimes where I blame myself for not being stronger when I was 15, for protecting you when I wasn't sure if you deserved it, but knew you needed it. Do you even know that I saved you when I was 15? Do you know that that's why I blame myself for where you are now? Maybe if I didn't save you, you could have gotten the "proper" help and it wouldn't have happened again. What happened to YOU, dad? When in your life did you lose your innocence? When did you know there was a monster inside you?

Here I am asking questions I didn't think I would. Don't worry, you won't ever see them, and you'll never have to face what you did. At least not to me. I hope you're saved now. I hope your demons have finally vacated your heart and I hope your mind is clear. I hope you know I forgive you. I forgive you for damaging my soul, for being so weak that you were used to destroy me, for not mending what you've broken, for lying to me and teaching me to lie to myself, for tainting my skin before it scaled away and revealed I was a woman and not a little girl, for ignoring me, for pretending that none of it happened, for being a better father for others than you were for me, for being there, for...not being there. I will always forgive you. Every day. I will remind myself that you are forgiven, that you have nothing to do with my successes but everything to do with my ability to be stronger than any man who has ever abused me. I will forever honor you on Father's day because you are who God saw fit to protect me and even though you failed, you provided me the tools to make my own armor and protect myself.

I walked alone on my wedding day and it was the tallest I've ever stood in my life. I walked without a father, without a man, without someone holding me up. I walked to meet a man who would hold me up for the rest of my life. I walked to meet my children who have birthed in me a love that is only possible when you call their heart your home. I earned my wings and you didn't even know.  I was able to drop the armor for a day and be loved and you didn't even know.

I take you with me every where I go and in those bad moments I remind myself that I have forgiven you...even though you don't even know. 

My Miscarriage After My 32nd Birthday: "Are you okay?"

As a mother and co-parent, I have found it extremely difficult to "share" my children. It's not because I don't trust their father or his family, but because I've only had to share them for two years. The feeling is still new to me. I'm still adjusting to holidays and nights without them. Sometimes, I'll still wake up and feel them in the house and won't realize they're not home until I get to their rooms and see empty beds. Before our divorce, our agreement was 70/30 which meant I had them 70% of the time. Before that, their father and I were together and I was 100% in their lives. I went from being their number one provider to only having "access" to 50% of their lives (with our new custody agreement).

I've never really gone more than a few days without seeing them and even then, I'm a wreck waiting for them to get home. I still question when it will get easier, but right now, it's breaking me. The kids will be leaving in the morning to travel with their father and support him in a family emergency. I couldn't...I would never...say no to my children supporting and being with their father during a life changing moment, however, it doesn't make my time away from them any less painful.

Because on top of anticipating to be without them for almost a week, it's during a time when I needed my children and their love the most...because this week, I lost a baby.

When I was 17, I miscarried in my high school bathroom. And almost exactly 15 years later, I miscarried in the bathroom of the high school where I teach. When I was 17, I kept it quiet and dealt with it alone. I attempted to go work that evening. I cried in the back seat of my best friend's mom's car.

At 32, I tried to go back to work, but couldn't stay. I'm even going through the motions now. I lack focus because all I can think about is how I failed my husband. How my body betrayed me. I cried in the staff lounge in the office. I'm swallowing tears now as I attempt to seclude myself with headphones in the back of a class where students prepare speeches for a class I don't teach.

While the world goes on, I'm frozen in the loss of my baby.

I'm pained by the pending absence of my two children for so long because the truth is, right now, their dad might need them more than me. And moms...we are superhuman...we have super strength...we are iron...and right now, that's who I have to be.

I wasn't going to share this with anyone, I was going to let it be something my husband and I carried with us, but I don't want it to destroy me or the love we have. It's also important that his strength is shared. He's without a doubt, the best man I've ever met. When I was 17, the father of my baby refused to acknowledge more of what was happened. This week, those fears came back to me. I was afraid he would blame me for losing his baby. I was afraid he wouldn't trust me to continue trying to conceive. I was afraid I wouldn't be able to carry his child. What if this man who sacrificed his idea of a family, to embrace the family I had already made, wouldn't be able to have his own child because of me?

I'd be lying if I said I still didn't have those fears. My husband has been so supportive. Allowing me to feel my emotions while daily, "As long as I have you and the kids, I will always be happy with my life," he's constantly reassuring me that "it's okay." Such a simple phrase, but it consoles me to see the honesty in his eyes. That yes, it is okay.

For a handful of days he and I lived on this silent high where we planned the next 9 months out, talked about rearranging our room to be a nursery, pushed back plans to move, looked up OBGYNs, and talked about how to share the news. We never got to tell anyone. We never got to share it with the kids. I went from days of a natural euphoria to one day starting to bleed, a negative test (after 6 positives), and a silent personal hell.

I'm functioning. I'm going through the motions, but I end up at work and wonder how I got there because the whole ride all I can think about it how I've failed. How I need my kids to tackle me in love piles and Maliya to refuse to let my arm go, but now I won't have that for almost a week. In the moments when all I need is to be reminded that I am a good mom, my "motherhood" role will be across the country.

I'm "ok," if okay is an emotion. If okay is a state of being, that's what I am right now.

I know there is greater, I know there is light after this, I know the sayings, but right now, the best I can be is...okay.